“Alas! alas! I did,” replied Wong-lih; “and I wish I could promise you that such monstrous iniquities should never occur again. But I cannot. I am doing, and have always done, my best to prevent this shameful tampering with Government property; but what can one man do, amongst so many? You will remember that I told you the mandarins were filling their pockets at the expense of their country; and there is no telling how far their peculations may have extended. I have examined as much ammunition as I have had time for, and I am bound to say that it looks all right; but beyond that I cannot go, for it is impossible to know for certain without opening every cartridge, and at a crisis like this, that would be an impossibility. You must do as I do, and trust that your powder will prove what it pretends to be.”
“Very well, sir,” returned Frobisher, bowing. “It does not seem a very satisfactory state of affairs; but I shall do my best, I assure you.”
“I am certain of it,” returned Wong-lih. “And now, one last word. Sorry as I am to have to acknowledge it, there are traitors everywhere about us, so trust no one but yourself and your admiral. News must have been conveyed to Japan by one of my countrymen to have enabled her fleet to know when the transports sailed, and where to meet them. That man, whoever he is, has Japanese gold in his pocket, and the blood of a thousand of his countrymen on his head.”
Drake and Frobisher exchanged glances involuntarily. The same suspicion had evidently crossed the mind of each simultaneously.
“Do you suspect anyone in particular, sir?” enquired Frobisher. “If so, perhaps you will kindly warn me in which direction to exercise the most care.”
“I am sorry to say that I do suspect someone most strongly,” was Wong-lih’s reply, after a somewhat lengthy pause. “But, unfortunately, he is so highly placed that even I dare not mention his name. If the man so much as guessed that I suspected his treachery, I should be assassinated within twenty-four hours; so, for my country’s sake, I must refrain from telling you something I would give a good deal to be able to do.”
“Someone very highly placed?” repeated Frobisher, drawing his chair a little closer to Wong-lih’s, and lowering his voice. “Should I be very wide of the mark in guessing him to be a prince of the blood royal?”
Wong-lih turned pale, and glanced uneasily round him. “You would be, on the contrary, very near the truth, if my suspicions are correct,” he replied. “That man has played many a scurvy trick in his time; but his other delinquencies are light compared with treachery to his country; and I fear to breathe his name in connection with so horrible a crime. But tell me, how came you to suspect also? Have you any grounds?”
“None,” replied Frobisher. “But I have met the man twice, and on each occasion he has impressed me most unfavourably. I suppose one should take no notice of intuitions; but he certainly looks a thorough scoundrel, to my mind. I shall watch him as carefully as I can.”
“Do,” said the admiral. “You say you have met him twice; I recollect the first time, but do not recall a second. When was it?”