In the distance I saw my friends rushing up and down the deck, gesticulating wildly. I could even hear a faint shout from the captain, but what good was that?
I was just considering whether to jump in and swim--such was my state of mind at the moment--or to accept the inevitable, and throw myself on the mercy of some kind friend in Hong Kong until the next steamer, a fortnight later, when, suddenly, I heard a shout from one of the steamers close by, and to my joy, perceived the kind, jolly face of the captain of the Hohenzollern. He shouted to me to wait until he could fetch me in his steam-launch, luckily near at hand, and a few minutes later the captain and I, with Chang securely fastened up in the bows, were steaming along merrily towards the great mail steamer; I fear, laughing heartily over the adventure.
When, however, the Kaiser stopped, and let down a ladder to take the two runaways on board, I own to a certain feeling of dread as to what punishment might be in store for us.
Luckily the captain was merciful and, in fact, treated the affair as a good joke, which was far more than we deserved, as it is considered rather a serious matter to stop a steamer carrying mails, if even for only a short time. We had to stand a good deal of chaff during the voyage home, but somehow I don’t think either of us minded much.
The funniest part of it all was that Florence, my friend from the Blue Bungalow, who had come on board to see us off, in the excitement of the moment was nearly carried off in my place, and had to be lifted over the side of the ship, and into a boat below, as the steam-launch, with all the other people on board returning to Hong Kong, had already left some minutes.
The time that elapsed between our sensational ‘send off’ and our arrival at Colombo was a little over three weeks.
At first Chang was regarded rather as a pet lamb among the children and babies--there were seventy-five little olive-branches on board. Then an officious and quarrelsome German made a request to the captain--who, poor man, always tried to please everybody--that dogs on the promenade deck were dangerous to the community at large; so my poor, harmless chow, and also a minute canine specimen--a Chinese sleeve-dog I believe it was called--were banished to the charge of the butcher and steerage passengers, in spite of many tears on the part of the sleeve-dog’s owner and remonstrances from myself.
Sometimes, however, before the ‘disagreeable man,’ as he was called, appeared in the morning, we would bribe the jolly old quarter-master to bring Chang up on deck.
‘Zo,’ he would say, ‘vat dee kinders dee hund vant for to play vith? Ferry vell, I vill him up bringen for a leetle.’ And then what romps he used to have with his little playmates, chasing each other round the deck, when the sailors would stop in their never-ending work of polishing to watch the fun.
How well I remember that strange little being, half child, half demon, who used to fondle and caress Chang so much! What a pretty pair they made, sitting side by side, their heads close together, her red-brown curls mingling with his thick yellow coat, and her little brown arms thrown round his neck.