"CHINESE MEN-OF-WAR."
Stan Lynn lay holding his breath and straining his ears, till he uttered
a hoarse gasp, and all the while the murmur of voices and the plashing
of an oar came nearer and nearer. Then the sounds were so close that he
raised himself a little to look round for some hiding-place in the
depths of the vessel, and then dared not stir. But all at once, just as
he felt that the boat must be alongside, relief came in a hearty laugh
uttered by one of the boatmen, the plash, plash, plash of the oar grew
more distant, and he let nerve and muscle relax till he felt limp and
helpless ready to do nothing but lie panting amongst the rotten wood,
resting and trying to recover his failing powers.
The light overhead increased, and as his eyes wandered here and there he
could see bright cracks and rifts in the deck and high up in the sides,
all evidences that he had found a sanctuary in some dilapidated,
half-rotten junk which had been drawn close inshore ready for breaking
up, its services being evidently at an end.
The morning grew brighter, and fresh sounds of plashing came near,
tempting him to creep through the half-darkness to where the first
gleams of the morning sun streamed through a rift in the side. Upon
reaching it and applying his eyes, he found that he could command a good
view of the river to right, left, and across, with the water becoming
animated, boats large and small passing and repassing, the opposite
shore waking up, and smoke beginning to rise from the house-boats moored
close to the bank, and all the morning business of a great city
appearing around.
If only the old junk were left alone, Stan felt that he might lie in
hiding till night. There might be a possibility of his marking down
some boat, and as soon as it was dark wading or swimming to it, when, if
he could loosen it from its moorings and secure the mast, sails, or
oars, escape would be simplicity itself. But, as the lad argued, there
were so many _ifs_.
"But I oughtn't to grumble," he muttered. "I have got out of the
prison, and I am here in a capital hiding-place where nobody is likely
to come."
Just about the time when he had come to this conclusion a waft of some
peculiar odour from food being cooked seemed to float down the river and
reach his nostrils, producing a sensation that was repeated again and
again with increasing violence, till the poor fellow uttered a low moan
of misery.
"If this goes on I shan't be able to bear it," he muttered; and then,
setting his teeth hard, he groaned out through them, "I must--I must.
Oh, what a coward I am! I've only got to wait till it's dark, and then
surely I can land and find something somewhere."
But even as he tried to console himself with these words, he felt more
and more hopeless, not seeing for a moment where he was to search, and
all the time suffering more and more keenly.
For in all directions smoke was rising from the hundreds upon hundreds
of house-boats that lined the shores, as well as from the many
one-storied houses clustering together, and a strange mingling of the
most maddening scents came floating around--literally maddening to one
whose sole sustenance for many hours had been a couple of bananas and a
piece of cake.
It was all so horribly civilised, too. The fugitive was in far-away
Asia, but his nostrils were assailed with the steam of fragrant tea,
freshly roasted coffee, newly baked bread, frying fish, and appetising
bacon.
No wonder the starving lad called it maddening as he crouched down in
the darkness and tried to think of other things.
Before long, however, he had something else to take his attention, for a
procession of nearly a dozen huge junks came slowly down the stream,
each with its leering, painted eyes and gay dragon-like gilded
ornamentations.
They were full of men armed with spear, fork, and trident, besides in
parts bristling with matchlock barrels, while fore and aft the watcher
could see that they carried big service-guns.
"Chinese men-of-war, full of soldiers!" Stan mentally exclaimed; but
only to alter his opinion directly, for he had some little experience of
the Government troops, and knew that the men all wore a grotesque kind
of uniform.
They were not merchant-vessels, he thought, for though many of the
trading-junks carried armed men, those before his eyes were out of all
proportion.
"Could they be pirates?" he asked himself; but the sight of the leading
junk casting anchor in midstream--an example followed by the rest--put
an end to his surmises, for they were evidently at peace with the people
in the vessels about them and on shore, many landing and mingling with
the men who came to the sides and crowded in boats about the anchored
vessels to supply them with food.
So much was going on all about him in this latter way that every now and
then Stan felt that, come what might, he must land and seek for
something, even if it was only a loaf of bread, to appease his hunger;
but he knew it meant surrendering his liberty, for there would be a
crowd round him at once; while doubtless by this time it was known that
the foreign devil had escaped:
Stan watched till the morning was well advanced, longing for the night
to come even though the sun was not yet at its height, while now a fresh
agony assailed him; the rugged deck overhead began to get hotter and
hotter, and the air about him suffocating, till at last he felt that at
all hazards he must crawl up and trust to his not being seen while he
crept to some spot where the remains of the lofty stern would act the
double part of shading him from the sun and the curious eyes of those
who passed.
There are limits to human endurance. Stan had not slept for above an
hour during the previous night, and the bodily and mental toil he had
gone through were tremendous. Hence it was that when his sufferings
were at the worst, the faintness produced by his hunger and the heat
more than he could bear, a half-delirious kind of insensibility stole
over him--half-stupor, half-sleep--which tided him over the hottest part
of the day, rendering him oblivious to all that was going on, till he
awoke suddenly, to find, to his amazement, that it was twilight in his
hiding-place, and on looking out through a rift he could see the river
glowing like blood from the reflection of the sunset clouds.
In his excitement at the beauty of the scene which met his eyes lower
down the river, he clapped his hands together, and had hard work to
refrain from shouting aloud, merely standing gazing out through the open
rift in the planking, and feeling giddy now in his joy.
Hunger and heat were forgotten, and he gazed out till his eyes grew dim
and he had to make an effort to avoid yielding to the giddiness and
swimming which attacked his head.
Strange that one in such a terrible position should feel such ecstasy
upon seeing a glorious vision in the sunset beauties of that far-eastern
river? Not at all. Stan Lynn was in no sentimental mood to be moved to
such excitement by a few orange-and-gold clouds reflected in the water,
or the gay aspect of the thronging people haunting the great warlike
junks still moored higher up. Stan's beautiful vision was something far
more simple. It was that of a lad of about his own age seated in a
_sampan_ which he had moored about a hundred yards lower down the
stream. There he was, sitting alone, unnoticing and unnoticed save by
the watcher in the crumbling junk's hull, who saw him pull up a silvery
fish, and then, after putting it into a basket between his feet, proceed
to rebait his hook and cast it in again.
Was it hunger, then, which produced a longing for a few raw fish? Again
nothing of the kind. As Stan's eyes lighted upon that small boat, which
seemed to have a little mast and matting sail laid with the oars and
pole projecting over the stern, the idea had struck him that this was
exactly the kind of boat for which he longed. Could he but gain
possession thereof and get rid of the boy who was fishing, while
retaining his lines and bait, the _hong_, no matter how many days'
journey distant, was within easy reach; and hence when Stan clapped his
hands it was after coming to the determination that he would have that
boat at all costs.
But how?