Produced by Al Haines.

[Illustration: Cover art]

[Illustration: They came over the last bluff (See page 186.)]

                                  THE
                            CALL OF THE EAST

                       _A ROMANCE OF FAR FORMOSA_

                                   BY

                             THURLOW FRASER

                              Illustrated

                                TORONTO
                             WILLIAM BRIGGS

                          Copyright, 1914, by
                       FLEMING H. REVELL COMPANY

                                   To
                       Her who shared my life and
                     suffered in the Beautiful Isle

                               *FOREWORD*

In every port of the Orient the outposts of the restless, aggressive
West touch the lines of the impassive East.  Consuls, military and naval
officers, merchants, missionaries force the ideas and ideals of the West
upon the reluctant East.  Many of these representatives of western
civilization are true to the high standards of the nations and religions
from which they come.  Many others fall to the level, and below the
level, of those they live among.

This story is an attempt to picture this life where the East meets the
West, in one small port and for the one short period covered by the
Franco-Chinese War of 1884-85.  Of the characters one, Dr. MacKay, is
unhesitatingly called by his own name.  Sergeant Gorman and one or two
others of the subordinate figures are drawn from life.  The rest,
including the principal actors, are purely imaginary.

T. F.
OWEN SOUND, ONT.

                               *CONTENTS*

      I. Storm Signals
     II. A Lull
    III. The Typhoon
     IV. Parried
      V. Introductions
     VI. On the Defensive
    VII. Sparring for Advantage
   VIII. Sinclair’s Opportunity
     IX. A Quiet Life
      X. Glorious War
     XI. The Life-Healer Is Come
    XII. Matutinal Confidences
   XIII. More Confidences
    XIV. The Appeal of the Heroic
     XV. The Lure Of The East
    XVI. Sergeant Whatisname
   XVII. Wolves and Their Prey
  XVIII. To the Rescue
    XIX. Allister
     XX. The Infallible Experts
    XXI. The Language of Song
   XXII. Halcyon Days
  XXIII. Impending Storms
   XXIV. The Ball Begins
    XXV. The Ball Proceeds
   XXVI. A Game of Ball
  XXVII. The Charge of the Tamsui Blues
 XXVIII. Unholy Confessors
   XXIX. Flags of Truce
    XXX. The Mystery of Love
   XXXI. Ancestors and Pedigrees
  XXXII. A Man and a Woman
 XXXIII. My Children in the Lord
  XXXIV. The Soldier of the Legion
   XXXV. The Language of Paradise
  XXXVI. An Apparition
 XXXVII. "My Son!  My Son!"
XXXVIII. Rejected
  XXXIX. A Realized Dream
     XL. The Coward
    XLI. "Good Will Toward Men"

                            *ILLUSTRATIONS*

They came over the last bluff . . . . . . _Frontispiece_

Sinclair threw off his coat, rolled up his sleeves, and went to work

A yell from one of the Chinese attracted the attention of Sinclair and
Gorman

"I’ll be thinking of you, Donald, and you’ll be thinking of me"

                                  *I*

                            *STORM SIGNALS*

"Pardon me, Miss MacAllister!  Is there any way in which I can be of
service to you?"

The young lady addressed turned quickly from the deck-rail on which she
had been leaning, and with a defiant toss of her head faced her
questioner.  A hot flush of resentment chased from her face the
undeniable pallor of a moment before.

"In what way do you think you can be of service to me, Mr. Sinclair?"
she demanded sharply.

"I thought that you were ill, and——"

"And is it so uncommon to be sea-sick, or is it such a dangerous
ailment, that at the first symptom the patient must be cared for as if
she had the plague?"

"Perhaps not!  But I am told that it is uncomfortable."

There was a humorous twinkle in his eyes.  At the sight of it hers
flashed, and the flame of her anger rose higher.

"From that I am to understand, Mr. Sinclair, that you are one of those
superior beings who never suffer from sea-sickness."

"I must confess to belonging to that class," he replied good-humouredly.
"I have never experienced its qualms."

"Then I abominate such people.  They call themselves ’good sailors.’
They offer sympathy to others, and all the while are laughing in their
sleeves.  They are insufferable prigs.  I want none of their sympathy."

"But, Miss MacAllister, you misunderstand me.  I am not offering you
empty sympathy.  I am a medical doctor, and for the present am in charge
of the health of the passengers on this ship."

"Then, Dr. Sinclair, I am not in need of your care. I never yet saw a
doctor who could do anything for sea-sickness.  Their treatment is all
make-believe. They know no more about it than any one else.  I do not
propose to be the subject of experiments. Good-evening."

She was again leaning on the rail, in an attitude which belied her
defiant words.

"Good-evening," replied the young doctor, as he turned away with a
scarcely perceptible shrug of his shoulders, and with an expression of
mingled amusement and annoyance on his face.  A low chuckle of laughter
caught his ear.  He was passing the cabin of the chief officer, and the
door stood open.

"What is the matter with you, Mr. McLeod?" he asked, the shade of
annoyance passing from his face, and a good-humoured laugh taking its
place.

"Come in and close the door."

"You heard what she said?"

"Yes.  How do you feel after that, doctor?"

"Withered; ready to blow away like a dry leaf in autumn!"

"You look it," laughed the mate, as he glanced admiringly at the big,
handsome man who seemed to take up all the available space in the little
cabin, and who was laughing as heartily as if some one else had suffered
instead of himself.

"Isn’t she a haughty one?" continued the chief.

"Who is she, anyway?  The captain made us acquainted.  But you know he
doesn’t go into particulars.  She was Miss MacAllister.  I was Sinclair.
That was our first encounter.  You witnessed the second."

"Her father is senior member of the big London firm of ’MacAllister,
Munro Co., China Merchants.’  They have hongs at every open port on the
China Coast.  He is making an inspection of all their agencies and has
brought his wife and daughter along for company.  Being a Scot, he likes
to keep on good terms with the Lord, who is the giver of all good gifts.
So he is mixing religion with business.  In the intervals between
examining accounts and sizing up the stock in their godowns, he is
visiting missions, seeing that the missionaries are up to their pidgin,
and preaching to the natives through interpreters."

"Easy seeing, McLeod, that you’re a Scot yourself, or the son of a Scot,
from your faculty of acquiring things.  Where did you get all this about
the MacAllisters?  They joined us only this afternoon at Amoy."

"Oh, yes!  But they were with us from Hong-Kong to Swatow last trip.
You missed that, doctor, by going over to Canton.  Miss MacAllister and
I got quite chummy.  Bright moonlight; dead calm; too hot to turn in and
sleep!  So we just sat out or strolled up and down nearly all night.  If
you had been there, I should have had no show.  See what you missed."

"If what I got to-day be a fair sample of what I missed last trip,
you’re welcome to it."

The mate laid back his head and laughed with boyish glee at the rueful
look which came over his friend’s countenance, at the mere memory of the
stinging rebuff he had suffered.

"Do not imagine that your lady friend is always in the humour she showed
to-day, doctor.  She is pretty sick, and for the first time, too.  She
told me before what a good sailor she was.  Never missed a meal at sea!
Never had an inclination to turn over!"

"Did she say that, McLeod?  That she was a ’good sailor’?"

"Yes."

"The vixen!  And then you heard the way she has just soaked it to me for
being a ’good sailor.’"

McLeod shook with laughter.

"Don’t be too hard on her, doctor.  She has got it good and plenty this
time, and she’s disgusted with herself, disgusted with the sea, the
boat, and everything and everybody connected with them."

"She doesn’t hesitate to express her disgust," replied the doctor.  "I
blundered upon her at an unlucky moment and received the full contents
of the vials of her wrath."

"Never mind; she will soon get over this.  Then she will be quite
angelic."

"I guess she got some Chinese chow at Amoy, which didn’t agree with
her."

"Perhaps!  But it doesn’t need any chow to turn over even good sailors
on a sea like this.  The Channel can be dirty when it likes.  This is
one of the times it has chosen to be dirtier than usual."

The two young men had stepped out of the mate’s cabin and were leaning
on the rail looking at the turbulent sea through which they were
steaming.  The coast-line had already faded out of sight in the
gathering gloom, but away to the northwest a great, white light winked
at slow intervals of a minute.  The tide was setting strongly in a
southerly direction, and the ship was breasting almost directly against
it.  The southwest monsoon meeting the tidal current, and perhaps
several other wayward and variable ocean streams which whisk and swirl
through that vexed channel, was kicking up a perfect chaos of broken
waves.  Through this choppy turmoil the _Hailoong_ ploughed her way, all
the while pitching and rolling in an exasperating fashion, no two
successive motions of the ship being alike.  None but seasoned sailors
could escape the qualms of sickness in such a sea.

"It certainly is nasty enough," said the doctor; "and the appearance of
the weather does not promise much improvement."

"The storm signals were hoisted as we weighed anchor," replied McLeod.
"They indicated a typhoon near the Philippines, but travelling this way.
The captain thought that we could make the run across before it caught
us.  But if we don’t see some weather before we cross Tamsui bar, I’m no
prophet."

"Seven bells!  Guess I had better polish up a bit for dinner."

"Don’t throw away too much labour on yourself, Sinclair.  She’ll not
appear at table this evening."

"_She_ must have made considerable impression on you, Mac, from the
frequency with which your mind recurs to her," retorted Sinclair, as the
two separated to make hasty preparations for dinner.

                                  *II*

                                *A LULL*

There were not many at dinner that evening. The _Hailoong_ never had a
very heavy passenger list.  Her cabin accommodation was limited.  On
this trip half of the small number of passengers were in no humour for
dinner.

When Dr. Sinclair entered the saloon, the chief officer, McLeod, was
already at the table.  His watch was nearly due, and he did not stand
upon ceremony. Presently Captain Whiteley came in, and with him a tall,
broad-shouldered man of past middle age. Sinclair had barely time to
note the high, broad forehead, and the square jaw, clean shaven except
for a fringe of side-whiskers, trimmed in old-fashioned style, and
meeting under the chin, before the captain introduced him.

"Mr. MacAllister, this is Dr. Sinclair, a Canadian medical man, spying
out the Far East, and incidentally acting as our ship’s doctor."

"I am pleased to make your acquaintance, Dr. Sinclair. I have been in
your country, and have a great respect for the energy and
progressiveness of your countrymen."

"I am glad to know that you have visited Canada, Mr. MacAllister.  It
seems to me that most British business men and British public men are
lamentably ignorant of Britain’s dominions beyond the seas.  It’s
refreshing to meet one who has visited these new lands and knows
something of their possibilities."

"It must be acknowledged that too many of us in the British Isles are
insular and conservative in our ideas.  But I have always felt that even
in the matter of trade we cannot make a success, unless we know the
people and the wants of the people with whom we do business.  Our firm’s
largest foreign trade is with China, and this is my fourth visit to the
China Coast. But we have interests in Canada also, and in connection
with them I have spent some months in the Dominion."

"I am quite sure that your interests there will grow. It is a great
country.  There is practically no limit to its possibilities.  Even the
Canadians themselves are only now discovering that."

"With such a country, and with such possibilities in it for a young man,
I am surprised, Dr. Sinclair, that you have forsaken it to seek your
fortune on the China Coast."

"Seeking one’s fortune, in the ordinary meaning of that phrase, is not
the only thing worth living for, Mr. MacAllister.  If that were the main
object in life, I should have remained in Canada."

The keen grey eyes of the successful business man searched the young
doctor’s face, as if they would read his very thoughts.  But Dr.
Sinclair did not answer their questioning gaze, nor volunteer any
explanation of his statement.

"Dr. Sinclair thinks with you," broke in Captain Whiteley, "that a man
is better of seeing life in different parts of the world, even though he
may end up by finding a snug harbour in some out-of-the-way corner."

"Yes," replied the merchant, "that is wise, if he can make any use of
the experience gained."

"And I think that the doctor is nearly as much interested in missions as
you are, Mr. MacAllister, judging from the way he visits them and
studies them at every port."

"Is that so, Dr. Sinclair?"  The keen eyes were again reading his face.

"I am interested in anything which proposes to make this old world
better, and to help the men who are in it.  That’s why I chose medicine
as a profession. I like to see things for myself.  That’s why I visit
missions."

"And what are your conclusions?"

"I have hardly come to any conclusions yet.  I have been only a few
months on the Coast.  Tourists and newspaper correspondents know all
about the Far East after spending ten or twelve hours at each of the
ports touched by the big liners.  I am not a genius. I cannot form
conclusions so rapidly.  But here is a fellow-countryman of mine who
knows more of missions now than, in all probability, I ever shall know."

As he was speaking a man had entered the dining saloon who would have
attracted attention anywhere. It was not his dress or his stature which
would have caused him to be noticed.  Like the rest he wore a
close-fitting suit of white drill.  He was of barely middle height,
though well-knit, wiry and erect.  But the quick, nervous movements, the
piercing dark eyes, which seemed to take in with one swift glance
everything and everybody in the room, betokened the fiery energy of the
soul which burned within.  The high forehead, a trifle narrow perhaps,
and the straight line of the mouth, with its firmly-closed lips,
indicated intensity of purpose and determination.  A long black beard
flowed down on his chest, contrasting sharply with the spotless white of
his clothing.

"Mr. MacAllister, have you met Dr. MacKay?"

"I have not had that pleasure.  Is this MacKay of Formosa?"

"I am MacKay."

"It is a great pleasure to me to meet you.  I have heard so much of your
work."

"I hope it may have been good."

"What else could it be?  I am told that it is marvellous what you have
accomplished in so short a time and almost alone."

"All have not that opinion of my work."

"All who spoke of it to me had that opinion.  If what they told me is
true, as I believe it is, how could they think otherwise?"

"Different men have different methods.  So have different missions.
Some can see no good in any but their own.  My methods differ from those
of others. They have not approved themselves to many of my seniors in
the mission fields of China."

"I shall be glad to study your methods and see your results for myself."

"You shall have the opportunity."

The little group of officers and passengers were ere this seated at the
table.  In addition to those already mentioned there was the chief
engineer, Watson, a Scot from the Clyde.  There was also a passenger, a
tea-buyer from New York.

