CHAPTER XVIII
LITTLE JOHN AS A MAN OF ACTION
Big Sam's warning was enough to drive me once more to the Kendrick house to make certain that all was secure. I could suppose, from his words, that he did not expect an immediate attack, yet it was by no means unlikely that Little John's ruffians would take advantage of the disorders of the night to make their attack. But all was quiet in the neighborhood, and Andrews reported nothing more threatening than a few disorderly hoodlums who had gone shouting past an hour or two before.
I confided to Andrews the warning of an intended attack, and directed him to engage six men instead of the two I had previously ordered.
"I think I can find the right sort," he said. "There's some boys I used to know up in Nevada when we were holding down some claims against big odds. Six of 'em would chew up a hundred of these cigarette-smoking hoods." And he told with keen enjoyment of the adventurous days of the claim-jumpers, when a man's life and property depended on his strength and courage and sureness of aim.
I paced the watch with him till the stars began to pale before the coming day, and then gladly sought home and bed. My sleep was troubled with vague, indefinable dreams of coming danger, and it was late when I rose with the presentiment that a crisis was approaching.
It was a Sunday morning, yet the apprehensions roused by my dreams found abundant reinforcement when I was once more astir. The echoes from the Nob Hill meeting were still to be heard in the city, rousing apprehension among the orderly. The newspapers treated it as the sensation of the day, yet, from their comments, I saw that they had no conception of the real designs that lay behind the activity of the anti-coolie agitators. Clark reported to me that the Council of Nine had been in session till long after midnight, and that the anti-coolie clubs had been ordered to hold daily drills. One of the two spies who were detailed to keep watch on Peter Bolton came at noon with the report that Bolton had reached his office before seven o'clock in the morning, where he had received a visit from Waldorf, Parks and Reddick, the three most active members of the Council. As they left Bolton's office, Reddick had been heard to say, "Before the week ends, we shall be masters of the city." And as a final fillip to anxiety, I found at my office a tangle-worded letter, which I recognized as the product of Kwan Luey's pen, that recalled the warnings I had received from Big Sam.
With this accumulation of mental disturbance, I took my way at last to the Kendrick house, to lay the tale of impending dangers before my client, and to give hint to the young ladies of the need for caution.
On my arrival, I found the house in confusion. There was sound of excited voices within, and, as I touched the bell, a servant rushed out and down the steps without taking time to close the door. I entered without ceremony, and a moment later met Laura Kendrick coming down the stairs, her face clouded with fear and indignation.
"Oh, I'm so glad you've come!" she said with a gasp of relief, and the look of fear faded out of her eyes. "We've been scared out of a year's growth, and it's one of the mercies of Providence that we haven't lost Moon Ying. It's not often I've wanted to be a policeman, but I did to-day."
"Well, I'll be your policeman, if you'll only tell me what it's all about."
"It's a comfort to have you say so, but I'm afraid you're too late. He must be ever so far away by this time."
"Who is it? What has happened?" I demanded eagerly.
"Somebody tried to steal Moon Ying–that's what has happened," said Laura Kendrick indignantly.
"Who did it? When? Did they attack the house?" I cried, startled at the promptness with which my warnings had been fulfilled.
"Come right up-stairs," said Laura, impulsively seizing my arm and leading me. "You shall hear at first-hand for yourself."
This sudden captivity gave me so pleasant a thrill that for a moment I forgot Moon Ying and my responsibilities, and betrayed such inclination to loiter that I was sharply ordered to "walk faster." So in a minute or two I found myself entering a room where Moon Ying, with pale and frightened face, leaned back among the pillows that covered a reclining chair, and Mercy Fillmore, at Moon Ying's side, looked at us with anxious eyes.
"This is Mr. Hampden, Moon Ying–the man who rescued you from Chinatown," said Laura. "Tell him what happened to you."
Moon Ying's resources of English were scant at best, and between fright, excitement and shyness, it took much prompting and explanation from Laura and Mercy before her story was fairly begun. But when all the tangled threads were straightened out the tale ran thus:
Moon Ying had of late spent an hour or two in the middle of the day, taking the air and the sun, on the lawn behind the house. An hour before she had been assisted to her sunny corner by Mercy, who had, after a time, returned to the house. Suddenly the back gate had opened, and a Chinaman had slipped in.
