I assumed four or five different names, and stayed with different friends in succession.
But the greatest difficulty still lay in finding ways and means to get to America. Once I nearly got away on an English ship, thanks to the introduction which a German friend procured for me. An English ship-owner introduced me as a Swiss, who did not know one word of English. I listened to the whole conversation, but was able to suppress my jubilation when I heard that I was to sail on the steamer Goliath, bound direct for San Francisco. It was, alas, of short duration, for the ship had weighed anchor two hours earlier on account of the tide—and we came too late!
I could have tried another steamer, but they all went by way of Japan, and I feared to risk that.
Fortune, however, smiled upon me. One day I accidentally met a friend with whom I had spent many a gay night in the haunts of the Far East; he was at once ready to help me. And after only a few days I held the necessary papers, and had received all the needful instructions. From a Mr. Scott, Meyer or Brown, I turned suddenly into a distinguished Englishman, rolling in money, who bore the beautiful and dignified name of MacGarvin. This gentleman was representative of the Singer Sewing Machines Company, and on his way from Shanghai to his factories in California.
What was more natural for Mr. MacGarvin than to travel on one of the first outgoing American Mail Steamers!
There were only two luxurious state-rooms aboard this boat. The one was allotted to an American multi-millionaire, the other to Oberleutnant Plüschow—no, I mean, Mr. MacGarvin. One difficulty still remained: to escape unobserved from Shanghai.
But there my friends again came to the rescue. Three days before the ship sailed I took official leave, and spread the report that I no longer felt safe in Shanghai, and was going to Peking, in order to work there at the German Legation. At eleven that night I left in a carriage for the station. How could I be expected to know that the coachman turned off a few minutes before, and drove sharply out of the town in a southern direction? What did I know about Shanghai?
After we had rolled along the Wusung River for nearly two hours, we stopped. Two men armed with revolvers came up, a brief countersign was exchanged; with deep respect and gratitude I kissed a woman’s slim, white hands which were extended to me from the interior of the carriage, and it wheeled round and disappeared. My two friends took me in their midst, I also drew my revolver, and we stepped silently into the waiting junk.
The night was black as pitch, the wind howled, and the dirty, dark water gurgled dismally as it flew by, driven by the tide.
The four Chinks bent to their sculls with the utmost exertion, and after an hour we reached our destination, which lay many miles downstream on the opposite shore!