The valley of eyes unseen
It was a dilemma. Our own safety rested upon secrecy and speed, and we
were in no sort of position to stop for crews of shipwrecked natives.
At the same time, to leave them unhelped would be to give them the
alternative of a horrible death by fire or the very slim chance of
swimming ashore across a mile of strong current either way. We could
see no sign of a smaller boat--apparently the junk hadn't one.
Philipson stood staring at the lurid picture. 'Nothing for it,' he said
suddenly. 'Yellow or white, it is all human life. I will take them off,
and put ashore at the first opportunity.'
Poyning had run forward and was kneeling behind the dummy wash-streaks,
boathook in hand. The next instant he had dropped flat to the deck.
'Down, everybody!' he yelled. 'That fire's a fake!'
Three or four shots crashed out, and Lo Eng slid into the well with a
short gasping cough. We had all ducked at Poyning's cry, and Philipson
put the tiller hard down, but too late. The way on the launch took us
right alongside before she could be turned, and two figures leapt up
rifle in hand from behind the junk's house and dashed for us, firing
as they ran. Poyning sprang to meet the first, grappled, and thudded
with him down on to the deck; the other came on, took these two in his
stride like a hurdler, and rushed aft for our engine. For an instant
I saw the fellow outlined against the fire on the junk. Then came a
deafening report, something scorched my cheek, and I felt a sting like
an exaggerated pinprick in my shoulder. I fell forward, but in the very
act of falling I instinctively clutched at his knees as he stood on the
cabin roof, and heaved with the last ounce of strength left in me. I
think the fellow must have gone overboard, but I don't rightly know.
Everything round me became a spongy grey mist. The flashes and reports
mingled in a sort of wild, hell-begotten dream. I must have fainted
then, for when I next remember, there was a marked change in the aspect
of the fight. I myself lay sprawling across the cabin roof--apparently
just as I had collapsed. When I lifted my head I realised that we were
backing away from the junk and that somebody in our bows was crouching
behind a thing that spat fire with a stuttering roar. I saw the great
mainmast of the junk totter and fall, dashing the remains of the fire
into the water with a smoky hiss, and heard, or thought I heard, a
shrill scream of agony and terror from many throats. I rested on my
elbows, staring stupidly, while the flame from our bows played over the
junk like a hose; then I must have lost my senses for a second time....
When I came to, I was lying on a locker in the cabin, while Philipson
leaned over me and dabbed something cool on my bare shoulder, which was
aching and stinging abominably.
'A nasty jag, Mirlees,' he said as he dressed the wound. 'That bullet
was in two minds whether to expand or not. Luckily it has left the
bones alone.'
'Who else is hurt?' I queried. 'I saw Lo Eng go down.'
'He has a hole through the apex of his right lung. Nothing desperate,
but he will require careful nursing.'
'And you? What's that on your wrist?'
'A mere graze. But the same shot punched a piece out of the tiller,
which I must fish without loss of time, or we shall be having a snap in
a crisis.'
Philipson continued at work all the time he was talking, swiftly
and skilfully. Where he picked up his knowledge of surgery I don't
know, but I fancy it would have been equal to the emergencies of a
battlefield. He was just completing a sling for my arm when Poyning's
face, the natural freckles supplemented by a liberal sprinkling of
powder-flecks, appeared through the cabin door.
'Come and watch the casualties, Poyning,' said our leader. 'I will
relieve you as soon as I have patched the steering-gear.'
Poyning took his place beside me, and squatted in silence, mopping his
face with a handkerchief. On the opposite locker Lo Eng was asleep,
breathing peacefully.
'Philipson tackled him while you were aswoon,' said Poyning at length,
nodding to the boy, 'and gave him a cooling mixture which put him
off at once. The managing director's bedside manner is distinctly
attractive to watch, Mirlees, I assure you.'
'You're not hurt?'
'I'm tattooed blue with powder-spirts like any Polynesian, but
Philipson hopes it will wash out in after years. Beyond that I am
suffering from slight muscular strain and grave loss of self-respect.
I fought to-night as no gentleman fights. I--er, bit my antagonist.
His gun fell overboard in the course of our struggles, and shortly
afterward he fell overboard after it.'
'Tell me what happened,' I said. 'It seems I went green right in the
middle of it.'
'My own recollection is none too clear,' replied Poyning. 'One of the
boarding party got past me, and I heard him fire. That, apparently, is
when you were hit. It was just at this point that I rolled my opponent
into the water. I heard another splash after that. Then Philipson
yelled to me to come and take the tiller. He had reversed the engine,
and we were drawing away. Philipson ran forward and began, as it seemed
to me, to pull the launch to pieces. Something came up with a clank,
and before you could say knife or any other abrupt monosyllable he had
entered upon a new campaign with--ye gods!--a maxim gun. It was one
of the pleasantest surprises of my life to learn that we had such an
armament on board.'
I heard Philipson chuckle in the doorway.
'I was unaware of it myself till yesterday,' he said, stooping to
enter. 'I could never understand why this boat was a little down by the
head, but when we took out that damaged plank, I saw quickly enough.