The latter sat opposite Dr. MacKay at the mate’s left.  He had been
listening to the conversation with a look of amused contempt on his
flabby face.  At the head of the table the captain, the engineer,
Sinclair, and MacAllister formed one group, who were soon deep in
conversation.  The tea-buyer took advantage of their preoccupation to
address his neighbour across the table:

"So you are one of those missionaries."

"I am."

"Been gettin’ a pretty fine collection of souls saved."

"I never saved a soul.  Never expect to."

The mate chuckled to himself.  But the point was lost on the tea-buyer.
He thought that he had scored.

"Glad to see that you have come round to my point of view," he said;
"and that there is one missionary honest enough to acknowledge it."

"And what is your point of view?"

"My point of view is that the red-skins and the black-skins and the
brown-skins and the yaller-skins ain’t got any souls, any more than a
dog has."

"I do not know of any reason why the colour of a man’s skin should
affect his possession of a soul."  MacKay spoke very quietly.  The
tea-buyer began to bluster.

"Reason or no reason, no man is going to make me believe that any of the
niggers or Chinees or any of the rest of them have souls.  Christian or
no Christian, a nigger is a nigger, a Chinee is a Chinee, a Dago is a
Dago, and a Sheeny is a Sheeny from first to last.  All the missionary
talk and missionary money-getting is nothing but damned graft, and the
missionaries know it.  Boy!  One piecee whiskey-soda! Chop-chop!"

"All lite!  Have got."  And the "boy," a Chinese waiter perhaps sixty or
seventy years old, quickly and noiselessly brought the bottles.

"I suppose you have had abundance of opportunity to see and judge for
yourself before you came to those conclusions, Mr. Clark," said MacKay.

There was that in his tone which would have made most men careful in
their reply.  But Clark was too self-confident to be wary, and repeated
whiskeys and sodas had made him still less cautious.

"You may bet your bottom dollar I have," he replied.  "I have known
niggers and Dagos since I was knee-high to a grasshopper; and I have
spent every season on the China Coast for the last five or six years.
Oh, yes!  I know what I’m talking about.  I know them from the ground
up."

"Doubtless you have visited many of the churches and chapels at the
different ports where you have done business, and have for yourself seen
the natives at worship."

"Me visit their churches!  Not on your life!  What do you take me for?
I take no stock in any of their joss pidgin.  I’d sooner go to a native
temple than to a native church.  But I’ve never been in either."

"Then I am afraid that I must assist your memory, Mr. Clark.  You were
in a native church."

"Me?  Never!"

"If I am not mistaken, Mr. Clark, you were a passenger on the American
bark _Betsy_, when she was wrecked on South Point, just outside of Saw
Bay, a year ago last November."

"I was.  But I don’t see what that has to do with the subject we were
discussing."

"The _Betsy’s_ boats were all smashed as soon as they touched water."
MacKay was speaking in the dead level tones of suppressed emotion.  But
there was something so penetrating in his voice that the conversation at
the other end of the table ceased, and all were listening.  "The
Pe-po-hoan or Malay natives there went out through the surf in their
fishing-boats and took every man off safely."

"Yes," replied Clark uneasily, "that’s all right enough.  But I reckon
we could have made the shore ourselves."

"They took you to their village, called Lam-hong-o: they opened their
church: the preacher gave up his own house to you: they made beds for
you there and fed you."

"Damned poor accommodation, and damned poor grub!  Boy!  One piecee
whiskey!  Be quick about it!"

"All lite!  No wanchee soda?  My can catchee."

"No!  Damn the soda!"

"All lite!  All lite!  Dammee soda!"

"I shall not say anything, Mr. Clark, of the return those white men with
souls made to those brown men without souls who saved them.  But I shall
tell you what would have happened if the missionaries had not gone to
Lam-hong-o; if there had not been a chapel there; if those brown-skins
had not been Christians. Your ship would have been pillaged.  Your heads
would have been cut off.  Your carcasses would have been fed to the
sharks.  But they were Christians. So they saved you.  They fed you.
They clothed you.  They sent you home with all your belongings that they
were able to save from the sea."

"Right you are, MacKay!" exclaimed Captain Whiteley, bringing his fist
down on the table with a thump which threatened to throw on the floor
the few dishes which the motion of the ship had not already dashed out
of the retaining frames.  "Right you are! Nearly thirty years ago I was
on the _Teucer_, Captain Gibson, as senior apprentice with rank of
fourth mate. We were bound from Liverpool to Shanghai, but ran on the
rocks a little farther down the East Coast than the _Betsy_ did.  There
were thirty-one of us all told. We got ashore without the loss of a man.
But when those devils of natives were done with us, there were only
three of us left alive—the carpenter, an A.B., and myself.  And we
wished that we were dead.  We would have been dead, too, before long.
But after being worked as slaves for nine months, a Chinaman, who had
been with the missionaries on the mainland, bought us from the Malays,
and rowed us out to the first foreign ship he saw, the old _Spindrift_.
She took us to Shanghai."

As the captain finished speaking MacKay rose and left the table.  As was
his wont, he had eaten sparingly and quickly.  MacAllister was pressing
Captain Whiteley for more details of his captivity among the
head-hunters.  McLeod was on the point of going out to his watch.

"That was score one on you, Clark," he said to his neighbour.  "It
doesn’t pay to get too fresh even with a parson."

"I don’t see that it’s any of your pidgin to stick up for those fakirs,"
retorted the tea-buyer angrily.

"And I don’t make it my pidgin," replied McLeod, "but it wasn’t up to
you to butt in on a man like MacKay the way you did.  He gave you what
you deserved."

"He needn’t have flared up so and brought in all those mock-heroics
about what those niggers of his did.  I was only jollying him.  He made
things a great deal worse than they were."

"He didn’t make things half as bad as they were, Clark.  What about the
way the native preacher’s daughter was used by the men to whom the
preacher gave up his house and his church?  Those brown-skins may have
no souls.  But MacKay believes they have.  To my thinking they have a
good deal more soul than the white-skins who did what was done there.
You fellows went the limit.  I wonder that MacKay let you off so easy."

"Oh!—Say!—Damn it, McLeod, that’s going too far.—I’ll not stand for
that.—Say!—Here!—McLeod!—Wait and we’ll break a bottle of
champagne.—Here!—Boy! One piecee champagne!"

"No, thank you, Clark!  It’s my watch."

At the door the chief officer paused and called back:

"Say, Doc, when you are done feeding that big body of yours, come up on
the bridge."

"All right, Mac.  I’ll be with you."

                                 *III*

                             *THE TYPHOON*

When Dr. Sinclair joined his friend on the bridge, a very marked change
had come over the weather.  It was intensely hot and sultry even where
the circulation of air was freest.  The wind was no longer blowing
steadily from the south-west. It came in short puffs, dying away
entirely between them, and veering around quarter of a circle. The
short, broken waves of earlier in the evening were giving place to a
long swell, coming up from the south. The movement of the ship was much
easier.  One or two passengers who had been unable to appear at dinner
had recovered sufficiently to come on deck and escape the unbearable
sultriness and stuffiness of the cabins.

"It’s coming all right, doctor.  Going to catch us sure.  I don’t care
so much if it will only wait till daylight.  I have no ambition to be
floundering around this channel in a typhoon in the dark."

"How’s the glass?"

"Away down, and still going.  Haven’t seen it so low since the big
typhoon that cleaned up Hong-Kong Harbour a couple of years ago."

"What prospect is there that the big blow will hold off till morning?"

"Oh, pretty fair!  The rain hasn’t started yet, and on this coast we
generally get splashes of rain for quite a few hours before the real
thing begins.  The sea is rising, but not very fast yet.  I don’t think
we’ll see very bad weather till to-morrow."

Just then a merry ripple of woman’s laughter sounded from away aft.

"Listen to that, Sinclair," said the mate.  "That ’sweet Highland girl’
of yours has evidently recovered sufficiently to come on deck.  She’s
back there talking to the captain.  I hope he may be as gallant as he
sometimes is with our rare lady passengers, and may bring her up here to
view the scenery.  I should just like to see how you and she would act
at your first meeting after the little tiff you had to-day.  I’m
interested in this case, doctor."

"What the deuce is the matter with you anyway, McLeod?  You are talking
a lot of rot to me about a young woman I have never seen before.  Surely
our experiences so far have been unpropitious enough.  If it were not
that I know about a little girl away back on your own Island, I should
say that those moonlight promenades between Hong-Kong and Swatow had
turned your head."

"Never mind, Doc.  You know that a bad beginning makes a good ending.
We people of Highland blood have a sort of second sight.  We can see a
bit into the future.  I give you fair warning——"

There was another ripple of laughter, this time from forward, almost
under the bridge.  Then a woman’s voice said:

"Oh, Captain Whiteley, I behaved myself most shockingly to-day."

"Surely not, Miss MacAllister.  I couldn’t conceive of your doing
anything which wasn’t charming."

"You told me that you were a Yorkshireman, Captain Whiteley.  After such
a speech as that I believe that you must have been born near Blarney
Castle. But I really did behave shamefully."

"How?"

"I said just awful things to your doctor."

"And what ever did Dr. Sinclair do to deserve those ’awful things’?"

"It was all your fault, Captain Whiteley.  When you introduced him, you
did not tell me that he was a doctor.  I was sea-sick, and—and in just
dreadful humour.  He offered assistance.  I did not know that he was a
medical doctor, sauced him, and sent him about his business.  And now
what shall I do to make amends?  It was all your fault——"

Anything more was lost to the ears of the two young men on the bridge,
as she and the captain strolled slowly aft.  But the rippling laughter
reached their ears from time to time.

"Not very penitent, that!" laughed McLeod.

"Did you catch on to the reason she gave for saucing me, because she
didn’t know that I was a medical doctor?  It was just when she found out
that I was a doctor that she gave me the worst.  Doesn’t that beat the
Dutch?"

    "’O woman! in our hours of ease,
    Uncertain, coy, and hard to please,’"

quoted McLeod.

In the light of the binnacle lamp the two friends looked into each
other’s eyes and laughed heartily. There was no cynicism, no cheap scoff
at a woman’s variableness.  Instead there was that manly
healthy-mindedness which can afford to laugh at her inexplicable ways,
and honour and admire her still.

"By the way, McLeod, Dr. MacKay put it all over Clark this evening,
didn’t he?  I couldn’t hear it all. Caught just the last few sentences.
But I thought, from what I heard, that he was giving that old Mormon
some knockout blows."

"You’re right he was.  But not half as much as he deserved.  There are
some white men who come out here who wouldn’t be decent company for
pigs.  Clark is one of them.  I’m no paragon of virtue, and I don’t set
up to preach to others.  But there are a lot of us on the China Coast
who try to keep decent enough not to be ashamed to go home once in a
while and look our mothers and sisters in the face.  There are a number
of others who are simply rotten.  They give us all a bad name.  Mormon!
Yes, worse than that! He could give points to old Abdul Hamid of
Turkey."

A dash of warm rain driving before a sharp squall of wind struck them.
The _Hailoong_ was rising and falling with the mighty heave of the great
swells which were following each other in regular succession from the
south, each apparently bigger than the last. Captain Whiteley climbed
the ladder to the bridge.

"Looks as if we were in for a bad night, Mr. McLeod."

"Yes, sir; and a worse day to follow."

"From the way the sea is rising, I’m afraid we cannot make Tamsui before
it breaks."

"I am sure we cannot.  I’ll be satisfied if it only waits till daylight.
We may have our hands full even with the light."

"I see that you have been making things snug. That’s right.  I’ll have a
look at everything before eight bells."

The captain went down to see that every preparation was made.  McLeod
spoke to his companion.

"You had better turn in, Sinclair," he said.  "Get a bit of rest.  You
may be needed to-morrow.  Good-night."

"Good-night, Mac."

How long he was in his berth, how much of that time he slept, how much
was spent in more or less conscious efforts to keep from being thrown
about his cabin, Sinclair did not know.  Accustomed though he was to the
sea and to storms, there came a time when he could remain in his berth
no longer.  The angle at which the ship lay over told him that she was
still holding in her course of the night before.  His cabin was still on
the lee side.  He opened his door and stepped out, grasping the
hand-rail with all his might to keep from being hurled off his feet.

Such a sight met his eyes as is rarely seen even by the sailor who
spends his life at sea.  The _Hailoong_ was heeled over so far that it
seemed hardly possible that she could right herself.  It appeared to be
the force of the wind rather than of the waves which had thrown her on
her beam ends, for she did not recover herself as she ought to have done
between the assaults of the billows.  Held in that position by sheer
wind pressure, she was deluged with water, rain, spray, torn crests of
waves—the air was full of them, while ever and anon some mountainous
roller, higher than its fellows, swept across her decks in a smother of
green water and snowy foam.

So dark was it that at first Sinclair could scarcely tell whether it was
night or day.  Presently he made out some figures clinging desperately
to anything which would afford a hold of safety.  He made his way slowly
towards them.  They were McLeod and a couple of the crew, looking to the
lashings of the boats.

"Man, but it’s a wild morning whatever!" roared the mate in his ear,
lapsing into the idiom of his native province when his feelings were
greatly stirred.

"How is she standing it?"

"Fine, so far!  The starboard boats are smashed. No other damage done
that I know of.  But it’s hard to tell what may be happening to
starboard.  Nothing to be seen but water!"

"The engines are working all right," said the doctor, as he noted the
steady throb and quiver running like an undertone through the succession
of terrific shocks the ship was receiving from the waves.

"Ay, and if they don’t work all right, it’ll not be Watson’s fault.
Yon’s a grand man whatever."

The mate was off, traversing the tilted deck with marvellous agility and
sureness of foot.  The doctor went below to see if he could be of any
service to the passengers.  An hour or more passed, and he was again on
deck, working his way forward to get as good a view as possible.

There in the shelter of the forward cabin stood Dr. MacKay.  He was
bareheaded; his long, black beard was blowing in the wind; his white
suit was drenched as if he had been overboard; his keen eyes were
striving to pierce the murk of cloud and rain and spray which turned the
day almost into night.  He seemed to be expecting to get a glimpse of
the land.

