CHAPTER XVII

LEAPING INTO UNKNOWN BLACKNESS

To the friends who had been so mysteriously separated many months earlier, and on the other side of the world, their reunion at this place and under such conditions was bewildering and incredible. They could scarcely believe the evidence of their own eyes. The last time Rob had seen Jo the latter had been shorn of his queue, while now his hair again hung in a long, glossy braid. For a moment they stood clasping each other's hand, after the fashion of the West, and staring without speech. There was so much to be said that they could say nothing. Then they were aroused to a sense of imminent danger by the sounds of ascending voices and hurrying footsteps on the stone stairway. Evidently the present was no time for explanations.

"Quick, Rob! Go up there and hide," whispered Jo, pointing, as he spoke, to a rude ladder leading into the darkness of an upper loft. "Stay there till I come or I cannot save you."

Even as he spoke, Jo turned to the stairway as though about to descend, while Rob sprang to the ladder.

A Chinese soldier was so close at hand that he would have gained the room and caught sight of the fugitive had not the young officer arrested his progress with the stern inquiry:

"What is going on below? Are you all mad or drunk with the juice of poppies? Cannot I meditate in peace without being disturbed by the howlings of you swine? How dare you come up here without orders? Answer me, dog, and son of generations of dogs, before I cause you to be beaten with a hundred blows!"

The terrified soldier, who held a petty office, corresponding to that of corporal of the guard, recoiled from the presence of his angry superior, who, if he had chosen, could have him beaten even to death, and, kotowing until his forehead touched the stones, answered:

"Know, your honorable excellency, that the outer gate has been closed without knowledge of any in the guard-house, and beyond it many persons, mad with anger, are clamorous for admittance. It is a mystery; and before opening the gate I came up here for a look at the outsiders, to make certain that they are not enemies."

"Closed, pig? How can it be that the gate is closed without orders from me, the keeper of the gate? This thing must be examined into," cried the young officer, with every appearance of extreme anger. "Let it be opened without delay. But first come with me and look at these outside howlers. It may be, even as your stupidity suggests, that they are men from Chang-Chow, who have ever been unfriendly to this city because of its greater prosperity."

This was said to give the soldier an opportunity for seeing that no other person was in the room, which fact he would report to his comrades.

As they examined the furious crowd besieging the gate, Jo exclaimed, even more angrily than before:

"Those be no Chang-Chow men, but our friends and own people. They are the dancers, who, together with the good priests, pray constantly for rain, and who went out to the shrine of the holy rain-god but an hour ago. Ah, but you shall smartly suffer for closing a gate of their own city against them. Hasten and open it again if you would have the setting sun behold your worthless head still upon your wretched shoulders."

Thus saying, the young officer spurned the trembling soldier with his foot and followed him down the stairway. In another moment the great gate was opened to the torrent of frantic humanity that rushed in demanding to know what had become of the foreign devil whom they had seen enter only a few minutes before, and where the soldiers had hidden him. Also why they had closed the gate in the very faces of his pursuers.

"Give him up to us," shrieked the priests, "that we may kill him, for doubtless it is he who keeps away the blessed rain."

The denials of the guard that they even had seen any foreigner, or that they had closed the gate, were so little heeded by the clamorous throng, that it might have gone hard with them had not Jo secured a hearing by firing a shot from his revolver, a weapon that he alone of all those present possessed.

"The guard has not seen the foreign devil or surely they would have arrested him," he cried, in the awed silence that followed his shot. "Nor did they close the gate, for they would not dare without my orders, and I gave none. Nor could one man, not even a foreign devil, close the gate unaided, since it often has been tried and they have proved too heavy. Only by magic could he have done this thing, and by magic must he have blinded the eyes of the soldiers so that they did not see him pass them into the city. But your priests have magic as well as the foreigners, and by means of it he may be discovered. Let us then again close the gate that he may not escape, and search for him in every quarter of the city. When he is found let his head promptly be cut off, before he has time again to use his magic. Thus shall the city be purified and the wrath of the rain-god be appeased. Protect the empire! Exterminate foreigners!"

With this rallying-cry of the Great Swords, Jo led the way across the enclosed space separating the inner from the outer gate, past the guard-house, where his soldiers spent their waking hours in gambling with long, slim Chinese cards and piles of beans, and on into the narrow streets of the city. There he was so active in the search that was maintained, until stopped by darkness, that he gained a notable reputation as a hater of foreigners. Thus by his prompt action were Rob's enemies so completely thrown off his track that not once was his real hiding-place approached or even suspected.

In the mean time he, intensely wearied by hours of confinement in that hot, dusty loft, grew vastly impatient of inaction. He was hungry and parched with thirst; no sound penetrated his prison, nor any ray of light. He had no idea of the passage of time, and imagined it to be much later in the night than it really was, when he was startled by a sharp "Hist!" that seemed to come from the top of the ladder.

