Doctor Nikola (Windsor Magazine, 1896)/Chapter 11

morning daylight was scarcely born in the sky before Nikola roused me from my slumbers.

“Wake up,” he said; “in half an hour we must be starting. I have already given orders that the ponies should be saddled, and as we have a long stage before us we must not keep them waiting.”

So within a quarter of an hour of his calling me I was dressed and ready. A meagre breakfast of rice was immediately served to us by one of the monks, and when we had eaten it we descended to the great hall. The chief priest was there waiting for us. After a few preliminary words with Nikola he led us down the steps into the courtyard, where, beneath the shadow of the great statue of Buddha, we took an impressive farewell of him.

Having received the assurance of his consideration we made our way towards the outer gate, where our ponies and servants were standing ready for us. The gate was thrown open, and in single file we proceeded through it. Then it clanged to once more behind us, and when it had done so we had said good-bye to the Llamaserai.

During the first day's ride nothing occurred worth chronicling. We reached a small village at midday, camped there, and after a brief rest continued our journey, arriving at the fortified town of Ho-Yang-Lo just as dusk was falling. Having ascertained the principal inn, we rode up to it and engaged rooms for the night. Our first day's stage had been one of thirty-six miles, and we felt we had well earned a rest.

It was not until the evening meal was eaten and Nikola and I had retired to our own private room that I found the first real opportunity of questioning him as to what he thought of the success which had attended our efforts so far.

“To tell you the truth,” he said, “I must confess that I am surprised that we have been as successful as we have.”

“Well that man's recognising me was unfortunate, I admit; but still”

“Oh, I don't mean that at all,” said Nikola. “I look upon that as quite an outside chance. And it proved a golden opportunity in the end. What I must confess does surprise me is that I should have been accepted so blindly for the Priest of Hankow.”

“But there is one thing I can't make out,” I answered, “and that is how it comes about that, as that stick was being searched for by the Chinese in Australia, it should fail to be evident to the society in China that you are the man who stole it?”

“My dear fellow,” said Nikola, laying his hand upon my arm, “you don't surely imagine that in such a business as the present, in which I have sunk, well, if nothing else, your £20,000, I should have left anything to chance. No, sir. Chance and Dr. Nikola do not often act in concert. When I obtained that stick from Wetherell I took care that it should not be known outside the circle of a few men whom I was certain I could trust. As soon as it was in my possession I offered a large reward for it in Sydney, and I took care that the news of this reward should reach the ears of the Chinamen who were on the look out for it. Then, on the plea that I was still in search of it, I returned to China, with what result you know. What does puzzle me, however, is how it comes about that the society has not yet found out that it has been deceived. It must eventually be discovered, and it can't be very long before it is. Let us hope by that time we shall be back in civilisation again.”

I knocked the ashes out of my pipe and rolling over on my blanket looked Nikola straight in the face.

“By the time you have got to the end of this business,” I said, “your information, presuming all the time that you do get it, will have cost you close on £50,000—very possibly more; you will have endangered your own life, to say nothing of mine, and those of many others, and have run the risk of being subjected to torture and all other sorts of horrors. Do you think it is worth it?”

“My dear Bruce I would risk twice as much to attain my ends. If I did not think it worth it I should not have embarked upon it at all. You have evidently not grasped my character yet. If it became necessary for me to kill a fly I would follow that fly into the utmost parts of Asia, and spend all I possessed in the world ever the chase; but one thing is very certain, I would kill that fly.” How much more then in a matter which is as important as life itself to me?”

As I looked at him I had to confess to myself that I had not the least doubt but that he would do all he said. I was very thankful to feel that I was not the fly.

“There is a proverb,” continued Nikola, “to the effect that 'whatever is worth doing, is worth doing well.' That has been my motto through life, and I try to live up to it. But time is getting on; let us turn in; we have a long day's ride before us to-morrow.”

