THE SETTLEMENT
Now, Len Shi had communicated one vital fact to his compatriots which
they had carefully concealed from the detectives. The opening campaign
against Forbes had practically ended that day. Thenceforth, for a week,
the Young Manchus meant to separate, revert to Chinese costume, live in
Chinese boardinghouses in the East End, and thus utterly mislead and
bamboozle the police, who, in their hunt for the miscreants, would be
searching for Chinamen in European dress and living in European style.
Winter was in two minds whether or not to inform the inmates of No. 11
as to the contemplated raid on the Charlotte Street rendezvous.
Ultimately, he decided to say nothing definite that evening. It was
better that the threatened people and their guards should not relax
their vigilance. "The best-laid schemes o' mice and men gang aft
a-gley," and if, perchance, the jute merchant's plan, whatever it might
be, miscarried, and some of the desperadoes escaped, they would be
stirred to instant reprisals.
But there was no semblance of doubt or hesitation about the measures
taken by the police. That night, from eleven o'clock onward, not even a
prowling cat entered Charlotte Street without being seen by sharp eyes.
Nearly opposite No. 412 was a large warehouse, with a back entrance a
long way in the rear, and approached from another street.
At midnight three Chinamen appeared, turned into Charlotte Street from
the south and shuffled on noiseless feet straight to No. 414. They
knocked, and after some delay were admitted. A minute later three others
came from the north, knocked on the door of No. 410 and disappeared, the
delay, seemingly caused by a parley with some one within, being longer
in this instance.
Afterward squads of Chinamen, exactly 25, all told, came from north and
south in practically equal numbers and entered those two houses, but
never a man entered, or passed, or came out of No. 412. These more
numerous arrivals met with no hesitation on the part of the two
doorkeepers. They entered without let or hindrance.
After that there was what is known in theatrical circles as a "stage
wait." Charlotte Street, save for its loafers and an occasional belated
resident of some dwelling other than those under observation, lapsed
into its normal and utterly dismal gloom.
From 12:30 onwards, Winter, stationed on the south side, looked at his
watch many times. A little man, mingling with the disreputable rascals
on the north side, was similarly fidgety.
A tall, slim man, wearing a dark overcoat, who lurked in a doorway near
Winter's post, blew the tip of the cigar he was smoking into a red glow
so that he might look at his watch. Another tall man, rather more
powerfully built, awaited developments with apparent unconcern. Mr.
Handyside, in fact, was in the august company of the Commissioner of
Police, and the latter, though eminently agreeable, nevertheless
observed an Olympian attitude. Thus might Jove watch a gathering in the
Pompic Way!
At 12:45 there was a stir. Out of 410 and 414 came 25 Chinamen. They
gathered on the pavement, and did not attempt to walk away, though a
sudden and concentrated advance was made by the two sets of loafers,
while the doors of the warehouse opposite belched forth a startling
array of constables in uniform.
Winter and Furneaux respectively headed the contingents from north and
south. An inspector was in charge of the central body, and even a
Chinaman who had not been a day in London must have realized that the
intent of these swift-moving detachments was to cut off his escape if he
meant flight. But not a Chinaman budged, save one, who seemed to
recognize the chief inspector, because he stepped forward and said in
suave tones:
"These men are my friends. The others are inside. They are quite safe.
Kindly wait till one o'clock."
"I must understand what you mean, Mr. Li Chang," said Winter sternly;
for some reason, he distrusted the smooth-spoken jute merchant. "Why
have you visited these two houses, and not 412? And what do we gain by
waiting here any longer? We must have been seen, and our purpose
guessed."
"No," came the somewhat surprising answer. "No one in No. 412 is aware
of your presence. We have taken care of that. As for the other houses,
they provide the simplest means of access to the center one. Doorways
have been made in the cellar walls and special staircases built.
