Part 6

"Not the slightest danger, Doc. The fact that a fellow admires a girl's looks or style doesn't necessarily mean that he has fallen in love with her. Oh, no! I have my own dreams of a trip I hope to make next year to Prince Edward Island, and if I come back to the China Coast I'll not come back alone. That's good enough for me. I admire Miss MacAllister. I think she's splendid. But falling in love with her! Not the slightest notion! Any interest I have in her is on your account."

"I'm sorry, Mac. I shouldn't have said what I did. I knew that you were as true as steel."

"It's all right, doctor. I've been jollying you too much. And the way she acts sometimes makes it a little hard to bear. But you'll win out in the end."

"I do not know about that," said Sinclair, somewhat gloomily. "The way she treated me last night did not look much like it."

"Never mind that. She would not treat you like that if she were not taking more interest in you than in any one else at present. She doesn't know just what is the matter with herself. That is the way she is taking to work it off. She'll change after a bit."

"I'll yield to your superior knowledge of the ways of women," said the doctor, with a laugh which had but little mirth in it. "It may be all right. Just the same, it doesn't look good to me.... Here comes Sergeant Gorman. I had better see my passports, and get him to instruct A Hoa what is to be done when we get to Taipeh."

Opening the packet, he found copies of passports in English, French, and Chinese. One addressed to the French Commander read:

"HER BRITANNIC MAJESTY'S CONSULATE, "TAMSUI, August 6th, 1884.

"_To the Officer in Chief Command of the French Forces at Keelung_:

"The bearer of this paper, Doctor Donald Sinclair, a British subject, has volunteered his services as a medical doctor to the sick and wounded of the Chinese army, at present engaged before Keelung. He will observe strict neutrality, and will be equally ready to perform humane offices and render skilled medical and surgical assistance to any of the French troops, should circumstances bring that within his power. Wherefore I, the undersigned consul for Great Britain at Tamsui, do beg the Officer in Command of the French Forces at Keelung, to accord to the said Doctor Donald Sinclair protection and liberty to perform his offices of mercy, in accordance with the terms of the Geneva Convention. He will be accompanied by one European assistant, likewise a British subject, Sergeant John Gorman, and by one or more Chinese assistants, all wearing the badge of the Red Cross.

"H. R. L. BEAUCHAMP, "Her Britannic Majesty's Consul."

Passports of a similar tenor were addressed to the Chinese authorities.

"Sergeant Gorman, you know Chinese. Tell A Hoa what we want him to do when we get to Taipeh. He is to get these vised and, if possible, to get a special permit from the governor. It will carry more weight than the passports."

"Very good, sir! I'll make him understand."

Sergeant Gorman's mastery of the language was not perfect. But the Chinese preacher required little instruction. He knew better than either Sinclair or the sergeant what should be done. Before becoming a Christian he had been private secretary to a mandarin in an official position at Pekin. He had travelled much on the mainland as well as in Formosa, and was well acquainted with official procedure both in peace and in war. Scarcely had Sergeant Gorman begun his explanations when his "Ho! ... Ho! ... An-ni ho! ... Put-tsi ho!" (Good! good! That's good! Very good!) showed that he fully understood what was expected of him.

*IX*

*A QUIET LIFE*

Meanwhile McLeod and Sinclair were studying the sergeant. He was a man of perhaps forty-five years, but could pass for much younger. Five feet eight or nine inches in height, he was broad-shouldered and sturdily built. No matter where he might be or how dressed, there could be no mistaking that he had been a soldier. Long military training spoke in every movement. His thick hair was a red-brown, with the emphasis on the red. So was his heavy, fierce-looking moustache. So were his bristling eyebrows. So were his eyes. His face, save where it was ordinarily covered by the band of his sun-helmet, was pretty nearly the same shade.

He talked rapidly; very rapidly; so rapidly that his words often stumbled over one another in their eagerness to get out, until he actually stuttered. When he tried, he spoke English with just enough Irish accent to make it sweet on his tongue. But when he didn't try, and that was most of the time, the brogue was rich and thick. Nearly always he had the peculiarly Irish trick of repeating the last words of a closing sentence.