We blew out the light and composed ourselves for the night, but it was hours before sleep visited my eyelids. Thoughts on almost every conceivable subject passed in and out of my brain. One moment I was in the playing-fields of my old familiar English school; the next I was ratching round the Horn in an ice-bound clipper, shipmate with a scurvy-ridden crew and with a trio of drunken miscreants upon the quarterdeck; the next I was in the Southern seas, some tropic island abeam, the thunder of the surf upon the reef, and palm-clad hill on palm-clad hill rearing their lovely heads up to the azure sky. Then my thoughts came back to China, and as a natural sequence, to Pekin. I enacted again that half hour on the wall, and as the memory of it came back to me I seemed once more to feel the pressure of that tiny hand in mine, and to see those frank sweet eyes gazing into my face with all the love and trust imaginable. Gladys was my promised wife, and here I lay on the road to Thibet in the company of a man who was feared by everybody who knew him, and in as desperate a position as any man would care to be in. It was long past midnight before I fell asleep, and then it seemed as if I had not closed my eyes five minutes before Nikola, who appeared to require no sleep at all, was up and ready to go on; indeed the sun was hardly risen above the horizon before our breakfast was despatched and we were in the saddle.

Nikola had remained behind to speak to the man who kept the inn. While he was there I amused myself by riding round to look at the other side of the house. It was of the ordinary Chinese inn stamp, not much dirtier and not much cleaner. A broad veranda surrounded it on two sides, and at the rear was a sort of narrow terrace, on which, as I turned the corner, two men were standing. When they saw me they were for retreating into the house, but before they were able to accomplish this manœuvre I had had a good look at them.

The taller of the pair I had never seen before, but his companion's face was somehow painfully familiar to me. While I was wondering where I had encountered it, a messenger came round the building to inform me that Nikola was ready to start, so catching my pony by the head I returned to the front as quickly as I could to find the cavalcade in the act of starting.

As usual Nikola took the lead, I followed him at a respectful distance, and the servants were behind me again. In this fashion we made our way down the track and across a stream towards the range of low-lying hills that could just be discerned away towards the north. All round us the country was bare and uncultivated, with here and there a few mud-huts, in colour not unlike the plain upon which they stood.

By midday we had entered the range of hills, and following a well-made track through rugged scenery, continued our journey in an upward direction. With the exception of a few camel teams laden with coal passing down to Pekin, and here and there a travelling hawker, we met but few people. In this region the villages are far apart, and what there are do not bear any too good a reputation.

That night we camped at an inn high up on the hillside and next morning made our descent into the valley on the other side. By the time darkness fell we had proceeded some thirty odd miles along the valley. The country was quickly changing, becoming more and more rocky, and the ascents and descents more precipitous. For this reason, at the next halting place we were compelled to part with our ponies and to purchase in their stead half a dozen tiny but exceedingly muscular donkeys.

On the third night after our entry into the hills and the fourth from Pekin, we halted at a small monastery standing on an exposed position on the hill top. As we rode up to it the sun was just declining behind the mountains to the westward. There was no need for any password, as we were invited to enter almost before we had knocked upon the gate. The place was occupied by an abbot and six priests, all of whom were devotees of Shamanism. The building itself was but a poor one, consisting of an outer court, a draughty central hall, and four small rooms adjoining it. At the entrance to the central hall we were received by the abbot, a villainously dirty little fellow of middle age, who conducted us to the rooms we were to occupy. They were small and mean, very much out of repair, and, as a result, exceedingly draughty. But if a view, such as would be met with but in few parts of the world, could compensate for physical discomfort, we should have been able to consider ourselves domiciled in luxury. From one window we could look across the range of mountains, over valley and peak, right away into the golden West. From another we could gaze down, nearly three hundred feet sheer drop, into the valley and perceive the track we had followed that morning, while, through a narrow gully to our left we could make out the stretch of plain, nearly fifty miles distant, where we had camped two nights before.

As the sun dropped a chilly wind sprang up and tore round the building, whistling through all the cracks and crevices with the shrillness of a thousand souls in torment. The flame of the peculiar lamp with which our room was furnished rose and fell in unison with the blasts, throwing the strangest shadows upon the walls and raftered ceiling. This eccentric light, combined with the stealthy movements of the coarse-robed, shaven monks, was not, as may be expected, the sort of thing to conduce to cheerfulness of mind, so that it may not be wondered that I sat down with Nikola to our evening meal with a greater feeling of loneliness, and a greater amount of home-sickness in my heart, than I had felt at all since the journey commenced.