Too wary to answer it, he only listened, with senses all alert, for something further. Then came a whispered "Rob," and he knew that his only friend in that part of the world was at hand.

"Crawl here on your hands and knees," whispered Jo. "Don't let your boots touch the floor, for the guards below are wide awake and listening to every sound. That's right. Now put on these felt boots. Leave your own behind, and follow me without a word."

Rob obeyed these instructions in all but one thing. His boots were of heavy English leather, lacing high on his ankles, and had been procured in Hankow. They were very comfortable as well as durable, and he could not bear the thought of exchanging them for cloth shoes with felt soles, especially in view of the amount of walking ahead of him if he made good his escape. So, though he put on the pair provided by Jo, he tied the others about his neck, and, thus equipped, noiselessly followed his friend down the ladder to the room below. From this room a narrow doorway opened on the broad parapet of the city wall. Towards this door they were making their cautious way, when suddenly the hastily tied strings of Rob's heavy boots gave way, and they fell to the stone floor with a clatter that awoke the echoes.

Our lad uttered an exclamation of dismay as he groped about the floor to recover his lost treasures; but it was drowned in a tumult of shouts from below. At the same time a scuffling of feet on the stairway proved that the alarmed guard were on their way to investigate.

Jo, knowing nothing of the boots, could not imagine what had happened, and called from the doorway that he already had reached:

"Never mind anything! Come on, quick, for your life!"

But Rob, having found one boot, was determined to have the other, for which he still was feeling over a wide area of floor space. At length his fingers touched it; but as he triumphantly rose to his feet a dark, heavily breathing form, brandishing some sort of a weapon, confronted him. The next instant he had sent the overzealous guard reeling backward with a swinging blow from the heavy boot just recovered, that took him full in the face. With a yell of combined pain and fright, the soldier pitched down the narrow stairway, carrying with him the comrades who were close at his heels. Before the confused heap could disentangle itself, our lads had fled through the doorway and were speeding like shadows along the top of the lofty wall.

As they ran they heard behind them a shrill screaming and a furious beating of gongs. Then from the tall drum-tower in the centre of the city came a deep, booming sound that could be heard for miles. The great drum that is only sounded in times of public peril was arousing the citizens and sending them swarming from their houses. Torches appeared not only in the streets but on the wall behind our flying lads. Then, to Rob's dismay, others began to gleam in front of them. To be sure, these still were a long distance away, but they gave certain evidence that flight in that direction must come to a speedy end.

"What is the use of running any farther?" asked Rob. "We'll only fall in with that torch-light procession all the sooner. Seems to me we might as well stop where we are and see about getting down off this perch."

"There's only one place to get down," answered Jo, "and it still is ahead of us. Run faster! We've got to reach it first."

So the fugitives put on an added burst of speed, though to Rob it seemed that they were only rushing directly into the arms of the advancing torch-bearers.

Suddenly Jo exclaimed, breathlessly, "Here's the place!" and then, to Rob's dismay, he took a flying leap off the parapet into the gulf of impenetrable blackness lying on the outer side of the wall.

For a moment the young American turned sick with the thought that, despairing of ultimate escape, his comrade had chosen death by suicide, and now lay lifeless at the foot of the lofty battlement.

Then came the familiar voice rising from some unknown depth, and calling on him to follow.

"Jump, Rob!" it cried; "you'll land all right, the same as I have."

Even with this assurance our lad hesitated to leap into the darkness. He knew that the wall was at least fifty feet high. There was at its bottom no moat filled with water, into which one might launch himself with safety. "Nor is there any pile of feather-beds, that I know of," he thought, grimly.

From both sides lines of torches were steadily advancing, while up from the city rose a tumult of angry voices. Only in the outside blackness that already had engulfed his friend was there the slightest promise of escape.

"I suppose there's nothing else to be done," he muttered, setting his teeth and bracing himself for the effort. "So, here goes!"

With this he sprang out into space and instantly vanished.

When, a minute later, the advancing lines of torch-bearers came together at that very point, they were bewildered and frightened by the absolute disappearance of those whom they had thought to be so surely within their grasp.

Certainly the magic of the foreign devils was stronger than their priests had led them to believe.

CHAPTER XVIII

A SUPPER OF SACRED EELS

The great plain of northern China is composed of alluvial matter extending to an unknown depth, reddish-yellow in color, and possessed of wonderful fertility. When wet it packs closely; and later, under the influence of a hot sun, it bakes like clay. During seasons of drought it pulverizes to an almost impalpable dust that is blown by fierce winds into ridges and heaps like snow-drifts. These are piled high against obstructing walls, so that sometimes buildings standing in exposed situations are completely buried beneath them. Such a drift of fine sand had formed in an angle of the city wall, along which our lads fled; and Chinese Jo, knowing of it, had selected this as a point for escape.