"How many?" I demanded.
"One–jus' one," replied Moon Ying.
"How him look?"
"Him small man–old man–all same Chung Toy you one time see," said Moon Ying in her plaintive voice.
The picture of Little John with his wizened face, his white, horse-hair mustache and his scant chin-whiskers, rose before me.
"Did he come alone?" I asked, incredulous of his boldness in venturing thus by himself.
"Him say two men come 'longside him, but I no see. Him talk velly soft–say I come Chinatown, him makee me velly nice dless–get velly fine house–find me velly good husband. I tell him go 'way, I too muchee sabby him. One time I thlink him good man–now I heap sabby him tell big lie–no got nice dless–no got fine house–no got good husband–I all time stlay Miss Kenlick. Him get velly mad–him say velly bad thling. Then him say I no go alongside him, two men come takee me so–" and Moon Ying raised her pretty little hands and gripped fiercely at the air, with the motion of one throttling a victim.
"What you do then?"
"I cly velly loud–likee so–" and Moon Ying let out a feminine screech that caused Laura and Mercy to cover their ears. "Then Chung Toy catchee me, so–," and she seized her arm roughly,–"put hand so–," and she covered her mouth with her palm. "I cly one time again. Miss Kenlick come. Miss Muh See come. One man come. Chung Toy him lun away."
"Did you see him?" I asked of Laura.
"Indeed I did; and I could have caught him, too, if I hadn't been such a goose as to be scared into a graven image. But by the time I came to life he was out of the gate. But it was the same man who was here last evening; and if he had any one with him. they took precious good care not to show themselves. He went in such a hurry that he left behind him a peddler's basket. It had a few silk handkerchiefs in it. I suppose he was going to make them an excuse, if he had been stopped on coming in."
"Where were my men? There should have been two of them on hand to stop such fellows. I must look into this." And the spirit of judgment rose stern within me.
"Well," said Laura, "there was one of your men here, and the other was sick, so you needn't look so cross. This one was at the front of the house, and he ran around to the back at Moon Ying's scream. When he got there that awful creature was out of the yard, so I got him to help us carry Moon Ying into the house. Then he went out the back gate, but by that time there was no heathen in sight anywhere. But I've sent one of the servants for the police and the doctor, and I want your miserable Chung Toy put in jail where he'll be out of mischief." And she gave her head a determined nod, as though his fate were settled beyond recall.
"I'll have a warrant out before night," I said, with anger tingling in my nerves, "and he'll be laid by the heels in the City Prison if he dares show himself on the street."
"I don't think jail is a very good place, even for bad people," said Mercy, "for it makes them worse; but I shall feel easier if that man is locked up. It is too dangerous to have him at large."
"I suppose you don't need any instructions," I said, "but I'll venture to suggest that Moon Ying had better take the air from an up-stairs window for a few days."
"I hope we have sense enough to know that much," returned Laura soberly, "though I don't blame you for thinking we haven't. I shan't dare let her out of doors unless there's a regiment of soldiers about the house."
"I'll have a few more men here to-morrow; but you'd better keep her in till I give the word that all is safe."
Laura Kendrick looked sharply at me.
"You needn't try to hide it," she said. "I see in your face that there's something more you're afraid of, and you'd better tell it now rather than later."
"I wasn't intending to conceal it. In fact, I was going to warn you against letting strange white men into the house. I've had a warning that leads me to believe that the fellow who was here asking questions yesterday is one of a gang hired by the highbinders to recover Moon Ying. They are much more dangerous than Little John, but if we don't give them a chance they won't hurt us."
Moon Ying had followed our conversation with eager attention; and though many of the words were beyond her understanding, she had caught the meaning of what we said.
"Too bad–too velly bad," she said, with sudden resolution evident in her face. "Bad man come, makee you 'flaid, maybe shoot. I go 'way, bad man no come."
"Indeed you shan't go away," cried Laura. "There's no place on earth you could be safe, even if we did let you go."
"I go Big Sam. Him velly big man. No bad man catch-em me in Big Sam's house. No bad man catch-em you when me-gone."
At these words, Laura impulsively flung her arms about Moon Ying.
"You dear creature!" she cried. "Nobody shall hurt you here–and nobody will hurt us, either. My uncle can protect you much better than Big Sam, and Big Sam himself has said so."
