creak of a board, as of some one's slow weight pressed upon it; and
twice he tiptoed to the window imagining at least that he heard the soft
pad of a native foot on the iron balcony. After the second glance into
the outer darkness, he shot the casement bolt, and the stuffy smell of
the Chinese house thickened. Toward morning he really tried to sleep,
but at the first departure he would meet a cloud of hideous rousing
dreams. He was abroad early and in the street, a certain reality and
grip of things returning with the movement and daylight.
Romney's heart was pumping rather fast for him. At the desk they
declared that Ti Kung had not come in. His own message was uncalled for
in the Doctor's box. The room-key was still gone. At breakfast he
waited for word, watching the door of the dining-room. An hour later,
Dr. Ti Kung not having joined him, he could no longer delay in carrying
out the plans which had occurred in the night. No change at the desk,
and he ventured to send a house-servant to Ti Kung's room. The _boy_
returned saying that repeated knocking at the door had brought no
answer. Romney, now convinced that something of grave importance had
happened, insisted for the _boy_ to try again. For many moments he was
gone, before the _Nestor_ people reluctantly whispered that Dr. Ti Kung
had been found dead in his room.
In the street, Romney's quick step halted, his perturbation strangely
broken by the personal issue. It was like the beginning of life again.
He saw the passage into the desert as nearer than the night before. The
Post Road from Peking was a portal to life of higher scope--romance with
Anna Erivan instead of the romance of an ambitious Empire--love of woman
instead of the old loves of men, peril, intrigue and adventure.... Now
he wondered that he could be so heartless.... A hand touched his sleeve.
Romney recognised one of the house-servants of Minglapo. He was led by
him hastily to a second rickshaw. The coolies were bade to run.
*2*
Nifton Bend met him at the door of the shop, which was not yet opened
for the day. The slim cold hand turned in his, and Romney felt as if it
clutched at some inner part of him.
"Have you seen Ti Kung?".
Romney reported in swift brief terms.
"You did not sleep?" the Hunchback asked in a queer way.
"No."
"Neither did I sleep," he added slowly, "but our good Minglapo slept."
Nifton Bend touched his hand, led the way to the second floor, and
entered there an apartment that was like a throne-room. In the centre
was a huge canopied couch. Romney's eye sought the heart of this even
before the lifted finger of the Hunchback directed.... The knees of the
occupant were drawn up against the abdomen--this fact obvious before the
cover was pulled back. The great face had taken on its ultimate gray
and yellow; the wide mouth that had laughed so wonderfully was twisted
in torture. Romney did not look far enough to ascertain the means of
death.
"Fat men sleep so soundly," repeated Nifton Bend.
"But Ti Kung could not have been caught sleeping. I reached the hotel
between eleven and twelve last night, and sent up word of arrival. He
must have been in the room then--the thing already done."
The objects in the great room were lost for the moment in a brown mist
before Romney's eyes. Then he saw that the wolf-hound head of the
Hunchback was close to his own breast--the face turned up to his own
face. His arm went around the low shoulder.
"The spirit of the little spy will rest easier," he whispered.
"You mean--"
"I was expecting this word from the _Nestor_. I expected them to find
him--like our master here. As for me, I did not sleep--"
"That was my trouble last night," Romney said.
"They may not have wanted you."
Romney recalled the creaking in the hall and the fancied step upon the
iron balcony.
"You think they have not finished?"
"I am sure they want _me_," the Hunchback said, his burning eyes
upturned to his countryman's face. "We will have a cup of tea
together--not here. Come--"
For a moment Romney thought they had turned to the room of the yellow
lamplight, but this was not the plan. They entered the apartment which
Romney himself had used--the same silken hangings so absurdly peopled
with pink embroidered storks and lavender fishes. The Hunchback rang
for a servant.
"I see that you have not brought all that we hoped for from the Inner
Temple."
"I think they saw something of this day from the distance of the Gobi,"
Romney answered. "They bade me hasten back, as if the time were most
precious--as if they wanted their servants Minglapo and Ti Kung to get
their blessing before last night--"
"Their servants--?"
"They spoke of you and the two who have passed with love and reverence,"
Romney said.