"How long has Gorman been here?" asked Sinclair in a low tone.

"Only a couple of months," replied McLeod. "Came over with us from Amoy."

"How does it come that a sergeant with his record of service should end up by being consulate constable in an out-of-the-way corner like Tamsui?"

"Search me! I can't tell you."

"Probably the old story of a man who has served his Queen and country well and then been dropped, to live or die wherever he may chance to fall."

"Yes, and none of the blockheads who have commanded him have sense enough to know how much good service they could get out of a man like that, if they would only give him a chance to rise. Instead they turn him adrift like a worn-out horse."

"Perhaps he has a history behind him. It seems to me that most men out here, except you and I, Mac, have histories. Here he comes. Perhaps he will talk."

The sergeant crossed the little deck, stood at attention, and saluted:

"I have the honour to report, sir, that I have given the Chinese, A Hoa, the instructions you commanded and that he seems to understand them very well, sir."

"Very good, sergeant. There is nothing further to be done until we reach Twatutia. Be seated."

"Thank you, sir."

"By the way, sergeant, I notice by the passport that your name is John Gorman."

"It is, sir."

"I used to know a Sergeant John Gorman on the police force in Kingston, Canada. They say that, when the college boys were out on a frolic and raising cain, he could do more to keep them within bounds with a smile and a bit of blarney than all the rest of the force could do with their batons."

"Och, but he'll be from Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky, in County Cork. All the people there are Gormans, an' most of thim are John Gormans. An' as for the shmile, all the Gormans have it. They get it whin they're childer, sayin' the name of their native place. An' whin they grow up, no matther where they go, the shmile wan't come off--the divil a bit will it come off."

"You're right there, sergeant," said McLeod. "You have the smile, sure enough. But it never shows to best advantage until you say the name of the place where you were born. What's this it is, again?"

"Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky."

"Exactly! That's a name to make any one smile."

"Och, Misther McLeod, but you shud have seen it on me whin I furst left the ould place. Me face was all shmile. But on the Afghan border wan day, an ould black-face of a Pathan--may the divil fly away wid him!--tuk a pot shot at me from betune two rocks. He got me through the two cheeks of me, an' siv'ral of me teeth. After the wounds healed up I never had me natural shmile ag'in,--wud you bel'ave me I niver was able to shmile natural ag'in."

"Did you get back at him at all?" inquired McLeod.

"That's jist what was hurtin' me. For while I was spittin' out me teeth, an' in no condishun to take aim, the onderhanded, tricherous Afghan was dodgin' away through the rocks. But me next in file in the Munsters, he was a Scotchman from Aberdeen got a squint of him as he bint double, goin' round the corner of a pricipice, an' be the blissin' of Hiven, took a chip off the stern works of him--a mortial good shot, for the target he hit was the only part in sight."

"But how did you know that he was hit?" asked McLeod. "Did you take him prisoner?"

"Divil a bit! A wounded Pathan can crawl loike a wounded snake. But eighteen months afterwards I was up in the hills, wan of an escort of the p'ace envoys. The very first day wan of the native policemen pointed out an ould black-face among the chiefs an' tould me that was the man that put the bullet through me two cheeks. An' be the powers, that ould haythen cud no more sit down than I cud shmile. The shot of me next in file had spoiled the joint in the middle of him. It was the furst rale comfort that had come to me since the day I was shot. I began to laugh whin I saw him shtandin' up shtiff as a ramrod whin the others sat; or lyin' on his back, shtraight as a yardstick whin the rest were reclinin'-loike on the divans. The more I thought of it, the more I laughed, an' the shmile of the Gormans began to come back to me little by little. But I'll niver have the shmile ag'in that I had in Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky--sure as I'm livin', I'll niver shmile ag'in as I used to whin I left Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky."

"How did you come to leave Sleeahtballymack-what-a-ghalicky?" inquired Sinclair.

"Shure, docther, an' it wasn't me own doin'. To the best of me ricolliction it was the doin' of Providence, wid a bit of help from the priests, an' me father, an' the government, an' the recruitin' sergeant thrown in."

"How did they all come to the help of Providence?" asked the doctor.

"Faix, but you're of an inquirin' turn of moind, docther; beggin' your pardon for makin' so bould as to tell you that same."

