Jack remained for several weeks with Hi Feng, hoping against hope. Herr Schwab was still at the Oriental Hotel. Exposure to cold, lack of sufficient food, and his mental anxieties had broken down the German's robust health, and for a fortnight he lay at death's door. Monsieur Brin happened to be at the same hotel; he had missed every fight, solely through his own restlessness, which sent him backwards and forwards from place to place—never the time and the place and the correspondent together. He was a good-hearted fellow, and, finding a German lying ill and not too carefully tended, he constituted himself sick nurse, and devoted himself to his self-imposed duties with unusual constancy. He had his reward in the patient's convalescence. As soon as Schwab was able to sit up and take a little nourishment, Brin undertook to prove to him that the Kaiser in Berlin was the Man of Sin, and for a good fortnight he had much the better of the argument.
One day Hi Feng learnt that a great effort was at last being made against Ah Lum. He had already been defeated by a large force of Cossacks, and driven from the neighbourhood of Kirin north-eastwards towards the Harbin-Vladivostok railway. Strong columns were hard upon his heels in pursuit. Through his position as forage contractor to the Russians, Hi Feng already knew that a large body of Cossacks was shortly to leave Harbin for a place half-way between that town and Vladivostok. Putting the two pieces of news together, and making discreet enquiries, he found that it was intended to make a sudden dash upon Ah Lum's line of retreat and dispose of him once for all. The evacuation of Moukden and the narrowing of the area of country open to the Russians in Manchuria had made the presence of a strong guerrilla force within their lines insupportable. Ah Lum must be rooted out.
Hi Feng was to deliver a large quantity of forage within ten days; it was pretty safe to infer that the expedition would start from Harbin soon afterwards. Jack felt that Ah Lum must be warned at once. Furthermore, he was much disposed to rejoin the Chunchuses. Without overrating his abilities, he knew that he had been able to do something for them, and what he had learnt about his father's treatment did not make him more friendly to the Russians or less inclined to do what he could to thwart them. If he had seen any chance of reaching or communicating with his father he might have taken a different view: having left Ah Lum with that purpose there would be no call for him to abandon his quest. But it was now clear that his enquiries must be pursued through Russian agents. He therefore decided to rejoin Ah Lum. At the same time he would let it be known that a reward of 1000 roubles should be paid to anyone giving him certain information of his father's whereabouts. This offer, judiciously circulated through Chinese channels among the officials of the railway, might bring definite news.
There was another consideration. Among the Chunchuses, so long as Ah Lum held his own, Jack would be out of reach of the Russian authorities. If he remained in Harbin, or any other Russian centre, the news of his offer would at once put his enemies on his track. While he was in Ah Lum's camp Hi Feng or his brother the compradore could easily communicate with him if they received any information.
Once more, then, he set out to join Ah Lum, Hi Lo accompanying him. He travelled in the guise of a Chinese farmer. Each took two ponies, and they pushed on with great rapidity, riding the animals alternately. By means of the secret signs used by Ah Lum, Jack soon got upon the chief's track. Making a wide detour to avoid the Russian columns now steadily driving Ah Lum towards the point whence the Harbin force was to complete his encirclement, he came upon the Chunchuses from the east, and early one morning rode into the brigand camp.
His arrival was regarded as a favourable omen. It was likened by Ah Lum to the delightfulness of rain after long drought. Sin Foo was lucky; Fortune would now surely smile. The Chunchuses were, in fact, in a somewhat critical position. The camp, only one day old, was pitched in a valley of the Chang-ling hills some twenty miles above the Kan-hu lake—an extensive sheet of water nearly thirty miles long and of varying breadth. Fifty miles to the north lay the nearest point on the railway, about 150 miles from Harbin and twice as far from Vladivostok, the line threading a tortuous path among the hills. A considerable Russian force sent out from Kirin was known to be at Wo-ke-chan to the south-west; from this place a winter track led over the hills to the head of the La-lin-ho valley, within striking distance of Ah Lum's camp. Another column, at O-mu-so to the south, commanded the upper valley of the Mu-tan-chiang, and while cutting off access to Ah Lum's old quarters on the upper Sungari, threatened his left flank by the high-road to Ninguta. At that place, some eighty miles from O-mu-so, a third column covered the passes into the Lao-ling mountains on the east. The bandits were thus in a ring-fence. Only the north was open, and Jack's news confirmed the wary chief's suspicions that the apparent gap in the north had been left with the sole object of tempting him into the neighbourhood of the railway, on which an overwhelming force was held in readiness.
The confirmation of his suspicions roused the chief from the dejection into which the gradual tightening of the coils had thrown him. From an attitude almost of despair he now rose to a spirit of sullen determination. The Russians were gradually closing around him; they would drive him to bay.
"The tiger comes to eat the fly," he said. "Wah! he may prove a wooden tiger. The Russians shall see what it is to draw a badger. I own, honoured sir, I thought once of disbanding my force. But on reflection I have come to another mind. The very villagers who have been most willing to help me would probably turn against me retreating, and sell me to the Russians. He who advances may fight, but he who retreats must take care of himself. It is better to die fighting. Adversity is necessary to the development of men's virtues. I will choose a strong position and await the flood. It will not be long in coming. The Russians, I doubt not, when their arrangements along the railway are complete, will advance at the same time from east, west, and south, driving me against the spears of the Cossacks hiding behind the railway to the north. I have only 600 men left. There has been much fighting since you left, honoured sir; my men are exhausted with constant marching and insufficient food. It is not easy to stop the fire when water is at a distance."
Jack found that the Russian prisoners were no longer with the Chunchuses. Ah Lum had been glad to exchange them against as many of his band captured during the recent fight. But for this exchange his force would have been even smaller than it was. He was hopelessly outnumbered by the Russians, each of whose columns was about 1200 strong. Their horses were in good condition; and the work of chasing the Chunchuses having devolved on one only of the columns at a time, the Cossacks were not so much worn out as their quarry, who had been kept moving constantly.
Ah Lum and Jack discussed the situation in great detail. There seemed indeed no way out. To fight or to disband: those were the alternatives, each fraught with peril if not disaster. Another fight would probably be the last, for the Russians would hardly make a serious attack until they had the wily brigand who had given them so much trouble completely surrounded. With perhaps 5000 men engaged on one side and only 600 on the other there was but one result to be expected.