Quickly he told the story of his meeting with Rajananda, Chi Yuan and
Tsing Hsia--how they were gathered together at the pool in Kuderfoi, and
how they listened to his own story of the work and the dream.
"They were more inclined to take your view of methods than mine," Romney
added. "They did not quibble about the death of individuals, nor the
manner of defense planned by Young China in case of aggression by the
Japanese. They said Japan is young-souled and, if allowed to master
China, would bring into the world more of the horrors known as
_civilised_, which are destroying themselves in Europe now. They saw
that you were pure. It was not necessary for me to impress my own
conviction of that. In fact, the three Holy Men united in the belief
that nowhere in the world was there such a promise of national
exemplarship for the new order of humanity as in this beginning under
your hand. They saw very far and very deep. I wish you could go to the
aged arms of Rajananda now. He seems pure power to me. He bathed his
hands in the pool and spoke at last, saying that you have brought the
dream into the world. I think at times he saw you alone--the others
only helping. He saw ahead that the time would come when man would
unite with his brother, race to race. But he said that it was not quite
time--that nothing of your work would be lost, but that your work had to
do with conception rather than with birth--"
"Then he saw that we are to be overpowered?"
"Do you believe that you are to be overpowered?" Romney asked slowly.
"It is practically accomplished. Old China has already mastered us, but
the vision cannot be covered long. The vision is in the world."
"Rajananda said that. He saw your work lost in the folds of the night
that still lingers on the face of earth. That was almost his
expression.... He bade me hurry to carry his blessing with the others
to you--a message of peace and goodwill from the Holy Fathers of the
Gobi. He said they were watching and waiting for the dawn, that they
could not give you their approval in script, since it might find no
living hands to accept it, no party to profit by it."
A servant had come to the call. Nifton Bend sent this one to find his
own personal servant.... The former returned, saying that the General's
_boy_ had been sent on an errand into the street. Nifton Bend called
for tea.
"... They saw a great deal from a distance--those three wise men," he
added thoughtfully. "I should have been glad to go to them.... And you
say they saw us as belonging only to the dream and not to the action?"
"Yes. That is what was said by Rajananda."
Nifton Bend's face was calm, something almost boyish in his smile.
"I should like to have my young men about me in this hour. I should
like to tell them to watch for the working out of the great story which
I shall not be allowed to see.... _Story_--I think of everything as a
story--a man's relation to his work and to his woman.... Romney, she
thinks much of you. She will be alone. I'd like to live. She makes
every day a quivering ecstatic thing. I used to think that death was
the best thing that could happen to a man, but death is different now.
Let me talk a little English and laugh with you.... Yes, death is
different. I would rather be in hell with her than in heaven without.
But, of course, everything is ordered better than I could do it. I
think I shall be _asleep_ when she comes. I was never a good sleeper
here. I shall sleep well for a little--until she comes and wakes me.
For she will come. I'm tired. I'm bending to the ground.... I talk to
you of this sacred thing--"
His head came very close to Romney, but his eyes were mild and
boyish.... "I liked you because you had an Occidental heart--a place
for a woman. If my young men were here they would sit and talk with me
about China. I love them. They are passionate countrymen--but I have
finished with China. Only the woman is left in my heart. And you--you
are a white man who can understand--"
"Yes, I can understand--" Romney whispered. "Where is Moira Kelvin?"
The Hunchback pointed forward toward the apartment where Romney had seen
her in the yellow lamplight.
"You think there is danger, and you sit talking with me?"
"She sleeps. She knows nothing of these things. She sat and read to me
all night.... She is young. She is so beautiful. I put her to sleep
against her will.... You will see her to a ship. You will tell her
that I had but one thought--that all dreams were merged into one--that I
sat at the last contemplating her beauty and the tenderness--"
The tea was served before them. The Hunchback thanked the servant and
bade him go. Romney absently reached for his teacup, but Nifton Bend's
hand touched his:
"Don't drink that. My passage out is doubtless in it, if not yours. I
don't think they want you particularly, though they would, if they
understood.... Ah no, they have doubtless murdered my servant. No one
but his master sends him on an errand into the street--"
Now the pinkish storks of the portieres had real moisture about their
lower joints, a faint but veritable mist rising before them. Smoothly
Nifton Bend had allowed the steaming contents of his cup to soak into
the wall-hangings behind his chair. He did the same with Romney's cup.