He was not clinging to the hand-rail, but had his hands clasped behind
his back.  In spite of the distressing angle at which the ship’s deck
was tilted, in spite of her pitching and plunging, he seemed able to
accommodate himself to her every movement.  A man of big stature and
splendid physical development himself, Sinclair could not help pausing
for some minutes to admire the poise and self-control of that
comparatively small, spare, but erect and athletic figure.  Then he
stepped a little nearer and shouted:

"Do you often have storms like this in Formosa?"

"I have seen as bad; perhaps worse: but not often."

"Do you think that we’re near Tamsui?"

"We must be."

"Can we make the harbour?"

"Not this time.  We’ll be late for the tide."

"A bad wind for putting about and getting out to sea again!"

"’Who hath measured the waters in the hollow of His hand?’"

At that instant a tremendous billow tumbled on board with such a weight
of water that for some moments it seemed as if the _Hailoong_ could not
rise from beneath it.  It caught two Chinese deck-hands, tore them from
the bridge supports to which they were clinging, and swept them
helplessly from starboard to port.  Like a flash MacKay’s left hand shot
out, grasped a thin brown wrist, and swung one of the natives into the
shelter of the cabin.  But the other was dashed with terrific force
against the deck-rail, where he lay motionless.

Sinclair sprang forward to help him.  A second wave hurled him against
the rail.  He did not fall, but performed some weird gymnastics in the
effort to keep his feet.  And through the shrieking of the wind and the
roar of the waves he heard a clear, joyous woman’s laugh, the same as he
had heard the night before.  There in the shelter of the cabin, on
almost the very spot where he had stood a moment before, was Miss
MacAllister, looking like the very spirit of the storm.

That was too much.  Even Sinclair’s usually unruffled temper began to
give way.  He caught up the helpless Chinese as if he had been a child,
and with one quick spring was back to shelter.

"You seem to find it very amusing to see men hurt, Miss MacAllister," he
said almost fiercely.

"I did not know that you were hurt, Dr. Sinclair, or I should not have
laughed.  I am so sorry."

"I’m not hurt," said the young man even more ferociously than before;
"but this man is injured, seriously injured, I’m afraid.  He’s still
unconscious."

"Oh, but I was not laughing at him.  I was laughing at you.  You would
have laughed yourself if you could have seen the figure you cut going
across the deck.  Really, Dr. Sinclair, you would.  I simply could not
help it."

She looked up in his face with such a childlike innocence of expression,
such confidence in the validity of the excuse, that even Dr. MacKay’s
somewhat stern face relaxed, and he turned away to hide a smile. As for
Dr. Sinclair, he was helpless.  He could not remain angry under the
circumstances.  His good-humoured laugh broke out as he replied:

"We must accept your confession, believe in your penitence, and grant
you absolution."

He and MacKay went below with the injured Chinese, but in a few minutes
reappeared on deck.

"I have not seen your father to-day, Miss MacAllister," said Dr. MacKay.

"He is in his stateroom with mother.  She is very ill and he will not
leave her."

"I must congratulate you on being so good a sailor. You do not show a
symptom of sea-sickness.  That is quite remarkable in such a storm as
this."

She shot a quick glance at Sinclair.  He did not seem to be paying
attention to what they were saying. But a quizzical smile playing about
his eyes and mouth betrayed his interest in the conversation and his
remembrance of what had taken place the evening before.

"Indeed, Dr. MacKay, I am not a good sailor at all.  I have been
sea-sick when there was only a little chop on the water.  I was sea-sick
yesterday.  I should have been sick to-day, only this storm is so
interesting that I have not had time to think about myself. When the
officers and crew are being tossed about the deck by the waves, like
dead leaves on a burn in autumn, it is really too interesting and
amusing to be missed."

The rare smile lighted up the missionary’s face as he glanced at
Sinclair.  The latter accepted the challenge, and a quick answer was on
his tongue, when McLeod hurried past.  He paused long enough to say to
Sinclair:

"We’re opposite the harbour, doctor, but we can’t make it."  Then he ran
up on the bridge to join Captain Whiteley, who had not left it since
midnight.

The words were intended for Sinclair alone.  But a momentary lull in the
storm made them louder than McLeod anticipated.  Sinclair’s two
companions heard them.  Yet neither showed any trace of concern—neither
the mature man who had faced death scores of times on sea and on land,
nor the young woman who had never knowingly been in danger before.

The same brief lull in the force of the wind brought an equally
momentary gleam of light through the darkness, which had up till then
made noonday as gloomy as a late twilight.  That gleam lighted for a few
short seconds the landscape, and showed the storm-tossed company where
they were.  There directly ahead was the harbour of Tamsui, with the
green and purple hills beyond.  There on the nearest hill-top was the
Red Fort which for two and a half centuries had braved such storms as
this.  Just beyond it were the low white bungalows of the mission,
nearly hidden in the trees, where anxious eyes were watching for one who
was on that battling ship.  There, too, were the black balls hanging on
the yard-arm at the signal station, saying that the tide was falling and
the bar impassable.  And the two white beacons for a single instant in
line, and then widening apart, told the seamen that not only the tempest
but the ebb tide, sweeping past the mouth of the harbour, was bearing
them full upon the long curving beach of sand and shells which lay just
to the north, where the surf was beating so furiously.

It takes time to tell.  But in reality the respite lasted only a few
seconds.  Then the typhoon burst upon them again, with apparently
redoubled violence.  The darkness and the tumult of wind and waves were
appalling.

"I wonder that you are not afraid," said Sinclair to Miss MacAllister,
losing sight of their passages at arms in the seriousness of the
situation.

"Should I be afraid?" was her reply.

"Most people would be."

"Are you afraid?"

"No: I do not think I am."

"Well, if you and the other officers who know whatever danger there may
be are not afraid, I do not see why I should.  They know the situation.
I do not. When they tell me that there is serious danger, it will be
time enough for me to be frightened."

Then for the first time Sinclair turned upon her a look of genuine
admiration.  Up to that moment she had been to him a mischievous,
teasing, whimsical girl, with a quick wit and a ready tongue, who had
been amusing herself at his expense.  Now he saw another side to her
character.  There was a strong, brave nature under the light, changeful
surface humours he had seen before.

If she were not afraid, there was at least one passenger who was.
During the brief lull in the storm Clark, the tea-buyer, had come on
deck.  He had hardly reached it when the second fury of the typhoon
burst upon them.  He was now clinging to the hand-rail, with a face so
flabby and ghastly that it was terrible to look upon.  He was not
sea-sick.  He was too experienced a sailor for that.  But he was afraid,
horribly afraid.  As the murk and gloom closed down again, and a
gigantic wall of water broke over the ship, making her shudder and
struggle like a living thing in death agony, Clark’s voice was heard
rising in a scream above the roar of the elements:

"MacKay, for God’s sake, why don’t you pray?"

MacKay looked at the man clinging there in abject terror.  For a moment
the keen, stern face softened as if in pity.  Then it seemed as if the
memory of something—was it of that wreck on the East Coast, and the evil
deeds done in the chapel and the preacher’s house there?—flashed through
his mind.  His face hardened again, and in a voice like ice he replied:

"Men who honour God when the days are fine do not have to howl to Him
for help in the time of storm."

What more the terror-stricken boaster of the evening before may have
said was lost on his companions, for something was happening which
engrossed all their attention.  Down in the engine-room bells jangled
sharply.  The screw began to thresh the water at a tremendous rate.  The
_Hailoong_ heeled still farther to port, began to forge ahead, bumped
something, was caught by a mighty wave squarely on the stern, righted
herself, and plunged forward.  Then Sinclair realized what was
happening.

"Everybody below!" he shouted.  "Quick!  The next will catch us on this
side.  Dr. MacKay, help Miss MacAllister."

Seizing the helpless Clark, he flung him by main strength into safety.
They were scarcely under cover when a big roller tumbled on board on the
port side. The _Hailoong_ had turned almost completely around, and was
fighting her way out to sea.

All afternoon and far into the night the brave little vessel battled
with the waves to get back to the coast of the mainland.  At last her
anxious officers were rewarded by a distant, hazy gleam of light through
the dense, water-laden atmosphere.  Fifteen seconds passed, almost
minutes in length.  Again the white beam shot athwart the darkness.
Then regularly and growing ever nearer, at intervals of fifteen seconds,
the great white light flashed, showing the way to safety.  It was
Turnabout lighthouse, behind which lay Haitan Straits, winding among the
islands, and between them and the mainland shore.

Into one of their many natural harbours the _Hailoong_ cautiously felt
her way, and cast anchor in a quiet basin among the hills.  There
nothing but the torrents of rain falling and the roar of the surf beyond
the island barrier remained to tell of the dangers they had passed
through.  Then Captain Whiteley left the bridge for the first time in
more than twenty-four hours.  Neither he nor his chief officer had found
a chance to sleep for forty-eight hours.

For years afterwards only three persons knew exactly what happened on
the bridge that day.  Then when Captain Whiteley was commanding a Castle
boat running to the Cape, and McLeod had a big trans-Pacific liner, the
quarter-master, who with a Chinese sea-cunny had been at the
_Hailoong’s_ wheel, felt absolved from the promise he had made to McLeod
to keep the secret, and told what he knew.

When the momentary lifting of the clouds showed the captain that the
wind combined with the ebb of the tide had carried them past the line of
entrance to the harbour, towards the shoaling beach on which the surf
was beating, he shouted to his mate:

"My God, McLeod, we’re lost!"

"Not so bad as that yet, sir!" was the reply.

"There isn’t room to turn and clear that shoal water. To starboard it’s
stern on: to port it’s broadside on."

"We haven’t tried, sir!"

"Then, for God’s sake, McLeod, try!"

The words had hardly left the captain’s lips when the engineer received
the signal for full steam ahead, and the mate, springing into the
wheel-house, flung himself on the wheel, and with the combined strength
of three men forced it over.  The _Hailoong_ responded gallantly.  Her
head swung directly towards the dreaded shoal, passed it, and pointed
out to sea.  So close was she that when the wind caught her stern it
dropped just for an instant between two rollers on the hard, smooth
sand.  But the next one lifted her, gave her churning screw a chance,
and the ebb tide, which a moment before had been threatening to send her
broadside to destruction, now helped to bear her past the long receding
curve of the sand bank, out into the open sea.

"That was the tightest corner I ever was in," Whiteley used to say
afterwards; "and it was McLeod who took us out."

But McLeod, in a moment of confidence, said to Sinclair:

"Man, but that engineer, Watson, is the jewel whatever!  He let his
second handle the levers, while himself held pistols to the heads of the
Chinese stokers, and told them to shovel or die in their tracks.  That’s
what saved us.  He’s a jewel.  I never saw his likes whatever."

                                  *IV*

                               *PARRIED*

It was a bright, calm summer day, perfect in its tropical splendour,
when the _Hailoong_ arrived off the port of Tamsui.  On the blue,
smiling sea and rich green shore not a trace remained of the furious
storm of two days before.  Where, save for one brief gleam, all had been
hidden from sight by the blackness of the tempest and the deluge of rain
and spray, there now lay before the ship’s company as fair a landscape
as the eye could wish to look upon.

Immediately in front of them was the broad, brimming river, its
sand-spits and oyster-beds hidden beneath the waters of the full tide.
On the right or southern shore a mountain rose from its margin in an
isolated peak to the height of seventeen hundred feet, clothed with
dense verdure to the very summit. To the left, on a hill and plateau two
hundred feet high, were the red brick buildings of the old Dutch fort,
the residence of the British consul, and the mission schools, and the
white bungalows of the missionaries and customs officers.  At the foot
of this hill and along the river bank, the mean buildings of the Chinese
town of Tamsui straggled off until lost to sight around the curve.  Its
limits were marked by the little forest of masts of the junks which lay
along in front of the town.  In the centre of the river, directly
opposite the mission houses, a trim gunboat rested at anchor.  Over all
rose the Taitoon Mountains in successive ranges of green and purple and
blue, the highest and farthest summits blending with the unclouded sky.

Exclamations of delight burst from those of the passengers who had never
looked upon the scene before.

"Father, isn’t this just glorious?"

"It certainly is.  I have often heard of the beauty of Formosa, but this
first view quite exceeds my expectations."

"It was worth while experiencing that typhoon and being delayed for two
days.  It heightens the enjoyment of a scene like this.  We should not
have appreciated it so much if we had been favoured with a peaceful
voyage.  Do you not think so, Dr. MacKay?"

"Perhaps you are right, Miss MacAllister.  But Formosa is always
beautiful to me.  It never loses its charm.  I have gone up and down it
for more than a dozen years.  I never grow weary of it.  It never palls
upon me.  It is still to me as the first day I saw it ’Ilha Formosa,’
the Beautiful Isle.  It always will be Beautiful Formosa."

There was an accent in his reply which spoke of more than love for the
scenery.  Miss MacAllister was not slow to detect it.  She heard in it
the passionate devotion of a heroic soul to the cause to which he had
given his life.  It struck a responsive chord somewhere in her own
being.  It was with a softened voice, a voice expressive of sympathy and
admiration, that she said:

"You love the island and its people, Dr. MacKay?"

"I do."

And Sinclair, who chanced to be standing near, as once before during the
storm, saw the veil of her surface waywardness lifted and caught a
glimpse of a character beneath which was capable of serious purpose.

"Mr. McLeod, that sampan over there with the flag is hailing us."

It was the captain’s voice which broke in on the conversation of the
group on deck.

"Yes, sir," replied the chief.  "It came out from the pilot village, and
has been waiting for us."

"I wonder what’s up?"

"I don’t know, sir.  Hold on, they are signalling from the Customs."

In an instant the chief officer had a glass focussed on the flagpole at
the customs offices.  The other officers and the passengers stood silent
while the little fluttering oblongs and triangles of red, white, yellow,
and blue talked.

"What do they say, chief?"

"Wait for a pilot.  Danger."

