"There is then no resource but to turn the girl into the street," said Big Sam decisively. "I can not risk my plans merely to secure her safety."
"Nor your life," I retorted.
"Oh, a man will die when he dies. Life, death, riches, poverty–they are man's fate. But my plans–they are much to me and my people."
Big Sam then pulled a cord that swung behind him. The door opened and the Chinese girl, frightened and tearful, was pushed in.
"The decision is for you, Mr. Hampden," he said.
I looked upon her and thought what the decision meant to her.
"Does she go with you, or with the tongs?" he asked.
"I have decided. I will take her," I said with sudden resolution.
"On the conditions I mentioned this morning?"
"It is late to bargain," said I.
"On the contrary," he said, "it is necessary. It is only with these conditions of compromise that I can hope to make my peace with the tongs."
"You have my promise," I said, rising.
"One moment," said Big Sam. "I believe you are a brave man, Mr. Hampden."
"I really don't know," I replied.
"At least you do not mind hearing a few revolver shots?"
"Not at all."
"They will serve to amuse some of our friends who are on the watch."
The implied information that we were spied upon by sentinels of the tongs startled me for a moment, though I might have known that they would not neglect so obvious a precaution.
"If you and your friend wouldn't mind breaking a window and smashing something and firing a shot or two yourselves and making a good deal of noise before you carry off the girl, it would oblige me."
"Why should we attract so much attention? Is it not better to slip out quietly?"
"Do you think to avoid the eyes that are watching?" said Big Sain. "The bold course is the best. We make sound as of a fight. The watchers of the two tongs will each believe that the other has made an attack. They will hasten to the meeting places to summon help. For a minute the road will be clear. Then you must run for it."
This was more of an enterprise than I had bargained for, and if I had had time to think I should have got out of Big Sam's net and left him to carry out his plans through some other agency. But I did not stop to reflect and acted at the urging of the wily Oriental.
"Take the girl," he said, and spoke to her in brief command. "My men will assist you to disturb things down-stairs."
I picked my way down the steps, and the soft clack of the Chinese shoe sounded behind me as the girl followed. Big Sam accompanied me to the lower floor, and, after making sure that our hack was where we had left it, he gave orders to his men. I hastily explained the situation to Mr. Baldwin.
"Ah–a comedy performance," he said with affected carelessness. But I could see that he cursed himself for a fool for being drawn into the affair.
"Draw your revolver, but don't fire more than one shot," I said.
Big Sam gave a shout, and in an instant the place was filled with a medley of voices raised in tones of anger and alarm. A table was overturned, boxes were flung about, cries of men rose, a dozen revolver shots followed in quick succession, a woman's scream pierced the air, and there was an excellent imitation of a highbinder affray on a small scale. I fired one shot into the breast of a mandarin, whose painted outlines ornamented a chest, and providently reserved the rest of my bullets for possible need. Then two of the Chinese lifted a heavy box and flung it at the closed doors. There was a crash of wood, a jingle of breaking glass, and the door fell outward.
"Well, I should judge it was time to go," said Mr. Baldwin.
"Come on," I said, seizing the Chinese girl. And we started on the run for the hack as the lights were extinguished.
We had just reached it when two or three more shots were fired and a bullet sang uncomfortably close to my head.
"In there, quick!" I said to Mr. Baldwin, as I lifted the girl to her seat "This place is getting too hot for us."
"Aren't you coming in?" he asked, with a trace of anxiety in his tone.
"No. I'll ride with the driver." I slammed the door and was climbing to the box when two breathless Chinese ran to the side of the hack and wrenched open the door with angry exclamations. There was a howl as one of them staggered back from a blow from Mr. Baldwin's revolver. I gave the other a kick alongside the head that sent him in a heap on his fellow.
It was all done in a second.
"Now!" I said to the driver; and with a cut at his horses we dashed away as cries and shouts and sounds of police whistles began to rise behind us.
As we lurched around the corner of Sacramento Street, I could see three policemen turning into Waverly Place from Clay Street and hurrying to the scene of disturbance. A crowd of shouting Chinese had already gathered about the entrance to Big Sam's store, and a man was waving his arm and pointing after us, while half a dozen Chinese had started on the run in pursuit. Then, the corner turned, the sight was shut out, and we went down the street on the flying gallop.
We slackened speed as we neared Kearny Street, for a policeman stood on the corner. If the sounds of battle had reached him he must certainly have suspected and stopped us. But if he heard anything of the uproar we had raised he had doubtless placed it to the credit of the leather-lunged orator and his clamorous hearers who held forth but a block away. He scarce looked at us, and we swung into Kearny Street on a swift trot, and were soon in the quiet precincts of the shopping district.
The hackman had been silent, heeding only my directions; but now he said:
"I don't know what you've been a-doin', an' it's none of my business. But I'll want pay for this night's work."
"Make yourself easy," I replied. "We've done nothing against the law."
"Oh, it's not the law I'm botherin' about. There's little law for a Chaynese; an' it's not me that would be hollerin' murther if you've sent a dozen of 'em to sup with the divil to-night. But you might have damaged the hack, an' ye'll pay for that."
I promised him a liberal reward, and we rolled rapidly out Sutter Street to Van Ness Avenue, and in a few minutes more had drawn up before Wharton Kendrick's house.
"I am afraid," said Mr. Baldwin as I opened the door to the hack, "that our charge is hurt. She has been groaning for a while, and now I think she has fainted."
My nerves had served me without flinching through the dangers of the escape. But at the apprehension that all our efforts had been in vain, and that death, not we, had been the rescuer, I fell a-trembling.
"I hope not," I cried. "Perhaps she is only scared. Let us carry her into the house."
As I put my hand to the girl, however, my fears received a fresh provocation, for the back of her dress was wet with the sticky wetness of coagulating blood. We lifted her between us, and carried her up the steps. We had scarce reached the upper landing when the door was flung open, and Miss Kendrick peered out.
"Have you brought her?" she cried.
"She is here," I replied, "but–"
"Oh, what is the matter?" interrupted Miss Kendrick in a voice of alarm, as she saw that we carried a senseless burden.
"She is hurt," I explained as we laid our charge down upon a hall seat. "There was a row over her, and she got one of the bullets that was meant for us."
Miss Kendrick grew white, and I looked to see her follow the Chinese girl by falling in a faint. But her small figure straightened as though in rebound from a physical shock, and in a moment she was directing servants to carry the girl to the room that had been prepared for her, ordering hot water, hot blankets, lint and bandages, and sending me on the run for the nearest doctor.
CHAPTER