Consequently, if you broke open the door of 412 you would find the way
barred by two other locked doors, while the occupants, if aroused, could
escape from either or both of the next houses. We Chinese have a long
acquaintance with the needs of a secret society. You may take it from me
that the obvious way into or out of an opium den, for instance, is never
the way used by the habitues."
By this time the commissioner, Handyside, Furneaux and the inspector had
come up, and the five formed a little group in the center of a
semicircle of detectives and police. There was absolutely no sign of
life in any of the houses; save for the raiders and the stolid
Orientals, the street itself was deserted. Many eyes, no doubt, were
peering through darkened windows, but the denizens of Charlotte Street
as a rule attend strictly to their own personal affairs when the police
are in evidence.
* * * * *
"What do you advise, sir," said Winter, addressing the commissioner.
"Mr. Li Chang wants us to make no move until one o'clock. It is only a
matter of six or seven minutes."
"And what then? Are we to enter these other houses, and not No. 412?"
"Yes," said the Chinaman.
"Have you left the doors open?"
"No. They must be forced. But there are only small locks. The bolts are
drawn."
"The places are apparently in complete darkness. My men must use their
lamps, and may be attacked."
"No," said Li Chang simply. "There will be no fighting. Those Manchu
dogs are helpless. We have seen to that."
"But how? Do you mean that they are stupefied?"
"Bound," said the Chinaman. "Tied hand and foot."
"Again then, may I ask, why wait?"
"It will be in order," was the calm reply. "I entered into an
arrangement with you. I want to abide by it."
Winter breathed heavily. The ways of the Oriental were not his ways, but
a bargain was a bargain, so what more could be said?
Suddenly, about two minutes to one o'clock, a curious crackling noise
was heard, a column of sparks burst high above the steep roof of No.
412, and the upper windows of the opposite houses reflected a red glare.
"Good heavens! the place is on fire!" cried Winter.
Simultaneously came a shout from both ends of the street. Men were
running from the detachment guarding the rear of the premises to say
that a fierce fire was raging on the first floor back of No. 412.
"Smash in those three doors!" cried Winter to his helpers. "Drag out
every Chinaman you meet! Handcuff them in threes and fours! Arrest these
fellows standing outside, but keep the two lots separate!"
"Why are we, your friends, to be arrested?" demanded Li Chang's
dignified voice.
"I'll soon tell you why, you slim demon!" shouted the chief inspector,
roused to anger by the consciousness that he had been duped. "What
fiendish trick have you played on those wretches penned up inside there?
But I'll soon know."
He turned to the local officer.
"Better march this crowd of Chinamen straight to your station," he said.
"I'll follow soon, and lay a charge."
He felt a claw-like hand on his arm, and wild with vexation though he
was, forced himself to listen.
"We are ready to go where you wish," said Li Chang calmly. "But spare
your own men. They must not enter No. 412. They will be blown to pieces.
Stop them! I shall not warn you twice!"
Somehow, Winter was impelled to obey. The center door was already
yielding, but he rushed forward and told the party which meant to enter
at that point to abandon it, and reinforce their comrades. A number of
detectives and police were already inside the dark hallways of Nos. 410
and 414 when the very walls trembled under the shock of a violent
explosion in No. 412, which was quickly followed by three others.
A tongue of flame darted instantly to a height of many feet above the
topmost storey, showing that the series of explosions had not only
destroyed the whole rear section of the house, and thus given the fire
fresh fuel and plenty of space but there could be no reasonable doubt
that the bombs, if bombs they were, had themselves been filled with some
highly inflammable substance. Thenceforth, the police could do nothing
beyond keeping at a distance the crowds which soon gathered, and thus
clear a space for the operations of the fire brigade.
No. 412 was thoroughly gutted. Not a shred of the building remained
except the crumbling walls at front and back. Its neighbors were in
little better case, and the firemen devoted their efforts mainly toward
keeping the disaster within bounds.
One thing was certain. No human being had escaped from out of that
doomed habitation. The fire, too, had gained hold with a phenomenal
rapidity which argued the use of petrol, or some kindred agent of
irresistible potency when ignited.
