CHAPTER XV
A RIPPLE OF TROUBLE
The brawling of many voices filled the air as I ran down the stairs, spurred by curiosity and by a vague, subconscious misgiving that the event was of more than impersonal interest. When I reached the entrance the circling crowd was halted in a mass of struggling men, and the hoarse roar that issued from it vibrated with the indefinable yet definite thrill of savage anger. Police whistles were blowing, men were running from all directions to get sight of the struggle, blows given and taken could be heard amid sounds of curses and exclamations of pain, and the centers of disturbance became pyramids of squirming, struggling mankind.
As I reached the street, Parks burst out of the crowd, his hat gone, his long hair tumbled in aggressive disorder, his face flushed, and his clothing bearing evidences of his violent passage through the mob. Behind him came Seabert, whom I knew for a member of the Council of Nine. Between them they dragged and pushed an old man, white-faced, frightened, who looked in helpless amazement on the turbulence about him. The old man's face stirred vague reminiscence of the familiar, but for the moment I could not trace these promptings of memory to their source.
"Here!" cried Parks, as they burst out of the struggling circle and flung their burden into the hands of a knot of men who stood by an express-wagon near at hand, "get him down to Number Two."
As the old man was sent staggering forward, helpless, trembling, perplexed, the men circled around him, lifted him in their arms, and in a moment had climbed into the wagon and were going on a gallop down California Street.
It had all been done in the time I had taken to pass from the door of the office building to the edge of the sidewalk. I pushed into the roadway and hailed Parks by name. He had snatched a hat from one of the men who climbed into the wagon, and was hastily removing the signs of conflict from his dress.
"What's the matter here?" I cried, when I saw that he recognized me.
"Matter!" he cried. "Matter enough! There has been an interference with the natural right of a man to present his grievance to his fellow-man. It has been properly resented."
"I don't understand you," I said. "Who was the old man you rescued from the mob?"
Parks looked at me in surprise. "Rescued from the mob!" he exclaimed. "Why, the mob–but wait a minute, and I'll tell you about it."
He turned as he spoke.
"Stop that fighting!" he shouted. And at his word a score of men lent their efforts to the task of separating the struggling, wrestling groups, raising the prostrate and quieting the violent.
The efforts of the peacemakers were signally assisted by the sudden appearance of a squad of police coming on the run around the corner from Montgomery Street. As the guardians of order were strong of limb, and were armed with heavy clubs, they had exemplary success in quieting the refractory, and satisfying those whose appetite for fighting was still unsated.
At the sight of the police, Parks took me by the arm and drew me quietly down the block and around the corner into Sansome Street.
"What was the trouble about, and who was the old man?" I asked.
"Why, that was Merwin," said Parks in a tone of surprise. "You ought to recollect him."
At the name I remembered the quiet, dreamy old man of my visit to the House of Blazes, and recalled the history of his life-wreck which was wrapped up in the volumes of legal lore that went under the title of Merwin versus Bolton.
"What had Merwin been doing to get the mob after him?" I asked.
"To get the mob after him!" exclaimed Parks in great indignation. "To get the police after him, you mean."
"The police!" I exclaimed in my turn. "Oh, he was the man under arrest, then?"
"It was an outrage of arbitrary power," said Parks, flushing angrily, "and the people have shown what they think of it. He has been taken out of the hands of those petty tyrants, and it will be a long time before he falls into them again."
"What was the charge?" I asked, at a loss to imagine what crime could have been committed by this inoffensive wreck of a man.
"He was arrested," said Parks indignantly, "for exercising the right of free speech."
"Free speech is rather an elastic term," I said. "What was he talking about?"
"The only thing he knows anything about," said Parks. "That's his case."
"Well, it is a subject that might call out rather strong language, but I don't see just how that could bring him afoul of the police."
"Sir," cried Parks, "it could happen only through the exercise of arbitrary power. The point of the thing is that the Supreme Court this afternoon handed down its sixth decision in his suit against Bolton. The judgment against Bolton is reversed, and the case sent back for a new trial."
"What a shame!" I said, remembering the justice of Merwin's claim, the ruin of his life, and his long fight against the wealth and malignity of Peter Bolton.
