CHAPTER XIII. WYNNIE MAKES A BLUNDER.
Edith and Wynnie found Tokio rather lonely after the two young men had gone. It was the loveliest season of the Japan year; the trees were pink with blossoms and every street and square carpeted with fallen petals. Save in the government offices and at the railway stations there was little outward sign of war. All over the empire almond-eyed girls and women were working quietly for the soldiers, arranging bandages, picking lint, preparing scrap-books for the hospitals; but this made no stir. The rickshaw coolies pattered along the city streets and groups of strangers clustered about the shop-windows as in the time of peace. Now and then the tap of a drum was heard, and a column of dark-faced little soldiers passed at quickstep, their faces set with stern resolve, the sunrise flag floating before them. For a moment the crowds turned to look, then returned to their money-making or sight-seeing or shopping.
Señor Bellardo became more attentive to the Blacks on the very day when the midshipman and correspondent sailed away in the Zafiro. He attached himself naïvely to their party, even when they went to the War Office to ask for the latest news.
Larkin and Bob Starr, in pursuance of their purpose of showing their friends everything worth seeing in Tokio, had introduced the American girls, as well as Colonel Selborne, to the high government officials, who had welcomed the strangers with utmost courtesy.
About a week after the departure of the young men the Blacks called at the War Office, Bellardo following meekly in their train. As it happened, no one was in the room but the orderlies, who gave the party to understand that their superiors had been called out, but would return soon.
"Oh, we can't wait," said Edith impatiently.
"But it's our last visit, really a call of ceremony, girls," protested their adopted uncle, as he called himself. "It will hardly be courteous to leave without seeing one or both of these gentlemen who have been so polite to us."
"I'll write a line and leave it for them," said Wynnie impulsively. "We've lots to do, Uncle, and we can't waste time, you know, in our last day in Tokio. They may not come back for hours."
She took the chair of one of the officials, looked about for pen and ink, and began writing hurriedly on a blank sheet which lay on the top of a pile of documents. The orderlies gazed in bewilderment at the pretty vision of the girl in a picture hat, occupying the chair of their venerated head of department.
Before Wynnie could finish her note, however, the owner of the chair appeared, with profuse apologies for his delay. Wynnie crumpled up the slip of paper upon which she was writing, and dropped it into the waste-basket as she rose to pay her respects to the war official. The rest of the party advanced and joined in the mutual farewells and regrets. As they stood by the desk, Edith was surprised to see the Spaniard stoop, take Wynnie's half-written note from the basket, and bestow it in an inner pocket. "How sentimental!" she thought, rather contemptuously. She started to speak to her sister about it, on the way home, but something in the street took her attention, and she forgot all about it.
The Blacks had expected to leave next morning for Yokohama, where they were to go on board a steamer for Hawaii and San Francisco. In the disturbed state of affairs on the Chinese coast, Colonel Selborne had concluded not to risk inconvenience or danger, and to give up the rest of the trip. Early in July the whole party would be at home once more. But their plans were interrupted by an unforeseen and astounding incident. It was no less than the detention of all four by the Japanese Government.
They had hardly reached the hotel, on their return from the War Office, when a dapper little gentleman stepped up to the Colonel and said a few words in a low tone.
"What!" exclaimed the American. "Impossible. We start for home to-morrow morning. Edith," he added, turning to his young guests, who were just behind with Señor Bellardo, "this man says we are not to leave the hotel till further notice. Special orders from the War Office!"
"Why, what can be the reason? What has happened?"
The Japanese officer shrugged his shoulders and murmured an apology. "A document of great value has been lost," he said. "It is necessary to detain every one who has visited the office during the afternoon. It is mere form. Honourably do not be annoyed—a thousand regrets for your inconvenience!"
Colonel Selborne understood Japanese methods well enough to know there was a hand of iron under the velvet glove. He submitted with what grace he could muster.
"Search our rooms," he said. "It is absurd to suppose——"
"Ah," interrupted the emissary from the War Office eagerly, "we suppose nothing. It is mere form. To-night, to-morrow, next day, you will surely be at liberty to depart. If you are put to extra expense by remaining longer than you had planned the Government will repay all."
At the Colonel's urgent request the rooms were searched, and of course nothing was found. The little man withdrew, walking backward and apologising over and over; but he did not leave the hotel. He sent a message to the Office and informed the Blacks that nothing further could be done until the next day.
It was ten o'clock in the evening when the recollection of Wynnie's half-written note flashed across Edith's mind. She almost flew to her uncle's door and rapped. The good man had not retired; he was too much annoyed and troubled to sleep.
"Uncle, Uncle, I've something important to tell you. It may be a clue!" And she described Wynnie's act of throwing away the piece of paper and its subsequent recovery by the Spaniard.