Thus, when Rob, with many misgivings, leaped into unknown blackness, he had not dropped more than twenty feet when he struck a steep slope of soft material down which he slid with great velocity amid a smother of choking dust. The next thing he knew, Jo was pulling him to his feet, and bidding him make haste to get away before their mode of escape should be discovered by the torch-bearers, who now swarmed on the wall above them. So the lads ran, with Jo acting as guide, across cropless fields, climbing over useless dikes, and stumbling through dry ditches, until a black mass, dimly outlined against the sky, rose before them. As they drew near, this resolved itself into a clump of trees, which, from experience already gained in China, Rob knew must be a sacred grove. It was, in fact, the very grove from which the frantic rain-dancers had streamed in pursuit of him a few hours earlier. Now it was silent and deserted, even the ancient temple of the rain-god, standing in its centre, being empty of priests or worshippers.

Finding the door of this temple open, and hearing no sound within, the fugitives made a cautious entry into the sacred precincts. Here their attention was attracted by a faint glow coming from a heap of embers on an altar that stood before a gigantic image of the rain-god himself.

CHAPTER XIX

AN EXHIBITION OF THE RAIN-GOD'S ANGER

Mongolians, including Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans, can get along with less sleep than any other of the world's people; and Jo, in spite of having travelled and learned to speak English, still was a true Mongolian. Therefore, he awoke quite refreshed after two hours of sleep, and, moving with the utmost caution, so as not to arouse Rob, he left their strange hiding-place, carefully closing and fastening its door behind him. Then he swiftly made his way back to the city, where he skirted its wall to the farther side, and forced an entrance through a now dry culvert or water-gate. After showing himself at the several guard-houses, that, if necessary, he afterwards might be able to prove his presence in the city that night, he went to his own quarters, where he made preparations for a journey. He ordered a horse to be brought, saddled, and ready for travel, and sent for his lieutenant, a man who, though older than he, was possessed of so little influence as still to be under the orders of his junior.

To this officer Jo turned over command of the guard, telling him that he considered the escape of the foreign devil, who had eluded them by the exercise of magic arts, to be an event of such grave importance that he was about to report it in person at Pao-Ting-Fu, and possibly to Pekin itself. The young captain named these places in order to throw possible pursuit off the scent, for he had decided to carry Rob in exactly the opposite direction, or back over the way he had come, to Hankow. Having thus arranged affairs to his satisfaction, he set forth at sunrise, riding by way of the very gate through which Rob had made so hasty an entrance the day before.

Jo was ready to leave the city a full hour earlier than this, and wanted to do so; but even greater authority than his would be insufficient to open the gates of any Chinese city before sunrise, and so he was forced to await that hour.

Once in the open he rode with all speed, hoping to reach the temple of the rain-god before any worshippers should appear, and while Rob still slept. In this, however, he was disappointed, for, though he reached the temple in advance of the priests who served it, and who, having joined in the pursuit of the foreigner, had been forced to spend the night in the city, he was dismayed to find a certain number of worshippers kotowing and burning incense before the great image. These were wretched farmers from the near-by country, who, having no work to do in their burned-up fields, and with death from starvation staring them in the face, had come in desperation to the only source they knew of from which aid might be asked.

Another company of these people, who reached the place at the same time with Jo, were provided with fire-crackers, with which they proposed to arouse the god's attention if he should happen to be asleep. A bunch was exploded as soon as they entered the temple, and to their awed delight the efficacy of this proceeding was immediately apparent, for the image of the rain-god trembled, and a muffled sound came from its interior. Evidently the god, who alone was all-powerful in this emergency, had been asleep, but now was awaking to the gravity of the situation. With heads in the dust, the worshippers humbly bowed before his image and implored his aid. Loudest of them all was the young officer who had forced a way to the very front of the assemblage.

His prayer was in Chinese, of the mandarin dialect, which no one present, except he, understood. Strange as it was to the ears of his fellow-worshippers, it also contained words of another tongue still stranger, that their ignorance did not permit them to recognize. Thus Jo was able to call out, under guise of a prayer, and undetected:

"It's all right, Rob. I am here, and we are safe so long as you keep quiet."

At this point some one at the back of the temple uttered a loud cry, at which all the bowed heads were raised. Jo looked up with the others, and, to his dismay, saw the great right arm of the god slowly lifting as though to impose silence upon those who persisted in annoying him with their unwelcome clamor. At this phenomenon the superstitious spectators gazed in breathless suspense, and when the arm suddenly dropped back into its former position they sprang to their feet.

They were not so much frightened as they were awed; for in China it has often happened that the gods have seemed to enter certain of their own earthly images, and by well-understood movements or sounds have caused these to express their will to the people. It was reported that the very image of the rain-god now under observation had been thus favored, and upon previous occasions of grave importance had made motions of the arms or head that only the priests could interpret. So the people now waited in terrified but eager expectation.