The fabric slowly sucked in the liquid.... The thrall of the great man
deepened in Romney's heart. His own romance was near and vibrant in the
room; yet he was touched by a dread which the other did not share,
apparently had not thought of.... Was Moira Kelvin safely sleeping
after her night of devotion to the sleepless one?
"Is it the Japanese secret agents that became active last night at the
_Nestor_ and here?" Romney asked quickly.
"No. Our work never appeared to get to them--thanks to your part with
the little old spy whom you liked so well. It is China punishing the
younger generation."
"But did he not work in the laboratory--that same spy? I saw him coming
up from there--a trap-door--"
"Only for a day or two, at the last. We were watching him before his
knee-cap snapped. He could not have gotten in his report."
These were old matters. Romney was troubled about the woman, and burned
with the peril of the man before him.
"Perhaps they do not want you," he said.
"Our enemy is in this house," the Hunchback answered. "I shall not be
allowed to leave. At least, not to go far--"
"Do you think you would be molested if you walked out now--with Moira
Kelvin and me?"
Nifton Bend seemed thinking aloud:
"They may have but one agent working here, but ten men, one after
another, would die gladly for my life. They are not afraid. If it is
not this tea, it will be another way and soon.
"They will watch.... But we have touched the vision. The young men
will carry it through. What are three lives compared to starting the
races of the world into a new wisdom, a new comeliness?"
"While you live, _you are Young China_--and what of the woman?"
"Ah, don't, Romney--"
"Is she safe?"
"What?"
"Are you sure that she will not be wanted?"
"China would not touch her--yet how strange I did not think, even of the
thousandth chance! Still, don't you see, I carry to her the menace of
myself. Romney, you must help me--"
Romney was hushed by the spectacle of Nifton Bend's sudden dread--and
this from a man scarcely capable of fear for himself. He saw the great
constructive worker for mankind turning helplessly to cope with a
personal issue. He pressed the General's hand.
"You can count on me," he said quietly. "I don't think the game's up--"
"Romney, you bring me back the old romance of America--"
"Let us think.... Have the police been notified in regard to Minglapo?"
"No."
"If the police were called here, the work of any secret agent in our
case might be complicated--"
"Vulgar detentions--a day of questions--a day lost--our enemy to
organise. Remember, these killers are ready to die themselves--"
"Then let us go forth now--"
"Go forth into China?" The question came mildly. "Any rickshaw
coolie--"
"To the American Consulate--" Romney interrupted.
The answer remained in Romney's mind as one of the high moments of life.
"I would not accept sanctuary from a country from which I have withdrawn
my allegiance."
"Then I'll stay with you here, but I think we had better join the
woman--"
"Yes--"
"Just a minute--wait," Romney whispered, touching the other's sleeve.
"Let them think that the tea did it. Walk heavily, on my arm, through
the halls. Let your legs reel a bit. It will give us time--"
"Yes, it might give us time--"
The utter hopelessness of Nifton Bend's repetition of his words brought
to Romney something like an expression of Fate itself. The Hunchback, in
accepting China, had accepted the code of her servants. The condemned
never resist death.
But Romney did not share the attitude.
"Listen," he added. "They will be watching. They will think you dying
from the poison--if they really fixed this tea. They will leave you
alone in your rooms--possibly for hours. I'll go out and get your young
men together. Don't you see? I am one of them. You are the Cause while
you live. We'll come again and take you out--"
The expression upon the Hunchback's face deepened with pain.
"I love the thought. It is brave and strong--as young men are. But it
would mean the deaths of all who came--yours and the others. My young
men cannot be spared. It would not save me. We are in China.... There
is this that you can do--I was almost forgetting. Here are two packets
of papers. It is the whole affair that you hated so--the plan and all,
in case of aggression by Japan. There is only one safe place for these,
in case our cause is lost--the bottom of the sea. Certain of these
parchments are fire and acid-proof. It's the work of years of Ti Kung
and others. Japan would use them quickly enough against China. You
must take care to prevent all that. Don't dare to die with these papers
on your person, Romney.... And now may we go to her?"
