“I wonder which faction that bird belongs to?” he murmured.
If he had but known the truth, a little ray of hope would have pierced the gloom of his leaden sky, for this balloon was none other than the one he had seen carry his good friends, Dave and Jarvis, away from the mines, some weeks before. They had made the journey in safety. Twice they had been obliged to land to escape the fury of a storm. Wild reindeer had made up for the scantiness of their food supply. Now they were about to alight and enter the city of many mysteries.
Pant had already entered. The clan was gathering, gathering for stirring events, for the development of new mysteries and the solving of old ones. Soon, all unknown to one another, Dave and Jarvis, Pant, Johnny Thompson, Cio-Cio-San, and Mazie would be in the same city—a city seething in the tumult of revolt.
CHAPTER XVIII
UNDER MACHINE-GUN FIRE
By the time Johnny had left the den of Wo Cheng, night had come down upon the city. It was by the light of a golden moon that he saw the balloon hanging in the sky. The balloon, however, interested him little. He was thinking only of Mazie. He had decided to make his way to a corner of the city occupied by Japanese people of doubtful character. To do this he must leave the street he was in and, after turning to his right, go straight ahead for ten blocks.
He was not long in discovering that the carrying out of his plans would put him in the greatest danger. The cross-street was jammed with Russians who fled from the raking fire of machine guns set somewhere at the head of that street. Johnny could still hear their rat-tat and the sing of bullets. Men, women and children ran through the street. An aged peasant woman, her face streaming with blood, toppled toward him, then fell. He sprang to assist her, but two of her own people came to her aid.
“What’s the rumpus?” He hazarded the question in English.