Nor were they disappointed; for no sooner had the arm dropped than the head of the image, which was big enough to hold a man, was seen to be in motion. It certainly was bending forward and assuming an attitude benign, but so terrifying that the awe-stricken spectators instinctively pressed backward. As they gazed with dilated eyes and quaking souls the great head was bowed farther and farther forward, until suddenly, with a convulsive movement, it was seen to part from its supporting shoulders and leap into the air.

The crash with which that vast mass of painted and gilded clay struck the stone pavement, where it was shattered into a thousand fragments, was echoed by shrieks of terror as the dismayed beholders of this dire calamity plunged in headlong flight from the temple. Never before in all the annals of priesthood had been recorded a manifestation of godly anger so frightful and so unmistakable. From this time on, that particular temple of the rain-god was a place accursed and to be shunned; for if after this warning any person should enter it, he would be crushed to death beneath the body of the idol, which surely would fall on him.

So the people fled, spreading far and wide the dreadful news, and only one among them dared return to the temple and brave the rain-god's anger. This one, of course, was Jo, who, startled and alarmed by what had taken place, had fled with the others. But he had paused while still within the shelter of the grove, and, flinging himself to the ground for concealment, had allowed the others to pass on without him. When all had disappeared he arose and returned to the temple. As he re-entered its dust-clouded doorway he was confronted by a spectacle at once so amazing and so absurd that for an instant he gazed at it bewildered. Then he burst into almost uncontrollable laughter.

The image of the rain-god already had acquired a new head, dishevelled and dust-covered, to be sure, but one endowed with speech as well as with motion, and which, when Jo first saw it, was violently coughing.

"I say, Jo Lee," called out a husky voice from this new feature of the giant image, "I think it was a mean trick to go off and leave me shut up in that beastly place. I mighty near smothered in there, and I don't suppose I ever would have got out if an earthquake or something hadn't happened. It almost shook down the whole house, and it knocked the roof off as it was, nearly burying me in falling plaster besides."

"It isn't a house," explained Jo, laughing hysterically in spite of his habitual Chinese self-control. "It's the image of a god. Don't you remember crawling into it last night? I don't know how its head happened to tumble off, but I expect you did it yourself. And now you have managed to give it a new one, a hundred times more useful but not half so good looking. I never in all my life saw anything so funny, and if you only could see yourself, you'd laugh, too."

"Maybe I would," replied Rob, with a tone of injured dignity; "but if you were as battered and choked as I am, you wouldn't laugh—I know that much. Of course, I remember now all about this thing being a god, only I was so confused when I woke up that I forgot all about where I was. I only knew that there had been an explosion of some kind, and that I should smother if I didn't get out. I could see a little light up above and tried to climb to it by some ropes that I found dangling. Two of them gave way slowly, while a third was so rotten that it gave way mighty sudden. Then came the earthquake and an avalanche of mud that nearly buried me; but I managed somehow to climb on top of it, and here I am. Now I want to get down and out, for I don't like the place."

"All right. Drop down inside, and I will open the door."

Accepting this advice, Rob withdrew the head that had looked so absurdly small on top of that great image, and in another minute slid out of the open doorway far below, in company with a quantity of débris.

"Whew!" he gasped. "That was a sure enough dust-bath. Now let us get outside and into an atmosphere that isn't quite so thick with mud."

"Wouldn't you rather remain in here and live than go out and meet a certain death?" asked Jo, quietly.

"Of course; but, even so, we can't always stay shut up in this old rat-trap."

"No, but it will be safer to leave at night, and also we have much to do before we shall be ready."

"Have we?" asked Rob. "What, for instance?"

"It is my plan that you should travel as a priest under a vow of silence, until we reach Hankow, while I go as your servant. If it is agreed, then must your head be shaved in priestly fashion, your skin must be stained a darker color, and we must obtain garments suitable."

"That's all right, so far as the priest business is concerned, if you think I can act the character; but you are way off when you talk about going to Hankow, for I am not bound in that direction. You see, I have just come from there and am on my way to Pekin."

"But the road to Pekin is filled with danger."

"So is the road to Hankow. I ought to know, for I have come over it, and I am certain, from the posters I saw displayed in every town, that Ho-nan is a Boxer province by this time. Besides, Hankow is twice as far away as Pekin."

"It is reported that all foreigners in Pekin have been killed."

"Including members of the legations?"

"So it is said."

"Well, then, the report can't be true. In the first place, the foreign ministers would have called in troops of their own countries for protection upon the first intimation of danger. In the second place, to kill a foreign minister is to declare war against that minister's country; and I don't believe that even the Chinese government is so foolish as to declare war against the whole world. At the same time, if there is to be any fighting I want to be where I can see it, or at least know about it, which is another reason for going to Pekin. Besides, I must go there, for it is in Pekin that I am to get news of my mother and father. Only think, I don't even know for certain if they are alive. If you didn't know that about your family, wouldn't you want to go where you could find out?"