Moon Ying tried to express more fully her fear that her presence brought danger to the household, but her language was unequal to her thought, and Laura and Mercy both talked at once to assure her that they feared nothing, and would refuse to give her up, even though all the tongs of Chinatown should come in force to demand her; so Moon Ying at last with a sigh of grateful content said:
"I likee stay–I likee you." And Laura on one side, and Mercy on the other, twined their arms about her with a laugh that was almost a sob.
It was a pretty picture of the sisterhood of Occident and Orient, and I admired it, with something of the feminine emotions raising a lump in my throat, when I was observed by the lady of the house.
"Go away," she said. "This is no place for men." And in spite of my remonstrance that I was in perfect harmony with my surroundings, I was driven forth, and went down-stairs to find Wharton Kendrick taking a Sunday afternoon nap in his den.
He gave me a sleepy greeting, but roused himself to attention at my account of the Nob Hill meeting, the midnight session of the Council of Nine, the morning meeting in Bolton's office, and the warning from Big Sam.
"Hm-m! Well, put on enough watchmen to see that we don't wake up to find our throats cut," he said. "I dare say P. Bolton is egging them on all around to do something for their money. But so far as the business goes, I think I've got everything shipshape and ready for storm. The syndicate is strong enough to protect the market, and the police can handle the Cheap John revolution, and I don't believe anybody is going to attack the house; so there's nothing to worry about. But you'd better keep in touch with your anarchist friends a little closer than you've been doing. If we can get warning over night of any particular deviltry they are going to start, it might be worth a hundred thousand dollars. Hallo! what's this?" he cried as a servant brought him a card. "Show him in." And before I could escape, General Wilson bustled through the door, his ruddy face aglow in the frame of his bristling yellow-gray side-whiskers, and his short stout frame radiating energy at every step.
"Why, God bless my soul! Kendrick–Hampden–I find you with your heads together like a pair of conspirators in the theater. Hope I don't interrupt. It does me good, Hampden, to see you youngsters pulling along in double harness with the war-horses like Kendrick and me; and you can't find a better one to pull with than Kendrick; he's the salt of the earth."
I professed myself glad to see the general, and Wharton Kendrick greeted him jovially.
"I don't believe in doing business on Sunday," said General Wilson. "In fact, I lost a million-dollar trade with Jim Fisk once, because I wouldn't sign the contract on the Sabbath, and on Monday Jim was chasing after something else. But I thought you'd like to know that I got a telegram from my people about that swamp-land deal. Here it is, and you see they'll come up to that eight hundred thousand dollar offer. That's the limit, and it won't last long at that. I don't like to boast, Kendrick, but I'll tell you that there isn't another man on the footstool that could have got 'em up to that point–I'm the only one that could do it; and, by George, I'm astonished at my own success, the way things are looking in the East with those confounded railroad strikes and rumors of riot. Now, I want you to understand that I'm not asking you to take up with the offer to-day, for of course you remember the Sabbath just as I do. But you can have a good chance to think it over. You know well enough that you're going to take the offer, so I'll warn you that I'll drop around in the morning and get your acceptance."
"Hold on, hold on, Wilson. You're running as wild as a mustang colt. I'm not so sure about this thing. I've got to have more time to consider it. I said I'd let you have the land for eight hundred and fifty thousand, but I believe I'm a fool to let it go for any such figure. However, I'll let it stand for a couple of days. I've got some affairs booked for to-morrow that will take all my time. But if you'll come in on Tuesday with your eight hundred and fifty thousand you can have the land. After that it'll cost you more."
"Kendrick, I'll wait another day for you, if I have to telegraph that I've broken a leg. Business, sir, is, next to war, man's most important pursuit; but even business must give way to the call of friendship. You'll see me coming into your office on Tuesday morning, Kendrick, like a conquering hero, ready to receive your sword–or your pen, which is mightier yet–but at eight hundred thousand, mind you."
"Come, come, Wilson, you're getting ahead of your horses," said Kendrick with a laugh. "I'm thinking of getting up a company to reclaim those lands, and if I conclude to do it, I won't sell for double the money."