"A pilot!  The devil!  What do they take us for? Some tramp which has
never been here before? Perhaps the typhoon shifted the bar."

While he spoke, McLeod had swung his glass upon the approaching Chinese
boat.  Two fishermen, standing up and pushing forward on their long
oars, were driving it rapidly through the water.  Their bodies, naked to
the waist, and their legs, bare save for the shortest of cotton
trousers, were covered with perspiration and shone in the sun like
burnished copper. In the stern sat a Chinese in a dress which was an
indescribable cross between Chinese official robes and a Western
uniform.

"That’s a Chinese military or naval officer of some kind, sir," said the
mate.  "They must be in a mix-up with somebody.  Perhaps the French have
taken it into their heads to annex Formosa."

The sampan shot alongside, and with unexpected agility the Chinese
officer clambered up the sea-ladder.

"The captain will please to excuse me," he said in slow, precise
English, "for offering to pilot his ship into the harbour.  The
captain’s skill as a pilot is well known to me.  The government of China
regrets to find itself in a state of war with the government of France.
Therefore, His Excellency, the Provincial Governor of Formosa, has laid
down mines for the defence of the port of Tamsui.  As I have knowledge
of the position of the mines, he has commanded me to pilot the captain’s
ship past the mines into the harbour."

He concluded his little speech with a profound bow. The captain’s reply
was brief:

"The ship is yours, sir."

Another profound bow, and the Chinese officer was in charge.

Captain Whiteley turned to Mr. MacAllister.

"I am sorry, sir," he said, "that the French have taken the notion to
transfer their scrimmage with the Chinese to Formosa just at this
moment.  It will interfere with your plans."

"It probably will interfere somewhat with our movements.  But, on the
other hand, it may be of advantage to us.  We are out to learn, and are
not hampered by lack of time.  I am deeply interested in your pilot.  He
seems perfectly at home, and to know his business thoroughly."

"Not the slightest doubt of that!  This is not the first time he has
navigated a ship.  Very likely he has spent years of apprenticeship on
board a British or American man-of-war."

"Is China getting her young man trained like that?"

"They are getting themselves trained.  The government isn’t awake yet.
But many of the young men are.  The old China is passing.  This is one
of the pioneers of the new China which is coming.  It will take time.
But when it does come, mark my words, the Western nations will have to
sit up and take notice."

Meanwhile the _Hailoong_, under the command of her Oriental pilot,
crossed the bar and zigzagged her way slowly up the river, following
invisible channels through the field of hidden mines until she reached
her berth at the customs jetty.

Leaning on the rail, Sinclair watched with keenest interest the little
crowd of foreigners and natives gathered on the shore and jetty, waiting
for the passengers to disembark.  He had met a number of them on a
former trip to this port, and occasionally waved his hand or gave a
greeting to some one he recognized.

There was a sprinkling of officers of the Imperial Maritime Customs,
sunburned young Britons for the most part, who had taken service under
the brilliant Irishman whose genius had saved the Chinese Government
from bankruptcy.  There were the representatives of the various foreign
business firms, all British, glad to leave their hongs for an hour, to
experience the little excitement caused by the coming of the weekly
steamer, and to welcome those whom they had almost given up for lost.
The foreign community doctor had found time from his not very pressing
duties to come down to the landing and call a "Wie geht es Ihnen?" to
his confrère on board the _Hailoong_.

Contrasting with the close-fitting snow-white garments of the foreigners
were the long, blue, or mauve silk gowns with, in some cases, sleeveless
yellow jackets over them, of the Chinese Christian preachers and
students who were there to do honour to Dr. MacKay. Darting back and
forth, chattering, screaming, quarrelling in high-pitched nasal tones,
were bronzed, sweating, almost naked coolies, each trying to get ahead
of the other and earn the most cash.

It was a scene of which Sinclair never tired. Fascinated by this strange
mingling of the East and the West he leaned over the rail, watching
every movement.  A quick step approached him:

"Dr. Sinclair, as soon as your duties here are done, you will come to my
house and be my guest.  The college coolies will bring up your baggage.
If I am not there, Mrs. MacKay will receive you and look after your
wants."

"Thank you, Dr. MacKay.  I shall be very glad to accept your hospitality
for a time.  I shall probably be with you to-morrow."

MacKay was gone as quickly as he had come.  A minute or two later his
native converts were receiving him with the oft-repeated salutation:
"Peng-an, Kai Bok-su!  Kai Bok-su, peng-an!" (Peace, Pastor MacKay!
Pastor MacKay, peace!).

One of the oldest preachers walked off with him up the narrow, climbing
path.  The rest tailed out in single file behind.

There was another quicker and lighter step, accompanied by the rustle of
a woman’s garments.  Sinclair turned to find himself face to face with
Miss MacAllister.  Her eyes were sparkling with mischief, her hand was
extended in farewell:

"Good-bye, Dr. Sinclair.  I have enjoyed this voyage so much.  I hope
that we shall meet again.  But, if we should not, I shall never forget
your rescue of that Chinese, the heroism and the grace you displayed.
Really, I never shall."

It was premeditated, and she intended to escape the moment the shaft was
shot.  But Sinclair was not so nonplussed as he had been at their first
encounter. He held her hand firmly so that she could not get away, long
enough to reply:

"Good-bye, Miss MacAllister.  I am delighted to know that I have given
you pleasure.  I should be happy to make a similar exhibition of myself
any day, if it would only contribute to your enjoyment."

He released her hand and she escaped into the saloon.  The colour which
overspread her face was not all the flush of triumph.  This time she had
met the unexpected.

"Well parried, Doc," said a voice beside him. "That fair tyrant was
beginning to think that you were an easy mark.  But you gave her as much
as you got this time....  Here’s a chit for you.... From the consulate."

"Where’s the boy?" said Sinclair, taking the letter McLeod held out to
him.  "I had better sign his chit-book."

"You don’t need to.  I signed for you.  There’s the boy going back,"
replied the mate, pointing to a Chinese in the dark blue and red uniform
of the British consul’s service, climbing the steep path up to where the
old Dutch fort and the consul’s house crowned the lofty hill above them.
"Don’t think that you are the only one to get a _billet-doux_ like that.
The captain and I are among the favoured.  It’s a bid to dinner at the
consulate to-morrow evening."

Sinclair opened and glanced at the note.  It was a brief and formal
invitation:

"Mr. and Mrs. Beauchamp request the pleasure of the company of Dr.
Donald Sinclair at dinner at 7:30 on Tuesday the 5th instant.

H. B. M. Consulate,
Tamsui,
August 4th, 1884."

"I guess I’ll be able to go.  Though I promised to put myself in
MacKay’s hands to-morrow, and he may have something else on for me."

"No danger!  MacKay knows everything that’s going on as well as the next
one.  He will not ask you to do anything which will conflict with a
dinner at the consulate.  If he’s at home, he’ll be there himself. You
just lay out to be present.  Mrs. Beauchamp is famous for the chow she
provides.  Where she gets it out here off the earth, I don’t know.  And
for entertaining guests, she and Beauchamp haven’t their equals on the
Coast."

"You’re a great pleader, Mac.  I’ll give you my word.  I’ll go."

"And the Highland girl will be there."

"Look here, McLeod, you’re gone batty on that subject.  I know an
address in Prince Edward Island. If you continue to talk as foolishly as
you have been doing the last few days, I’ll write and peach on you."

"Oh, no, you won’t!  But just to change the subject, look at old De Vaux
meeting them.  He’s so excited that I shouldn’t wonder to see him take
an apoplectic fit."

Mr. MacAllister, his wife, and daughter had just left the boat.  A
large, fleshy man, with a clean-shaven, florid face, bulging blue eyes,
and all his features except the double chin bunched unnecessarily close
together, was hurrying forward to meet them in a state of perspiring
excitement and nervousness.  He was carrying his white sun-helmet in one
hand, mopping his brows with a huge handkerchief held in the other, and
all the while the mid-summer tropical sun was beaming down on his
shining face, and on his head with its quite inadequate covering of
hair.

"Mr. MacAllister! ... You cannot know what pleasure it gives me to
welcome you to Formosa.... ’Pon my soul, you cannot! ... I have been
twenty years in Formosa, and this is the greatest pleasure I have
experienced....  ’Pon my honour, it is!"

"Glad to see you again, Mr. De Vaux.  If I remember right, the last time
we saw each other was in our office at Amoy, five years ago last May."

"That is so, Mr. MacAllister....  Lord, what a memory you have! ... I
don’t know another man on the China Coast who would have remembered a
date like that....  ’Pon my soul, I do not!"

"Mr. De Vaux, I wish you to meet my wife and daughter.  My dear, allow
me to present Mr. De Vaux. My wife, Mr. De Vaux.  My daughter, Mr. De
Vaux."

The stout man bent double in profound bows, dropping his hat to the very
ground, gurgling something almost inarticulate with excitement:

"Mrs. MacAllister! ... I am so pleased! ... Bless my soul!  Miss
MacAllister....  This is the happiest moment of my life....  ’Pon my
honour, it is!"

Above them on the deck Sinclair was saying to McLeod:

"Who is this De Vaux, anyway?  Of course, I know that he is chief agent
in Formosa of MacAllister, Munro Co.  But who is he and what are his
antecedents?"

"That is just the question," replied McLeod.  "We know, and we don’t
know.  We know that the Honourable Lionel Percival Dudley de Vaux is the
oldest known son of the late Lord Eversleigh, the oldest brother or
half-brother of the present lord.  But why he is out here sweltering and
swearing in this steambath of a climate while his younger brother enjoys
the cool shade of his ancestral parks and halls, and holds down a seat
in the Lords, no one seems to know. Some say that he is the son of the
late lord by a Scotch marriage in his wild-oat stage; some that he is a
son born to the late lord by the countess dowager before wedlock.  At
any rate, he was shipped to the Far East as a boy, and here he has been
these more than twenty years, pensioned, they say, to keep out of
England."

"He seems to be very excitable," said Sinclair, as he looked down at the
stout, perspiring individual, who was still holding his hat in his hand,
still bowing, still gurgling in a high-toned voice, while his face and
head grew redder and shinier every moment.

"Yes, he is now.  When he came out first, they say that he was a regular
Lord Chesterfield in his manners.  But he was here alone for years.  No
comforts but drink and a yellow woman.  He took to both. These with the
isolation and the climate have made him what he is.  When he meets a
white woman he loses his head completely.  Any little irritation in
business sends him right up in the air.  Then he swears.  We call him
old De Vaux.  In fact he has hardly reached middle age.  The life here
is killing him.  If he doesn’t die of apoplexy one of those days, he’ll
commit suicide.  And he’s not a bad old soul. Just the victim of his
parent’s wrong-doing.  Poor old De Vaux!"

Just then they heard Miss MacAllister saying in a tone of utmost
concern:

"Mr. De Vaux, will you not put on your hat?  I am so afraid that your
head will get sunburned."

"A sunstroke you mean, my dear," said her father, "a sunstroke."

"No, father, I mean sunburned.  Really, Mr. De Vaux’s head is becoming
quite crimson."

"Lord! ... Miss MacAllister! ... How good of you to notice that! ...
Bless my soul! ... I never thought of it....  ’Pon my honour, I didn’t!
... A man should put on his hat in a sun like this.... ’Pon my soul, he
should!..."

He was still executing a sort of war-dance around the ladies and still
holding his hat in his hand. Mr. MacAllister took him gently by the arm.

"My dear De Vaux," he said, "it has been exceedingly kind of you to come
down to meet us as you have done, and to provide those sedan chairs, for
I can see that it is you who have engaged them.  With your permission,
we’ll go to our quarters now.  The captain promised to see that our
baggage was sent over at once.  After tiffin, I am sure that you will be
so good as to accompany me to call on the consul."

As the four chairs were borne off along the narrow road by the shore,
McLeod said to Sinclair:

"MacAllister’s a trump.  He saved the situation. Old De Vaux was just
ready to go up like a balloon, and—swear."

And Sinclair thought to himself as he turned away:

"Miss MacAllister has found another victim."

                                  *V*

                            *INTRODUCTIONS*

A few minutes before the time appointed for dinner, Sinclair strolled
over to the consulate.  A couple of the I.M.C. officers joined him on
the way.  Out on the broad verandah the consul and his wife were
receiving their guests, taking every advantage possible of the slight
coolness of the evening air. None had yet gone inside.  Some lounged on
the verandah.  Most were strolling about the grounds, on the gravelled
walks or the green of the tennis lawn between the house and the old
Dutch fort.

Many coloured paper lanterns hung from the cocoanut and areca palms,
were nestled in the clumps of oleanders, or were strung on wires around
the verandah.  On the side of the house shaded from the sunset glow,
native servants were already lighting them.

It was a scene of rare beauty.  The broad river gleaming between its
lofty banks: the green mountain towering up on the opposite shore: the
glassy ocean stretching away to where the sun had sunk to rest in its
waters: the old fort lifting its dark, massive walls and battlements,
undecayed by centuries of tropical storm and tropical sun, against the
pale yellow and rose and purple of the sunset sky: the strange, rich
vegetation of a tropic clime, amidst which moved men and women in
conventional evening dress, as they would have done in the drawing-rooms
of England.

Save for the shrilling of the cicadas and the quiet voices of the hosts
and their guests, the air was as still as if it had never known
disturbance.  Yet all that day, from eight A.M. till nearly sundown, it
had quivered with the roar of heavy ordnance and the rattle of machine
guns.  Less than twenty miles away, across those hills to the east, the
French fleet had poured a tempest of shot and shell from its long naval
guns and mitrailleuses into the Chinese forts at Keelung, and the
Chinese had replied from their Krupps and Armstrongs till their defences
tumbled about their ears.  Now the game of war was over for the day, and
all seemed as peaceful as if it had never been played.  But the
conversation of the guests continually reverted to the tempest which had
so suddenly broken upon the island.

Just at the hour set for dinner the little gunboat, the _Locust_, which
had been away since early dawn, was seen steaming up the harbour.  As
she passed the consulate, a boat dropped from her and pulled swiftly in
towards the jetty.  At the sight of it the host and hostess led the way
into the brightly-lighted drawing-room.

