“Burning prayers before the body. He’s going to make trouble for us, pretty soon.”
“How’s that?” asked the Captain.
“These Chinese believe it’s a lasting disgrace to allow their bodies to be buried anywhere but at home. Mai Lo has already asked me when I would embalm the body; but I’ve been making inquiries and find there’s no material aboard the Seagull that will enable me to preserve the corpse of Kai Lun Pu until we can get him to China. He himself understood this, and was willing to be cast overboard; but old Death’s-Head has different ideas, and when he learns what we are going to do he will make trouble, as I said.”
“What can he do?” asked Uncle Naboth.
“These Chinese have a disagreeable way of running amuck and slicing a few people into mincemeat before they can be overcome. I won’t say Mai Lo will do that, but he will do something—anything in his power to prevent us lowering his master’s body into the sea.”
“He won’t run amuck,” said I, positively; “nor will he do anything that will endanger his own life.”
“Why not, Sam?” asked my father. “Mai Lo’s a queer chap. I can’t make him out at all. Seems to me he’s likely to do anything.”
“Except endanger himself,” I added. “The Prince knew Mai Lo better than anyone, and from what he told me I believe Mai’s more clever than you suppose, and too ambitious to sacrifice his life for a mere whim.”
“It isn’t a mere whim,” said the doctor. “The Shintoists are ancestor worshippers, and the sacredness of a dead body is part of their religion. Mai Lo, if he’s a good Shintoist, believes he himself will be condemned by the spirits of his own ancestors if he allows his master to be cast into the sea, whence it is impossible he can be resurrected when the end of the world comes.”
“But is Mai Lo a good Shintoist?” I asked.