"This foreign devil's flunkey shall increase the wisdom of the mighty Ling," he shouted. "He shall tell me in his Hong-Kong jargon why he holds conference with one of Cheong-Chau's bandits, and one who has grown so old in wickedness, and so rich in ill-gotten gains, that his eyes are sunk in the wrinkled fat of his face."
He dumped Yung How back into his chair, and for once the habitual expression of serene dignity had departed from that gentleman's countenance. Indeed, he looked terribly frightened--but not more so than Ah Wu himself, who now came forward, holding in his trembling hand an opium pipe, which he offered politely to this gigantic Oriental swashbuckler.
Ling examined the pipe critically; and then, apparently satisfied with the appearance of it, proceeded to roll opium pills in his huge, flat-tipped fingers.
"I smoke," said he, "not like fools, to dream. I smoke to fight, to think, and to make fools of others."
As he said these words he flung off his long coat. Underneath he was wearing a thin vest of the finest Chifu silk. Around his waist was a belt, attached to which was a great knife--a Malay kris--the handle of which was studded lavishly with jewels.
[CHAPTER III--OF THE TIGER AND THE FOXES]
Ling was a Northerner. He hailed from the province of Honan, a land of rugged hills and dark, inhospitable valleys, through which flows the unnavigable Hoang-Ho, the turbulent Yellow River that thrashes its way into the Gulf of Pe-chili, over cataracts and rocks, through dark, precipitous ravines.
The Honanese are a warlike race. From this province the viceroys of the north were wont to recruit the majority of their soldiers--wild, raw-boned men who, in the old days, guarded the sacred presence of the Emperor.
The pirates of the West River may be compared to wolf-packs that roam the southern provinces in search of plunder. But Ling may be likened to a solitary beast of prey, a man-eating tiger, or a rogue elephant--than which there is no more dangerous beast in all the world. He lived by his wits, his great strength and cunning. He had established such a reputation for himself in the provinces of Kwang-si and Kwei-chau that he was feared alike by peasants, priests, and mandarins. He committed crime openly and gloried in it; for in China there are no police, and prefects and magistrates can be bought with silver taels.
And Ling was a man of great wealth. He employed bribery when that was likely to succeed. Otherwise he relied upon his Malay kris, or his great hands, with which he could strangle the life out of an ordinary man in no more time than it would take to wring the neck of a hen.