Chapter 40

A light spring rain was drizzling down when Peter ordered four rickshaws of the proud Sikh who stood guard over the porte cochère of the Astor House. Long bright knives of light slithered across the wet pavement from the sharp arc lights on the Soochow bridge. The ghostly superstructure of a large and silent junk was thrown in silhouette against the yellow glow of a watchman's shanty across the dark canal, as it moved slowly in the current toward the Yellow Sea.

It was a desolate night. The streets were deserted except for an occasional rickshaw with some mysterious bundled passenger, the footfalls of the coolies sounding with a faint squashing as of drenched sandals, slimy with the heavy sludge of the back-village streets. The world was lonely and awash.

Peter busied himself with Peggy's comfort when the first rickshaw, dripping and wet, rattled up. He drew the waterproof robe up under her chin and fastened the loops, then tucked it in under her feet. Her cheeks were glowing with the pink of her excitement.

Anthony meanwhile gave similar attention to the other twin.

Peter glanced at his watch as they climbed in. He wondered how Anthony might be taking his first and relatively unimportant lap of their adventure, and he instructed his coolie, in "pidgin," to drop behind.

Clear gray eyes shone with a confident reassurance.

"You mustn't hit too hard, and be careful if you shoot your revolver to discharge it in the air. At close range even the wads from the blank cartridges are rather deadly."

Anthony's clear voice came across to him: "Of course."

They stopped at length before the rambling structure which was the abode of Romola Borria. The lamp was extinguished, probably beaten out long before by the pelting rain. Only a pale glow emanated from the place, this from a tiny upstairs window, covered over with oiled paper, and the only sounds were the ceaseless drip of the rain and the low gibberings of the coolies as they examined the coins given them in the greasy light of the rickshaw lanterns.

Peggy, slipping her arm through Peter's and hugging him close to her, trembled with the excitement of anticipation.

"We must not be separated," he warned them in a whisper. "Whatever happens--Peggy and Helen--stand close to us. In case of trouble, each of you stand behind whichever of us is nearest. Don't scream. Don't show any money. Peggy, put your pocketbook in your shirt-waist. Now--ready?"

"Yes!" came the threefold whispering chorus.

He raised his knuckles, and brought them down sharply--three times rapidly, twice slowly. Silence followed, the bristling silence of an aroused house.

Slowly the door gave way, and a villainous-looking old Chinese in black beckoned with a long snake-like finger for them to enter.

Only two candles now were burning on the lacquered rail in the smoky corridor. Curtains at the rear parted; there was a sweep of heavy silken garments, and a white-faced and beautiful woman made her way toward them.

Deft employment of the make-up pot and painstaking searchings through a great number of trunks had blended a picture that was all but melodramatic.

Romola Borria's wonderful dark hair was arranged in a great heap which sloped backward from her head. Her face was chalk white, from a bath in rice powder; her fine lips were curled in the most sinister of smiles; and her eyes glowed with a splendid abandon. She looked wicked; she radiated cruelty.

And the twins gasped in sweet horror. It is probable that twin trickles of icy excitement chased up and down their twin spines. Anthony gaped, and his gray eyes expressed an unbounded infatuation.

With a gracious stealth she moved beyond them, not once lowering her magnificent eyes, and shot a huge brass bolt in the door.

They formed an expectant, a worshipful semicircle. In a low voice Peter made the introductions, dwelling at fastidious length upon the tremendous villainy of this slender sorceress, who swept him all the time with a proud and disdainful fire. She nodded stiffly at intervals.

"The Princess Meng Da Tlang has a word to say to you." He bowed profoundly.

"It is only this," said Romola Borria in tones as rich as the Kyoto temple gong, "what you have thus far seen, and what you are about to gaze upon, must always--forever--remain a secret within your hearts. Follow me." Romola, or the Princess Meng Da Tlang, floated down the dim corridor with a further silken rustle of skirts, and drew back the curtain at the far end.

The quartette filed into a large and lofty room, flickering under the pallid flames of candles. The wax dripping from some of these hung like icicles or stalactites from the shallow bronze cups, and they illuminated a scene that was bizarre.

The walls were burdened with heavy rugs which responded with a waxen sheen to the mystic light of the candles, and they were of the sombre hues of the China that passed its zenith many centuries ago. They served to give this place a solemn air of vast dignity and richness.

Along the inner wall, placed so that it squarely commanded the doorway, grinned a huge green image of Buddha, surrounded by a clutter of brass candlesticks and mounted on a splendid throne of brass filigree underneath which red flames were burning.

The odor of costly incense was heavy and sweet, the smoke from a brazier arising in a thin, motionless blue spar which, when it had climbed up through the air for a distance of about four feet, broke into a sort of turquoise fan and this drifted on up to the ceiling in heavy wisps. The incense pot was very old, of black lacquer and brass, greened with blotches of erosion.

And above the green image of Buddha, before which the Princess Meng Da Tlang was now kneeling and moaning in a faint voice, reposed a very realistic skull and cross-bones. Across the forehead of this hideous reminder of the hereafter was a deep green notch, attesting in all probability to the cause of the luckless owner's death.

"Please be seated--there," Romola requested.

Her graceful, ivory-white arm indicated with a queenly gesture a heavily carved ebony bench, and her guests filed expectantly to this seat.

Peggy, with a long sigh, dragged Peter into the corner. "I'm almost scared. Oh, oh, isn't this simply romantic!" she whispered.

Helen and Anthony gravely occupied the space on the other side of them. The Princess Meng Da Tlang was moving gracefully toward the doorway through which they had entered.

