The tomb of Ts'in
As briefly as possible Tillizinni gave a résumé of the events which
had preceded and followed the stranding of the China mail-boat.
His Excellency listened, his features composed to that immobility
which is characteristic of his race. When Tillizinni had concluded, he
asked:
“You suggest that the thieves were seeking information which they knew
I would publish, and which is to be found in every historical
text-book on China.”
“I suggest to your Excellency,” said Tillizinni quietly, “that amongst
your documents there was one which threw greater light upon the
Treasure House of the Dead than anything you have published.”
The Ambassador was silent. His delicate fingers played restlessly with
a silver paper knife on his desk, and his eyes were averted from the
other’s face.
Tillizinni offered no encouragement to speech. He understood that he
had been right in his surmise. There was reason for the attempted
burglary and the reason was to be found in the contents of the
mail-bag.
It was fully three minutes--no inconsiderable period of time--before
the Ambassador spoke:
“I can only imagine,” he said at last, speaking very slowly, “that the
people who tried to rob the safe desired information which I am not
prepared to give.”
He looked up sharply.
“Do you realise, Mr. Tillizinni,” he asked, “that buried with Ts’in
Hwang Ti are jewels computed to be worth over two million pounds?”
“Two millions?”
The Prince nodded.
“Two millions,” he repeated. “All the authorities agree that even in
those days, China was enormously wealthy in gold and precious jewels,
and that the value of the First Emperor’s possessions were enormous.
He was originally the King of Ts’in, and he it was who established the
Empire. By conquest alone he must have secured enormous wealth apart
from that which he obtained through the recognised revenues of peace.”
The knowledge that this wealth lies buried is sufficient to tempt the
foreign adventurer--no Chinaman save some of the worst criminal
characters would desecrate a tomb.
“I have in my possession the exact location of Mount Li,” he added
simply.
“But----”
“You think that is easy to find, but as a matter of fact the Empire is
filled with Mount Lis, and though on one of these--the most obvious
one--the tomb has been located, the great Emperor is really buried on
a small and barren island in the Gulf of Pe-chili.”
Tillizinni’s eyes narrowed.
What mystery there was in the burglary had now vanished.
“Why is not the location generally known?” he asked.
The Ambassador favoured him with one of his rare smiles.
“The Emperor himself forbade the disclosure,” he said. “In China in
those days, the Divine Sun of Heaven controlled not alone the
destinies by the memories of men.”
Tillizinni rose to go.
“One last question,” he asked. “Do you intend publishing the
information you have at any future date?”
“I do not,” said the Ambassador briefly.
Tillizinni had occasion to go into the red drawing-room, where he had
left his hat and walking-stick.
A man was sitting waiting--a tall, good-looking man, jaunty enough in
spite of the poverty of his attire.
“Captain Talham, I believe,” said Tillizinni, and the other rose.
“You are the gentleman who searched my luggage at King’s Cross
cloak-room,” said Captain Talham, without resentment, and the
detective laughed aloud.
“That is a confession which I should not care to make,” he said. “How
do you know your luggage had been searched?”
“I have had some experience,” said the other coolly, “and it may
interest you to know that, since your search, a more conscientious
search-party took away the whole of my baggage and has, so far, failed
to replace it.”
Tillizinni was genuinely concerned. This strange man had a tender spot
in his heart for the needy and it needed no second glance at the man
from China to discover his straitened circumstances.
He drew a chair forward.
“I am interested in this,” he said. “Perhaps I can help you.”
Captain Talham raised a dignified and protesting hand.
“The normal mind,” he said “rejects without hesitation the instinct of
rebellion against recognised authority. Undisciplined resentment
toward social safeguards imposed by society for its own protection is
aluvistic. I appreciate the necessity for the examination you made and
regard as admirable the choice of agent which the government has made.
Moreover, since I am directly and frankly interested in discovering
the location of Mount Li, and came to this country by the same ship as
certain documents revealing that location, your suspicion was
pardonable.”
He said all this, scarcely pausing to take breath.
Tillizinni’s face, schooled to conceal his emotion, displayed no hint
of his sensations. Had this man been listening at the door of the
study, that he should take up the threads of the Ambassador’s
discourse?
Talham seemed to divine the working of the Italian’s mind, and smiled.
“I gather you have been discussing the matter with Chu-hsi-han. I
gather that because you did not make your call till after the
publication of his article, and because I have reason for knowing that
that article has excited a great deal of interest in circles with
which you are probably unacquainted--the Society of Good Intention,
for example.”
There was something in his tone which at once interested and nettled
Tillizinni. The stranger had put him on his mettle, too, challenged
his knowledge of forces. Yet the Italian was too big a man to allow
pique to stand in his way of acquiring information. He was not too
clever to learn.
“I know nothing whatever about the Society of Good Intention,” he
said; “though I gather from its benevolent title that it is a Chinese
secret society with a felonious propaganda.”
Talham was tickled. Here was a man after his own heart.
