The H. Bedford-Jones Pulp Fiction Megapack. H. Bedford-Jones
done so. As it is, all’s well. You’ve done your work excellently, all and more than I had counted on; I think we may say that the campaign has been very successful.”
O’Grady, who had been staring hard at Kohler, suddenly broke into a laugh.
“By the rock o’ Doon!” he cried out gaily. “So you’re Kohler, are you? Well, I’m out o’ this game; you’re too deep for me. Faith, if I’d guessed that the boy Yu was really James Sze Kohler—What dev’lish chances I’ve missed, what?”
Kohler chuckled. “Exactly, my dear O’Grady! Your attention was quite centered on Mr. Breck, just as I figured. May I have the pleasure of taking you to the coast with me and sending you home to Japan?”
O’Grady shook his head, drew a deep breath, laughed again, more freely this time.
“Not me, thanks! No Japan for me. I’m done with sellin’ my honor among devils.”
“Then,” suggested Kohler, “suppose we journey to the coast together—and I may find some employment for you. Would such a course appeal to you, or do you class me with devils?”
“D’ye mean it?” cried O’Grady, his eyes widening.
“I do,” said Kohler calmly.
“Good! It’s agreed!” responded the Irishman promptly. “When do we start?”
“In an hour,” said Kohler.
At this, I intervened.
“But see here, Kohler!” I protested. “French is in no shape to travel just yet! You’ll have to give his shoulder a chance to mend, you know! And we can’t all run off and leave him alone here with Miss French.”
Under Kohler’s slow, sleepy smile I checked myself.
“My dear Breck,” he replied, “I don’t intend doing anything of the kind. French remains here with his sister, until he’s able to travel. Perhaps you remember the precise matter in which I engaged your services? It was to bring French to the coast. When that is done, your present task is ended, and you begin your work on my private staff.”
“What!” I said. “You mean that you’re going to leave me here with them, to bring them down to the coast?”
“Exactly,” said Kohler, and chuckled. “Do you object? If so, Mr. O’Grady—”
“Damn O’Grady!” I said hastily, “no, I’m tickled to death to stay! That is, if Miss French—”
I broke off in some confusion, for O’Grady was laughing, and in Kohler’s eyes I read a complete understanding of all that I had not said.
“Suppose you go in and ask Miss French for yourself,” said Kohler, amusedly.
I did so.
That’s why it was two months before we reached the coast again, and as everyone knows, a tremendous lot of things can happen in a period of two months. They did, at least, in my particular case; and O’Grady was best man.
But I never saw my perfect servant, Yu, again!
YELLOW INTRIGUE
CHAPTER I
The Word Hunter
When Alan Groot hailed me, I had just been congratulating myself that I was the only white man in Cheng-tu, barring missionaries. The brief, bloodless revolution was over; I had helped engineer it, but no one knew that. Cheng-tu, and with it the whole province of Szechwan, was now solidly under the Shanghai government. Sun Yat Sen and the patriots of Young China, without firing a shot, had cut away the very heart of China from the grafting, corrupt old mandarin government in Peking.
Our own civil and military governors were now installed in the provincial capital, Cheng-tu, and we were calmly proceeding with our share of the vast economic policy outlined for new China by Doctor Sun—a policy which will astonish the world when it has attained full publicity.
When Groot called out, I was strolling along the wide business street inside the east gate of the city, watching the crowds. Against the huge red-and-gilt signboards flowed a varied stream of humanity—coolies, brawny river men, priests from mountain lamaseries with their rosaries and helmet hats, black-robed scholars, soldiers, peddlers from Shensi and mountaineers from the Yunchan. In the midst of the clamorous confusion, I heard a familiar voice shout my name.
“Breck! Sam Breck! Wait a minute!”
I halted, and turned to see Alan Groot shoving toward, me. No wonder I was astounded! The last I heard of Groot, he was an assistant professor at Berkeley—not at all the sort of man I expected to meet casually here in western China.
Nor had he changed appreciably. He was five foot six, his face concealed behind a gray, straggling beard in sad need of trimming, and a pair of thick spectacles with large horn rims. He lived always in the past, never in the present. He was cut out for an academic life, where he could be walled in with his books out of the world, and could peacefully study and run down and transfix some hapless word or subject, until he had it feeding out of his hand.
I will admit, however, that Alan Groot knew a lot.
“Breck!” he exclaimed, grabbing my hand and shaking it heartily. “What in the name of goodness are you doing here? In a uniform, too! I thought you were out of the army?”
“This isn’t an American uniform,” I told him.
“Bless my soul, that’s so! What is it?”
“Chinese. I’m a captain in the new aviation service. Didn’t you know there’s been a change of government here since last week?”
“A—what?” He blinked rapidly at me. “You mean a revolution?”
“Put it that way,” and I chuckled. Evidently he knew nothing about it. “I’m building the hangars and aviation field here, Groot. It’s the terminus of the new air mail and express line from Shanghai. But what on earth dragged you out of your Berkeley diggings and brought you here?”
“Oh, my boy, I’m doing great things, great things!” He was fairly bubbling over with happiness. “I’ve accomplished some of the most astounding—but come along, quick! I have to meet a man in three minutes, at that corner shop. I’m getting a copy of the original edition of the Yuan Shi—an original, Breck! Come on; we can talk later. You’re free?”
I was free—and I was interested. It was certain that no report had been turned in of the presence of any white man in Cheng-tu, much less a scholar and linguist like Alan Groot. Not that I suspected him, of course; but I suspected somebody. There was a nigger in the woodpile, and it was part of my business to exterminate such gentry.
Groot was the most innocent person on God’s footstool—just the type to be used by somebody clever enough to take advantage of innocence.
We walked along together to the corner, and entered a shop. Two men sat there. One was the proprietor, smoking in a most uninterested fashion. The other was a tall, skinny mountaineer, who had beside him a sack stuffed with old Chinese volumes. The mountaineer got one good look at me, and his eyes blinked. Otherwise, his face was absolutely impassive.
I said nothing, and kept out of it. Groot began to bargain for the sack of books. He looked over one of them then simply quit haggling. He hauled out an astonishing lot of money and handed it over.
“Get a coolie for me, Breck, will you?” he asked excitedly. “An original of the Yuan chronicles! My boy, my boy, this is too good to be true!”
I stepped outside the shop, and felt the eyes of that mountaineer boring after me. I knew better than to think those volumes had turned up by any chance. They had probably been stolen from some temple, and sent here to be used in the right way.
By great good luck, I caught sight of Lieutenant Ch’en of the yamen guard, and beckoned to him. He was a Harvard man, by the way, a good type of Young China.
“Lieutenant,