When it was finished we lit our pipes and sat smoking for half an hour. Then, being unable to stand the silence of the room any longer—for Nikola had a fit of the blues upon him—I left our side of the house and went out into the courtyard before the central hall. Just as I reached it a loud knocking sounded upon the outer gate. Two of the monks went down to open it, and when they had swung the heavy doors back a small party of men mounted on donkeys rode into the square. The arrival of a party of travellers would at least afford me a little excitement, I thought, so I went down to watch them unload.

As I approached them I discovered that they were five in number, and that the principals were three, the remaining two being coolies. What their profession was I was unable to guess; they were all armed, and, as far as I could tell, had no merchandise with them. When they had dismounted the old abbot came down to receive them, and after a little talk conducted them to the guest chambers on the other side of the hall, opposite to our quarters.

For some time after the leaders had retired to their rooms I remained where I was watching the coolies unharness; then just as the last pack-saddle was placed upon the ground one of the owners came out of the house and approached the group. He had got within a few paces of where I stood when he became aware of my presence; then he stooped, and, as if to excuse his visit, opened the pack-saddle nearest to him. I noticed that he did not take anything from it, and that all the time he was examining it he did not once turn his face in my direction; therefore, when he wheeled quickly round and hurried back to the house without speaking to either of his men, I felt that I had every right to suppose he did not wish me to become aware of his identity.

This set me thinking, and the more I thought the more desirous I became of finding out who my gentleman might be. I waited in the courtyard for nearly a quarter of an hour after the animals had been picketed, and the pack-saddles and harness carried away, but without his putting in another appearance. Then seeing that he did not come I went back to the buildings and set my brain to try and find some plan for discovering what I wanted to know, but for a long time I could hit on nothing; then an idea came to me and I left the room again and went round to the back of the buildings, hoping, if possible, to be able to discover a window through which I could look in upon them as they sat at supper; but it was easier, I discovered, to talk of finding such a window than actually to do it.

The back of the monastery ran flush with the edge of the cliff, the rampart wall joining the building at the angle of our room. If only I could manage to pass along the wall and thus reach a small window which I guessed must look out on to a tiny court, situated between the rearmost wall of the central hall and that on the left of our room, I thought I might discover what I wanted to know. But to do this would mean a long and difficult climb in the dark, which I was not at all anxious to attempt until I had satisfied myself that there was no other way of obtaining the information I sought.

It might be very well asked here why I was so anxious to convince myself as to the man's identity. But one instant's reflection will show that in such a situation as ours we could not afford to run a single risk. The man had plainly let me see that he did not wish me to become aware of his presence. That in itself was sufficient to excite my suspicion and to warrant my taking any steps to satisfy myself that he was not likely to prove an enemy. As I have said before, we were carrying our lives in our hands, and one little precaution neglected might serve to ruin all.

Before venturing on the climb mentioned above, I determined to go round to the other side of the house and endeavour to look in by one of the windows there. I accordingly did so, and was relieved to find that by putting my hands on the rough stone window-sills and bracing my feet against a stone buttress in the angle of the wall, I could raise myself sufficiently to catch a glimpse of the room.

I pulled myself up and looked in, but to my astonishment and chagrin there were only two people present, and neither of them was the man I wanted.

I lowered myself to the ground again and listened for the sound of a third person entering the room, but though I remained there nearly twenty minutes I could not distinguish what I wanted. That the man was of the same party I was perfectly convinced, but why was he not with them now? This absence on his part only increased my suspicion and made me the more anxious to catch a glimpse of him.