"Commander Gardenier has made jolly good time," said the consul.  "We
can well afford to wait a few minutes for him.  He’ll be here directly.
In the meantime we can get acquainted."

While the host was busy with introductions, Sinclair had time to
consider the company.  He had met almost all before.  But he had not by
any means satisfied his keen interest in their personal characteristics.
One by one he studied the men and women before him, taking in with the
celerity of one who has long practised it as an art the physical type of
each, and estimating the mental peculiarities which lay behind the
outward forms.

The first was the consul.  Of barely middle height, but perfectly
proportioned, every movement betrayed muscles trained and developed by
consistent physical exercise.  The keen, bright blue eyes, looking out
of a sunburned face, the small, closely-clipped moustache, the nervous,
vigorous movements, hardly needed the confirmation of his short, quick
sentences and decisive accents to tell the story of his character.  The
interests of his country would not suffer at his hands for lack of
courage or decision.

Mrs. Beauchamp was a small woman, somewhat delicate in appearance.  Her
slight figure was well set off by the rich simplicity of her evening
gown. The quiet ease of her manners spoke of a lifetime spent in the
atmosphere of polite society.

In sharp contrast was Mrs. MacAllister—large, stout, middle-aged, with
raven black hair, and the bright colour characteristic of her Highland
people still warm in her cheeks.  Considering the occasion and the
tropic heat, she was over-dressed.  More noticeable still was the fact
that she was not at home in her present surroundings.  With her husband
she had risen from a humble station in life to wealth, and the entrée
into social circles which wealth gives. The wife of the great London
merchant and financier must not be overlooked.  Oh, no!  Indeed, she had
no desire to be overlooked.  She had brought from an almost menial
position an exaggerated reverence for the gentry, and the ambition to
associate with them.  Yet she was never at ease in their company. Her
husband showed the poise of one who could adapt himself to any position
in life, and manifested no embarrassment or awkwardness in any company.
But Mrs. MacAllister was never free from constraint at social functions,
and her attempts to appear at home sometimes resulted in disaster.

There was another married woman present—Mrs. Thomson, the wife of Dr.
MacKay’s colleague.  Youthful in face and figure, she was dressed
plainly, almost to the verge of severity.  But her quick wit and
vivacious manner gathered a little group of the guests about her, and
more than atoned for the commonplace dulness of her husband.

Standing among some tropic plants just outside a French window,
Sinclair, unobserved himself, was able to study each one in succession.
But ever and anon his eyes turned to where nearly half the men present
had gathered around the only other woman who was there to grace the
occasion.  Miss MacAllister was facing him, and he could note every play
of expression on her countenance.  There was a rapid exchange of
conversation, and she had an answer for every one. The rippling laughter
he had heard on the deck of the _Hailoong_ now sounded over the murmur
of voices in the drawing-room.

"What a queenly stature and bearing!" Sinclair thought to himself.

It was true.  Miss MacAllister was taller than all but one of the little
circle of men gathered about her.  She held her small head, with its
wavy crown of rich brown hair, as if she were proud of her commanding
height.  Her eyes, so dark a blue that in the light of the candles they
seemed black, looked right over the heads of the men of average stature.

Yet, if her height was masculine, there was nothing masculine about her
figure.  Though well proportioned and vigorous, it gave the general
impression of slightness.  Neither was there a trace of masculinity
about the face.  It was thoroughly feminine, with its somewhat low
forehead, its small, straight nose, the rich, Highland colour in the
softly-rounded cheeks, the small chin, and the lips parted in merry
laughter—a thoroughly girlish face.

Keeping himself in the shadow, and looking at her in the bright light of
the drawing-room, Sinclair thought that rarely, if ever, had he seen a
more strikingly beautiful woman.  He wondered that he had not noticed it
before.  Then he laughed to himself as he remembered that, during their
short acquaintance, he had so often suffered from her raillery that he
had been in little humour for appreciation or admiration.

"A pretty picture, that!" said McLeod’s voice at his shoulder.  "I am
glad to see you enjoying it, doctor."

"Until I get better acquainted I prefer looking on to taking part in the
conversation.  It’s an interesting study."

"Isn’t she a beauty?  That evening rig sets her off to perfection."
McLeod generally used nautical terms to describe dress, on which he was
not an expert.

"I see that you are still on the same tack," replied Sinclair, with a
laugh.  "But really I agree with you that the ’rig’ does suit her, and
that she is a beauty. Who is that tall, dark fellow who is trying to
monopolize the conversation with her?"

"English remittance man.  A younger son, no better than he ought to be.
Sent out here to be rid of him.  In a moment of weakness the I.G.[#]
gave him a place on the customs....  But here comes Beauchamp."

[#] Sir Robert Hart, Inspector-General of Chinese customs, was
familiarly known as the I.G.

"Is this where you are, Sinclair?  I have been looking around for you.
Have you met every one yet?"

"I believe so, Mr. Beauchamp, except the tall gentleman talking to Miss
MacAllister."

"Come along then and I’ll introduce you before I have to receive
Gardenier....  Miss MacAllister, I am sure you will pardon me for
interrupting your conversation.  I should like to make these gentlemen
acquainted....  Dr. Sinclair, the Honourable Reginald Carteret of the
Imperial Maritime Customs staff....  Will you excuse me now?  I see
Commander Gardenier at the door."

Sinclair saluted Carteret with the frank, easy courtesy which suited so
well his big, powerful frame and pleasant countenance.  The
acknowledgment was a slight, stiff bow and a brief:

"Glad to make your acquaintance, I’m sure."

The tone and the words stung Sinclair.  His face lost something of its
good-humour.  His lips closed tightly.  A gleam of anger showed for an
instant in his blue eyes.  The signs of irritation passed quickly. But
it was in a colder and more formal tone that he uttered some
commonplaces, to which Carteret made a commonplace reply.

Slight as were the changes of tone and manner, they were not lost on
Miss MacAllister.  She had noted the unconscious ease with which
Sinclair had met Carteret, and had been surprised at the
superciliousness, almost insolence, of the latter’s response.  She had
caught that momentary flash of the eye, betraying the rising anger,
immediately brought under control.

Then as the two young men exchanged a sentence or two of polite
formalities, she mentally compared them.  Both were tall men—with the
possible exception of her father, much the tallest men in the company.
Neither was less than six feet in height.  The Englishman was the
slighter of the two, though fairly athletic in appearance.  He was
black-haired and dark-eyed.  A black moustache and well-trimmed pointed
beard gave him a foreign appearance and made him look older than his
five-and-twenty years.

The Canadian was equally tall, but broad-shouldered and deep-chested.
The massive head with its abundance of loosely-curled hair, so light in
colour as to be almost golden, the clear-cut features, fair complexion,
and singularly bright blue eyes reminded her of pictures of idealized
Vikings she had seen at home. Perhaps it was more than a fanciful
resemblance. Sinclair’s forefathers had come from Caithness to Canada,
and the blood of Norsemen probably flowed in his veins.  Though older by
a couple of years than the Englishman, Sinclair’s fair, clean-shaven
face looked years younger than Carteret’s.  In spite of the maturity of
the broad, white forehead, it was almost a boyish face, with its
cheerful, eager outlook on life.

"Allow me to apologize, Miss MacAllister, for having interrupted your
conversation with Mr. Carteret. The consul simply projected me into the
midst of it."

"A heavy projectile, Dr. Sinclair, for so light an explosive!  With the
thunder of the bombardment still in our ears, I suppose that we cannot
help talking in terms of cannonading.  But I assure you that no
apologies are necessary.  I am ever so glad to meet again a companion of
our eventful voyage."

She looked so charmingly sincere that Sinclair wondered to himself if
she really meant it.

"Attention!  The consul is marshalling the company for dining-room
parade," said Mr. Boville, the commissioner of customs.

"Exactly seven minutes and forty seconds late," said Carteret, looking
at his watch.  "Beauchamp will not recover from this for a year.  He’ll
have to report it to the Foreign Office and ask that his leave be
postponed six months as a punishment."

"Why?  Is Mr. Beauchamp so particular about being punctual?" asked Miss
MacAllister.

"Latest for an engagement he was ever known to be, three minutes and
fifteen seconds.  That was because of a typhoon."

"Pity that there were not more like him!" said the commissioner tartly.

"Commander Gardenier, you will conduct my wife to the dining-room.  Mr.
MacAllister, will you take in Mrs. Thomson?  And Mr. Boville, Miss
MacAllister. The less fortunate gentlemen will follow."

Offering his arm to Mrs. MacAllister, the consul led the way.

                                  *VI*

                           *ON THE DEFENSIVE*

The commissioner of customs had the honour of conducting Miss
MacAllister to the table, because his official position and his long
years of residence in the island gave him precedence over the newcomers,
or those who were engaged in mercantile pursuits.  In appearance he was
ill-suited to be the escort of such a young and queenly person.  He was
middle-aged, very bald, rotund in figure, and so short that his head was
hardly level with her shoulder.

When she took Boville’s proffered arm, she realized how absurd their
disproportionate statures must appear.  Involuntarily she glanced around
to find Sinclair.  He was just offering his arm to McLeod, for lack of a
lady companion.  A moment later she heard their voices at her back, and
knew that they had taken their places in the little procession
immediately behind her and the commissioner.  Then the voices ceased,
and instinctively she felt that they were laughing silently.  Her figure
stiffened, and she held her head a trifle higher than before.  Her
escort made the most of his five feet one or two, but do his best he
couldn’t get the shiny top of his head above her shoulder.

As they entered the dining-room she caught a glimpse of McLeod’s face.
He was laughing undisguisedly.  When she took her place at the table she
found herself facing Sinclair.  He was not looking at her.  He was
watching the last of the guests filing in, and was trying to look
unconcerned.  But there was a suspicious quivering of his mouth and a
sparkle in his eyes.  Her quick Celtic blood took fire at once.

"He’s laughing at me," she thought to herself. "How dare he?  There’s no
limit to the presumption of those Canadians.  But I’ll teach him."

Strange to say, she quite forgot how she had laughed at him on board the
_Hailoong_.  Stranger still, she seemed to take no offence at the
laughter of McLeod, who also was a Canadian.

As soon as they were seated, the natives out on the verandah began to
pull the cords; the punkah began to wave to and fro and creak.  It
wouldn’t have been a punkah if it hadn’t creaked.  The consul, who had
nerves, had striven to put an end to the creaking, but had failed.  The
creak was an essential part of the punkah.  But there was no creaking
about the movements of the waiters.  Noiseless as spectres, the "boys"
in their long blue gowns moved quickly in and out, back and forth, their
felt-soled shoes sliding silently over the smooth tiled floor.

"Commander Gardenier, we have all been models of patience.  No one has
asked you how the day went at Keelung.  But you cannot expect us to wait
much longer.  Such virtue would be superhuman.  Do tell the company what
all the noise was about to-day and who got the better of it."

A murmur of applause greeted the consul’s request, and all eyes turned
towards the bronzed sailor who sat beside Mrs. Beauchamp.  He seemed a
little uncomfortable under the expectant gaze of so many eyes and
answered modestly:

"I do not know that I can tell you much about it. The French had three
ships at it.  On their part the Chinese in the big new fort on the east
side of the harbour and in the old fortifications on the west side were
engaged.  Between them they put up a pretty scrap for a while."

"Really!  Did the Chinese actually pretend to offer any resistance to
the French?" inquired Carteret.

"There was no pretending.  They offered resistance, and a very effectual
one for a time," replied Gardenier.  "You know, Beauchamp, the lie of
the harbour?"

The consul nodded.

"The old corvette _Villars_ was anchored in the inner harbour, opposite
the south side of Palm Island.  She pelted away with her guns and
mitrailleuses at the new fort at a thousand-yard range.  The little
gunboat _Lutin_ lay close in shore on the west side and hammered the old
fortifications there.  Admiral Lespès, in _La Galissonnière_, lay in the
outer harbour and raked both sides with his long guns."

"I should think that he would be in little danger there," said one of
the merchants.  "The Chinese gunners couldn’t hit a range of mountains,
let alone a ship, at that range."

"That is just where you are mistaken.  They put three holes into _La
Galissonnière_ just above water-line, almost as soon as the game
commenced.  If they didn’t beat off the French to-day, it was not the
fault of their gunners.  It was because their works could not stand the
French fire.  The Chinese worked their guns till their forts were
knocked to pieces."

"Did the French land any men?" inquired Boville.

"Yes," replied Gardenier.  "When we left Keelung, a landing-party of
marines had just hoisted the French flag on the ruined Chinese fort."

"Then Keelung is in the hands of the French?"

"Yes.  That is if by Keelung you mean a strip of a few hundred feet wide
around the harbour.  But the hills all around that again are occupied by
the Chinese."

"Little difference that will make," said Carteret. "The Celestials have
had all they want.  At the first sign of a French advance they’ll run,
and never stop running till they reach Taipeh."

"I’m not so sure about that," replied Gardenier, a trifle coldly.  "In
the first place, the French have no land forces with which to make an
advance.  In the second place, the Chinese are better fighters than you
give them credit for, Mr. Carteret.  All they need is a good leader, and
I believe that they have such a man in Liu Ming-chuan."

"And in the third place," said Beauchamp, "the Keelung climate is enough
to defeat the French if there were no Chinese.  By the time their
transports arrive the northeast monsoon will be about due. Then the Lord
help them!  One of the wettest spots on earth.  Boville, what is the
annual rainfall over there?"

"One hundred and fifty-eight inches on the average. One year it lacked
only an inch and a half of the two hundred."

"One hundred and fifty-eight inches," repeated MacAllister.  "That does
not convey much meaning to my mind.  How does it compare with some
climates we do know?  That of London, for example?"

"Ashamed to say that I don’t know London’s rainfall," said the consul.
"All I remember is that it seemed to do little else but rain there when
I was a boy.  Boville? ... Carteret? ... You are Londoners....  What?
Do none of you know? ... Shocking ignorance!"