"I thought he just wanted a bit of Wyn.'s writing," she said, her lip curling a little. "It may be there was something deeper in it."
"But the paper was perfectly blank; there was nothing on it but two or three lines I had written when General Kafuro came in," said Wynnie, who had joined them.
"Did you look on the other side of the sheet?" demanded Colonel Selborne.
"Not once! And it may have been the very document they miss! Oh, what a foolish, foolish girl I was! I saw the paper lying there on a heap of other sheets, and supposed—oh, the General must have turned it over so that no one would see it when he was called out, expecting to return in a minute! That was it, I know it was—and it's all my fault!" Wynnie hid her face on her uncle's shoulder.
"There, there, dear, it was a natural enough mistake, and you really meant to do a kind and courteous thing in writing our regrets," said the Colonel, patting the brown head.
"Do you know what the missing paper was, sir?" asked Edith.
"It was a sketch of a portion of the fortifications at Sasebo, with specifications below—all in very fine handwriting and pale ink. I must see the officials at once," added Colonel Selborne, looking for his hat.
"Why not hunt up Señor Bellardo first?" suggested Edith eagerly. "Now I think of it, he must have left us just as you were first notified, and he didn't come near us the whole evening."
"I noticed that," said Wynnie, "and was glad of it. I can't bear him, and never could."
"Do you remember how Mr. Larkin looked at him?"
"Yes, and he said——"
"I can't stop, my dears," broke in the Colonel. "I'll enquire for the Spaniard at once and find him if he is in the hotel. Do you know where his lodgings are in Tokio?"
Neither of them knew. Singularly enough, the man had never mentioned his lodging-place. He always dined at the hotel.
Colonel Selborne found the Japanese official on the verandah, and at once took him into his confidence. They made enquiries and looked into every public room in the hotel. Bellardo was not there.
"Leave the matter now with me," said the secret-service man quietly. "My men are near, and I will continue the search. In the morning you shall know the result, and I hope to be able to relieve you from further surveillance."
Early the next morning the report was made by the chagrined but ever-polite officer. The bird had flown. Señor Bellardo's lodgings were known—as were those of every stranger in the city—to the police. They were visited before midnight, and found empty. The police in every seaport were notified by telephone and ordered to arrest a tall, well-dressed man, claiming to be a Spaniard, with dark complexion and black beard and moustache. His clothes were described, as well as a certain shifty look in his eyes. His bearing was that of one who had been trained in a military or naval school.
Colonel Selborne and his party made affidavits before the American consul, telling everything they knew about the matter. As General Kafuro remembered leaving the paper on the very pile from which Wynnie had taken her sheet, there seemed to be no doubt that Edith's story accounted for the theft. Other papers of value had been missed from time to time since the war broke out, and it was believed at the Office that the so-called Spaniard was a dangerous spy in the pay of the Russians.
General Kafuro congratulated Ethelwyn on having forced the man's hand, and, at the request of the consul, declared the American party free to leave Tokio whenever they wished.
Colonel Selborne lost no time in availing himself of the permission and, with his wife and the two young ladies, sailed from Yokohama two days later.
On the evening of the same day, when the City of Pekin was heading eastward with the Americans on board, a small sailboat put out from a village on the west coast of the island. Besides the sailors it had one passenger—a gentleman with smooth face, light complexion, and red hair. The boatmen had agreed, for a large sum, to land him at the nearest point in Korea, unless they should previously fall in with a Russian war-ship. The latter contingency actually came to pass, as the boat was driven northward by a southerly storm, and picked up by one of the Vladivostock squadron, then cruising for prizes.
From Vladivostock, where he was safely landed on the following day, the red-haired gentleman proceeded by rail to Harbin Junction, and then southward to Port Arthur, now nearly cut off by Nogi's troops. Trains, however, were still running regularly between the beleaguered port and Moukden.
Strangely enough, the hair of the mysterious gentleman was now rapidly turning dark. By the time he reached Port Arthur, it was quite black. A stubbly beard and moustache, too, began to show themselves on his sallow face. The man spoke Russian brokenly, and used English when he could. Never a Spanish word came from his lips, and the Barcelona estates proved veritable castles in Spain, fading from his memory.
As the man passed up the street of Port Arthur, under escort of a corporal's guard, he laid his hand triumphantly on his breast. In an inner pocket, beneath it, reposed a sheet of rice paper, on one side of which were scrawled a few lines, in a girlish handwriting. On the other were drawings of moats, counterscarps, and a medley of fortifications, followed by vertical lines of delicate Japanese characters.
"Take me at once to General Stoessel's headquarters," said the sallow-faced man. "I have important information for him. Here is my pass from the War Office at St. Petersburg."