"It's all right, sergeant. Go on."

"Well, docther, to make a long story short, it began this way. Me father was an indepindint farmer, wid a bit of land right forninst the dure of the church at Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky, an' a hundred pounds in a bank in Cork. He was gittin' on in years. Me mother was dead, an' I was the only choild. What does me father do but tips an' wills his land to the Church for masses, me to be a priest, an' the money to the college that was to educate me. You'll onderstand that the land an' the money were not to be paid over till me father was dead an' done wid thim, d'ye see? But I was to go to school at wanst to be trained for a priest, d'ye onderstand?"

"Yes, I see the plan."

"Well, widout even so much as sayin' 'by your l'ave,' they packed me off to the Classical School in Skibbereen, to learn Latin an' the other dead-an'-gone languages. To make a long story short, it didn't agree wid me, an' I didn't agree wid it. It wasn't the languages. I cud get thim all right. It was this business of bein' a priest. Moind ye, I'm not sayin' annything ag'in the Church. I was born a Catholic, an' I'll die a Catholic. But bein' a priest wint ag'in me grain. To repeat ould dead prayers for dead people, in dead languages, which nobody prisint but the blissed Lord Himself cud onderstand, an He tired of hearin' thim centuries before you were born; to hear ould wives confessin' their sins which they shudn't tell to anny man, barrin' another ould wife loike thimselves; to live on the fat of the land while the Paddies an' Dinnies an' Mickies were livin' on pitaties an' salt, wid now an' ag'in a taste of butthermilk--it didn't seem to me givin' value for the money received.

"An' thin I was gettin' to be a bit of a gossoon, an' sometoimes I was afther thinkin' of me farm at Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky, which wasn't moine ayther, for it was willed to the Church. They often tould me that whin I was a priest I wud have no use for the farm. They said that a half-acre of purgatory was worth more to a priest than the best two-hundred-acre farm in County Cork. But they all had their well-cultivated garden plots in purgatory, an' bedad but they wanted me farm as well--d'ye moind. They were afther me farm in County Cork as well.

"Not to be wearyin' you wid the details of me autybiography, the longer I was at it the less I loiked it, an' the more I had differences of opinion wid the priests of the college, 'speshully wid the wan they called the Prefect of Discipline, which is the polite name for the Wallopin' Masther. Jist as I was gettin' tired of the b'atin's, an' was thinkin' of runnin' away an' joinin' the navy for the sake of a quiet loife, the English Government came to the assistance of Providence, an' betune the two they got me out of bein' a priest--thanks to the government an' the Hivenly Lord, I got out of bein' a priest."

"How in the world did the government come to interfere with your course in the college?" inquired Sinclair.

"The government did not interfere directly, as you moight say. It didn't make what you moight call a frontal attack. It jist made a kind of divarshun in the rear. It appointed me father a Jay Pay."

"A Jay Pay!" exclaimed McLeod. "What kind of a pay is that?"

"Why, Misther McLeod, it's a Jay Pay, jist. A Justice of the P'ace for the District of West Cork."

"Oh, I understand!"

"Yes, sir! It appointed me father a Jay Pay for West Cork. An', docther, did you ever hear of annything foolisher in your loife? To appoint a man a Jay Pay who was sixty-foive years ould, foive fut two inches high, weighed only seven stone, and had never learned how to use the two hands of him or the proper twisht to give a blackthorn? Wud you tell me now, fwhat was the use of makin' a Justice of the P'ace in West Cork out of a little ould man who cud nayther use his hands nor twirl a shillelagh?"

"It does appear unreasonable."

"Onreasonable? Begorra, it was wurrse than that. There was no sinse to it. An' anny man that knows West Cork will tell you the same. But the ways of the governmint are loike the ways of Providence, past foinding out. Anny way, it meant that me course for the priesthood was brought to a speedy conclusion.

"How?"