"It is outrageous!" exclaimed Parks vehemently; "as scandalous as the open sale of justice to the highest bidder. Those men should be dragged from the bench, and driven through the streets in a cart, with their price for rendering such a judgment placarded on their backs. The judges were bought and justice was sold."
"No, no," I protested. "The men on the bench may be wrong-headed, small-minded, pettifogging, but not corrupt–believe me, not corrupt."
Parks looked at me with a pitying shake of his head.
"You are welcome to your opinion," he said, "but it isn't mine. However, it doesn't matter. The court has driven another nail in the coffin of the present social order."
"But how did this decision get Merwin into the hands of the police? Did he go around to the courtrooms and tell the justices what he thought of them?"
"No, indeed!" said Parks indignantly, "though I shouldn't have blamed him if he had. He got up at our water-front meeting and, for the first time since I've known him, made a speech. It came hot from his tongue, too, telling the plain story of his case to his fellow-citizens. And what did the police do? Why, they arrested him for trying to incite a riot!"
Parks paused as though waiting for my opinion on this exercise of police power.
"Well," I admitted, "the plain story of the case of Merwin against Bolton might very well sound like an attempt to stir the mob to violence."
"It makes my blood boil, Hampden," cried Parks. "It's the stuff that revolutions are made of. The hirelings of Nob Hill know it, and that is why they trampled on the liberties of speech in the attempt to shut the mouth of the injured man."
"Go on with your story. What happened after he was arrested?"
"Why, I wasn't there, so I don't know exactly how it was. But when Merwin was dragged off the cart, one of the boys ran over to headquarters with the news. As soon as I heard what was being done, I hurried over here with such men as I could get together. We found a big crowd following the two policemen who were dragging Merwin between them, but the men didn't know how to do anything but holler and ba-a. So I passed around the word that Merwin was to be taken out of the hands of the police. The crowd was ready to follow if any one would take the lead; so when I gave the signal the police were tumbled over in just one minute by the clock, we hustled our man to the wagon, and now I've had Merwin taken to a safe place."
"My sympathies are with Merwin," I said, "but this rescue is a more serious matter than the arrest. It is resistance to the constituted authority of the law."
"The constituted authority of the law!" said Parks contemptuously. "That's not the last resistance that will be roused against its tyranny and injustice. The day is at hand, sir, when this constituted authority of the law, as you call it, will be overthrown and scattered as easily as it was overturned a few minutes ago in the persons of its petty tyrants. Then a new and better authority will rise, founded on the will of the people, responsive to the people's needs, and protecting the people's interests."
Parks had begun in a low tone of voice, as befitted one who had reasons for avoiding notice; but with his closing words he was once more the orator and prophet of the agitators, and I gave him a word of caution to save his breath for a less dangerous occasion. I saw nothing to be gained by arguing with him the folly of his plans of revolution. I could not hope to turn him from his purposes, and would only shut myself out from the chance of getting further information from him. Therefore I suppressed the remonstrance and advice that rose to my lips, and asked instead how the movement was progressing.
"Splendidly," replied Parks, with an enthusiastic shake of his head. "The cause of the people is advancing by leaps and bounds. Men are awakening to their rights, and responding to the efforts for their betterment. Our organization has gone into every district in the city. By to-morrow we shall be five thousand strong. Next week we extend our propaganda outside of San Francisco, and shall proceed to establish branches in every town in the state. To-night we invade the stronghold of aristocracy. At eight o'clock we hold a meeting on Nob Hill, at the corner of California and Mason Streets, to tell the nabobs what we think of them."
We had reached the corner of Market and Sansome Streets and had halted for a little, when a hot and breathless man overtook us, and tapped Parks on the shoulder. For an instant the enthusiast thought that he was under arrest, for he whirled about with a fierce and determined look. If the man had been a policeman he would have had a difficult prisoner to handle. But there was no hostile intent in his face, and a look of recognition relaxed the tense lines of determination about Parks' mouth and eyes as he caught sight of him.
"Egbert and Baumgartner are arrested," whispered the man in gasps; and he drew Parks aside.
There was a hurried conversation of which I caught but a word now and then, and I had time to wonder whether Parks would not presently share the fate of the two men he was now called upon to aid. It was not unlikely that a man of such conspicuous appearance had been recognized by the officers when Merwin had been snatched from their grasp. After a minute of whispered conversation, Parks turned to me, his face lighted with decision and excitement.