Jo admitted that he would.

"By-the-way," continued Rob, "speaking of families, I thought you had a wife. Where is she? Are you going to take her with us to Pekin? Wasn't she awfully glad to see you when you got back from America?"

For the second time that day the young Chinese laughed. "Yes," he replied, "I have a wife. I think she is in Canton, for that is where my father left her when he came north. No, I am not going to take her to Pekin. No, she was not glad to see me when I came back from America, for she has not yet seen me."

"If I had only known your wife was in Canton, and where to find her, I should have called," said Rob, soberly.

The idea thus presented was so absurd that Jo laughed again as at a good joke, for in China no man ever calls on the wife of another.

CHAPTER XX

ROB MAKES A STARTLING DISCOVERY

Finding Rob determined to go to Pekin, Jo yielded, though with many misgivings, and at once began preparations for their dangerous journey. Thanks to the general terror inspired by the fall of the rain-god's head, the lads were secure from interruption so long as they remained in the temple. Having thought over his plan the evening before, Jo had brought with him from the city a number of things necessary to carrying it out. Among them were shears and a razor, with which he removed every trace of hair from Rob's head, after the fashion of the lamas or priests of Buddha. Then his whole body, from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet, was tinted yellow with a dye that would have to wear off, since it never could be washed away. He was further disguised in priestly robes of yellow, and, worst of all, was finally obliged to give up his cherished boots in favor of sandals, which of all forms of foot-wear he most despised. For head-covering he was given a priest's huge straw hat, as large as a small umbrella.

As neither of the lads was sufficiently expert in "making up" features to change Rob's wide-open eyes into oblique slits, he submitted to the wearing of big, round, shell-rimmed, smoked-glass spectacles, found among the temple properties. Another thing there obtained was an inscribed iron tablet that had hung upon the breast of the rain-god, and to carry this to Pekin was to be the ostensible reason for their journey in that direction. Also the silence with which Rob was to conceal his ignorance of the northern dialect was to be explained as being imposed by a vow not to speak a word, even in prayer, until he had safely deposited that holy tablet in the great Pekin temple of the rain-god. The only bit of property formerly belonging to him that he was allowed to retain was his revolver, which, together with a belt full of cartridges, was concealed beneath his robe.

As their changed plan was to carry them in the very direction Jo had announced his intention of taking before leaving the city, he decided to maintain his character as an officer of imperial troops, escorting the priest, rather than to assume that of a servant, as he at first had proposed. Thus he would be able to ride horseback, carry weapons in plain sight, and disburse money for many comforts that a priest's servant could not obtain.

With these preparations completed, our lads waited impatiently for darkness, and no sooner had it descended than they set forth, exercising great caution in leaving the temple grove, but after that travelling as briskly as Jo could walk. The latter insisted that Rob, being unused to sandals, should ride his pony, while he proceeded on foot until they could beg, borrow, steal, or buy another.

They had gone but a few li, or Chinese miles, each of which equals about one-third of an English mile, when they heard the steady beat of a horse's hoofs, accompanied by a grinding noise as of machinery. After listening until he located the sound as coming from a field at one side of the road, Jo crept softly in that direction. He quickly discovered a horse, attached to a long, wooden beam, travelling in a monotonous circle, and thus lifting an endless chain of earthen jars full of water from a deep well. Each, as it came to the surface, emptied itself into an irrigating ditch, and then went down to be refilled. All this was simple enough, and did not particularly interest Jo, for he had seen hundreds of just such irrigating plants in operation all over the great plain. Heretofore, however, a prominent feature of the outfit had been the man or boy who, armed with a bamboo whip, had kept the horse awake and at work; but here no human figure was to be distinguished. At the same time, there was a sound of blows, delivered at regular intervals, each of which inspired the horse to fresh exertion. Finally, becoming convinced that, in spite of the blows, there was no person in the vicinity, Jo went closer to determine their origin. At the machine he found working a scheme so practical, simple, and ingenious as to arouse his admiration—a section of stiff but springy bamboo, and a stout cord fixed on the beam to which the horse was attached. That was all. Three revolutions of the beam wound up the cord and sprung back the bamboo. At the beginning of the fourth revolution the cord suddenly was slackened, and the liberated bamboo struck the horse a blow across the hind quarters. Nor did these blows always descend at the same point of the circle or at regular intervals, since their frequency depended upon the speed of the horse, who, being blindfolded, was thus made to believe that he was at the mercy of some constantly alert though invisible person.

So impressed was Jo with the ingenuity of this contrivance that he went back to persuade Rob to come and see it. The latter did so, though somewhat unwillingly, not caring to waste time over Chinese inventions just then; but when he had approached close enough to the horse to discern its markings, he exclaimed: "Hello! That's my pony! The very one I was riding yesterday when the rain-dancers got after me. And here he is, being made to work all night by an infernal machine. I never heard of anything so disgusting. Here! whoa, you beast! You have done the tread-mill act long enough, and now we'll put you to a better service."

