The Apple of Discord. Earle Ashley Walcott
I passed the threshold I was overwhelmed with amazement. Instead of the bare walls and dingy cobwebbed den the entrance had led me to expect, I was ushered into a room fitted up with a wealth of decoration and discomfort that was thoroughly oriental. The walls were covered with woven tapestry, grotesque in figures and bright with colors. Dark cabinets, rich with carving, stood about the room; the desk and chairs showed the patient handicraft of the Ancient Empire; the floor was inlaid with varied woods, and beaten brass and copper were freely used for decorative effect. To the western mind the colors and the ornamentation were garish, yet I could see that the fittings were costly and a striking example of Chinese artistic taste.
Big Sam waved me to a seat and took his place at the desk.
"I assume, Mr. Hampden, that you did not come here out of idle curiosity?"
"That depends," said I, repressing with difficulty the instinct to address him in the "pidgin" dialect. "You might call it curiosity, and idle at that; but it is of some concern to me."
"I can believe it," he said politely.
"But before I enter on the errand that brings me here, I should present you with my credentials." And I handed him the card from Kendrick.
He scarcely glanced at it.
"Any friend of Mr. Kendrick's is welcome to any service in my power to give," he said, with a bow.
"I have a paper written in your tongue that I should like explained to me," I said, bringing forth the sheet and unfolding it.
Big Sam leaned across the desk to receive it. I put it in his hand and kept one eye on his face, the other on the sheet of paper.
There was no trace of surprise on the bronze mask of the Oriental. For an instant I thought I could detect a shadow of the stolid "no-sabby" look of the coolie, but it was gone with the dropping of an eyelid. There was before me only the grave, impassive face of the Chinese merchant.
"What is the difficulty?" he asked with a polite smile, after he had glanced over the paper.
"The difficulty is that none of your countrymen seems to be able to translate it."
"I can not believe it."
"I have asked a dozen."
"They were very busy." The voice was a combination of assertion and inquiry, but my ear warned me of something mocking in it, too.
"They concealed it most successfully, if they were," I retorted.
Big Sam smiled again, and took up the paper. It slipped from his hand and fluttered to the floor.
"Excuse my clumsiness," he said, diving after it.
I sprang around the corner of the desk to assist in recovering it, and dropped to one knee.
"I beg your pardon," I said, catching at the paper that Big Sam was stowing away in his capacious sleeve. "I believe this is the document." And I held it up.
"I think not," said Big Sam, straightening up and looking me blandly in the eye. "I believe this is it." And he handed me another paper with a bewildering maze of Chinese characters straggling across it.
I was puzzled and rose, looking first at the sheets of paper and then at Big Sam. There was a flash of triumph in his eye that made me suspect that neither sheet was mine, after all. I cursed my ill-luck in not knowing something of Chinese writing.
"Allow me to assist you," said Big Sam politely. "This is your paper." And he indicated one of the two in my hand with his long brown finger.
I saw that I was beaten. The clever Oriental had been one too many for me. I raged inwardly as I looked at that bland, courteous, impassive face before me, and for an instant thought of attempting to search him by force. The thought was gone as soon as it came. Even with a fair field the result of a personal encounter between us would have been in doubt. Big Sam was a well-built, powerful man, able to give a good account of himself in a rough-and-tumble fight. But in that den it would have been madness to raise a finger against him. I should but add another to the long list of mysterious disappearances. I swallowed my discomfiture and said as blandly as Big Sam himself:
"If you have no objections I'll take a translation of both documents."
Big Sam paid my request the tribute of a smile. I read in the turn of his lips a confirmation of my suspicion that neither paper was the one I had brought.
"Certainly," he said. "I will read them both to you. After that you can say more wisely which is yours."
He reached out his hand to take one of the papers, when a triple rap sounded at one of the panels. He straightened up and looked at me gravely.
"If you have no objections, Mr. Hampden, I shall do a little business. Can you spare the time for the interruption?"
"Certainly. When shall I come back?" said I, rising.
"Don't move," said the Oriental courteously. "It will be but a few minutes, and it may interest you." He rapped on the desk before him, the door swung open, and in filed a dozen or more Chinese.
In the midst of the band were two men whose coarse dark faces stirred a ripple of memory. Where had I seen them? For a moment I could not recall them, searching too far back in time to cross their trail. Then it came to me that these were the two villains who had seized the Chinese girl across the way but a few minutes before. Their stolid faces were hardly more expressive than a mask, yet under the "no-sabby" look there was an indefinable trace of fear. In the rear of the band was the old man whose girl had been stolen. None of them paid the slightest attention to my presence, yet I felt well assured that not a detail of my appearance was lost to them, as they huddled about the desk before Big Sam.
The face of Big Sam had changed. In place of the bland and courteous diplomat was the stern judge and ruler. In his eye was the anger that he could not wholly conceal. His voice gave no sign of emotion. He spoke in even tones, yet there was a force behind them that made every word a threat.
It might all have been in dumb show for the understanding I got of it. On the one side was accusation and reproach. On the other was sullen excuse and defense. I could see that the anger of Big Sam grew as he spoke. Then at some denial or evasion of the men before him he clapped his hands, a door opened and the young girl whose abduction I had witnessed stepped in. She gave a cry as she saw the two men who had seized her, and would have shrunk back.
The old man, who had been standing in dejection in the rear of the crowd, made an inarticulate sound of satisfaction and started toward her.
Big Sam jumped to his feet; the rage in his eyes overflowed into his face, and his voice rang out sharply. The girl ran to Big Sam and clasped her hands, then threw herself on the floor before him.
The girl threw herself on the floor
At the sound of Big Sam's words the old man stepped back mumbling. Big Sam waved his hand, the abductors and the old man were led away, and the girl, with hands clasped, lay bowed to the floor beside me.
The rage slowly faded out of the face of Big Sam. With a word he raised the girl to her feet, motioned her to a chair and seated himself.
"Of what use is it to hold the power of life and death over men, when folly and greed are more powerful than your will?"
Big Sam spoke with a smile, but there was a bitterness in his tone.
"Neither money nor fear can put brains into the head of a fool," he continued, with the same acrid savor to his words. "I suppose you have hardly understood what has gone on, Mr. Hampden."
"I confess I am much in the dark."
"Necessarily, as you do not understand our language. You saw the beginning of the trouble. You have seen what followed. I wish you could tell me the end."
"I'm sorry," I answered, "that I'm not a prophet–"
"It would be worth something to me–to both of us–if you were."
He paused a moment and turned to his charge before he continued: "This girl, as you may suppose, is a valuable piece of