“That’s your affair. We have it on excellent authority that Mr. Blakeborough’s factory was raided by your orders. Now, listen; I give you six hours in which to find Mr. Blakeborough and hand him over to us. As compensation you will pay eight hundred ounces of gold.”
“It cannot be done!”
“Then my instructions, which have the approval of the Nankin Government, are to open fire and also to make use of the aircraft we carry on board. I’m not here to argue. The flag of truce will be hauled down in half an hour.”
Fu-so-li smiled, but it was a sickly smile. Like all bullies, he was a coward at heart.
“I see what can do,” he rejoined, and signed to the mechanic in the motor-launch to restart the engine.
Watching the bandit chief out of sight, Raxworthy actually winked to the two ratings, who for the first and probably last time in their service careers were wearing gold rings with curls on their sleeves.
“It’s going to work,” declared the midshipman. “The only thing I was doubtful about was whether that blighter had brought Ti-so with him!”
VI
But Fu-so-li had not brought the treacherous second steward of the gunboat with him. Actually, Ti-so had been reaping a profitable income from his double-dealings. As the steward of the luckless coasting steamer Ah-Foo, he had been instrumental in giving the pirates a chance to seize her. That done, he had hurried hot-foot to Shanghai, where he heard that Sandgrub was going up the Yang-tse to conduct operations against the notorious Fu-so-li. By offering a sum of money, he had bribed Ming, the captain’s messman, to allow him to impersonate the second steward, and none of Sandgrub’s officers and crew had noticed his deception. The one possible set-back was Ti-so’s recognition by Midshipman Raxworthy, and in that case his doubts were removed by Ming’s affirmation that the suspect had been several months in the ship.
It was a simple matter for Ti-so to drug the food intended for the officers’ mess; equally simple for him to signal to a passing sampan—which was there by previous arrangement—to get her to pick him up when he dived overboard.