Seating myself on the stone steps of the central hall, I roughly traced in my own mind a ground plan of the building, as far as I was familiar with it. The central hall was of course empty; we occupied the rooms on the right of it, the second party those on the left; of these their coolies had the front room, while the two men upon whom I had just looked in held possession of the rearmost one. There was also a third, which did not look out on the open courtyard, and must therefore have its window in the small court formed by the angles of the wall at the rear. If I wanted therefore to look into it I must undertake the climb I had first projected and, what was more, must set about it immediately, for if I did not do so his lamp would in all probability be extinguished, and in that case I might as well spare myself the trouble and the danger.

I returned to my own side of the house and, having convinced myself that there was no one about, mounted the wall a little to the right of where I had been standing when I heard the men knock upon the gate.

If you would estimate the difficulty of what I was about to attempt you must remember that the wall at the top was scarcely more than eighteen inches wide. On one side it had the buildings to support it, the wall of which rose above my head for more than a dozen feet, and permitted me no sort of hold on its smooth surface, while, on the other hand, I had a sheer drop down into the valley below of fully three hundred feet.

At the summit of the mountain the wind was now blowing a perfect hurricane, but so long as I was behind the building I was not subjected to its full pressure; when however I arrived at the courtyard, where I could see the light of the window I was so anxious to reach, it was as much as I could do to keep my footing. Clinging to everything that could uphold me, and never venturing a step till I was certain that it was safe, I descended from the wall, approached the window and looked in. This time I was not destined to be disappointed. The man I wanted was lying upon a sort of bed-place in the corner smoking a long pipe.

His face was turned towards me and directly I looked at it I remembered where I had seen him before. He was one of the principal, and, at the same time, one of the most interested members of the society who had visited the house to which we had been conducted by Laohwan, in Shanghai.

As I realised this a most horrible and creepy feeling passed over me. This was the same man whom we had seen at the rest-house two nights before. Was he following us? That he had recognised me, in spite of my disguise, I felt certain. If so, in whose employ was he, and what would he do? I remained watching him for nearly two minutes, trying to compose myself sufficiently to know how to act. Then, just as I was about to turn away, I saw the man raise himself, and as he did so the taller of the pair I had seen in the other room entered and sat down.

“So far we have succeeded admirably,” said the new-comer; “they do not suspect, and by to-morrow evening we shall meet Quong Yan Miun at the ford, tell him all, and then our part of the work will be at an end.”

“But we must have the stick, come what may,” said the man upon the bed. “It would never do for us to go back to Pekin without it,”

“We shall receive much honour if we do,” chuckled the other. “And then these foreign devils will suffer torture till they die.”

“A lesson to them not to meddle with our affairs,” returned his friend. “I wish that we could be there to see it.”

“It is said that they have many new ways of torture, of which we cannot even dream, up there in the mountains,” continued the first man. “Why may we not go forward to see it?”

“Because we could not enter even if we did press on,” returned the man I had recognised; “nor for myself do I want to. But these foreign devils have stolen the password and imitated the priest of Hankow, and if it had not been for Laohwan, who liked Chinese gold better than foreign secrets, and so betrayed them, we should never have found them out at all.”

Then with significant emphasis he continued—

“But they will die for it, and their fate will be a warning to any who shall come after them. And now tell me, where do we meet Quon Yan Minn?”

“At the crossing of the river in the mountains, at sundown to-morrow evening.”

“And how shall we know him—for there may be many crossing?”

“He will be riding a camel and sitting upon a red saddle embroidered with silver. Moreover it is said that he has but one eye, and that his left hand, which was cut off by the mandarin Li, is still nailed to the gateway at I-chang.”

“Does he expect our coming?”

“By no means. Once in every month he is sent, down by the Great Ones of the mountains to receive messages and alms from the outside world. Our instructions are not to tarry until this letter be in his hands.”

As he spoke he took from his pocket a small roll of paper carefully tied up. Having replaced it he turned again to his companion, and said—

“Now leave me; I am tired and would sleep. See that all is ready for proceeding on our way in the morning.”

The second man left the room without another remark, and next moment the lamp was extinguished.

As soon as all was dark I crept softly across the yard, mounted the wall—not without a tremor, as I thought of what my fate would be if I should overbalance and slip, and retraced my steps round the house. Once in the courtyard I made all the haste I could back to my room.