"I do not want to put forward my opinion on the climate of London in a
company of Englishmen," said Sinclair; "but I believe the rainfall there
is about twenty-five inches."

"Easy seeing that you have not lived in England," said Carteret, with
the same contemptuous tone he had already used when introduced to
Sinclair.  "A hundred inches would be more like it."

"Dr. Sinclair is right," said Commander Gardenier, who had been
consulting a tiny memorandum book. "No considerable part of the British
Isles exceeds eighty inches, and London has twenty-five."

Miss MacAllister flashed a quick glance at Sinclair.  There was
admiration in it; admiration that he should know this simple scientific
fact which those who had better opportunities did not know.  She had
noted this peculiarity in him before, his remarkable fund of accurate
information on all manner of subjects.

Then her mind took a curious twist.  What right had he to know the
rainfall of London?  What business had this colonial to know a fact
about London which a company of Londoners did not know?  It was another
proof of his presumption.  She’d take some of his self-confidence out of
him.  She’d teach him.

The conversation drifted on about the climate, the war, the probability
of a bombardment at Tamsui, the prospects of an easy victory which most
conceded to the French.

"I believe that you are rating the Chinese too low," said the consul, in
reply to a number of expressions of such views.  "From what I have seen
of the new Imperial Commissioner, Liu Ming-chuan, he will give the
French more than they bargained for.  As Commander Gardenier says,
leaders are what the Chinese need.  When they get a few more men trained
in Western ideas, they are going to surprise the world. What do you
think, Mr. De Vaux?  You have known them longer than any of us."

"’Pon my soul, Beauchamp, I believe you are right! ... The Chinese are a
smarter people than they get credit for....  ’Pon my honour, they are!
... And they’re honest, too....  The last time I was in America, a man I
had business with in New York said that he did not know how I could
stand living among those pig-tails, as he called them.... He wouldn’t
live among them for a hundred thousand a year....  It vexed me....  I
told him that I’d rather do business with a good Chinese firm any time
than with some Yankees....  ’Pon my soul, I would! ... Do you know, that
duffer cheated me the very next day!"

There was a burst of laughter at De Vaux’s injured tone.

"It’s a fact," he continued, his face and head growing redder and his
voice higher at every sentence. "And to think of that scoundrel casting
reflections on the Chinese! ... Bless my soul! ... It vexes me so! ...
By——! ... I mean it’s a thundering shame the way the Chinese have been
treated by some white people."

"What Mr. De Vaux says is true enough," said the consul.  "I am sorry
Dr. MacKay is not here. He could give us more information about the
preparations the Chinese have made than any one else.  But I understand
that he has gone over to the vicinity of Keelung to look after some of
his converts who are in the danger zone.  Is that not so, Dr. Sinclair?"

"Yes," replied Sinclair.  "He could hardly wait for tiffin yesterday, he
was in such a hurry to catch the first launch up river."

"I saw him landing from the launch at Twatutia," added one of the
merchants.  "He barely bade me the time of day, and set off on foot for
Keelung at such a rate that the Chinese with him had to run to keep up.
I never saw the like of him.  I wonder that the heat does not kill him."

"It is perfectly marvellous the amount of work he goes through, no
matter how exhausting the heat may be," said Mrs. Beauchamp.  "No person
need ever tell me again that missionaries take easy times."

"Dr. Sinclair, I’m so sorry!  I do believe that I have all the wines
here beside me, and your glasses are empty.  Will you not allow me to
pass some to you?  Which shall it be, claret or sherry or port?"

It was Miss MacAllister, speaking in so clear a voice that it caught
everybody’s ear and attracted the notice of all to the fact that, while
the wines had frequently circulated around the table, Sinclair’s glasses
had never been filled.  A slight flush, scarcely noticeable under the
tan, climbed into visibility above the line which separated the sunburn
from the white of the broad forehead.  The attention suddenly
concentrated on him was evidently unwelcome.  But it was with perfect
courtesy and good-humour that he replied:

"No apologies are necessary, Miss MacAllister.  To do without wine is no
privation to me.  My glasses are not empty because the wines have not
been offered to me."

"Oh!  Perhaps you are a teetotaller."

"If you wish to so describe me."

"Really!  How interesting!  I do not think that I ever met one before."

"Your own glasses have been filled, but, if I am not mistaken, they are
yet untasted, Miss MacAllister."

"Oh, yes!  That’s all very well for a woman.  But I mean a man.  I am
sure that I never before met a man who couldn’t enjoy a glass of wine,
except some ministers and very immature youths in Bands of Hope."

A laugh went round the table.  Sinclair joined in it.  But the flush
deepened on his forehead.

"My dear," interrupted Mr. MacAllister, "I am afraid that you are
forgetting your father.  I am practically a total abstainer."

"Oh, I know, father!  But then you are an elderly man, and something of
a preacher, too.  Such virtue is to be expected in you.  But Dr.
Sinclair is a young man and—a medical doctor.  To find such
extraordinary rectitude in him is, as the Scotch would say, ’no canny.’"

Again the laugh went round at the doctor’s expense.  The fair tyrant was
getting even with him. Mrs. Thomson, realizing the disadvantage he was
at in this verbal passage at arms with a woman, spoke up in her
fellow-countryman’s behalf:

"You must remember, Miss MacAllister, that different countries have
different customs.  In your home surroundings it may have been a manly
thing to use intoxicants.  Where Dr. Sinclair comes from one of the
highest standards of manliness is to be a total abstainer."

"And pray tell us where such lofty standards prevail?" asked Carteret.
"Where was Dr. Sinclair reared?"

"On a Canadian farm."  Sinclair’s voice had a defiant ring.

"I shouldn’t think that it would be the most up-to-date school of social
usages in the world."  Carteret’s tone was a trifle more insolent than
before.

"Perhaps not, Mr. Carteret.  But there was one thing we did learn there.
We learned——"  A biting retort was on his tongue.  His eyes met those of
the hostess.  He paused and softened it.  "We learned to give to others
the same liberty of opinion as we claimed for ourselves.  You claim the
liberty to use wine.  I do not interfere with your liberty.  I claim the
liberty to abstain.  I expect, Mr. Carteret, the same courtesy in
return."

Carteret’s face flushed a dark red.  He, the son of an English peer, to
be taught a lesson in courtesy by the son of a Canadian farmer.  Before
he had time to frame an answer Mrs. Beauchamp interposed:

"Dr. Sinclair is perfectly right to claim liberty on this question.  Our
social usages are apt to become tyrannical.  I like, every once in a
while, to see some one independent enough to revolt against them."

"I am glad to hear you say so, Mrs. Beauchamp," said Commander
Gardenier.  "I was just beginning to wonder where I came in.  I am an
abstainer.  It is not because I was trained to it from a boy, for I
wasn’t.  Nor is it because of any pledge.  It is because of my
experience in the navy.  I have seen so many of the most promising
careers in the service come to nothing, and so many of my seniors go
down and out through drink, that I felt it my duty to give it up.  At
our mess those who wish to drink even the Queen’s health in water are
free to do so."

"This discussion must stop right now," broke in the consul, "or, by
Jove! every man at the table will be confessing himself a teetotaller,
except De Vaux and myself.  We shall not forsake the good old ways,
shall we, De Vaux?"

"Bless my soul, no, Beauchamp!  A little wine for thy stomach’s sake,"
replied De Vaux amidst a burst of laughter, for this was one of the most
evident weaknesses of this scion of a noble house.  Already his
high-pitched voice was noticeably thick.

Then the ladies retired to the drawing-room, leaving the men to their
cigars, wine, and black coffee. Miss MacAllister knew that she had made
Sinclair uncomfortable for a time.  But she had also the consciousness
that her little coup had not been so successful as she had intended.
Sinclair had come out of the predicament she had contrived for him with
rather the better of her.  And, curious as it may seem, her feelings
were a bit injured.

                                 *VII*

                        *SPARRING FOR ADVANTAGE*

"I think we ought to have some music," said Mrs. Beauchamp, as the men
rejoined the ladies in the drawing-room.  "There is nothing which takes
me back home like the old home songs.  I believe that there is
considerable talent in our company this evening.  May we not have some
songs?"

"Nothing in the world I like better!  ’Pon my soul, there isn’t,"
exclaimed De Vaux, who was talking very freely and was disposed to be
gallant towards the ladies.  He raised his voice, trembling perhaps with
emotion, to a high pitch, and said: "Ladies and gentlemen, permit me to
have the honour on your behalf of requesting our hostess to favour us
with a song.  Bless my soul!  I’d rather hear her sing to the
accompaniment of her guitar than Patti or Albani, or any other of their
prima donnas.  ’Pon my honour, I would! ... Mrs. Beauchamp, will you not
accede to our united request and give us the happiness of hearing you?"

He finished with a bow intended to be as profound as those of his Lord
Chesterfield days.  He seemed unconscious of the limitations imposed on
him by the aldermanic proportions which had come to him since his slim
and graceful youth.

Mrs. Beauchamp rose with a smile which had more of sadness than of
mirth, glanced at her husband, and permitted De Vaux to conduct her to a
seat near the piano and to bring her guitar.  The consul sat down at the
piano, ran his fingers over the keys, touching soft chords, to which the
guitar was brought into tune.  Then to the accompaniment of the two
instruments Mrs. Beauchamp sang in a voice, not strong, but sweet and
sympathetic, a tender old English love song.

"By——! ... Bless my soul, I mean, it makes me homesick to hear those old
songs!" exclaimed De Vaux, amidst the applause.  His voice was high and
trembling.  There was a suspicious redness and moisture in his eyes.
"I’ve been more than twenty years in this forgotten island.  But when I
hear Mrs. Beauchamp sing such a song as that I protest I want to take
the first boat home.  ’Pon my honour, I do!"

"Oh, no!  You’ll not go back to England just yet, De Vaux," said the
consul.  "We shouldn’t know Formosa without you.  But I’ll tell you what
you will do.  You’ll sing something for us yourself, will you not?"

"Yes, yes, De Vaux!" exclaimed several voices. "Do sing something.  Sing
’Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep.’"

"That’s De Vaux’s Royal George," whispered McLeod to Sinclair.  "He
always sings that.  But he won’t sing it yet a while.  He’ll need a few
more drinks first."

"’Pon my soul, it’s awfully good of you to ask me!  I do not profess to
be a singer.  Really! I do not....  But, since you have been so good as
to ask me, I shall do my best, on one condition, that Mrs. Beauchamp
will honour me by playing my accompaniment....  Mrs. Beauchamp, will you
be so kind?"  Another bow meant to be profound.

"Certainly, Mr. De Vaux, with pleasure."

In a voice which had once been a sweet tenor, but was now fat and
breathless, he sang, "Silver Threads Among the Gold."  He had to take a
breath in the middle of every long note.  As for the high ones, he just
touched them.  Then his breath failed him, leaving the audience to
imagine the rest.  But when he was rewarded with a round of applause he
responded with an encore, "In the Gloaming."  His head was becoming
crimson with the effort.  Perspiration streamed down his face and neck,
in spite of the constant use of his handkerchief.  His collar had melted
and fallen limply against his coat.  The starch of his shirt front had
disappeared, leaving it but a crumpled rag.

Some of the guests were insisting on a third number, when the consul
came to the rescue:

"This sort of thing mustn’t go any further.  If my wife and De Vaux
continue singing such sentimental songs, they’ll have us all homesick.
We cannot afford to ship all the English residents of North Formosa by
the _Hailoong_ to-morrow.  Just to change the current of your thoughts,
I’ll make a break and give you something different."

He took his place at the piano, and to his own accompaniment sang with
great spirit, in a strong baritone voice, the old English song, "A
Hunting We Will Go."

The applause was as enthusiastic as the spirit in which he had sung, and
he was pressed for an encore. The consul replied with mock stage bows,
but refused to sing again.  He had done his part in chasing away the
blue devils of homesickness.  Now it was some other body’s turn to
perform.  He knew Miss MacAllister could sing.  Would she not continue
the good work and give them something rousing?

Miss MacAllister did not wait to be urged, but responded at once.  Her
voice was a rich, strong soprano.  With a verve and fire worthy of her
choice, she sang Lady Nairn’s stirring war-song, "The Hundred Pipers."
To the insistent demand for another song she replied with "The March of
the Cameron Men."  With her stately figure at its full height, head
thrown back, and eyes which seemed to look away beyond her tropic
surroundings to the hills of old Scotland, she sang as if possessed by
the spirit of generations of Highland ancestors.

Sinclair, from his place over by the mantel-piece, was looking at her
with undisguised admiration.

"Isn’t she magnificent?  Yon’s a prize for some man! ... Sinclair, man,
why don’t you go in and win?  If you don’t try, I’ll be ashamed of you,
whatever."

It was McLeod.  He was speaking in a low tone, only for his friend’s
ear.  But he who had been the personification of coolness during the
typhoon was now fairly quivering with excitement.  The songs of his
people had fired his blood.

"You needn’t be ashamed of me, Mac.  I’m going to try."

"Good for you!  I’ll back you to win."

"Don’t stake too much on me, Mac.  I’m new to this game.  You might lose
heavily.  Carteret is ahead of me."

"That dirty snob!" exclaimed McLeod in a tone of disgust.  "He wants her
in just the same way as he wants every pretty woman he sees.  And then
her money would help to repair the Carteret fortunes. It’s an insult to
a good woman to mention him in relation to her."

"All the same she and her family are not supposed to know the things
that you know against him, whatever they may be.  He belongs to a titled
family.  That counts for a lot with most people who have risen from the
ranks.  Her mother is greatly taken with him."

"Yes, but the daughter is not."

"I’m not so sure about that."

"I’d stake my life on it.  But look, Carteret is going to sing."

It was evident that Carteret had expected to sing, for he had just
returned from the cloak-room with a roll of music in his hand.  He
placed it on the piano, and then turning to Miss MacAllister he
conducted her to the instrument with almost an excess of courtesy.  Yet
his manners were easy and graceful. If at times he seemed to exceed the
requirements of etiquette, his ultra politeness accorded well with his
Gallic cast of countenance and the cut of beard which he affected.