Thus it happened that the very ingenuity of this inventor of perpetual motion, by which he gained a few hours of sleep, also caused him a heavy loss; for, had he been on hand, Jo would have bought the horse from him at his own price, while Rob would not have appeared on the scene at all.

As no saddle could be found near the tread-mill, Jo was forced to ride bareback until they reached a town where one could be purchased. At this same town they slept a few hours, during which their horses also rested and were liberally fed on beans and chopped bamboo grass. Our young travellers were again on the road by sunrise, and after this they pushed ahead with all speed for the greater part of a week, riding early and late, but taking long rests in the middle of each day.

Although as a priest and an officer of imperial troops they were suffered to pass, without delay, many points at which any other class of travellers would have been detained for rigorous examination, they met with ever-increasing evidences of trouble as they advanced northward. Everywhere they came across dead bodies, ruined buildings, and occasionally whole villages swept by fire. Everywhere people gazed on them with suspicion or fled at their coming. They heard of the great Boxer army gathering near Pekin, and encountered numerous small bodies of armed men hastening to swell its ranks. Also they came into constant contact with prowling bands of starving peasantry. Several times, in order to escape from the latter, our lads joined themselves to one or another of the Boxer companies, and remained with it until the immediate danger was passed. Then, on the plea of urgent haste, they would push ahead.

Finally, when thus travelling with a company who would have hacked them to bits had they discovered their identity, they crossed the Hu-Tho-ho (the river that goes where it pleases) and approached the walled city of Cheng-Ting-Fu. In this city stands a Roman Catholic cathedral, built of stone, and having a massive square tower that looms like a great fortress above the low roofs of the surrounding temples and native dwellings.

In this stronghold were many foreign refugees, priests, nuns, and Belgian engineers who had been engaged on the railway running south from Pekin; also several American missionaries who, wounded and plundered of everything, had gained this asylum barely in time to save their lives.

For more than a month the great gate of Cheng-Ting-Fu had been kept closed to all companies of friends and foes alike, only a little wicket being occasionally opened for the passage in or out of one or two persons at a time. In addition to this precaution, which was taken by the Chinese authorities of the city, the foreign refugees inside the cathedral were compelled to remain hidden behind its stout doors for fear lest their appearance on the streets should excite the local population to acts of violence. On the sandy plain beyond the city wall was a large and ever-changing encampment of Boxers thirsting for foreign blood, undisciplined soldiers, highwaymen, and outlaws of every description.

Upon reaching Cheng-Ting-Fu our lads, wearied by a day of continuous riding, felt that they could go no farther that night. In fact, there was no place for them to go to nearer than the city of Pao-Ting-Fu, a long day's journey away, so bare had this section of country been swept of inhabitants. At the same time, they regarded with dismay the prospect of spending a night amid the horrors and dangers of the lawless outside camp, where robbery and murder were committed unchecked and unpunished at all hours of day and night.

"We must try to get inside the wall," said Jo, in a low tone, "for if we stay out here it is pretty certain that neither of us will live to see another sunrise."

With this they turned their jaded ponies towards the city gate and rode to it, followed at a short distance by a small crowd of pig-tailed cut-throats, who only awaited a favorable opportunity for making a rush upon them. So desperately hungry were these wretches that they joyfully would have killed even a priest and an imperial officer for sake of the meagre food-supply represented by the animals they rode.

At the gate Jo's demand for admittance was at first received with stout refusal by a guard who gazed carelessly at the travellers from behind a small, heavily barred opening. Fortunately, Jo still had money with him, and a handful of silver, temptingly displayed, finally unclosed the coveted entrance. As the wicket opened, the starving rabble, seeing their prey about to escape them, made their threatened rush; but Jo, leaping to the ground and calling on Rob to get the horses through the gate, held them at bay with his revolver. Only one minute was necessary, for the ponies, as though aware of their danger, scrambled through the narrow wicket like cats. Rob followed close at their heels; Jo, firing one shot over the heads of the crowd for effect, sprang after him, and the gate was slammed shut, not again to be opened that night.

Even now the officer of the guard, who had yielded to a silver influence, dared not give the strangers the freedom of the city; but, under threat of again being thrust outside, compelled their promise to spend the night in a temple to which he would conduct them, without attempting to leave it before morning. Also, they must not hold communication with a soul outside the temple walls, and they must depart from the city at sunrise.

When Jo had given this promise in words, and Rob had assented to it by nodding his priestly head, they were conducted to the temple selected as their lodging under an escort of soldiers detailed to act as their guard during the night. On their way the travellers, thus cautiously welcomed, gazed curiously about them at the sights of the beleaguered city, and especially at the grim walls of the great cathedral uplifted above its houses. Especially was Rob affected by this ecclesiastical fortress, which at that very moment was giving safe shelter to persons of his own race.