"Well, it was this way. Me father was appointed a Jay Pay, wid headquarters at Bantry. The very furst case he troied was wan of assault committed by Micky Murphy on Paddy O'Leary whin he was seein' Biddy O'Hea home afther mass. They were pretty well matched, and wan got as much damage as the other. So me father jist bound both of thim over to kape the p'ace. Wud you belave me, just to show th'ir contimpt for the law an' for a little ould man loike that bein' made a Jay Pay, by common consult they fought it out forninst the very dure of his court, while the local consthables held their coats an' Biddy O'Hea was referee.

"Thin was me chanst. Before that me father wud hear nothin' for me but bein' a priest. Now he appointed me a speshull consthable. He wanted me to go to Dublin an' take some lessons wid me hands an' wid a shtick from a profissor of the science. I tould him that it was quite unnecessary. Anny likely gossoon of eighteen or nineteen who had spint three years contindin' wid the Wallopin' Masther of that school in Skibbereen had all the science he was likely to need as a speshull consthable. An' be the powers, me father had no reason to repint of his choice. There was no more contimpt shown for the law whin he held court--shure as the saints are in hiven, niver a wan showed anny more contimpt of court in West Court, but he was sorry for the day he was born.

"Not to be wearyin' you wid particulars, this wint along for about three years. Thin me father got too feeble to do the wurrk, an' the governmint appointed an associate Jay Pay. That was the ind of me service as a speshull consthable. The new Jay Pay stood six fut three, an' weighed two hundred an' fifty pounds. I was out of a job.

"But there was no lack of divarshun. From Mullaghareirk to Ballingurreen, from Clonakilty to Ballydehob, from Musheramore to Teampeall-na-bo'ct, every Rory of the Hills that had iver been in me father's court, or iver had a relation there, was lyin' for me wid his shillelagh, an' sometimes an ould rusty fowlin'-piece. It wasn't healthy for me in West Cork anny more. The priests cud have made it safe enough. But I had wanst studied to be a priest, an' had continded wid the Prefect of Discipline, d'ye see? An' thin there was the hundred pounds in the bank in Cork, an' the farm forninst the dure of the church in Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky, d'ye moind? They wud be surer if I was out of the way. So, for the sake of a quiet loife, I tuk the Queen's shillin' an' went away to the wars--God pardon me if I'm not speakin' the truth, it was for a quiet loife I left West Cork, an' was shipped out wid the Munsters to the wars in Indy."

"Did you ever see your father again?"

"Niver! He doied a twelvemonth after I left for Indy."

"Have you ever been back to see the old place where you were born?"

"Wanst. Tin years afther I enlisted, I got l'ave an' wint back from Indy."

"And the farm----?"

"It was still there. They hadn't moved it."

"Who had it?"

"The priests."

"Was the money still in the bank in Cork?"

"Divil a bit!"

"Did you inquire?"

"I did."

"What did they tell you?"

"They tould me that they had expinded the hundred pounds, an' the value of the farm, an' a little more in masses an' prayers to get me father out of purgatory. They said that I was a bit in their debt, an' that they would need a trifle yet for they hadn't got him quite free. I asked thim if that was God's truth they were speakin'. They tould me that it was. 'Thin,' says I, 'if you know so much of what's goin' on in purgatory, wud you jist give me father a message from me? Jist tell him to ask the Blissed Lord to open the dure and let him out, an' I'll stake me sowl's salvation on it that the Lord will do it at wanst, and niver ask him for a farm or a hundred pounds in the bank. For me father was a man that niver willingly hurted a chicken.' An' wid that I left them wid me farm an' the hundred pounds. But it's many a cintury me father will be restin' on the beds of flowers in glory before the fires of purgatory will have burned that farm an' the hundred pounds out of the sowls of the black dragoons who defrauded me of me inheritance. An' that's God's truth I'm tellin' you. An' moind ye, it's a Catholic I was born and a Catholic I intind to die."

For a time the three white men sat in silence, each busy with his own thoughts. The broad river streamed past them, gleaming in the sun, bearing its fleet of fishing boats and market boats and here and there a cargo boat, with big mat sails, dropping down with the current and tide, laden with tea or sugar or camphor or coal. The low green shores were quick with the life of a dense population. Beyond these the blue and purple hills rose and stretched away in wavy lines of colour till the far-off lofty peaks blended with the sky.