"I must leave you, Hampden," he said. "Let me see you at the meeting on Nob Hill to-night. The contest between plutocracy and the people may begin earlier than we have expected."
And with these significant words he set off briskly in the direction of the House of Blazes.
I digested Parks' hints with my dinner, and, getting no light from them, I took my way to Wharton Kendrick's house to deliver the postponed budget of information gained from my visit to Peter Bolton.
The sun had just set upon the long July day, and the bright afterglow still forbade the use of lamps. And in the misgiving that I should come upon my client before he had finished his dinner, I was about to continue my stroll past the house when I saw the door open and some one walk in. As the door remained hospitably ajar, I changed my intention and climbed the steps. Before I reached the landing I heard an inner door close, and a moment later the voice of Miss Kendrick asked:
"Well, what do you want?"
"You Miss Kenlick?" came the reply, with an unmistakable Chinese intonation.
"Yes, I am Miss Kendrick. What do you want of me?"
"You sabby China gell–nice li'l China gell?" The voice of the Chinaman was pitched in a fawning tone, offensive in the obsequiousness of its effort to win the confidence of the hearer.
At the words I was startled with the thought that Big Sam had come to survey for himself the situation of Moon Ying with a possible view to her recapture. I was in two minds about my duty in the matter. Had I obeyed my first impulse I should have walked in and expressed my opinion of the attempt in unceremonious terms. But second thought suggested that Miss Kendrick might prefer to manage the affair without interference. A sudden wish to hear her match her wits against the diplomacy of the Oriental proved irresistible, and I determined to await an apparent need for intervention. Her first words reassured me of her ability to handle the situation.
"No," she replied calmly, with just the suspicion of a tremble in her voice, "we don't want any Chinese girl."
"No–you sabby gell?" insisted the Chinese voice, with its fawning emphasis. "Nice li'l China gell?"
If this was Big Sam, I should be compelled to compliment him on a marvelous control of his vocalization; and in curiosity to see if his bodily disguise was as complete as that of his voice, I peeped about the edge of the door till I caught sight of the oriental figure. My first glimpse of the man assured me that he was not Big Sam. He was small and bent, and gave an inimitable appearance of age. Whatever his capacity for masquerade, Big Sam could not have reduced his bulky form to this figure. The man turned his head a little, and I saw a wizened face, embellished with a mustache of coarse white hair, and scant chin-whiskers that might have belonged to an anemic billy-goat.
Miss Kendrick's face was pale, but its firm expression was an index to her resolve to save Moon Ying from this creature at any cost.
"No," she repeated sharply, "we don't want a Chinese girl–or boy either. We never hire them. You go now." And with a gesture to the man-servant who stood beside her, she turned and was gone without a glance in my direction.
The man-servant, in eager obedience to Miss Kendrick's hint, took the Chinaman by the shoulders, and amid protesting exclamations of "Wha' fo'? Wha' fo'?" ran him out of the hall, and started him down the steps, his speeding word to the departing guest taking the form of: "Get out of here, John, and if you come back I'll kick you out."
Then suddenly catching sight of me, he recovered his breath and his dignity with a sudden effort.
"I beg your pardon, Mr. Hampden," he gasped. "I didn't know you was here. Mr. Kendrick is just done dinner. He's gone to his smoking-room. He said if you came I was to show you right in." And with a glance to see that the Chinaman had reached the sidewalk, he shut the door and led the way to the master of the house.
I followed him mechanically, but my thoughts were far from the errand of Peter Bolton's schemes that had brought me hither. An insistent question ran through my mind in endless variations, but when reduced to words it took this form: "Where have I seen the face of the old Chinaman before?"
CHAPTER XVI
LAYING DOWN THE LAW
Wharton Kendrick sat at his ease in smoking-jacket and slippers, but his brow was wrinkled with thought. The cigar that he held between his teeth gave evidence of his discomposure of mind, for it was unlighted, and one end of it had been reduced to the semblance of a cud. I had just delivered to him a conscientious account of my interview with Peter Bolton, and now observed the perturbant reflections that it had stirred.
"Was that all you could get out of the old rascal?" he said after an interval of silence.
