“I came back,” said Harder.

  Mow Jie’s voice was tender.

  “To look for your servant,” he said. “Ai-i-i-i! Ah-h-h-h! But you should have been Chinese!”

  The munitions junk loomed above them.

  “In close,” Harder said. “Tie the sampan and up we go.”

  They gained the deck of the junk. Upon the forward part, men were standing about, awaiting instructions. There was a dispute between the boatmen as to whether the junk should be unloaded and the cargo transferred, or whether it should be taken back to Canton with the cargo intact.

  Mow Jie’s unerring feet led the way. He knew, without the necessity of words to tell him, the plan that Harder had in mind.

  The two men, moving as silent shadows, slipped into the deserted living quarters of the junk. They brought out a large can of peanut oil. It was but the work of a moment to drop down into the hold of the junk, where boxes and barrels were stacked in rows. The peanut oil splashed to the wood. Boards from a smashed case made kindling. A match sputtered.

  The two men turned and raced for the deck. Behind them was a flare of light, the crackle of flames. Black smoke began to roll upward through the hatch.

  Two Chinese in the front of the junk turned to run back toward the two men. The flames roared into red, angry brilliance. Someone shouted a warning. The men fell back.

  Mow Jie and Harder went over the side into the sampan, pushed away from the junk.

  Behind them, came a rattle as a case of cartridges suddenly popped like firecrackers. Then there was a terrific roar. Flames shot up into the heavens. White smoke puffed out over the junk like a mushroom, then drifted upward, giving way to black smoke, which rolled up in clouds. Small explosions made a continuous rattle.

  Mow Jie sculled the sampan desperately.

  “Toward the shore,” called Harder.

  There were other sampans which had been cruising about, but they turned and raced back toward the flaming junk as they saw the spreading flames.

  Harder stood up in the bow of the sampan.

  Someone shot at him. The bullet whizzed past his head. He continued to stand there, peering out into the darkness. Again there was the sound of a shot; the bullet thudded into- the wood of the sampan.

  Harder stood there like a statue.

  Near the shore a figure waved at him. The voice of Edith Minter called, “Here!”

  Mow Jie sent the sampan darting toward the bank.

  There was a third shot. A deadly breath of cold wind whispered across Harder’s face. Suddenly behind him the sky seemed to blossom into red light. There was a roar which pushed out a wall of air as though it were a giant invisible fist, knocking Harder down to the deck of the sampan.

  He saw burning brands rising high in the night air, heard the hiss of water turning to steam as it came in contact with flame. Then, after a moment, he heard the humming noise made by fragments of wreckage hurtling down from the upper heavens. There were myriad flashes.

  Mow Jie continued to scull the boat steadily, never missing a stroke.

  Edith Minter waded out to meet them. Harder lifted her into the sampan.

  “To Canton,” said Mow Jie, with his strange dry chuckle as he turned the bow of the light craft.

  “No,” Harder said in English, staring back toward the place where the water was littered with smoking wreckage.

  “The leader is dead. The munitions are destroyed. Our work is over. But there is one thing we must do. I can’t lose Ballinger. They’ll kill him unless we rescue him.”

  Edith Minter’s tone showed her surprise.

  “I thought you were sworn enemies,” she said.

  Harder’s tone was grim.

  “Make no mistake,” he said, “I hate his guts. But he plays a remarkable game of chess, and I’ve just found out that I need to improve mine.”

  Mow Jie, ever keen for a fight, pulled a knife from his sash, inspected the stained point.

  “It is,” he said, “covered with Look Took Yok, the green poison.”

  He sculled the boat with swift rapidity, holding the knife in his right hand. In the bow of the sampan, Harder crouched, ready to spring.

  Darkness had once more descended upon the waters. The remaining junk showed only as a black outline against the sky. The air was filled with the acrid fumes of burnt powder, with the odor of charred wood to which water had been applied.

  Mow Jie gave his peculiar dry chuckle.

  “The leader is dead,” he said, “the munitions of war are destroyed. It is dark. There will be no difficulty. It is time for the cat to walk a fence.”

  There were three school teachers from the States, a missionary, a clerk from the consular office, and the buyer for a British importing house on the river steamer which pulled out from Canton to Hongkong.

  The little group gathered around a table, where two men sat in silent hostility, playing chess, exchanging never a word.

  Back of the group, Sidney Minter, his arm around his sister’s waist, watched the men with horrified fascination.

  Jimmy Harder suddenly abandoned the conventional two-knights opening, flung out his queen in what was apparently an unprotected spot.

  The spectators, trying to fathom the peculiar strategy, saw the fat man push back his chair, stare with wide, horrified eyes at the chess board.

  “No, Jimmy! Not that move. Not that one. For God’s sake, no! That’s the one HE used.”

  It was the first time Ballinger had spoken to Jimmy Harder in five years.

 

 

  Erle Stanley Gardner, War Lord of Darkness

 

 

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