*3*
There was a smile back of the tortured eyes of the Hunchback as he
reeled through the hallway, holding heavily to Romney's arm. The latter
caught a trace of the humour of the thing. He could not have reached
this smile had it not been for the days in the Gobi. A man who had had
his own loved one torn away, who has been forced to take his faith from
the substance and place it upon the spirit of things, does not easily
find himself denied a laugh afterward, when the world is at its worst.
There was another urge to realisation that came in that brief and
laboured walk to the room where he had seen the woman and her own in the
yellow lamplight. It seemed the nexus to an ampler power and a broader
wisdom. Nifton Bend's part in Young China was already done. To a
material mind, it was the darkest hour, but Romney lived and moved that
moment in a larger world where brave unselfish thoughts have immortal
potency. He saw that no task is finished with the conceiver--that
Nifton Bend was merely the drawer of plans, that the builders must come,
that matter must obey since the plan was in the world. He saw also a
new power in the quick refusal of the Hunchback to bring his young men
into this house of secret death. The dreamer would spare the builders.
The door was opened instantly. Romney stepped behind the Hunchback to
keep the eyes of the hall from observing the change, for Nifton Bend was
himself at the turn of the knob. Such men cannot be relied upon as
actors....
"I have brought you back an old friend, Moira," he said.
Romney pushed the door shut behind him and stepped forward to the
woman.... They did not speak. Nifton Bend asked with concern:
"You did not sleep?"
"I was asleep when you sent the tea."
The Hunchback's face was turned from her. Romney saw the broad bent
shoulders sag a little. The woman did not see that, but sensed the
recoil of the tragic shaft that had entered her lover's heart.... Her
eyes instantly left Romney's face. She turned, almost running--her
hands to the low shoulders. She was never more beautiful.... Nifton
Bend lifted the little teapot from its wrapping in padded silk.
"How long since this came?" he asked.
The voice was calm again, but the tone was hollow.
"Don't drink that. I'll get some fresh for you both," she said. "It
must be a half-hour since that came--"
"Moira ... don't call for more now. We will sit down together--we three.
Romney has brought us the voice of God from the desert.... I hoped you
would rest a little more. I was thoughtless to let them waken you--"
Romney could scarcely credit his listening.
The woman spoke:
"Indeed, I never felt more animate. I was fathoms deep when the knock
came--deep, deep and dreaming. The knock must have repeated several
times, for it became a part of my dream, before I awoke and answered....
The _boy_ said that you were having tea and had sent some to me. I
thought you would soon be coming, so I drank as I dressed--to be ready
for you. I began to feel more joyous and light--like a little girl
combing her hair for a great day. It was like a day of
something-to-happen. It must have been your coming, Sir Romney. We
hoped to see you last night--"
There was a blithe richness of vitality, a sparkle that made him
remember the wine at Longstruth's, the Chinese girls twanging the _vina_
in the bamboo clumps by the river.... Wine and song at Longstruth's, and
a score of other thoughts, light and indistinct as the trailing
movements of a vagary--with this concrete enormity in the room.
Romney suddenly whipped in closer to reality. His mind had been trying
to hold off the truth from itself. Moira Kelvin turned to her mirror.
The Hunchback, glancing to see that his face was out of range of the
glass, directed one slow terrible look into the eyes of his friend.
Romney took it all. For an instant there was an indescribable tightness
across his chest and a sense of inadequacy to bear the drama. Nifton
Bend had already accepted the death of his beloved. He would spare her
from all knowledge of it. There seemed a dull gray shine about his
face. The long hands were lifted a little, but steady. The face did not
implore; it commanded Romney to be calm, to help in bringing happiness
to the departure.