Winter and Furneaux, accompanied by the commissioner and Mr. Handyside,
walked to the local police station. The American was the only one who
spoke.
"Queer ducks, the Chinese!" he said, seemingly musing aloud rather than
inviting comment. "They like to settle their own differences. I guess
we'd feel pretty much like that if we lived in China."
No one took up the point thus raised. Winter bent a searching, almost
sorrowful glance at Furneaux, but the little man's eyes were fixed on
the ground, as though he were deep in thought.
In the charge room of the police station the twenty-five Chinamen
awaited them. Twenty-five pairs of oblique eyes gleamed at the four when
they entered, but not a word was spoken.
Winter, of course, singled out Li Chang for a parley.
"Now," he said, "tell me just what happened after you and these others
went into the two houses in Charlotte Street."
The Chinaman faced him imperturbably. His manner was as unemotional and
his words as slow and methodical as if he were selling jute in his East
End warehouse.
"We asked to be admitted, and after giving the password and showing the
sign there was no difficulty," he said. "We were in parties of three. As
you probably saw, I headed one, which entered No. 410. My friend, Won
Lung Foo, led the other. The ivory skulls made matters simple. We
explained to the door-keepers that we had just arrived from China, and
brought messages of great urgency. Once inside, we gagged and bound the
door-keepers. Then we entered No. 412, where we knew that Wong Li Fu
would be smoking opium with the remaining fourteen."
"Were there seventeen in the gang, all told?" broke in Furneaux.
"Seventeen Manchus. The rest are--paid men--of no account."
"Queer," muttered Furneaux, almost to himself. "The story begins and
ends with the number 17!"
Again did Winter strive to pierce his colleague with a look from those
bulging eyes, but the little man was far too occupied with a singular
numerical coincidence to pay any heed to him.
"Well, go on!" he said impatiently, glaring at the Chinaman.
"We went to the big room at the back," continued Li Chang quietly,
uttering each word separately, and evidently weighing it in his mind to
test its accuracy before use, "and found Wong Li Fu. Him we bound
quickly, and very securely. The others we tied in twos and threes. Of
course, we brought the two doorkeepers to the same room, so that you
should experience no difficulty, but take them all together."
Here Mr. Won Lung Foo broke in. Evidently he could follow English better
than speak it.
"Yes," he said. "We wantee you catchee Chineemans all togeller--muchee
wantee!"
Then he smiled blandly, and his tongue rolled over his lips as though
some fruit or sweetmeat had left a pleasant taste there.
"Then, if your surprise was so successful, what caused the fire?" said
Winter, affecting a magnificent disregard of the plain facts.
Li Chang, for once, permitted his immobile features to show some
semblance of anxious uncertainty.
"That," he said, "is a mystery which can, perhaps, never be solved. But
it saves your Government much trouble."
In those few words he expressed quite clearly the line he adhered to
throughout a long cross-examination. Neither Winter nor the commissioner
could shake him. The fire was an accident--the outcome of an
extraordinary chance. He knew nothing whatsoever of its origin.
After a protracted debate in private between the two heads of the
Criminal Investigation Department, the names and addresses of the
prisoners were recorded and they were set at liberty.
Before Li Chang went away Furneaux demanded the return of the three
ivory skulls, which were promptly handed over.
"One word in your ear," murmured the detective, _sotto voce_. "Did Wong
Li Fu recognize you?"
"Oh, yes," said the Chinaman.
"And you spoke to him?"
"Oh, yes."
The eyes of the two clashed. For once, Furneaux peered deep into the
mind of an Oriental, and what he saw there kept him quiet, but he knew,
just as surely as if he had been present, exactly what Li Chang said to
Wong Li Fu. He delivered a message from two graves in far-off China.
* * * * *
And that is all--or nearly all.
The "Charlotte Street Fire" caused only a slight sensation. It became
known that No. 412 was a resort of Chinese opium fiends, and the loss of
the den and its frequenters was not treated as a National calamity. The
shooting at No. 11 Fortescue Square was regarded much more seriously,
and the newspapers were full of it all next day.
