Peter the Brazen: A Mystery Story of Modern China
anybody. And there were always volunteers, hardened by the buffets of
this life, to cast water upon that same fire.
So, humming a gay little tune, Peter snapped on the light, bathing the
milk-white room in a liquid mellowness, opened the port-hole, wound his
watch, hung it on the curtain-bar which ran lengthwise with his berth,
pushed the flowered curtains at either end as far back as they would
go, in order to have all the fresh air possible, and----
Peter gasped. He declared it was absolutely impossible. Such things
did not happen, even in this world of strange happenings and of
stranger stirrings below the surface of actual happenings. His
self-complacencies came shattering down about his ears like mountains
of senseless glitter, and he stooped to recover the object which was
lying upon, almost ready to tumble from, the rounded, neat edge of the
white berth.
A rose of cameo! The hot breath from his lips, which drooped in
astonishment and chagrin, seemed to stir the delicate petals of the
exquisitely carved red rose which reposed in its mountain of soft gold
in the palm of his trembling hand. The fine gold chain, like a rope of
gold sand, trickled between his fingers and dangled, swinging from side
to side.
The impossible thought pounded at the door of his brain and demanded
recognition. Romola Borria had been a visitor to his room. But why?
He had no secrets to conceal from the prying ears of any one, not now,
at all events, for he had destroyed all evidences depending upon the
excursion he had made from Shanghai to Len Yang, and from Len Yang to
Mandalay, to Rangoon, to Penang, Singapore, and Batavia.
Naturally, his first impulsive thought was that Romola Borria was
somehow entangled with those who ruled the destinies of the hideous
mountain city, which crouched amidst the frosty emerald peaks on the
fringe of Tibet. He had felt the weight of that ominous hand on other
occasions, and its movements were ever the same. Night stealth,
warnings chalked on doors, the deliberate and cunning penetration of
his secrets; all of these were typical machinations of the Gray Dragon,
and of those who reported back to the Gray Dragon.
No one would break into his stateroom who was not the tool of Len
Yang's unknown king. Thus the finger of accusation was brought to bear
tentatively upon Romola Borria.
Yes, it was incredible that this girl, with those scarlet stripes
across her breast, could in any way be complicated with the wanton
designs of the beast in Len Yang. Yet here was evidence, damning her,
if not as a wilful tool of the cinnabar king, then at least as a
room-breaker. Why had she come into his room? And how?
He searched the room, then dragged his suit-case from under the bunk to
the middle of the blue carpet, and spilled its contents angrily upon
the floor. It took him less than ten seconds to discover what was
missing; not his money, nor the few jewels he had collected in his
peregrinations, for they were untouched in the small leather bag.
Peter looked again, carefully shaking each garment, hoping, and
refusing to hope, that the revolver would make its appearance. It was
an American revolver, an automatic, a gift from Bobbie MacLaurin. And
now this excellent weapon was missing.
He felt that eyes were upon him, that ears were listening slyly to his
breathing, that lips were rustling in bated whispered comments upon the
fury with which he took this important loss.
Snapping off the light, he plunged down the murky corridor, with the
guilty rose cameo clutched in his sweating hand, and came at length to
the purser's office. This dignitary was absent, at midnight lunch
probably; so Peter rifled the upper drawer in the desk, and brought out
the passenger-register, finding the name and room number he sought
after an instant of search.
Carefully he replaced the ledger in its original position, closed the
drawer, and darted back up the corridor.
In front of a room not far from his own he paused and rapped. His
knock, sharp and insistent, was one of practice, a summons which would
not be mistaken by the occupants of adjoining staterooms, nor was it
likely to disturb them.
After a moment, light showed at the opened transom. Some one rustled
about within, and in another instant the door opened far enough to
admit a head from which dark masses of hair floated, framing a face
that was white and inquisitive.
At sight of her midnight visitor Romola Borria opened her door wide and
smiled a little sleepily. She had paused long enough in arising to
slip into a negligee, a kimono of blackest satin, revealing at the
baglike sleeves and the fold which fell back from her throat a lining
of blood-red silk.
One hand was caught up to her throat in a gesture of surprise, and the
other was concealed behind her, catching, as Peter surmised, nothing if
not his own automatic revolver, which had been loaded, ready for
instant use, immediately the safety-catch was released.
She stared at him softly, with eyes still mirroring the depths of the
sleep from which he had so rudely aroused her, her delicate red lips
forming a curious smile. And she continued to smile more gently, more
tenderly, as she became quite conscious of his presence.
"You have come to tell me that you will go to Japan with me," she
stated.
Peter shook his head slowly, and with equal deliberateness lifted up
the small object in his hand until the light from the ceiling-lamp fell
directly upon it.
"My cameo!" she exclaimed with a start of surprise. "Where did you
find it?" She reached impulsively for the ornament, but Peter closed
his fingers upon it firmly.
"You have something to give me in return, I think," he said sternly.