Dr. Sinclair turned from the natural scenery to look again at the Irish soldier who was to be his companion in the new and unaccustomed scenes which lay before him. Sergeant Gorman was looking out over river and plain and mountain. But his eyes were those of one who did not see. There was a far-away look in them. Dreams slept in their red-brown depths. He interested Sinclair strangely. He was a rare specimen in the doctor's field of research, human kind. He wanted to know more of him.

"You have put in most of your service in the Far East, Sergeant Gorman?" he said.

"I have, sir. All except two years spint at the Cape."

"Mostly in India?"

"Mostly, wid spells at Aden and in Burmah. Thin I was sint to Hong-Kong, where I picked up the pidgin. I put in my last years of service in the Straits, where I learned a bit of the lingo spoken here. At the Straits all the wurrk is done by Chinese from Amoy, the same people as these in Formosa. Thin, as there was nothing for a time-expired soldier to do, an' the climate was too hot for the wife an' childer, I came north to Amoy an' tuk service ag'in wid some more has-beens, to guard the consulate an' do a bit of police wurrk in the Settlement durin' the trouble wid the French. But, begorra, it was out of the fryin'-pan into the fire."

"How was that?"

"Me mother-in-law came to live wid us."

"That was hard lines," said McLeod sympathetically.

"Faith, an' if you'd known her you'd say that from the heart."

"How long did you stand it?

"Six weeks."

"And then----?"

"Thin I heard that the French were beloike to kick up a shindy in Formosa. So for the sake of a quiet loife I exchanged to Tamsui. An' here I am off to the wars ag'in an' enjoyin' p'ace an' happiness--by the blissin' of Hiven, enjoyin' p'ace an happiness."

*X*

*GLORIOUS WAR*

The launch had reached the landing-place at Twatutia. The little party stepped ashore. A parting grasp of the hand from McLeod, and Dr. Sinclair, Sergeant Gorman, A Hoa and the student guide stepped into chairs, to be borne to the governor's yamen in the adjoining walled city of Taipeh.

The governor was not at home. He had already left for Keelung to take personal charge of the defences. But the deputy he had left in Taipeh seemed to have imbibed some of the active and progressive spirit of Liu Ming-chuan. He read a Chinese copy of the passports, listened carefully to A Hoa's courteous and polished explanations, affixed the official seals, and wrote a brief order to all officials, civil and military, to extend all courtesy and afford every assistance to the distinguished foreigners who were volunteering their services to the Chinese forces. There were none of the old-time red-tape evasions and delays of Chinese officialdom. He was another of the pioneers of a new China.

A Hoa returned to Tamsui, having fulfilled his commission. The rest pushed on towards the camp at Loan-Loan.

Before they left the city they met in the streets many natives who were plainly refugees from Keelung and the vicinity. Once outside the walls, they saw the narrow road as it wound and zigzagged through the rice-fields, dotted with town and country people, hurrying as best they could towards the capital for safety. The farther they advanced the denser grew the stream of fugitives.

The rice-fields were left behind with the plain near Taipeh. The road began to pass through a more and more mountainous region. It grew narrower and narrower, until it was a mere foot-path, sometimes threading the bottom of a ravine and sometimes clinging precariously to the face of a hill which was almost a precipice; now dropping down to the very margin of the river or fording a tributary stream, and now far up on a mountain side. And all the way, like a huge, writhing, variegated snake, appearing on the hillsides and open spaces, disappearing in the ravines, in the long grass or groves of bamboos, that endless line of refugees wound its slow length along.

It is about twenty miles from Taipeh to Keelung. After the first ten miles the throng of fugitives became so dense that it was very difficult for the chairs to proceed. Honest fathers of families laden with all they could carry of their poor household possessions; rascally banditti and sneak thieves taking advantage of the general disorder and distress to loot their neighbours' deserted houses, and even to snatch from the hands or shoulders of the defenceless the few valuables they were trying to save; women hobbling along on their little feet with infants strapped to their backs, and older children, whom they were ill-able to help, clinging to their hands; maidens terror-stricken by the tales of the imaginary atrocities of the foreign devils, and scarcely less afraid of the real atrocities of their own rascally fellow-countrymen, especially of many of the braves from the mainland.