As they passed it he stared hard at a row of narrow windows, with the hope of seeing an American face, but none presented itself until the last window was reached. In it was dimly outlined the form of a woman who turned upon the passers-by a face expressive of hopeless weariness. She gave them one listless glance and then stepped from sight, but that fleeting view caused Rob Hinckley to utter a choking exclamation and to reel in his saddle until only a supreme effort saved him from falling. He had seen his mother.

CHAPTER XXI

THE REFUGEES OF CHENG-TING-FU

The malady with which Dr. Mason Hinckley had lain critically ill at Wu-Hsing was of so strange a nature that, directly after the cablegram calling Rob to his supposed death-bed was sent, it took a surprising turn for the better. As he longed for a change of air and scene, and felt that with them a full recovery of health might be effected, he decided to resign his position at Wu-Hsing and, with his wife, travel as far as Nagasaki. There they would meet the steamer on which, as they had been notified by cable from America, Rob was coming to them, and the reunited family would spend together a delightful holiday on the lovely Japanese coast.

So they set forth full of hopeful anticipations, and travelled down the Si-Kiang to Hong-Kong, where they were so fortunate as to find the China on the point of sailing for San Francisco by way of Nagasaki. At Hong-Kong they told an acquaintance who assisted the invalid to a carriage that they were going to Japan to meet an American steamer; but in the confusion of the moment he understood them to say that they were going to America, and so reported to Mr. Bishop, who, in turn, repeated the story to Rob a few weeks later.

In the mean time, the doctor and his wife journeyed to Nagasaki, the former so gaining strength with every mile of the voyage that upon reaching Japan he deemed himself to be practically a well man. Thus they were prepared to give Rob a most joyful surprise; but when, only three days after their own arrival, the Occidental steamed into Nagasaki harbor, they were met by the bitter disappointment of finding that their boy was not on board. From the purser, as well as from the gentleman who had taken Rob's cabin, they learned that somehow he had missed connection and had been left behind. After that the anxious parents waited in Nagasaki a month, boarding every incoming ship from the States, but without finding their boy or hearing a word from him. They had written to Hatton immediately upon their arrival, and finally from there came the cable message, "Rob, transport, Manila."

What could it mean? Why had their boy gone to Manila? Where would he go from there? Where was he now? How in the world did he happen to be on board a transport? Had he enlisted in the army? These and a thousand other equally puzzling questions presented themselves, but no one of them was accompanied by an answer. They had received news of the murder of missionaries at Wu-Hsing. Could Rob have reached there in time to become involved in the trouble? If so, was he alive or dead? They no longer could remain in Japan, but must return to China where news might more readily be obtained. So they sailed for Shanghai, from which place they sent letters of inquiry to Manila, Wu-Hsing, Hong-Kong, and Canton.

Then ensued another month of anxious waiting, during which Dr. Hinckley, now restored to perfect health, received from Pekin a fine offer to become missionary medical director for the province of Shan-Si. It was an offer that he gladly would have accepted but for his uncertainty concerning Rob.

At length came a letter from Canton informing the anxious parents that their boy had been there a month earlier, but almost immediately had joined an expedition that was to traverse the interior from that point to Pekin in the interests of an American railway syndicate.

Again did the puzzled parents ask each other questions concerning the erratic movements of their son that neither could answer. Finally, Dr. Hinckley said:

"It is useless to worry ourselves any more about the boy, since it is evident that he has passed entirely beyond our reach. He is in God's hands, and that there is some good reason for the apparent strangeness of his actions will sooner or later be made plain. Let us be thankful that he is alive and in the same country as ourselves. Also, we now can accept that offer from Pekin, where, as it seems, we are most likely to meet him."

So the bewildered but still hopeful parents took steamer from Shanghai to Tien-Tsin and rail from there to China's capital, at that time a wonderland of mystery to the greater part of the outside world. From Pekin they travelled south to Cheng-Ting-Fu, which then was the extreme terminus of railway construction, and here Dr. Hinckley left his wife, while he should go on by horseback to Tai-Yuan, the capital of Shan-Si, and prepare their new home.

Then, almost without warning, came the terrible Boxer uprising, sweeping over the northern provinces with the fatal speed of a storm-driven prairie-fire. From every direction were heard reports of murder and outrage—some of them simple relations of actual happenings, others gross exaggerations based upon fact, and still others pure inventions, but all equally terrifying to the handful of foreigners within the walls of Cheng-Ting-Fu. A little later refugees, bearing evidence of the terrible sufferings through which they had passed, began to straggle in. Some told of the beheadings and burnings to death in Pao-Ting-Fu on the north, and others of the frightful tragedies enacted in Shan-Si on the west, by orders of the infamous governor, Yu-Hsien, credited with being the originator of the Great Sword Society, and who was the most vindictive hater of foreigners in all China. The Shan-Si refugees reported that one day in Tai-Yuan this monster personally superintended the beheading of forty-five foreigners, men, women, and little children, besides a much larger number of native Christians; and on hearing this, Mrs. Hinckley lost all hope of ever again seeing the husband who had gone to prepare a home for her in that very city. Also, she mourned for her boy, who, if he had carried out his reported intention of traversing the interior provinces to Pekin, must have been overtaken by this same all-devouring storm of wrath.