I fully expected to find Nikola asleep; my surprise therefore may be imagined when I discovered him calmly seated working out Euclid's forty-third problem with a piece of charcoal upon the floor. He looked up as I entered and, without moving a muscle of his face, said quietly—

“What have you discovered?”

I sat myself down beside him and furnished him with a complete résumé of what I had undertaken and all that I had heard that evening.

When I had finished he sat looking at the wall. I could see, however, that he was thinking deeply. Then he changed his position, and with his piece of charcoal began to draw figure eights inside each other upon the floor. By the time the smallest was the size of a pin's head he had arrived at a conclusion.

“We are in a tight place,” he said coolly, “and if I could sacrifice you here I could probably save myself and go forward with nothing to fear. It's a funny thing that I should think so much of a man as to be willing to save his life at the expense of my own, but in this case I intend doing so. You have no desire to be tortured I suppose?”

“I have a well-founded objection to it,” I said.

“In that case we must make out some scheme which will enable us to do without it. If these fellows arrive at the ford before us they will have the first chance of doing business with the messenger. Our endeavour must be to get there before they do, and yet to send them back to Pekin satisfied that they have fulfilled their mission. How to do this is the problem we have to work out.”

“But how are we to do it?” I inquired.

“Let me think for a few minutes,” he answered, “and I'll see if I can't find out.”

I waited for fully five minutes. Then Nikola said—

“The problem resolves itself into this. By hook or crook we must delay this man and his party on the road for at least three hours. Then one of us must go on to the ford and meet the man from the monastery. To him must be handed the letter I received from the chief priest at the Llamaserai, and when he has been sent back with it to the monastery there must be another man, accoutred exactly like himself, to take his place. This man, who will have to be myself, will receive our friends, take their letters and despatch them back to Pekin with a message from the monastery. After that it will be touch and go with go. But I'm not afraid to go forward, and I pay you the compliment of saying that I don't believe you are.”

“By Jove, Dr. Nikola!” I answered candidly, quite carried away by the boldness of his scheme, “you're what I call a really good-plucked one, and since you take it in this way I will go on with you and carry it through if it costs me my life.”

“I thank you,” said Nikola quietly. “I thought I wasn't deceived in you. Now we must think out how these different schemes are to be worked. To begin with we must leave here at least an hour before our friends in the other rooms. Once on the way we must push forward as fast as we possibly can and secure a camel and saddle of the kind described before they can suspect. Then we have got to discover some means of delaying them upon the road. Now how can that be accomplished?”

“Couldn't we get some villagers to rise against them?”

“It would cost too much; and then there is always the chance of their turning traitor, like our friend Laohwan. No, we must think of something else.”

He re-commenced drawing eights upon the floor. By the time he had perfected the thirtieth—for I counted them myself—he had worked it out to his evident satisfaction.

“By twelve o'clock to-morrow at the very latest,” he said, “if my information be correct, we ought to be at an inn in the mountains fifteen miles ahead. It is the only dwelling between this place and the ford, and they will be certain to call at it. I shall instruct one of my men, whom I will leave behind for that purpose, and he will see that their animals are watered from a certain trough. If they drink what I give him to pour in, they will go about five miles and then drop. If they don't drink I shall see that he brings about another result.”

“If you can depend on him, that should do the trick. But what about Laohwan?”

“I shall deal with Laohwan myself,” said Nikola with grim earnestness; “and when I've done I think he will regret having been so imprudent as to break faith with me.”

He said no more, but I could not help a feeling of satisfaction in knowing that I was not the man in question. From what I had so far seen of Nikola's character I can say that I would rather quarrel with any other half dozen people in the world, whoever they might be, than risk the displeasure of the man Dr. Nikola.

“Now,” I said, when he had finished, “as they've turned in we shouldn't be long in following their example.”

“But before we do so I think you had better find the coolies and see that they thoroughly understand that we start at three o'clock. Moreover bid them hold their tongues.”

I complied with his request, and half an hour later was wrapped in my blankets and fast asleep.