"Talk as long as you like, Kendrick; but I've got a sixth sense that tells me when a bargain's made, and it never fails me. I can tell, nine times out of ten, when the other fellow has concluded to take my figures before he knows it himself, and that gift has saved me a pretty penny more than once. Why, when the Ohio Midland was enlarging its Chicago terminal, there was one piece we had to have–but the story's too long to tell. However, I made a hundred thousand dollars the best of the bargain by knowing what the other fellow was going to do before he knew it himself."
Wharton Kendrick gave a hearty laugh at General Wilson's diplomacy.
"Well, I shall take warning by that and hold out for my hundred thousand–or, I should say, fifty thousand, as I've given you a price."
"You're getting your extra hundred thousand with the price I'm offering you," said the general testily, "and I know well enough you'll not be fool enough to refuse it, especially after such a row as you had on Nob Hill last night. I hope my New York clients don't hear of it, or everything will be off. I was there, sir, and of all the howling mobs I ever saw, this beat anything since the draft riots. Why, sir, that blatant beast, Kearney, shouted arson and manslaughter, and another fellow called for the overturn of society, and if it hadn't been for the police, I believe they would have worked up the crowd to the point of blood-letting." Then General Wilson went at such length into the proper methods of handling mobs that I seized upon a favorable moment to slip out the door.
As I left the boom-boom of General Wilson's voice behind me, I caught sight of Mercy Fillmore's perplexed and anxious face.
"Oh, I thought you had gone," she said, "but I'm glad you haven't, for I want to thank you for your thoughtful note of last night. And now Mr. Parks has sent me word that he is too busy to come up this afternoon, and I was wondering how I could get a few lines to him. I am so afraid he is planning something very reckless–something that will get him into trouble. If I did not fear that he would be angry, I should go down and speak to him myself."
"If that is all that's worrying you, I'll see that he gets your letter–that is, if you can give me any idea where he is to be found."
"He wrote that he should be detained all the afternoon at Mr. Blasius' place, with some very important committee meetings." The idea of Mercy's seeking Parks in the House of Blazes struck me as slightly amusing, but I forebore to enlighten her as to the social position of H. Blasius, and she continued: "Now if you know where that is, you might send one of your men down there with this note." And she handed me an envelope addressed to "Mr. Gerald Parks." "You are sure it is not asking too much of you? I hope you are enough interested in him to wish to keep him from trouble."
I assured her that I was glad to be of service, and she thanked me with a dash of color in her pale face.
CHAPTER XIX
MISCHIEF AFOOT
My first thought in accepting Mercy Fillmore's commission had been to intrust her letter to one of my men. But once outside the house, it dawned upon me that I held in my hand a provident excuse to seek the conspirators in their lair. The hint by which Parks had roused such enviable anxiety corroborated the information I had received from my spy service. The campaign of action was evidently at hand, and I might possibly learn from a personal visit what I could not learn through others–provided I could pass unchallenged through the doors of the House of Blazes. The letter I held was a card of admission certain to be honored, if Parks were there. For the rest, chance must serve to expose or to conceal the plans that were keeping the agitators' committees in prolonged session.
H. Blasius received me with reserve born of suspicion, and his bleary eyes searched my face coldly at my name and my demand for Parks.
"Meestaire Park? Why do you want him?" he inquired at last.
"I have a very important message for him," I replied.
"Gif to me ze message," said Blasius. "When Meestaire Park he come, he shall have it."
"I couldn't give it to you," I said. "I am to deliver it into his hands only. And I can tell you that he will be very angry if there's any delay about it."
H. Blasius' pasty face took on an expression of dismay at the thought of an angry Parks, and with a grumbling of French interjections that suggested the cracking of his ill-regulated internal machinery, he waddled to a doorway at the end of the bar, and disappeared up a box stairway.
I looked around the saloon at the dozen or more men who lounged about in varying degrees of alcoholic stupefaction, and had just noted a group of men half concealed at a table at the farther end of the L of the room, when a rapid step descended the stairs, and Parks appeared.
"Hampden!" he cried, shaking my hand. "What can I do for you? It is a surprise to see you here."
"If I need an apology for intruding, here is a good one." And I held out Mercy's letter.
Parks seized it with a start of emotion as he recognized the handwriting, looked about with apparent thought of the profanation of reading Mercy's words in that place, and then giving me a nod to follow him, strode to a secluded table and opened the letter. His face lost something of its aggressive resolution as he read and re-read the pages.