"Why, yes," I replied. "I thought it was a pretty good afternoon's work; and indeed I am surprised that he told me so much."
"Oh, thunder, Hampden, you're as easily taken in as the rest of 'em. Didn't I tell you that Peter Bolton is never in the place you're looking for him?"
"Why," I argued, somewhat piqued at this reception of my budget of information, "I thought he told a good deal about his plans–in fact, showed himself a garrulous old foozle instead of the shrewd fox you'd told me about."
"My dear boy," said Wharton Kendrick with a pitying smile, "I'm grateful for your zeal, but the only thing he exposed was his desire to get you to betray me, and I might have guessed that without his telling it."
"But that half-million of notes–"
"Doesn't it strike you, Hampden, that, as a business man, I might be expected to know something about the notes outstanding against me? You're right about one thing: I didn't know they had fallen into Bolton's hands, and I'll have a score to settle with the men who sold 'em to him. But I've got every piece of my paper recorded up here," and he tapped his forehead, "and I'll be prepared to take care of it as it falls due."
"Well," I said ruefully, "I'm just one more victim of misplaced confidence in Peter Bolton."
"Oh, you needn't feel ashamed of that, my boy," said Kendrick kindly. "Your time wasn't wasted. It's worth while to know that those notes are in the hands of an enemy. But that's a mere detail. Now if he had told you how he expects to keep me from meeting them when due–"
Wharton Kendrick left his sentence suspended in the air, while he chewed his cigar for a minute or two.
"After all, Hampden," he continued, "I suspect he has pushed those notes forward to draw away attention from his real point of attack. He's figured on the possibility that you would bring me every word, and has found something to gain out of it, whether your final decision is to stand by me or to take up his offer. Now, about that offer? Are you prepared to accept his twenty-nine thousand for that trifling service he wants?"
"If I get it, I'll go halves with you when you're broke," I replied with an attempt at lightness that was far from a success. "But to tell you the truth, I don't like to discuss the thing, even in joke. It makes my gorge rise to hear a hint that I could take money for betraying you."
"That's Dick Hampden's son," he returned, his face softening into a smile. "I could hear your father speaking then. But if you think I am worrying about your loyalty, just set your mind at rest."
I thanked him for his certificate of confidence, and he continued:
"You don't have to tell me that Bolton isn't the most agreeable company, but I'll be much obliged if you'll cultivate his acquaintance a little further."
"Do you mean that you want me to pretend to accept his offer? I couldn't do that. I couldn't take his money."
"Do you think you would get it?"
"He offered a thousand dollars a week. I'd get that as long as the job lasted."
"Well, fix it up to suit yourself. But if you can find some way to keep him talking, you may get the one word that will join the different ends of his scheme together. Here we have his dealings with Big Sam and the Council of Nine, and his battery of notes ready to fire at me. A little more, and we may see his whole plan. Once I get that, I'll fix a scheme to scoop his pile out from under him so quick that he'll think an earthquake has struck him." And with this hint he excused me for the night.
As I went out into the big hall, I looked regretfully at the library door, with a mental vision of the pleasure of spending an evening in converse with Miss Kendrick setting my pulses to beating. But with Spartan resolve, I crushed down my emotions with the notion that it was my duty to attend the Nob Hill meeting of the agitators.
"Oh, you aren't going without so much as saying 'How is Moon Ying?' are you?" said a piquant voice; and at the words, I turned to see Miss Kendrick coming down the stairs. Her light dress and graceful motions suggested the vision of a fairy floating down from some celestial region with the benevolent purpose of cheering the life of mortals–a purpose that met my instant and hearty approval. At the sound of her voice, the reasons that had drawn me toward the Nob Hill meeting were whisked away like so many scraps of paper before the summer breeze, and I stammered out some clumsy expression of my pleasure in remaining.
"Well," said Miss Kendrick, "I've heard that appearances are deceptive, and now I'm sure of it. You were a very good imitation of a man planning an escape." And she led the way into the library.
"There was something in the appearance," I said. "I was wishing to escape from the duty of going down town."
"Oh, if it's a matter of duty, I shouldn't think of interfering."
"I can't see now why I thought it so," I returned, "but I was suspecting there might be the chance of a fight."
"Well, if there's to be any fighting," said Miss Kendrick in some alarm, "I'll give you a bit of advice, and that is to keep out of it."