His voice was a tenor, not very strong, but pure in tone and evidently
well-trained.  The first selection was "Drink to Me Only with Thine
Eyes."  It was sung with feeling.  The strength of his voice accorded
well with the size of the drawing-room, and passion was thrown into the
tender lines.  As an encore he sang another love song, still more
amorous in sentiment and manner.

"His musical talent is Carteret’s hope of promotion if he remains in the
customs," said Boville, who was one of a little group of guests near to
where Sinclair stood.  "He thinks that, if he could get the opportunity
to sing before the I.G., he would be promoted to Pekin at once."

"Or better still, if he should succeed in marrying a handsome wife who
is musical," said a merchant. "I am told that the I.G. is even more
considerate of a subordinate with an accomplished wife than one who
possesses the accomplishments himself."

"He has the voice already, and now he seems to be making a bold stroke
for the gifted wife," interjected another.

"I shouldn’t wish Miss MacAllister any ill," replied Boville.  "But I do
hope something will happen to take him off my hands.  If the I.G. wants
him, he will be most welcome to the fellow, so long as I am well quit of
him."

Sinclair took no part in the conversation.  But he heard every word.
The careless references to Miss MacAllister hurt him in a way which
surprised himself.  The callousness of the suggestion that Carteret
should get promotion by marrying her cut him to the quick.  How could
any one entertain such an idea?

Then he wondered at himself.  What was Miss MacAllister to him?  A
passing stranger, who had taken it into her whimsical head to amuse
herself at his expense.  Already she had succeeded in making him feel
most uncomfortable; indeed, for a time something of a laughing-stock.
What need he care? She was nothing to him, and he was nothing to her but
the subject of an evening’s laughter.  What a fool he had been to accept
McLeod’s challenge!  He would have to straighten that out in the
morning. Then they both would have shaken off the glamour of that face
and figure, and those martial Highland songs which had so stirred their
blood.  They would be in their cool senses then.  They had not been when
the one had made and the other had accepted the challenge.

Meanwhile Miss MacAllister and Carteret were still at the piano.  She
was slowly turning over some music.  He was bending low as if to see it,
and perhaps to choose another song.  All the while he was speaking to
her in a soft voice, and she was making monosyllabic replies.  She
realized that his head was sinking lower and his face closer to hers.
She felt his hot breath on her face and neck and shoulder. It was hot
and heavy with wine.

She turned her head slightly but quickly towards him.  She saw his eyes
fixed greedily on the rich beauties of form only half concealed by her
low evening dress.  Her face flamed crimson, and she rose hastily from
the piano, disregarding his appeal that she should play just one more
selection.

As she passed from the instrument to a chair she heard the consul say:

"Sinclair, you’re the most confoundedly comfortable-looking duffer I
ever saw in a dress suit."

"That’s because the tailor who made my suit put side pockets in the
trousers," was the reply.  "You would be just as comfortable if you had
pockets to put your hands in.  I have noticed you trying to get them
into the seams half a dozen times this evening."

"You’re right there.  But it’s not my fault.  I laid it on that tailor
in Hong-Kong as a parting injunction to put pockets in my trousers.  And
he promised.  When the suit arrived they had none, and I was five
hundred miles too far away to get my hands on him and wring the beast’s
neck."

"Fortunate for the beast!"

"Yes.  But he’ll get his punishment yet, that tailor will.  He has a lot
to answer for.  I have sworn outwardly often, and inwardly more times
than could be numbered, whenever I have had these clothes on. I envy
you.  You do look comfortable in that suit. It fits you as if you had
been born in it, and with your hands in the trousers’ pockets."

Miss MacAllister, looking at Sinclair from the seat she had taken near
the French window, agreed with the consul’s judgment.  The big Canadian
was in conventional evening dress, except for one slight concession made
to the heat of the climate.  Instead of the low-cut vest he wore a broad
kamarband of black silk about his waist.  The only trace of jewellery
was the gold locket on the end of a black leather watch guard, which
hung over the kamarband.  There was a total absence of dressiness.  But
as the girl who had been for years familiar with London drawing-rooms
looked at the strong, clean-cut features, the massive head with its fair
hair contrasting with the black clothing, the lazy grace of the powerful
frame leaning against the mantel-piece, she thought to herself that she
had never seen a man who had on him more of the marks of being to the
manner born.  Yet he was the self-confessed son of a Canadian farmer,
and reared on a Canadian farm.  She found it hard to remain offended
with this big, good-looking, good-tempered man.

Involuntarily she compared him again with Carteret, the son of a noble
English family.  The latter was now talking to Mrs. Beauchamp.  She
could see that his ordinarily somewhat pallid face was flushed and there
was an expression in his eyes which was not pleasant to see.  She
thought again of that greedy look and of the hot breath, heavy with
wine.  She turned her eyes once more towards Sinclair.  He was talking
to the consul and smiling.  The distinction between the two young men
took shape in her mind. Sinclair was clean and his smile was frank and
pure as that of a child.

She heard the consul saying to him:

"McLeod tells me that you sing."

"McLeod tells a lot of things he knows very little about.  I shall have
to lay an injunction upon him to hold his peace."

"That’s all right for some other time.  But for the present you do not
deny the charge that you do sing."

"I’ll plead guilty to disturbing my neighbours sometimes by singing
college songs and such things. But I have none of them here and no music
for the accompanist."

"Just what we want; something lively.  If there’s a chorus, we’ll all
join in.  Give me an idea how it goes and I can chord for you."

Beauchamp ran his fingers over the keys while Sinclair hummed or lilted
the tune.  Soon the proper chord was struck.  Sinclair repeated the
words of the chorus till all got them.  Then he sang a rollicking
college song.  When he reached the chorus all joined in, and for the
first time the walls of the old Dutch fort and the listening palms and
oleanders and magnolias heard the jolly abandon of "The Old Ontario
Strand."

When the chorus was reached the second time, Sinclair relinquished the
leadership of the air to Miss MacAllister.  She took it as if by
prearrangement, while he dropped into his rightful place and supplied
the undertone of a bass powerful enough to balance the voices of all the
rest of the company.

When it was finished there was an outbreak of applause and even cheers,
which showed that all reserve had disappeared and the company were
prepared to give themselves up with childish delight to singing.
Another college song was sung with the same spirit as the first, and
Sinclair was pressed to lead still another.

"I will," he said at last, "if you will allow me to choose one as
characteristic of our French Canadian people as those we were favoured
with by Miss MacAllister are of the Highland Scotch."

In response to the general consent he sang some verses of—

    "En roulant ma boule roulant,
      En roulant ma boule,"

and a number of the company joined in the simple refrain.  The song
which had so often echoed on lake and stream, by the evening campfire,
where the paddle dipped, or in the frosty stillness of the snow-laden
forests of the north rang out through the scented darkness of the warm
tropic night.

A number of other songs were rendered by different members of the party.
Then Sinclair was called for again.

"I am afraid that my repertoire has come very near the point of being
exhausted," he said.  "I have only those songs the words of which I can
remember, and the selection is not very choice."

This time it was a plaintive negro melody of the Sunny South.  Again
Miss MacAllister found herself singing heartily with the rest in the
refrain, and after the first verse leading the chorus while Sinclair
sang bass.  When the song was done she suddenly said to herself:

"What a silly I am making of myself!  I came in here determined to get
even with that doctor.  And here I am singing with him and for him like
a sissy in a Sunday-school concert.  He can do his own singing from now
on.  I’ll pay him back yet."

The rest were urging Sinclair to sing again, when Miss MacAllister said:

"Dr. Sinclair has shown wonderful versatility in his choice of songs
this evening.  English, French, negro, he sings them all with equal
facility.  I wonder if he would not favour us with a Canadian Indian
song.  I have never heard any of their music.  I should so love to have
the opportunity.  Will you not sing us one, Dr. Sinclair?"

Her face wore an expression of childlike innocence and interest.  But
McLeod thought he saw a mischievous gleam in her eyes.  Mr. MacAllister
looked at his daughter with a puzzled face and shook his head a little.
The consul eyed her doubtfully, as though trying to fathom the purpose
behind this request.  He saw nothing but the appearance of almost
infantile guilelessness.  Then he heard Sinclair saying:

"Certainly, Miss MacAllister.  I am happy to do anything in my power to
serve you.  Only it is a little hard on Mr. Beauchamp to ask him even to
chord to a type of music he may never have heard before."

"Thank you so much, Dr. Sinclair.  I am all anxiety to hear you."

Then she added:

"I am sure Mr. Beauchamp will be able to accompany you.  He is a man of
infinite resource in music."  For she was afraid that Sinclair’s concern
about placing the consul in a difficult position was only an attempt to
provide a loop-hole for his own escape.

A buzz of conversation broke out in the room while Sinclair bent over
the instrument, softly humming a slow, stately measure, and the consul’s
fingers felt for the harmonious chords.  Soon the voice and the chords
were moving together in harmony.

"That may be an Indian tune," said Beauchamp, "but it sounds remarkably
like certain bars from an old sixteenth-century mass I had to practise
when a boy until my fingers were nearly worn out."

"Perhaps the Indians learned it from the early Roman Catholic
missionaries," was the quick reply. "In any case, I fancy it is the
sound of the language Miss MacAllister wishes to hear rather than the
music."

"If you like, I shall play the tune for you.  I remember it perfectly."

"Thank you, I prefer the chords."

Sinclair straightened himself, and the buzz of conversation instantly
ceased.  Then his voice rolled forth to the slow, solemn air, words as
melodious as the notes of the music.  At their first sound the consul’s
head ducked below the level of the piano, which hid him from most in the
room.  Sinclair gave him a vicious dig in the ribs, but sang on without
the quiver of an eyelid.  The full vowel sounds of the unknown language
brought out to perfection the tones of his rich bass voice.

His eyes glanced around the room.  All were listening intently, and all,
save Commander Gardenier, had their eyes on him.  He thought that he
could detect a grim smile on the naval officer’s averted face. Miss
MacAllister had a keen look—was it a suspicious look?—in her eyes.

Under cover of the applause which followed the consul turned on him:

"You have the nerve to pass a chorus from a Greek tragedy on a company
like this for a Red Indian war-song."

"I plead guilty," replied Sinclair.  "But I had to do something or be
again held up to ridicule as I was at dinner.  I thought that you were
the only one likely to recognize it and I knew that you would not betray
me."

"I acknowledge that you had to do something.  For some reason Miss
MacAllister seems bound to make game of you.  She deserves what you have
given her, and I’ll not give you away.  But it was nervy just the same."
And the consul laughed indulgently as he turned away.

Miss MacAllister did not join in the general applause.  But when it was
done she said gravely:

"Thank you, Dr. Sinclair, for gratifying my whim to hear a song in the
Indian language.  I had no idea that it would be so beautiful.  Thank
you very much."

Sinclair’s face flushed as he replied:

"I am only too glad to have been able to do anything which has pleased
you."  At the same moment he felt a pang of remorse for the deception.

He had not long to think of it when he heard Mrs. MacAllister saying to
Commander Gardenier:

"What a barbarous jargon to be called a language!"

"Yes," replied the officer drily, "but I have heard a good many others
more barbarous."

Then Thomson, the missionary, remarked in his slow way:

"It—some—way—seems—to—me—that—I—have
—heard—some—thing—like—that—before."

Sinclair had to act quickly:

"You were a missionary once among the Indians of Bruce Peninsula, were
you not?"

"Yes—I—was."

"You probably heard it there."

"Well—perhaps—I—did."

Some of the guests rose to depart, and their hostess rose with them.
Before they had time to begin to say farewell, Carteret said loudly
enough to be heard by all in the room:

"Mrs. Beauchamp, before we go, may we not hear Mr. De Vaux sing again?
I know that we should all be delighted to hear him."

"I am afraid that we are imposing on Mr. De Vaux," replied the hostess,
who realized the condition De Vaux ordinarily reached by that hour after
a dinner.  "I think that he is tired.  He has done his part so well this
evening that it seems unfair to ask him for any more."

"I am sure, Mrs. Beauchamp, that Mr. De Vaux will not feel it a hardship
to sing again.  He is our foremost vocalist in Formosa.  We want him to
uphold the honour of the local talent.  Mr. De Vaux, will you not sing
for us ’Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep’?"

"Lord! ... Mr. Carteret—ladies and gentlemen—how good of you to ask me!
... By——! ... Bless my soul, I mean! ... It is good of you.... I’m
afraid....  I’m not in very good voice.  But since you insist—I’ll
try....  By——! ... I mean ’pon my honour, I shall!"

"Shall I play your accompaniment, De Vaux?" said the consul, in response
to an appealing look from his wife.

"How good of you, Beauchamp! ... By——! ... ’Pon my soul, I mean—it is!"

Purple-faced, perspiring, steadying himself by the piano, The Honourable
Lionel Percival Dudley De Vaux sang, in a series of high-toned asthmatic
gasps, "Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep."

Then the guests said their farewells and, preceded by natives carrying
lanterns, they began to move off into the warm aromatic darkness of the
southern night.

                                 *VIII*

                        *SINCLAIR’S OPPORTUNITY*

Sinclair and McLeod were awaiting their opportunity to say good-night
when one of the consul’s Chinese servants hastily entered and handed his
master a letter:

"One boy b’long Kai Bok-su come Keelung side, one piecee chit new
sick-boy-man can catchee."

"All right, boy," replied the consul.  "Dr. Sinclair, here’s a letter
for you from Dr. MacKay."

The doctor cut the letter open and read:

"CHINESE CAMP, LOAN-LOAN, NEAR KEELUNG,
       "Aug. 5th, 1884.

"DEAR DR. SINCLAIR:

"As you are aware, a battle is raging.  A number of the Chinese have
been killed.  Many more are wounded.  The end is not yet.  They have no
doctors but native fakirs.  They have no medicines, no instruments, no
knowledge of surgery.  There is dreadful suffering.  Will you help?
Never a better opportunity to serve humanity and win the Chinese.