"Hampden," he said in a softened voice, "did you ever realize that the sympathies of women are individual and concrete? The welfare of the masses is but a shadow to them, except as they see it through some one they know and care for. Here my petty personal welfare is put before the interests of the whole people!" And he laid a monitory finger on the letter. "I am asked to give up an enterprise of the greatest moment lest I shall get my head cracked or be thrown into prison."
"Would you have her think otherwise?"
He looked at the letter without answering. Then he thrust it into his pocket, gave his head a shake, and his face was once more dominated by the aggressive spirit of the agitator.
"I don't deny it is pleasant to be considered worth a moment of anxiety; but it is weakening to the resolution. It is something that must have no part in my life."
"Good heavens, Parks! You don't mean to say that you would give up the chance to get a girl like Mercy Fillmore, just for the sake of making speeches about–" It was on the tip of my tongue to say "the riffraff," but in deference to the prejudices of my listener, I ended weakly with "–people who don't care a snap of their fingers for you?"
Parks was silent for some seconds, and he studied the table with a far-away look in his eyes.
"Do you think I have a chance?" he asked.
"Great Scott, man, how much encouragement do you want? Why, if a young lady I could name–and won't–showed half as much interest in my personal safety as this girl is showing in yours, I'd be down on my knees at once."
He looked in my eyes, with something of frank boyishness, for the first time, showing under the enthusiast and dreamer.
"I don't mind confessing to you, Hampden, that I've been in love with that girl ever since we were school children together. But I think you overestimate her interest in me. She is a very sympathetic person, and–" He did not finish the sentence, but gave his hand a wave that made her anxieties include the entire circle of her acquaintance. "It was her work among the suffering poor that led me to the studies that have shown me the rights of man and the wrongs of society. But, I have resolved, Hampden, before I say a word, to accomplish something–to make myself known–to strike a blow for the regeneration of mankind that shall make the nations ring."
His voice had risen in the oratorical fervor of his last sentence, until it attracted attention from the group at the lower end of the room, and a chorus of voices called "Parks! Parks!"
"Here!" responded Parks. "What's wanted?" And rising, with a wave of the hand that summoned me to follow him, he strode to the farther end of the L where a group of five or six men sat around a table.
Five or six men sat around a table
Dominating the group, I recognized Denis Kearney, talking with grandiose bonhomie to his companions. There was a self-satisfied look on his face, and something of arrogance was added to his bearing. A brief experience of public applause had banished the simplicity from his countenance, and in its place had come the indefinable lines of calculation, ambition and authority. He was leaning back in his tilted chair, but came to his feet as we approached. He shook hands warmly with Parks, and remembered me as though he were conferring a favor.
"I've shaken thousands of hands this day," he said as he gave me a grip. "It's harder worrk than hefting barrels, but it's worrk in a good cause. We'll drive the haythins into the say in a month."
Parks introduced me with a wave of the hand to the men about the table, and Kearney continued:
"Well, we'd better be thinkin' of the program for to-morrow night, and how to get our tarriers out. I've got something to say about the police interferin' with our meeting last night that ought to raise the timperature about forty degrees."
"I've been thinking about the speeches," said Parks, "and I've concluded it's time to swing 'em round."
"Swing 'em round to what?" demanded a tall man with a black mustache, who had been introduced to me as Enos.
"The overthrow of capitalism," responded Parks, his face aglow. "The Chinese cry is a good thing to rouse 'em with, but the Chinese question is only a little corner of the real issue before the people. Capitalism, plutocracy–these must be put down before the people can come to their rights, and it's time we told 'em so."
There was a minute of silence, and the agitators looked about the table as if each sought to read the others' thoughts.
"That's all well enough, Parks," said Kearney at last, "but we've tried 'em on that, an' it's no go. Whin I tell 'em the haythin is taking the bread out of their mouths and ivery pigtail ought to be driven into the say, they holler till I can't hear me own voice. But whin I tell thim that society has got to be reorganized, an' that times will niver be right till the collective capital of the nation is administhered by the nation's ripresintatives–those are the worrds, aren't they, Parks?–they shake their heads and say, 'What th' divil is he dhrivin' at?' I can git five thousand men to follow me to Chinatown to-night to burn the haythin out if I but say th' worrd, but I couldn't git fifty to follow me to the City Hall to turn th' mayor out."