"I--I'm really a little afraid!" whispered Peggy, with her lips so close to Peter's ear that he could feel her warm breath against his neck. "Put your arms around me--please!" Peter slipped his arm behind her and around her. He squeezed her. "Oh," sighed Peggy, "this is grand!"

Helen gave her a sidelong look of surprise. "Peggy, I think you're hardly discreet."

"Let me die while I'm happy!" grinned Peggy. She turned a wistful face to Peter. "Did you ever put your arm around another woman before?" she whispered.

"Heaven forbid!" groaned Peter. "Don't I act like an amateur?"

"No; you don't!"

Romola was holding back the curtains while a troop of four men, muddy and wet, as if from long travel, moved silently into the large room.

"Mongolian smugglers," Peter whispered.

The four large men crossed the room with dignified tread, depositing four small bundles wrapped in blue silk at the altar of Buddha. Then they removed straw-matting rainproofs which dangled from their broad shoulders to their muddy sandals. They were garbed in black silk and fastened at the belt of each was a kris, curved and flashing where the golden candle light skimmed along the whetted steel.

After depositing their slight burdens they bowed low before the altar, muttered deep in their throats, arose and salaamed gravely, until the four pigtails flapped on the heavy blue rug at Romola's bare feet. She wore no sandals, which was probably the custom among pirate princesses. When the men were gone, Romola drew back a rug which hung close to the altar, revealing a small cupboard flush with the wall. Even Anthony looked at the black door and the brass hasp with his gray eyes round in wonder and interest.

After disposing of the four silken parcels, Romola addressed them in a mysterious voice: "Those packages contain gems; diamonds, rubies, pearls from the Punjab, from Bengali, from Burma."

"Can we see them?" pleaded Helen in rapt tones.

"Aw, please!" inserted Peggy in an angelic whisper.

Romola raised both of her hands as if in horror. "They would tempt even a saint," she muttered.

"Be careful," warned Peter, laying his lips to Peggy's pink ear, "the princess has a terrible temper. She has been known to strangle a man for less than that!"

"I don't believe it!" retorted Peggy. "I think the princess is just too sweet for anything."

Romola gave Peter a look of indolent inquiry. She arose abruptly.

"You must have some of my spiced wine. It is really delicious. _P'êng-yu_ Moore, we won't bother the servants; won't you help me?"

Peggy folded her hands demurely in her lap. "I hope it isn't intoxicating," she murmured.

Romola had moved graciously across the room, where in a bronze jardinière protruded the dusty, slender necks of tall bottles. She knelt before this. "Nearer," she whispered, as he followed suit. "Peter, tell me----"

"Yes, Romola?"

"What does this little girl mean to you?"

Peggy's clear voice sounded: "Peter, my throat is dusty!"

"In a minute, Peggy," he called back. Lowering his voice again: "She's merely a child. But why----"

"Peter, I've gone to more trouble to-night than you realize, perhaps----"

"What do you want me to do?"

"I want you to stop making love to that innocent child."

The innocent child's sweet voice was clamoring again. "Peter, the Sahara Desert is a flowing river compared with my throat!"

"All right, Peggy; in a minute."

"You said once that you--loved me."

"I still stand by my guns. But I don't love any one now. You're a temptress, Romola. Why, you are a princess! I never saw you more beautiful than to-night!"

"Peter, can't you realize what a dreary life I've led since that night you ran away from me in Hong Kong? Won't you--for me--because I want it--because I want _you_--reconsider, won't you stop, and think, and----"

"We're getting back to forbidden grounds, Romola."

"Oh, God! I know, I know! But what is there left in my life? Why, what is there left in yours? Perhaps you are the best operator on the whole Pacific Ocean; you've had that reputation now--how long--five years? But it is aimless! Where are you drifting? What will become of you as the years pass? You must be nearly thirty now, Peter. I? I am younger, but I have suffered more. The only happiness I have known has been with you."

Peggy's voice became petulant. "Peter, is that cork _awfully_ obstinate?"

"In a minute," he said absently.

"Do you remember those wonderful days and evenings we spent together on the Java Sea, on the old _Persian Gulf_? Do you remember those evenings, Peter, under the moon and the Southern Cross?"

"I remember a great deal of treachery!"

"But there is to be no more treachery," she said passionately. "Think, Peter, think! You are penniless--I have only a little money; it will not last long. What follows? Do you know what happens to white women when they are stranded, penniless, friendless, in this country?" She shivered. "And it would be such a simple thing to do---to go with me--to him. We would be together forever then--you and I! Tibet! The Punjab! The merchant's trail into Bengal! You and I with our caravan--in the blue foot-hills!"

"I'm sorry," confessed Peter sadly.

Romola hung her head with a bitter sigh.

Peggy pitched her voice: "Smash the neck, Peter; I don't mind a little broken glass!"

Romola was pushing two silver cups along the floor to him.

He spilled an amount of the sparkling golden liquid on the carpet, where it formed a dark, round stain. With slightly unsteady hands he conveyed the cups across the room, and Peggy, without another word, following a rather vexed: "Thank you, m'lord," emptied the cup in a single swallow. She licked her lips daintily, and her eyes were sparkling.

As Peter moved into the seat beside her, he saw the curtain over the doorway slowly drawn back by an unseen hand. He looked smilingly toward Romola, and her eyes were fixed on the moving curtain, her face rigid in surprise and concern. The thing seemed to puzzle her.

White metal flashed coldly. A lean hand and arm appeared, and a short, fat knife, the haft sparkling with drops that resembled blood, was projected into the room, point down, quivering, in the wood, not five feet from Romola's lacquered bench!