"Sowinski is coming with Russian soldiers!" he gasped. "They will be here in five minutes. I found Ah Lum's man, Me Hong; he will send a guide to Hsien-chia-kou, ten miles away. You must not go near Me Hong. But how to get away!"
Jack fortunately could keep his head. He had but a few minutes to decide on a course, and he made the most of them. If he went into the street he would be at once seen; probably there were already men on the watch at each end. The only other way out was by the back. The compradore peered out; as Jack expected, he saw several figures lurking in the shade of the wall. Jack remembered that in the fence separating the compradore's garden from Mr. Brown's there was a narrow gap through which Hi Lo had been wont to creep as a short cut to the house. Between the fence and the house there was a line of shrubs about two and a half feet high. It was growing dark; if he could creep away under cover of the bushes to the hole in the fence he might gain his father's house. There he would in truth be in the enemy's country; but the attention of the watchers would probably be engrossed by the soldiers whose tramp was now heard approaching, and his own house would be the last that Sowinski would suspect as the fugitive's hiding-place. What the next step might be Jack could not imagine; the first was risky, but he saw no other. In a word he told the compradore of his intention. The man gasped; then with a rapid movement took a revolver from a shelf and pressed it into his young master's hand.
"Good-bye, Mr. Hi! I will let you know. Don't forget Father."
He slipped to the back door, dropped on all-fours, and wriggled along the ground close to the line of shrubs. He had barely started when he heard Sowinski loudly summoning Hi An to open the door. The compradore made some reply, apparently temporizing; the answer was an angry shout, followed by a soothing response from the faithful servant. Jack heard no more; in another moment he reached the gap in the fence. He wriggled through; the garden had been neglected since Mr. Brown's arrest, and the undergrowth was rank; this was fortunate, for only a few feet away he saw, leaning on the fence, the form of a Russian soldier, and a yard or two beyond him another. They were talking together, or they might have heard the rustle as Jack squeezed through the hole and made for the house.
In these few moments he had been rapidly thinking. He could not hope to hide in the house, but he might pass through it, gain the front door, and escape by the street. Naturally he was so familiar with the house that there was no danger of his going astray. But, slipping in by the back door and turning into the passage leading to the front, his hope was suddenly dashed. Three Chinamen stood at the open door, completely barring his egress. They were talking excitedly and in loud tones. Jack overheard one of them say that the Russians were arresting a supposed Chinaman, actually an Englishman who had come to spy for the Japanese, the very man who had been living in Hi An's house behind, and whose illness had given them such concern. Evidently they were servants of the Pole, stationed at the door to keep watch. The three men blocked up the doorway and stood facing the street.
Jack noiselessly slipped into the dining-room, lit by a single lamp. He felt like a fox in a hole, with dogs all round ready to snap him up if he showed his nose. He looked round the familiar room with a curious sense of aloofness. Had this been for so long his home? It was the same room, the same furniture—a table, a few chairs, engravings on the walls, the large oaken press; but a different air seemed to pervade it now. For a moment he thought of hiding in the press until dead of night, and then slipping away. He opened the door; the lock had been forced; the press was empty save for a few bottles of wine. Clearly this would not be a secure refuge; a bottle might be required at any moment. What else could he do? He could open the window—the only glass one in the house—and drop into the street; but he would certainly be seen by the men at the door or by a casual passer-by, though there were few people about at that hour of the evening. Yet no other course suggested itself, and he was moving towards the window when he heard soft footsteps in the passage outside. Quick as thought he sprang behind the open door, listening with thumping heart.
One of the servants passed by on the way to the kitchen. He had left the others at the door to keep watch while he prepared his master's supper. The cloth, Jack noticed, had been left on the table. In a minute or two the man would come into this very room, and Jack must be seen. With nerves tingling he waited, setting his lips as a plan of action was suggested to him by the emergency. Soon he heard the clink of glass. The servant was returning. He came from the kitchen carrying a tray with a glass jug, a tumbler, and a plate. He entered the room, walked to the table, and set the tray upon it. At that moment Jack stepped quietly up to him from behind, brought one arm round over his mouth to stifle any cry, and with the other held the cold barrel of his pistol to the man's temple.
"Keep silent, for your life!" he whispered.
The Chinaman, with fear in his eyes, made no sound or movement, but stood as still as his trembling limbs allowed. Still keeping the pistol pointed at the man's head, Jack quietly closed the door. Then he said:
"I will do you no injury, but your safety and mine require that you should be out of harm's way for a time. I have business with your master. Go into that press. So long as you are quiet and do what you are told, you have nothing to fear. But if you make the slightest sound, that moment will be your last. You understand me?"