Romney was continually swept by surges of incredulity--that this thing
was working out under his eyes. In another way it was like the last
moment of a tragedy which one knows is coming. He wanted to leave
before the end. He felt himself an inadequate third in this great
hour.... He heard his own voice, telling of the three sages at the
little pool of the lilies in Kuderfoi.... He was describing
Rajananda.... She laughed and came close for an instant to listen. She
caught the same magic that had been so dear to Anna Erivan.... He
remembered a similar look from Moira Kelvin, though more imperious and
passionate, when he told her of Nifton Bend and Young China.... He
caught a glance of calmness and commendation from the eye of the
Hunchback now.... He pictured the tranquil and compassionate Chi Yuan,
the firmer and more balanced Tsing Hsia to whom the sureness of the
retributive forces of life were as inevitable as gravitation. He spoke
again of the little withered master lying between them--so vast, so calm
and inclusive.... Always Romney's own story came in with its wonders
and pictures, but he did not let them reach the point of words. His
romance was something he might have brought to Moira Kelvin alone, if
there had been hours. He longed for her sanction and to show her how
wise and deep in life she had been, since all that she had said came
true; he wanted her word on the chance of finding Anna Erivan again--to
help his faith. There was none to whom the story belonged as to her;
but it was not for Nifton Bend in this hour....
He repeated instead what the three sages had said of the dream which was
Nifton Bend's--what they thought of him ... and how the picture of
Nifton Bend and herself, together in the lamp-lit room, had stayed with
him through the days and nights of the desert riding.
Her movements were swift, her laugh sweet and low, her love and joy on
the wing.... For a moment they forgot the Hunchback.... Something had
come to them from their fortnight--something that had to do with the
moths and the rice fields and the tea among the pyramids.
"You are wonderful, Sir Romney. You change so rapidly now.... You are
sun-darkened. All waste seems burned away. You bring the breath of the
desert nights--and something else. Your heart has known some great
replenishment, and some great terror. I see the man who was a boy when
I first looked.... All happens where Nifton Bend is. I think it must
be the ignition of his mission and his service. The world will never
know the wonder of him. Every one changes who touches him--the young
men--"
He had followed her eyes to the Hunchback, who had poured a cup of tea
and was drinking leisurely.
"You said you did not want tea," she ventured. "I could have had it
fresh. That must be cold and bitter from standing."
"I like it strong," said Nifton Bend.
Moira Kelvin was speaking on, but Romney only heard the murmur of her
voice. The picture of the next hour came to him--that all was done.
There was something like a cry in his heart for the end of the mystic.
And poignantly the sweetness of the woman before him returned--the last
moment by the river when her fervent impulse to give him a token
expanded his nature to its broadest reaches of emotion. Her splendour
was lifted now, her whole being crowned with the spirit that can only
come to one whose quest has ended.... The Hunchback came toward them.
The calm that Romney saw upon that face was marmoreal, the calm of one
whose circle is almost finished. He led her to a chair which the yellow
rug covered, and sat before her upon a cushion, his arm across her
knees.
"You are young, but very old," he said. "You are a child, a girl, a
woman all lavish in her love, but more than all a mother. This--this
Romney--is like a son to us--and those brave young men--our sons. We
are ancient, Moira. We shall end our work to-day and depart. We have
known the cities of men, and the fruitful valleys have been our
meeting-places. To-day we shall go to the hills. We have talked much of
the world. To-day we shall talk of God. Our work is finished. This is
one of our sons who will carry on the work here. It is good that he is
with us.... Moira--Moira--what a love it is."
She bent forward, listening, her face in a kind of noon glory.
"What has come to us?" she whispered. "Has Sir Romney brought us magic
from the desert? Does he carry with him some power from the Holy Men?
... I think I was never so happy. All things that I have thought undone
seem accomplished. Are all the rest of the days just for you and me?
Shall we walk together--our tasks all finished? ... Ah, you have always
had so much to do. I have been wasteful in the waiting hours. I have
seemed always waiting for you to come to me--"
"I shall not leave you again," he whispered.
"But your work--"
"My work is finished."
"I thought when I found my own, that it would be like this--everything
pushed away for our being together--and now it has come.... Listen, I
have hated her, when you found her so very beautiful--"
The Hunchback turned with a smile to Romney.
"Her rival," he whispered. "She means the old Mother China--"
"She has taken you away from me--days and nights. I am terrible in
waiting. You will go to her no more?"
"No more," he answered.
"Did she cast you out?" she asked softly. "Is it because she will not
have you that you come back to me?"
"Yes," he said.
She thought he was carrying out her own whimsicality.