Mongolians, including Chinese, Japanese, and Koreans, can get along with less sleep than any other of the world's people; and Jo, in spite of having travelled and learned to speak English, still was a true Mongolian. Therefore, he awoke quite refreshed after two hours of sleep, and, moving with the utmost caution, so as not to arouse Rob, he left their strange hiding-place, carefully closing and fastening its door behind him. Then he swiftly made his way back to the city, where he skirted its wall to the farther side, and forced an entrance through a now dry culvert or water-gate. After showing himself at the several guard-houses, that, if necessary, he afterwards might be able to prove his presence in the city that night, he went to his own quarters, where he made preparations for a journey. He ordered a horse to be brought, saddled, and ready for travel, and sent for his lieutenant, a man who, though older than he, was possessed of so little influence as still to be under the orders of his junior.
To this officer Jo turned over command of the guard, telling him that he considered the escape of the foreign devil, who had eluded them by the exercise of magic arts, to be an event of such grave importance that he was about to report it in person at Pao-Ting-Fu, and possibly to Pekin itself. The young captain named these places in order to throw possible pursuit off the scent, for he had decided to carry Rob in exactly the opposite direction, or back over the way he had come, to Hankow. Having thus arranged affairs to his satisfaction, he set forth at sunrise, riding by way of the very gate through which Rob had made so hasty an entrance the day before.
Jo was ready to leave the city a full hour earlier than this, and wanted to do so; but even greater authority than his would be insufficient to open the gates of any Chinese city before sunrise, and so he was forced to await that hour.
Once in the open he rode with all speed, hoping to reach the temple of the rain-god before any worshippers should appear, and while Rob still slept. In this, however, he was disappointed, for, though he reached the temple in advance of the priests who served it, and who, having joined in the pursuit of the foreigner, had been forced to spend the night in the city, he was dismayed to find a certain number of worshippers kotowing and burning incense before the great image. These were wretched farmers from the near-by country, who, having no work to do in their burned-up fields, and with death from starvation staring them in the face, had come in desperation to the only source they knew of from which aid might be asked.
Another company of these people, who reached the place at the same time with Jo, were provided with fire-crackers, with which they proposed to arouse the god's attention if he should happen to be asleep. A bunch was exploded as soon as they entered the temple, and to their awed delight the efficacy of this proceeding was immediately apparent, for the image of the rain-god trembled, and a muffled sound came from its interior. Evidently the god, who alone was all-powerful in this emergency, had been asleep, but now was awaking to the gravity of the situation. With heads in the dust, the worshippers humbly bowed before his image and implored his aid. Loudest of them all was the young officer who had forced a way to the very front of the assemblage.
His prayer was in Chinese, of the mandarin dialect, which no one present, except he, understood. Strange as it was to the ears of his fellow-worshippers, it also contained words of another tongue still stranger, that their ignorance did not permit them to recognize. Thus Jo was able to call out, under guise of a prayer, and undetected:
"It's all right, Rob. I am here, and we are safe so long as you keep quiet."
At this point some one at the back of the temple uttered a loud cry, at which all the bowed heads were raised. Jo looked up with the others, and, to his dismay, saw the great right arm of the god slowly lifting as though to impose silence upon those who persisted in annoying him with their unwelcome clamor. At this phenomenon the superstitious spectators gazed in breathless suspense, and when the arm suddenly dropped back into its former position they sprang to their feet.
They were not so much frightened as they were awed; for in China it has often happened that the gods have seemed to enter certain of their own earthly images, and by well-understood movements or sounds have caused these to express their will to the people. It was reported that the very image of the rain-god now under observation had been thus favored, and upon previous occasions of grave importance had made motions of the arms or head that only the priests could interpret. So the people now waited in terrified but eager expectation.
Nor were they disappointed; for no sooner had the arm dropped than the head of the image, which was big enough to hold a man, was seen to be in motion. It certainly was bending forward and assuming an attitude benign, but so terrifying that the awe-stricken spectators instinctively pressed backward. As they gazed with dilated eyes and quaking souls the great head was bowed farther and farther forward, until suddenly, with a convulsive movement, it was seen to part from its supporting shoulders and leap into the air.