"There's to be a meeting of the anti-Chinese clubs to-night up by the Stanford-Hopkins houses, and it may start a riot," I explained. "I didn't know but I ought to go to it."
"The curiosity of these men!" she sighed. "And they talk of the inquisitiveness of women. Why, you might have fifty riots, and you'd never see me going near one of them–not if I heard of it beforehand."
"I hope not. But it isn't altogether curiosity that would lead me to attend."
"You don't mean that you have any crazy idea of trying to stop the fighting if it begins?"
"Well, no."
"Then you just leave the business of the police to the police," she said. "I'm beginning to believe that you need a guardian."
"I believe so, too," I replied, with the thought that I saw a very desirable person for the place. I was tempted to say as much, but Miss Kendrick responded hastily:
"I wouldn't envy him his position." Then she added: "I'm not sorry I interrupted you in your foolishness, but I shouldn't have done so if I hadn't wanted to take counsel with you."
I wished she had chosen a more complimentary way of putting it, but professed myself all readiness to listen.
"There was a Chinaman here a little while ago," she began, and then she described in detail her interview with the little old man in the hall.
As she told her tale my thoughts were busy with the insistent question–where had I seen the Chinaman before?
"Now, what does that mean?" she demanded, when her tale was done.
As she asked the question the problem was solved. A sudden picture flashed into my mind of the old Chinaman who had posed as the girl's father after she had been stolen.
"It means nothing, I think–some peddler with silk handkerchiefs to sell, perhaps," I replied, with an effort to put a careless indifference into my voice.
"You think nothing of the kind," said Miss Kendrick. "I don't see why you treat me like a child. I'm not a child, and I am wishing that you would discover it." She spoke with a little of wistfulness in her voice and manner. "Tell me honestly what you think about the visit of the Chinaman?" she said pleadingly.
I reflected a minute on her request, and she broke forth in rapid words:
"Do you think, if I am afraid, that you can make me confident by telling me that the dark won't bite me? Perhaps I am afraid–sometimes I do feel horribly scared–but don't you think I counted all the dangers before I made you bring poor little Moon Ying? There's one thing I'm more afraid of than all the rest of things put together, and that is the unknown thing. Let me know of a danger, and I'll be scared, and face it. But when I know it's there, and don't know what it is–that's the time I want to run. Now I saw in your face that you knew, or thought you knew, and were afraid. Please tell me what it is that you think."
She looked into my eyes with such a mixture of pleading and command that my reluctance to confide my fears to her melted away.
"The man," I replied, "was beyond doubt the old pirate who had Moon Ying in charge for the Hop Sing Tong."
"And you think he was on a reconnoitering expedition for his wicked society?"
"I have no doubt of it."
She considered the matter with a grave face and downcast eyes, and I regretted that I had confided my fears to her so bluntly. Then she asked:
"Do you think the highbinders will come here?"
"No, I don't. I do not believe there is courage enough in all the tongs in Chinatown to attack this house. They have a pretty clear idea of the sort of vengeance that would be taken on them, if they tried such a thing. The burning of Los Angeles' Chinatown was a lesson that they will remember a long time."
"Do you think it possible that your wicked tongsters might hire some white men to do what they don't dare do themselves?"
Miss Kendrick spoke in such tone that I demanded sharply:
"What put that idea into your head?"
"I suppose I ought to have told you at first, but the fact is that it's just this minute I've put two and two together and made five out of them. Now this is the way of it: A little while before the old Chinaman was here, a white man came to the back door and asked for something to eat. The cook set out some victuals for him, but he didn't seem to have the appetite of a starving man. What he did have was a consuming curiosity about the family. After a good many questions, he asked if there were any Chinese about the place. The cook said 'No,' and then he asked if there wasn't a Chinese girl here. I can't get out of the cook just what she did tell him, but I have no doubt he had the whole story out of her. I'm sure the fellow knows this minute just what room the girl is in, and who waits on her, and what she has for dinner, and how many people are about the place, and whatever else he wanted to find out."
I balanced my suspicions between the possibility that the fellow was a spy for the tongs, and the chance that he was an agent of the anti-coolie clubs, and then asked for a description of him.