She was staring at the closed hand with something of despair and
fright, as if reluctant to believe this truth, while her fingers groped
at her throat to verify a loss apparently not before detected.
She stepped back into the room and said:
"Close the door. Come inside."
He thought: If she had wanted to shoot me, she had plenty of chance
before. A shot in this room, a murder would fasten evidence upon her,
and besides, it would instantly arouse the occupants of the adjoining
staterooms, if not one of the deck crew on watch.
So he entered and closed the door, presenting a full view of his broad,
white-uniformed back, and the gaudy-blue sarong about his waist. He
took more time than was necessary in closing the door and sliding the
bolt, to give her every opportunity to arrange this scene she desired.
But the girl was only drawing the curtains over the port-hole, to keep
out prying eyes, when he turned about.
She sat down on the edge of her berth, with her small white feet almost
touching the floor, and the huge blue automatic resting upon her knees.
It was unlikely that she did not appreciate fully the seductive charm
of the red and black gown which adapted itself in whatever pose to the
youthful curves of her body; and she permitted Peter to sit down on the
narrow couch opposite and to examine her and perhaps to speculate for a
number of seconds before she seemed to find her speech.
Meekly her dark eyes encountered his.
"I was afraid," she explained in a voice, low but free in her
remarkable self-possession. "I knew you would not care, and I hoped
that you would have a revolver in your room. So I went there. How did
I get in? I borrowed a pass-key from the purser on the plea that I had
left mine in my room. I hoped you would not miss it until we reached
Hong Kong, and I intended to return it then and explain to you.
"My life," she added deprecatingly, "is in some slight danger, and,
like the small fool that I am--even though I am fully aware that no one
in the whole world cares whether I am living or dead--well, Mr. Moore,
for some reason I still persist in clinging to the small hope."
She smiled wanly and earnestly, so Peter thought. A dozen impulses
militated against his believing a word of this glib explanation; his
common sense told him that he should seek further, that the explanation
was only half made; and yet it cannot be denied that she had gone
unerringly to his greatest weakness, perhaps his worst fault, his
belief in the sincerity of a woman in trouble.
"Why didn't you ask me?" he demanded in his most apologetic voice, as
though he had wronged her beyond repair. "Why didn't you tell me you
were in danger? I'd have loaned you the revolver willingly--willingly!"
"I did try to find you," she replied; "but the wireless room was dark.
You were nowhere on deck."
Peter was aware that for some reason Romola Borria did not prefer to
share the secret of her real or fancied danger with him. He felt a
little dissatisfied, cheated, as though the straightforward answer for
which he had come had been turned into the counterfeit of evasion.
The situation as it now had shaped itself demanded some sort of
decision. Without the whole truth he was reluctant to leave, and it
was imprudent to remain any longer.
Romola, in this constrained pause in their conversation, feeling
perhaps the reason for his silence, lowered her dark lashes and drew up
her feet until they were concealed by the red folds of the kimono, and
she drew the satin more closely about her soft, white throat.
"You have decided nothing, then?" she parried.
"What decision I might have formed," he said, a trifle coolly, "has
been put off by--this. You see, I must admit it, this--this rather
complicates things for me. I'm in the dark altogether now, you see. I
wanted to help you, however I could. And then--then I find this cameo."
She nodded absently, fingering the groove in the automatic's handle.
"I'm afraid I took too much for granted," she said in a low voice.
"Don't you suppose my curiosity was aroused when you threw the coolie
overboard? I said nothing; rather, I asked you no questions; and I
thought that a man who was self-poised enough to meet his enemies in
that way would be--what shall I say?--charitable enough to overlook
such a----" She paused. "When I confessed that you and I are facing a
common enemy, that the same hands are eager to do away with both of us,
I thought that bond was sufficient, was strong enough, to justify what
might shock an ordinary man. I mean----"
"I think I understand," Peter took her up in contrite tones. "I'll ask
nothing more. In the morning we will talk the other matter over. I
must have a little time. For the present, I want you to keep the
revolver, and--here is the cameo. Forgive me for being so
unreasonable, so--so selfish."
He leaned over. She seemed uncertain a moment, then caught the gold
chain lightly from his hand.
"And--your revolver," she said. "Those are the terms of the agreement,
I believe."
"No, no," he protested. "I have no use for it; none whatever. You
keep it."
But quite as resolutely Romola Borria shook her head and extended the
automatic, butt foremost, to him. "I insist," she said.
"But you say you're in danger," he argued.
"No. Not now. I have something else that will do quite as well. If
it is written that I am to die, why give Death cause to be angry? I am
a fatalist, you see. And I want you to take back your revolver, with
my apologies, and quite without any more explanation than I have given
you, please."
"But----" began Peter.
"Look," she said.
In the small space of the stateroom he could not avoid bending so low
as to sense the warmth of her skin, in order to study the object toward
which she was directing his gaze. A sense of hot confusion permeated
him as her fingers lightly caressed his hand; her physical nearness
obsessed him.
She had drawn back the fluffy pillow, and on the white sheet he