There is a false bulkhead forward of the cabin, and behind that a
machine gun mounted on a vertical slide built into the hull. When you
take away the deck planking above it the thing can be raised to fire
over the bows. I give you my word, the whole contrivance is highly
ingenious. When I discovered that we had such a treasure I at once set
about getting it in working order. That is what kept me so late in the
yard last night. The bearing parts were somewhat rusty, but they worked
again with persuasion and grease. All that then remained was to find
ammunition--a problem which at first seemed formidable enough. But
there again my incomparable luck was with me. I have had a good deal
to do with revolutionary activities in this country at one time and
another, for the subject is one which interests me. I happened to know
that one of my former acquaintances, to whom I had been of service,
was now skulking in Hankow, awaiting the next chance to gratify his
life-long ambition of overthrowing the Manchu Dynasty. That man's
vocation as a rebel conspirator obliges him to deal in such things as
maxims and ammunition for the same, and if there were any contraband
stocks in Hankow, he would know where they were. At any rate, now that
I had found the gun, the opportunity to secure some was too good to be
missed, and was worth even taking a certain risk for. Things turned
out better than I had hoped. He had ammunition in his own den, and on
my paying a liberal contribution to the "cause" he brought himself to
part with two belts--though in point of fact I imagine he anticipated
his quarters were to be raided in the near future and was rather glad
to get rid of the damning evidence. I knew well enough without taking
measurements that the ammunition would fit our gun.'
'How did you know that?'
'I had a strong suspicion that both came into this country in the same
gun-running. The venerable desperado we visited in Hankow, Mirlees,
was the man from whom I purchased this boat. That was in Canton two
years ago. He had in hand at the time as pretty a little armed rising
as you could wish to see. Unfortunately the plot was discovered at the
last moment, and my friend was obliged to leave in such haste that he
could not even get to his own private launch. So he did the next best
thing--sold her to me. He was much surprised to see me this morning,
but even more so when I told him I had discovered the hidden gun. At
first he wished to buy the launch back. I said that I could not spare
it. He pressed his point. I hinted with all possible delicacy that
if he were so importunate the imperial authorities might get to hear
of his whereabouts. At last he made the best of it, sold me two belts
of ammunition at an exorbitant price, and I took it across the stream
and installed it in our bows. I think you will admit that measure of
precaution was well justified by the event.'
'And may be again,' said Poyning. 'Is there any ammunition left?'
'One belt, but I do not anticipate needing it. Something seems to tell
me that we have seen the last of our enemies for a season. There will
at least be no survivors from this affair to report where we are. Those
junks are very heavy, and they sink quickly when they are wounded
below the waterline. I cut a plank out of that one. I can forgive most
things, but not treachery.'
'It was a pretty cute idea,' I said, 'the junk in distress.'
'Brilliant,' he agreed, heartily. 'They must have guessed we should be
upstream from Hankow before long. No doubt they had been hanging about
here at anchor, and started their dummy fire as soon as they heard our
engine. Without a fast boat of their own--their launch, I fancy, is
still far down the river--it was about the best ruse they could have
chosen for coming to grips with us on the water. With ordinary luck
they must have succeeded.'
My wound healed quickly, and on the third day after the fight I was
able to move about in fair comfort. We had now come to the stiffest
spell of our river journey--the ascent of the beautiful but perilous
Yangtze Gorges. These famous localities are too well known from books
of travel to need expatiating on here. Suffice it to say that we had
passed in a few hours from reedy flats and swamps into a region of
tremendous limestone cliffs, sometimes rising naked into the sky like a
rock wall built by the Titans, sometimes cleft most picturesquely with
gullies of pine and bamboo and orange-trees or bearded with clematis
and fern. Not that we had much opportunity to admire the scenery. Our
whole attention was usually concentrated upon getting that launch
safely past dangerous whirlpools and snag-bottomed shallows into the
comparatively peaceful water beyond. Philipson had well chosen his time
for the attempt. The annual rise of the river, while it had already
deepened the worst shoals, had not yet come to the tremendous pitch
it reaches in autumn, when the mere force and volume of the water
crushed into these jaws a few hundred yards wide blocks all progress
for a span of months. As it was, our ascent was a wild, touch-and-go
affair throughout, and I hardly knew whether to marvel more at the
capabilities of our boat or the consummate nerve and skill of Saunders
Philipson in handling her. There was the usual assembly of junks at
the foot of each gorge, waiting their turn to be "tracked"--which is
to say, hauled up through the racing water by big gangs of coolies
harnessed to bamboo ropes ashore; and as we came along and set about
ascending on our own motor power, tremendous yells went up from the
trackers and the crews of the waiting junks and the sailors of the
red-hulled lifeboats. These outcries may have been a warning to us,
but I think rather that to the eyes of these primitive, superstitious
folk we appeared a devil-boat, a phantom living through water that
would have destroyed any craft of this world.
One after another we took the dreaded gullies between the
mountains--Niukan, Mitan, Wushan, the Wind-Box Gorge and the "Old
Horse"; and when finally we reached Chungking, nine days after leaving