"Well," said Miss Kendrick, "he's a most remarkable-looking creature, and I'm sure you ought to have no difficulty in finding him. I asked three of the servants who saw him, and took down their descriptions, and all you have to do is to look for a tall, short, middle-sized young man, with yellowish, brown, black hair, and black and blue (or possibly green) eyes, with and without a mustache, wearing a slouch derby hat, and dressed in dark, light-colored clothes–and then you'll have the man."
"I'm sure the police ought to be able to lay their hands on him at once," I said. "But it's no matter. I can hardly imagine the tongs hiring a gang of burglars to steal the girl. However, I'll have men enough around here to give them other things to think about if they come near the house."
"Well, then, I shall sleep easier," said Miss Kendrick with a sigh of relief. "It's a comfort to one's mind to know that there's some one looking after your safety. It's not strong-minded, but it's much more satisfying than having the responsibility one's self." She paid this tribute to the protecting hand of man with an infinitely charming condescension, and then at a sound from without changed her tone to earnest admonition: "And now I hear Mercy coming, and you're not to say a word of worriments."
"Mum's the word," I replied, pleased to enter into the bonds of conspiracy; and a moment later Miss Fillmore entered, breathless, followed by Mr. Baldwin clothed in supercilious indignation.
"Why, what's the matter?" cried Miss Kendrick, starting up impulsively, and embracing Miss Fillmore.
"Oh, my dear," returned her friend in a disturbed voice, "it's nothing much, I think–" She hesitated in evident unwillingness to alarm her hostess, but Mr. Baldwin's indignation was repressed by no such consideration.
"It's another demonstration by Mr. Hampden's friends," he said with something of heat in his cold cynical voice. "That blatherskite Kearney has led a crowd of hoodlums up Nob Hill, and it looks as though there would be wild times before the night is over. We passed a gang of the riffraff a few minutes ago, and they were headed up California Street, yelling like wild Indians about burning down the Stanford and Hopkins places. It's a fine pass that this toleration of the worst elements has brought us to. There's just one way to deal with those fellows, and that's to call out the troops and mow them down. If we were under a city government that had the first notion of protecting life and property, it would have had the whole gang in jail without waiting for murder and arson."
With this threat in the air, the Nob Hill meeting became a matter of immediate interest. If a riot should start at that point, it might be followed by an attack on the Van Ness Avenue district, and it evidently behooved me to judge for myself the temper and designs of the crowd.
"If my friends are engaged in any such desperate business, I'm afraid it's my duty to keep them from getting any further into mischief," I said; "so I'll bid you a good evening."
"You don't mean you are going out into that mob, do you?" cried Miss Kendrick.
"That is my present purpose," I replied with some exultation at the anxiety betrayed in her tone and look.
"Well, I'm sure you're old enough to know better, but I see you are an obstinate man-creature, and it's no use to say anything to you. But when you get there, I hope you'll remember that you're not a regiment of soldiers, and leave the business of the police to the police."
"Send word if you're arrested," said Mr. Baldwin scornfully, "and I'll see what can be done about bail."
I bowed my thanks, and went out into the hall where I found Miss Fillmore awaiting me.
"Do you think Mr. Parks is in that mob?" she asked, with a charming air of embarrassment.
"I don't doubt it," I replied.
"He is so impulsive," she said. "I saw him this afternoon, and he was very much excited over something that happened to Mr. Merwin. I am very much afraid he will let his feelings run away with him to-night."
There was a depth of anxiety in her eyes that Parks ought to have been proud to inspire, and even with the call of conflict urging me to be gone, I spoke a few words of comfort, and reflected on the mysteries of attraction that should draw together the gentle Mercy and the impassioned leader of revolt against society.
"If you find him to-night, try to restrain him," she pleaded. "It is his good heart–his sympathy with the suffering–that brings him into these troubles."
"I shall do all I can," I promised.
Outside the house, I stopped for a few minutes to see that my watchmen were on duty, and to learn if they had observed any signs of trouble.
"No," said Andrews, the head watchman, "there's been nothing worse than a gang of hoodlums going up toward Nob Hill, and yelling like Comanches. But one of 'em makes me a bit suspicious, for as he passes, he says, 'That's the house.' I says to myself that there's a chance he means this one, so I've cautioned the boys to be wide awake."