Jack waited for no more. Taking a rouble note from his pocket, he cried:
"Here is six times your fare; this or nothing!"
At the same time he seized the yuloh,—the pole that does duty for a stern oar, and shoved off. There is nothing a Chinese coolie will not do for a rouble. The man sprang to the oar, worked its flat end backwards and forwards with all his strength, and sent the sampan over the water at a greater speed than its clumsy build seemed capable of. Jack kept his head low in order to be sheltered as long as possible by the shanties on shore and the sampans crowded at the water's edge; Sowinski, he felt, would not hesitate to take a shot at him. He could see the Pole spring from his droshky and rush at break-neck pace towards the waiting row of craft. He leapt into one, pointed Jack out to the coolie, and in a few moments started in pursuit.
The Waverley had left the inner harbour where merchant vessels drop anchor, and was steaming dead slow out to sea. The captain stood on the bridge, and the vessel hooted a farewell to the cruiser Rurik that lay in the middle of the channel. Suddenly Captain Fraser became aware that the voice sounding clear across the still water was hailing him. Glancing round, he saw a sampan making rapidly towards him from the shore, and in it a youth with one hand to his mouth, the other waving his hat. The captain first swore, then signalled half-speed ahead; it was some Russian formality, he supposed, and as a British sailor he'd be hanged if he delayed another moment for any foreign port officer. But next moment he heard his own name in an unmistakably English accent, and, looking more closely at the shouter, recognized him.
"Young Mr. Brown!" he muttered. "What's he wishing?"
At the same time he jerked the indicator back to "stop", a bell tinkled below, and the vessel came to a stand-still.
"Ay, ay!" he shouted. "And be hanged if there isn't another man bawling. What's in the wind, anyway?"
The first craft was soon alongside, a rope was heaved over, and in a few seconds Jack stood on deck.
"Pleased to see you, Mr. Brown," said the Captain. "Ay, and I wouldna have sto'ped for no ither man."
"Thanks, Captain! I want your help." Jack spoke hurriedly; the second sampan was but a biscuit-shot distant. "The Russians have collared my father on a charge of spying for the Japanese; I don't know where he is; that fellow in the boat is at the bottom of it. I've managed to steal a march on him and sell the flour you landed the other day, and I want you to take charge of these bills and deposit them at the Hong-Kong and Shanghai Bank for me."