“The Society,” he began, as if to deliver a speech, then changed his
mind. “The Society is purely criminal, though it had a political
origin. It is an off shoot of the Guild of Honourable Adventurers
which flourished in Canton twenty years ago. It has committed more
crimes than any other in China, and it has reached a pass where----”
Clear and sharp above the conversation a pistol shot rang out.
It sounded overhead, and simultaneously the two men leapt to their
feet. With one accord they darted to the door, across the wide hall,
and up the soft-carpeted stairs, Tillizinni leading, an automatic
pistol in his hand.
A servant was standing at the door of the Ambassador’s study, vainly
twisting the handle.
“It is locked, Excellencies,” he said.
“Out of the way!” cried Talham.
The man obeyed with suspicious alacrity. He flew down the stairs, past
the chattering crowd of servants hurrying up.
At the door of the house the Chinaman in the livery of the Embassy was
joined by another.
“We will go quickly, brother,” said the first man, “else these people
will know that we are not in the Tao-ae’s service.”
They passed through the door and out into the dark street as the sound
of a crash told them that Talham had gained admission to the room
above.
The room was in darkness, but the observant Tillizinni had noted the
mother-of-pearl button switch, and his fingers found it now. Instantly
the room was flooded with soft light.
Huddled in his chair was the Ambassador--dead.
There was no wound which the men could see, and Tillizinni, going
swiftly to the side of the dead man, uttered an exclamation.
“He has been strangled!” he cried.
Talham leant over the desk, his brows puckered in a frown.
“Strangled! Then who fired that shot?” he asked.
Servants were coming into the room now. The English secretary pushed a
way through a crowd of excited Chinamen. He had been writing in his
study on the third floor when the shot aroused him.
“Marshall all the servants,” said Tillizinni, and whilst this was
being done the detective made an examination of the apartment. The
windows were closed and fastened with a catch, for the Ambassador
shared with his countrymen a horror of ventilation. There was no
possibility of entry from that direction.
Nothing had been disturbed with the exception of a large inlaid bureau
which stood against one wall of the room. Here the door had been
wrenched open, and a drawer forced and ransacked. Private papers lay
scattered on the floor.
Tillizinni picked up a large envelope. It was inscribed in Chinese
characters: “The burial-place of the First Emperor.” The seal on the
envelope remained intact, but the cover had been slit from end to end,
and was empty.
“Look!” said Talham’s voice explosively.
Tillizinni followed the direction of the pointing finger. The bottom
of the bureau was formed by one huge drawer, the width and depth of
the massive piece of furniture and some eighteen inches high.
From one corner bright red drops were dripping and forming a little
pool on the carpet.
The two men grasped the bronze handles of the drawer and pulled.
The body of a man lay in the bottom. He was doubled up so that his
knees were under his chin. He had been shot evidently from behind, and
was quite dead.
“Do you know him?” asked Tillizinni.
Talham nodded.
“He called himself the ‘Star above the Yamen,’” he said, “and I had an
interesting talk with him this afternoon.”
For this poor, inanimate thing had been the spokesman of Hyde Park.
CHAPTER III.
INTRODUCES MR. SOO.
It was a busy night for Captain Talham. The clocks were striking
three when he hailed a taxi-cab. Tillizinni joined him as he stood on
the edge of the pavement, and the two conversed together for some
time. Then they entered a cab, and drove off.
The man who watched them from the opposite side of the road followed.
His car waited in a side street at no great distance, and it was a car
which readily overtook the cab which carried the two men eastward.
They passed through the stone archway of Scotland Yard, and the
pursuing car continued its way along the Embankment, and in obedience
to the instructions given through the speaking tube, slowed in Horse
Guards Avenue to allow the occupant to alight.
He was dressed irreproachably in the evening dress of civilisation,
and carried himself with ease and confidence. He walked back the way
the car had come, turned into Scotland Yard without hesitation, and
found the constable on duty very ready to carry a message to
Tillizinni.
The Italian received him alone, and the visitor favoured him with a
ceremonious bow.
Tillizinni took him in from foot to crown in one sweeping and
comprehensive bow.
The newcomer was unquestionably Chinese, though he did not wear a
_queue_ which distinguished the Manchu before the rebellion. His face
was good-looking for a Chinaman, his features clean-cut, his eyes
alone betrayed his nationality. His lips, straight and thin, were
expressionless, and Tillizinni noticed that this strange man, dressed
in the height of fashion, yet with the restraint which marked the
gentleman, wore in one eye a gold-rimmed monocle.
When he spoke there was no trace of a foreign accent.
“Mr. Tillizinni?” he said, and the other nodded. “My name is
Soo--L’ang T’si Soo--and I am, as you may suppose, a compatriot of the
unfortunate man who was murdered to-night.”
Tillizinni nodded again.
“I know the Prince slightly,” said Soo, as he seated himself, “and
naturally I am distressed at the tragic news.”
“News travels very fast,” responded Tillizinni dryly. “The Ambassador
has not been dead very long.”
Soo inclined his head easily.
“I was passing the Embassy, and I saw a number of distracted
servants--one of whom you sent to find a policeman,” he explained.
“Naturally the servants being commonplace Chinamen and inveterate
gossips, were ready to talk to one of their race.”