CHAPTER XXV.
'Now's our time to get the treasure,' Charlie said. 'The fighting is nearly at an end, and the sailors won't want our help now.'
'Come along, then,' Fred answered; 'and I hope that we shall do better this time than last.'
Much to their surprise they found that the gate was open.
'Chin Choo has fled,' Ping Wang declared, on seeing that the gate was unprotected, and they heard later in the day that the rascally mandarin, after making a very warlike speech to his countrymen, had sneaked out of the town, and was on his way to Peking.
As Charlie, Fred, and Ping Wang entered Chin Choo's enclosure they were more excited than ever they had been during the siege of Su-ching, or the storming of Kwang-ngan; for they knew that in a few minutes they would discover whether or not their journey to China had been a fruitless one. Several of Chin Choo's servants, their pockets and arms loaded with loot, hurried out at the back of the house as Charlie, Fred, and Ping Wang approached it. They did not interfere with the thieves, but the thought that they had, perhaps, already taken away the idol occurred to each of them. They quickened their speed, and ran up the verandah steps together.
'There is the idol!' Ping Wang exclaimed, excitedly; and Charlie and Fred saw a brass image standing in the corner of a room which opened from the verandah.
Ping Wang went down on his knees, and grasping the right forearm of the image, tugged at it. To the amazement of Charlie and Fred, he pulled the idol's arm forward from its body until it was in an almost horizontal position. Then, placing his fingers on the spot where the idol's hand had lain, he pushed to the right its crossed legs, and showed to Charlie and Fred that the brass pedestal on which the figure sat was practically a jewel-box.
'Marvellous!' Charlie muttered; but his and Fred's delight was greater still when Ping Wang took out of it a little piece of cloth, and, unrolling it, exhibited an immense ruby.
'There are at least thirty as good as this one,' Ping Wang declared, joyfully; but, as he spoke, a noise was heard in Chin Choo's enclosure.