Thenceforth, however, interest flagged. Mr. Forbes and his family and
servants left London for Scotland, and the Amateur Golf Championship
came along, so the escapades of a few Chinese fanatics in London were
quickly forgotten.
They were forgotten, that is, by most people; but one man, Frank
Theydon, went back to his flat in Innesmore Mansions to plunge into work
and strive vainly to obliterate those pages of his memory charged with
bitter-sweet day-dreams.
Strive as he would, and did, to bury the past under the duties and cares
of the present, the radiant vision of Evelyn Forbes remained
ineffaceable and entrancing.
But he was built of tough fiber, and resolutely refused an invitation to
visit the Sutherlandshire glen in which Forbes and his daughter were
sedulously nursing to health and strength the dear wife and mother whose
nervous system had suffered far more than she permitted to become known
under the stress and strain of the kidnaping experience.
Even when Evelyn herself wrote, seconding her father's most friendly
note, Theydon pleaded the exigencies of his profession and filled a
letter with an amusing account of Bates's chagrin because he had failed
to "bag a Chinaman on his own account," having actually purchased a
pistol and fixed it in position before he and his wife quitted the flat.
Three months passed. On August 9, a broiling morning, Theydon was
dejectedly reading of preparations for the "Twelfth," when a telegram
reached him. It read:
"Handyside has arrived here in his car. Come for the gathering of the
clan. We take no refusal. Forbes."
Theydon traveled north that night. He reached the glen in time for
dinner next evening and passed a few delightfully miserable days in
Evelyn's company.
At last, feeling that he was losing grip and might act foolishly, he
announced to Forbes, one night when a glorious moon was shining, and he
knew that Evelyn was awaiting him in the garden, that he must leave for
London next day.
"Why?" inquired his host. "Has something unforeseen happened? I thought
you meant remaining here till the end of the month at the earliest."
"I'm sorry," said Theydon, chewing a cigar viciously as a means toward
maintaining his self-control. "I'm sorry, but I must go."
There was a slight pause. Forbes looked at his young friend with those
earnest, deep-seeing eyes of his.
"Is it a personal matter?" he went on.
"Yes."
Again there was a pause. Theydon was well aware that he risked a grave
misunderstanding, but that could not be avoided. It might be even better
so. And then his blood ran cold, because Forbes was saying:
"Are you leaving us because of anything Evelyn has said or done?"
"No, no!" came the frenzied answer. "Heaven help me, why do you ask
that?"
"Heaven helps those who help themselves," said the older man. "That is a
trite saying, but it meets the case. I think I diagnose your trouble, my
boy. You are in love with Evelyn, and dare not tell her so, because I
happen to be a rich man. Really I didn't think you had so poor an
opinion of me as to believe that money or rank would count against my
daughter's happiness."
He said other things--kindly, wise, appreciative--but Frank Theydon
never knew what they were. He managed to stammer out some words of
gratitude and then went to find Evelyn.
She had crossed a sloping lawn and was standing by the side of a little
stream that gargled and bubbled in joyous career to the nearby loch. She
had thrown a white shawl over her head and shoulders, and looked
adorably sylphlike as she turned on hearing his footsteps; the moonlight
shone on her face and was reflected in her eyes.
"Oh, you're here at last!" she cried gaily. "The next time I ask any
cavalier to escort me he will come more quickly, I imagine."
He stood in front of her, and stretched out both hands.
"Evelyn," he said, "here is one cavalier, at any rate, who offers
himself as an escort for life."
The merriment died out of her eyes, and the quip on her tongue failed
her. Greatly daring, her lover took her in his arms. Through the open
windows of the drawing room floated the tender refrain of a ballad. Mrs.
Forbes was singing, and sweet words blended with sweet music in the
still air.
Then their lips met, and the dark glen became an earthly Paradise.
THE END