The others nodded assent to Kearney's words; but Parks' face had been growing blacker and blacker, and now he broke forth impetuously:
"By heavens! If they don't see their own interests, they must be made to see them. What are our tongues given us for but to tell them of the things they can't see for themselves? The wrong, degradation and poverty we see about us are no more due to the petty evils of Chinese competition than to the wearing of machine-made shoes. They are due to the control of industry by capital–to the system that puts a thousand men to work for the benefit of one man instead of for the benefit of all men. The Chinese now do injure the white man. But you put the capital and labor of the nation under control of the nation's representatives, and the labor of the Chinese would injure nobody–would help instead of hurt. The more the Chinaman produced, the more there would be to divide, and the less the Chinaman lived on, the more there would be for the rest of us. We must make capital the servant, not the master, of mankind. Wipe out the old system! Bring in the new!" Parks had grown more and more excited as he talked, and his hair stood out aggressively from the emphatic nods with which he had pointed his declamation.
"Do you mean that you want us to start a rebellion?" growled Enos.
"Successful rebellions are revolutions," cried Parks, "and it is a revolution that society demands."
"Well, society isn't demanding it out loud," said Kearney.
"We must work through the ballot-box," said Enos, "we must keep within the law."
At this word there was a harsh croak behind me, and I turned to see the white pasty face of H. Blasius gloating over us, his fat forefinger pointed at Enos.
"Law!" he cried. "It is ze superstition of politiqueimposed on us by ze capitalist, as ze superstition of moral is imposed on us by ze priest. When we say Non--no more for us–zen it is gone–we are free. Let us say Pouf! away! we make laws to suit ourself. Eh, mes braves?"
"Pooh!" said Enos. "You're talking nonsense."
"Nonsense? Poltron!" answered Blasius with contempt. "It take but a few barricade and two free t'ousand men to defend zem, and–boum! We have ze city. I was of ze Commune, and I tell you so. And instead of Marchons, you say Nonsense. Eh-h, cowarrd!"
Enos jumped to his feet, his dark face flushing angrily. His fists were doubled, and if Blasius had been a younger man, I should have witnessed the beginning of civil war in the camp of the agitators. But Enos held his arm before the gray hairs of the ex-Communard, and before the quarrel could be warmed by further words, there was an interruption that turned all thoughts from private disputes. A man burst through the swinging doors of the saloon and ran down to our table.
"Waldorf!" cried Parks.
I looked with interest at this leader of the Council of Nine–a tall, large-faced man, whose square jaw, spare cheeks, and bulging brows gave promise of force.
"It has come!" he cried.
"What?" cried Parks, springing to his feet. "The word from the brethren?"
"Just as good," said Waldorf, waving a newspaper excitedly before the group. "See this!" And as he unfolded the sheet we could see the printed announcement of an extra edition.
Parks seized the paper, and cried out the headlines:
"Riot and Bloodshed–Pittsburgh in Flames–Railroad Shops Wrecked by a Furious Mob–Troops Cooped up in the Roundhouse and Compelled to Surrender! Fighting in Baltimore. Mob Law Rules a Dozen Cities."
The men about the table looked at one another in silence, and the pallor of fear or excitement spread upon their faces.
"That's the signal," said Waldorf. "I wish we were better prepared."
"Prepare'!" cried Blasius scornfully. "We need no more. We have arrms. We can make ze barricade. We have leaders–plans. All we need is ze brave heart, and–boum!–we arre ze government!"
"What are you going to do?" asked Kearney uneasily. I saw that he was not in the full confidence of the Council of Nine, and was disturbed at this glimpse of its plans.
"Here's what we are going to do," said Parks, who had resumed his seat and scribbled a few words on a sheet of paper. "This news settles the plans for to-morrow night's meeting, and this is the way we'll call it." And he read out his composition with fervor:
NOTICE OF MEETING
The working-men and women of San Francisco will meet en masse this (Monday) evening, at 7:30, on the City Hall lots, to express their sympathy and take other action in regard to their fellow workmen at Pittsburgh and Baltimore. Prominent speakers will address the meeting. By order of
COMMITTEE.