"The consul will give you passports.  The bearer of this will guide you.
A Hoa will come with you as far as Taipeh and secure a permit from the
governor.  Mrs. MacKay and Dr. Bergmann will give you a free hand with
the Mission’s stock of medicines, and will help you to pack them.  Will
you come?

"Yours,
       "G. L. MACKAY."

Without a word Sinclair handed the open letter to the consul, who had
now bidden farewell to the rest of the guests.  He read it quickly and
looked up:

"You are going?"

"Yes."

"When?"

"First launch in the morning."

"Good!  I’ll have your papers ready."

"Thank you, Mr. Beauchamp.  Good-night."

"I’ll send the constable over to MacKay’s with the papers.  Take care of
yourself.  Good-night, doctor. Good-night, McLeod."

The first faint rose of dawn was showing in the sky behind the great
bulk of the Taitoon Mountains when Sinclair stepped out on the broad
verandah of the missionary’s bungalow, ready for his journey. The
Chinese student who was to guide him was already there.  A coolie
bearing two round baskets containing the medicines, instruments, and
other necessaries, balanced on the end of his long bamboo carrying pole,
came round the corner of the house.

The iron gate at the foot of the garden clicked sharply.  A vigorous
step sounded on the gravelled walk.  An erect, soldierly figure stepped
out of the darkness into the light streaming from the doorway, rapped
his heels together, saluted, and handed Dr. Sinclair a packet of
letters.

"Good-morning, Sergeant Gorman.  You’re sharp on time."

"No credit to me, sir!  It’s the consul, sir!  The divil himself wud
have to get up in the morning before he went to bed at night to catch
the consul late."

There was no mistaking Sergeant Gorman’s native land.  Sinclair laughed
as he said:

"I suppose these are my passports."

"Right you are, sir!  But wud you moind lookin’ at the last one furst,
for, widout army conceit in meself, it’s the most important of thim
all."

Sinclair opened it and read:

"H. B. M. CONSULATE, TAMSUI, Aug. 6th, 1884.

"DEAR DR. SINCLAIR:

"I am presuming on your good nature to make a request of you.  Will you
accept of Sergeant Gorman’s assistance in your volunteer Red Cross
Service?  Ever since the cannon fire began yesterday morning, he has
been aching to get into the field of action.  Your going is an
opportunity.  He will not be an encumbrance.  He has been at various
times surgeon’s assistant and hospital sergeant.  He speaks pidgin, and
knows quite a bit of vernacular.  Commander Gardenier will spare me a
man to take his place.  Feeling sure that you will grant my request as
soon as you read it, I have enclosed his passports with yours.

"Wishing you a safe and speedy return, I am,
       "Your obedient servant,
              "H. R. L. BEAUCHAMP."

Sinclair read between the lines.  It was not merely the desire to
gratify Sergeant Gorman’s passion to be in any fighting which might be
handy which had actuated the consul.  It was solicitude for himself. He
was a stranger in the island.  He did not know the language.  He had
never been nearer war than the annual camp of a brigade of Canadian
militia. This resourceful Irishman, with more than twenty years of
varied service, mostly in the Orient and among Oriental peoples, would
simply be invaluable to him.  The consul had been up all night arranging
for his convenience and safety.  More to himself than to any one else he
exclaimed:

"Beauchamp’s a trump!"

"An’ the right bower at that!" interjected Gorman.

Sinclair dashed into MacKay’s study, scribbled off a hasty note of
thanks, and was out again before the sergeant had finished
congratulating himself on his good fortune.

"We must be off.  There goes the launch’s whistle," said Sinclair, as he
swung off with his long, powerful strides, which put Gorman to his best
gait and made the natives drop into their peculiar little jogging trot.

Although the day had scarcely broken when they left the house, and it
was but a few hundred yards down the steep hill to the beach, the
impatient sun of the South had already sprung into the heavens when they
reached the little jetty at which the launch lay.  A Hoa, the chief
Chinese assistant of Dr. MacKay, and McLeod were already there.

"Hallo, Mac!" exclaimed the doctor.  "I thought you would be sleeping
yet.  It’s more than decent of you to turn out so early to see me off."

"I am going with you as far as Twatutia," replied McLeod.  "The Chinese
are so excited over this war that they have not forwarded part of our
cargo.  I am going up to see what persuasives I can apply to the
compradore.  We have to sail by this afternoon’s tide and want to take a
full cargo.  We may not get another chance for a while."

"I certainly am in luck this morning," said Sinclair.  "You to keep me
company as far as Twatutia; A Hoa to get my passports viséd, and
Sergeant Gorman to act as my bodyguard and be generally responsible for
my safety and good conduct."

By this time the two friends and the Chinese preacher had found for
themselves as comfortable positions as possible under the awning which
covered the decks of the little launch and sheltered them from the rays
of the sun.

The launch was threading its way through a fleet of junks which were
hasting to get out to sea with the ebbing tide.  Some had already
hoisted their huge, brown, bat-wing sails and turned their watchful eyes
towards the open sea.  Some were just lifting their anchors, while
priests from the neighbouring temple rowed around them in boats with
beating drums and droning pipes, to frighten away the demons, propitiate
the goddess of the sea, secure for the sailors a prosperous voyage,
undisturbed by the French, and incidentally to get for themselves and
their temple a substantial contribution.  Some had not yet finished
taking cargo, and their crews were working with feverish haste to get
loaded in time not to miss the last of the ebb.  From them all came the
ceaseless shrill, nasal shouting of the Chinese seamen as they pulled at
the ropes, or heaved up the anchor or hauled away at the tackle hoisting
their cargo on board.

It was all intensely interesting to Sinclair, who never wearied of
studying human life, especially when it presented types and phases which
were new and strange to him.  But he was not so much interested in the
Chinese as to fail to notice the large house, with its cool-looking
upper and lower verandahs, looking out on the river, in which the
MacAllisters were quartered.  He wondered if the maiden who had teased
him so were awake and plotting some new mischief to make him or some one
else uncomfortable. Or was she sleeping as peacefully as if she had
never done a naughty deed in all her bright young life?  It was with a
start, as if a guilty secret had been discovered, that he heard McLeod’s
voice saying:

"I suppose your Highland girl is having her beauty sleep.  I never saw
any one who to my mind needed it less."

Sinclair was annoyed that McLeod so often seemed to read his thoughts.
It was a little tartly that he replied:

"Are you still harping at that?  If I were a suitor for that young
lady’s hand, I should have to look upon you as a rival, you seem so
smitten with her."

"Not the slightest danger, Doc.  The fact that a fellow admires a girl’s
looks or style doesn’t necessarily mean that he has fallen in love with
her.  Oh, no!  I have my own dreams of a trip I hope to make next year
to Prince Edward Island, and if I come back to the China Coast I’ll not
come back alone. That’s good enough for me.  I admire Miss MacAllister.
I think she’s splendid.  But falling in love with her!  Not the
slightest notion!  Any interest I have in her is on your account."

"I’m sorry, Mac.  I shouldn’t have said what I did.  I knew that you
were as true as steel."

"It’s all right, doctor.  I’ve been jollying you too much.  And the way
she acts sometimes makes it a little hard to bear.  But you’ll win out
in the end."

"I do not know about that," said Sinclair, somewhat gloomily.  "The way
she treated me last night did not look much like it."

"Never mind that.  She would not treat you like that if she were not
taking more interest in you than in any one else at present.  She
doesn’t know just what is the matter with herself.  That is the way she
is taking to work it off.  She’ll change after a bit."

"I’ll yield to your superior knowledge of the ways of women," said the
doctor, with a laugh which had but little mirth in it.  "It may be all
right.  Just the same, it doesn’t look good to me....  Here comes
Sergeant Gorman.  I had better see my passports, and get him to instruct
A Hoa what is to be done when we get to Taipeh."

Opening the packet, he found copies of passports in English, French, and
Chinese.  One addressed to the French Commander read:

"HER BRITANNIC MAJESTY’S CONSULATE,
       "TAMSUI, August 6th, 1884.

"_To the Officer in Chief Command of the French Forces at Keelung_:

"The bearer of this paper, Doctor Donald Sinclair, a British subject,
has volunteered his services as a medical doctor to the sick and wounded
of the Chinese army, at present engaged before Keelung.  He will observe
strict neutrality, and will be equally ready to perform humane offices
and render skilled medical and surgical assistance to any of the French
troops, should circumstances bring that within his power.  Wherefore I,
the undersigned consul for Great Britain at Tamsui, do beg the Officer
in Command of the French Forces at Keelung, to accord to the said Doctor
Donald Sinclair protection and liberty to perform his offices of mercy,
in accordance with the terms of the Geneva Convention.  He will be
accompanied by one European assistant, likewise a British subject,
Sergeant John Gorman, and by one or more Chinese assistants, all wearing
the badge of the Red Cross.

   "H. R. L. BEAUCHAMP,
"Her Britannic Majesty’s Consul."

Passports of a similar tenor were addressed to the Chinese authorities.

"Sergeant Gorman, you know Chinese.  Tell A Hoa what we want him to do
when we get to Taipeh. He is to get these viséd and, if possible, to get
a special permit from the governor.  It will carry more weight than the
passports."

"Very good, sir!  I’ll make him understand."

Sergeant Gorman’s mastery of the language was not perfect.  But the
Chinese preacher required little instruction.  He knew better than
either Sinclair or the sergeant what should be done.  Before becoming a
Christian he had been private secretary to a mandarin in an official
position at Pekin.  He had travelled much on the mainland as well as in
Formosa, and was well acquainted with official procedure both in peace
and in war.  Scarcely had Sergeant Gorman begun his explanations when
his "Ho! ... Ho! ... An-ni ho! ... Put-tsi ho!" (Good! good! That’s
good!  Very good!) showed that he fully understood what was expected of
him.

                                  *IX*

                             *A QUIET LIFE*

Meanwhile McLeod and Sinclair were studying the sergeant.  He was a man
of perhaps forty-five years, but could pass for much younger.  Five feet
eight or nine inches in height, he was broad-shouldered and sturdily
built. No matter where he might be or how dressed, there could be no
mistaking that he had been a soldier. Long military training spoke in
every movement. His thick hair was a red-brown, with the emphasis on the
red.  So was his heavy, fierce-looking moustache.  So were his bristling
eyebrows.  So were his eyes.  His face, save where it was ordinarily
covered by the band of his sun-helmet, was pretty nearly the same shade.

He talked rapidly; very rapidly; so rapidly that his words often
stumbled over one another in their eagerness to get out, until he
actually stuttered.  When he tried, he spoke English with just enough
Irish accent to make it sweet on his tongue.  But when he didn’t try,
and that was most of the time, the brogue was rich and thick.  Nearly
always he had the peculiarly Irish trick of repeating the last words of
a closing sentence.

"How long has Gorman been here?" asked Sinclair in a low tone.

"Only a couple of months," replied McLeod. "Came over with us from
Amoy."

"How does it come that a sergeant with his record of service should end
up by being consulate constable in an out-of-the-way corner like
Tamsui?"

"Search me!  I can’t tell you."

"Probably the old story of a man who has served his Queen and country
well and then been dropped, to live or die wherever he may chance to
fall."

"Yes, and none of the blockheads who have commanded him have sense
enough to know how much good service they could get out of a man like
that, if they would only give him a chance to rise. Instead they turn
him adrift like a worn-out horse."

"Perhaps he has a history behind him.  It seems to me that most men out
here, except you and I, Mac, have histories.  Here he comes.  Perhaps he
will talk."

The sergeant crossed the little deck, stood at attention, and saluted:

"I have the honour to report, sir, that I have given the Chinese, A Hoa,
the instructions you commanded and that he seems to understand them very
well, sir."

"Very good, sergeant.  There is nothing further to be done until we
reach Twatutia.  Be seated."

"Thank you, sir."

"By the way, sergeant, I notice by the passport that your name is John
Gorman."

"It is, sir."

"I used to know a Sergeant John Gorman on the police force in Kingston,
Canada.  They say that, when the college boys were out on a frolic and
raising cain, he could do more to keep them within bounds with a smile
and a bit of blarney than all the rest of the force could do with their
batons."

"Och, but he’ll be from Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky, in County Cork.
All the people there are Gormans, an’ most of thim are John Gormans. An’
as for the shmile, all the Gormans have it.  They get it whin they’re
childer, sayin’ the name of their native place.  An’ whin they grow up,
no matther where they go, the shmile wan’t come off—the divil a bit will
it come off."

"You’re right there, sergeant," said McLeod. "You have the smile, sure
enough.  But it never shows to best advantage until you say the name of
the place where you were born.  What’s this it is, again?"

"Sleeahtballymackcurraghalicky."

"Exactly!  That’s a name to make any one smile."

"Och, Misther McLeod, but you shud have seen it on me whin I furst left
the ould place.  Me face was all shmile.  But on the Afghan border wan
day, an ould black-face of a Pathan—may the divil fly away wid him!—tuk
a pot shot at me from betune two rocks.  He got me through the two
cheeks of me, an’ siv’ral of me teeth.  After the wounds healed up I
never had me natural shmile ag’in,—wud you bel’ave me I niver was able
to shmile natural ag’in."

"Did you get back at him at all?" inquired McLeod.

"That’s jist what was hurtin’ me.  For while I was spittin’ out me
teeth, an’ in no condishun to take aim, the onderhanded, tricherous
Afghan was dodgin’ away through the rocks.  But me next in file in the
Munsters, he was a Scotchman from Aberdeen got a squint of him as he
bint double, goin’ round the corner of a pricipice, an’ be the blissin’
of Hiven, took a chip off the stern works of him—a mortial good shot,
for the target he hit was the only part in sight."

"But how did you know that he was hit?" asked McLeod.  "Did you take him
prisoner?"

"Divil a bit!  A wounded Pathan can crawl loike a wounded snake.  But
eighteen months afterwards I was up in the hills, wan of an escort of
the p’ace envoys.  The very first day wan of the native policemen
pointed out an ould black-face among the chiefs an’ tould me that was
the man that put the bullet through me two cheeks.  An’ be the powers,
that ould haythen cud no more sit down than I cud shmile.  The shot of