Under the Chinese Dragon: A Tale of Mongolia

by F. S. Brereton

A guttural response reassured him. 'We have understood. His Excellency speaks plainly, though he makes many mistakes. Hung wished only to tell of something which has been forgotten. There is no need to go out on deck and enter by the port, for there is a path to the cabin by this way. Does his Excellency forget that meals are brought to his friends through a hatchway leading up through the floor of the cabin?'

The position of that hatch flashed across David's brain instantly, and he could have struck himself for having forgotten it so readily. Of course, it was the only way by which to rejoin the party in the cabin, and offered a perfectly safe road.

'We will make along it at once, Hung,' he said. 'Let Jong run and warn our friends immediately. I will watch at the top of the ladder, while you and the other two search about for something with which to block the foot of the ladder leading up to that hatch. Quick with it! They may have remembered it too.'

Feeling sure that his orders would be carried out promptly, he swarmed up to the level of the deck again, and once more cautiously protruded his head. At the same moment a heavy thud reached his ears; there came the sound of splintering wood, then the sharp, distinctive snap of a magazine pistol. As on a former occasion, though to a lesser degree this time, the flash of the weapon gave our hero an instant's view of his surroundings. Thirty feet away was the wall of the cabin, with the dark lines of the doorposts in the centre, while the deck on either hand was occupied by crouching figures. One Chinaman alone was prominent, and he stood before the door, frantically struggling to drag the blade of the axe he had been wielding out of the woodwork. He staggered backwards with the weapon, as the darkness fell like a screen about him. Then the sound of splintering wood was repeated, a pistol snapped, and after it another, illuminating the scene for the space of a few seconds. David saw the Chinaman reel across the deck, and heard the axe fall heavily upon the boards, then his eye fell upon other figures. Half a dozen men were creeping towards the hatchway from which he was watching, and the leader of the band was within a few inches.

'One of the foreign devils,' he heard a man call. 'Hold him! Seize him! He has stolen out of the cabin.'

'I have him. Follow. Push your knives into his carcass.'

The leader so close to our hero recovered from his astonishment far sooner than did David, and hardly had his companion shouted when the man threw himself forward as if he were diving, and landing full upon the lad, who was standing on the steep steps that lead to the 'tween decks, gripped him round the neck in an embrace that was stifling. The result must have been as much of a surprise to him as it was to our hero; for the latter's feet slipped, his soft, felt soles failing to grip the rungs of the ladder, and at once both were precipitated to the bottom.

'Yield, foreign devil,' the man hissed in his ear. 'Yield, or I will thrust my knife through you.'

He made frantic efforts to get at the weapon, and releasing one hand groped at his belt. But the fall had shaken the weapon from its place, and had sent it tinkling on to the boards, while the movement gave David an opportunity he took the utmost advantage of. Naturally strong and active, and by this time fully restored to health, he was a good match for the Chinaman. Indeed, he was more; for, exerting all his strength, he thrust the man beneath him and held him there, wondering what next he should do with him. However, he was not to be spared time for such a purpose, for by now a second man was beside them. David felt his hand on his shoulder as the Chinaman sought in the darkness to assure himself which was friend and which foreign devil. In a moment he would know, for the clothing would tell its own story promptly, and if David were to escape a thrust from the long knife the rascal bore he must act on the instant. It may have been an inspiration—perhaps the whole thing was done unconsciously—in any case our hero braced his muscles as he had never done on a former occasion, and stretching out a hand gripped the pigtail of the man beneath him. Then he lifted the head sharply and sent it back against the deck with a sickening thud that stunned his antagonist instantly. A moment later something struck hard against his own shoulder, and, though he did not realise the fact then, the explanation came afterwards. The second Chinaman had thrust at him in the darkness, and missing his aim, had sent his blade within a couple of inches of his back, and far across it till his wrist came against the shoulder.

'Which shows he means business in any case,' thought David, recoiling before the blow. 'How's that?'