Although the southern end of the railway as far as Pao-Ting-Fu was kept open by the Chinese for the transportation of their own troops, it was reported that everything north of that point, including the telegraph-line, had been destroyed. Thus Cheng-Ting-Fu, with closed gate and surrounded by enemies, was cut off from all news of the outside world. Only rumors drifted in, and these were of such a nature that the handful of refugees facing an almost certain death in the cathedral believed themselves to be the only foreigners left alive in northern China.

Such was the state of affairs on that evening of early summer when Mrs. Hinckley, hopelessly weary of life, happened to glance from one of the cathedral windows just as a yellow-robed priest was passing along the narrow street. She turned quickly away, for, of all Chinese, the priests had been most active in persecuting foreigners, and she never saw one without thinking that he might be the murderer of either her husband or son.

An hour later the "boy" who brought in her light supper of tea and toast laid something else on the tray beside it, and disappeared without having spoken. For a minute Mrs. Hinckley did not notice the strange object, but finally it caught her eye, and she picked it up. It was a narrow strip about six inches long, cut from the dried leaf of a talipot palm, the material used instead of writing-paper in certain Buddhist temples. Characters traced on the smooth surface with a sharp stylus, afterwards are rubbed with lampblack, which brings them out in bold relief. In the present case, to Mrs. Hinckley's amazement, she found the strip of palm-leaf to be a letter written in English, and beginning, "My own dear mother!"

The poor woman uttered a stifled cry, and a blur so dimmed her eyes that for a moment she could read no more. Then it passed, and she eagerly scanned the following message, written on both sides of the slip:

"I could hardly believe my eyes when I saw you at the cathedral window. How did you get here? Where is father? I am the priest who rode past on horseback with a guard of soldiers. Am safe and on way to Pekin. They will not let me come to you, nor even leave this temple where I am spending the night under guard. I must go on at sunrise, when they will put us out of the city. Jo is with me. Perhaps I shall again pass window, so please stand in same place on chance. I will come back to you from Pekin quick as possible. Don't worry a single little bit about me, for I am all right. Your own loving Rob.

"Send an answer by the one who gives you this."

Over and over did the happy mother read this message from the boy whom she had been mourning as dead, until she knew every word of it by heart.

Then, on a leaf torn from her journal, she wrote with lead-pencil an outpouring of love, joy, and anxiety such as only a mother situated as she was could write. She begged Rob to be careful, for her sake, and warned him of the danger of going to Pekin, though she added that if his father still were alive that city would be the most likely place in which to obtain news of him. She said she should remain near the window all night for fear of missing her boy when he again passed. Then the servant came for the untouched tea-tray, looked at her inquiringly, and she only had time to sign: "Ever your own devoted mother," fold the note, and slip it into his hand ere he again left the room.

The shock of seeing his mother in that dreadful place, when he had supposed her to be safe in America, was so great that Rob had been on the point of proclaiming his amazement aloud, when Jo, always keenly on the watch for some such slip on the part of the pretended priest, checked him.

"It is but a little more to go," he said in Chinese, so that all who heard might understand him, "and then the holy one shall find a place of rest. He is very weary," added Jo to the officer of the guard, "and his vow of silence sits heavy upon him."

"Yet he does not look so old," replied the officer.

"It is true that he is well preserved, and may give us the joy of his presence for some years to come; but mere looks cannot restore to age the lost strength of youth. I pray you, therefore, find for him a place of quietness, where he may have a season of rest undisturbed."

Thus it came about that a small building of the temple to which our lads were conducted was set apart for them, and orders were given that no other person should enter it that night.

When they were alone, and Rob had explained to Jo the cause of his excitement, he added: "And now I must go to her for a long talk."

It took Jo some time to persuade his friend of the impossibility of what he proposed, and that to attempt it would only endanger all their lives, including that of his mother.

"Then," said Rob, finally convinced, "I must write, and you must somehow manage to get the letter to her."

The letter was prepared with the only materials that the temple afforded, and by the liberal use of money Jo got it sent to its destination and had the answer brought back. After that, much as Rob hated to leave his mother behind, he had the sense to realize that she probably was safer in the cathedral of Cheng-Ting-Fu just then than she would be anywhere else in north China. Also, what she had written concerning the possibility of gaining news of his father in Pekin made him more than ever desirous of reaching that city.