“I’d like to destroy it, but I don’t dare,” he said. Then he read in a voice trembling with emotion:
“Department condemns your actions in entering To-Yan Lake and attacking Chinese soldiers. Proceed immediately back to Ku-Ling and offer ample apology to viceroy. Consider yourself relieved of your command.”
If a shell had exploded in their midst the eager listeners could not have been more surprised.
“Burn it up,” Langdon exclaimed indignantly. “That’s the way things are run from a distance of ten thousand miles.” Then his glance encountered the wide-open eyes of Ta-Ling and he snorted with rage as he roughly jerked the bound Chinaman to his feet.
“Did you hear it?” he cried.
The mandarin’s eyes burned balefully as he nodded his head in assent. Langdon released the Chinaman, and but for Phil’s steadying hand he would have fallen to the floor. Then the pilot raised the long braided cue of the interpreter and with a swift cut of his jack-knife severed it close up to the Chinaman’s head; the next second, holding it out to Phil, he cried gleefully:
“Put this on under your cap; it’s all you need to complete your costume.
“You won’t be so keen to show yourself in public hereafter,” he continued spitefully to the mandarin.
Ta-Ling was beside himself with rage, but he could only grow red and utter inarticulate sounds, while Langdon sat on the wooden bench laughing scornfully at the disgraced official.
“If he doesn’t commit suicide in twenty-four hours, it’s because he’s chicken-hearted.” Langdon laughed in a low tone, mainly for the Chinaman’s ear. The pilot knew he held the secret of the cablegram. Apparently he had guessed at the contents and was going to send it together with the letter for the American captain. If the viceroy knew the stand that was being taken by the American government, every missionary in the valley of the Yangtse would be unsafe. The mandarin officials in the towns of the provinces were as yet guarding the foreigners against attack until they could be sure of the outcome at Ku-Ling. Once the viceroy had humbled the foreign pride then the rabble would be free to indulge its aroused hatred.