The Pagan Madonna Part 5

"Why didn't you put up here?" she asked. "There is plenty of room."

"Well, I thought perhaps it would be better if I stayed at the Palace."

"Nonsense! Who cares?"

"I do." And this time he did not smile.

"I suppose my Chinaman will be waiting in the lobby."

"Let's toddle along, then."

Dennison followed her out of the tea room, his gaze focused on the back of her neck, and it was just possible to resist the mad inclination to bend and kiss the smooth, ivory-tinted skin. He was not ready to a.n.a.lyze the impulse for fear he might find how deep down the propellant was. A woman, young in the heart, young in the body, and old in the mind, disillusioned but not embittered, unafraid, resourceful, sometimes beautiful and sometimes plain, but always splendidly alive.

Perhaps the wisest move on his part was to avoid her companions.h.i.+p, invent some excuse to return by the way of Manila, pretend he had transfer orders. To spend twenty-one days on the same s.h.i.+p with her and to keep his head seemed a bit too strong. Had there been something substantial reaching down from the future--a dependable job--he would have gone with her joyously. But he had not a dollar beyond his acc.u.mulated pay; that would melt quickly enough when he reached the States. He was thirty; he would have to hustle to get anywhere by the time he was forty. His only hope was that back in the States they were calling for men who knew how to manage men, and he had just been discharged--or recalled for that purpose--from the best school for that. But they were calling for specialists, too, and he was a jack of all trades and master of none.

He knew something about art, something about music, something about languages; but he could not write. He was a fair navigator, but not fair enough for a paying job. He could take an automobile engine apart and rea.s.semble it with skill, but any chauffeur could do that.

"Hadn't we better go into the parlour?" he heard Jane asking as they pa.s.sed out.

"We'll be alone there. It will be easier for you to resist temptation, I suppose, if there isn't any audience. Audiences are nuisances. Men have killed each other because they feared the crowd might mistake common sense for the yellow streak."

Instantly the thought leaped into the girl's mind: Supposing such an event lay back of this strange silence about his home and his people? She recalled the ruthless ferocity with which he had broken up a street fight between American and j.a.panese soldiers one afternoon in Vladivostok.

Supposing he had killed someone? But she had to repudiate this theory. No officer in the United States Army could cover up anything like that.

"Come to the parlour," she said to Ling Foo, who was smiling and kotowing.

Ling Foo picked up his blackwood box. Inwardly he was not at all pleased at the prospect of having an outsider witness the little business transaction he had in mind. Obliquely he studied the bronze mask. There was no eagerness, no curiosity, no indifference. It struck Ling Foo that there was something Oriental in this officer's repose. But five hundred gold! Five hundred dollars in American gold--for a string of gla.s.s beads!

He set the blackwood box on a stand, opened it, and spread out jade earrings, rings, fobs, bracelets, strings. The girl's eagerness caused Ling Foo to sigh with relief. It would be easy.

"I warned you that I should not buy anything," said Jane, ruefully. "But even if I had the money I would not buy this kind of a jade necklace. I should want apple-green."

"Ah!" said Ling Foo, shocked with delight. "Perhaps we can make a bargain.

You have those gla.s.s beads I sold you this morning?"

"Yes, I am wearing them."

Jane took off her mink-fur collaret, which was sadly worn.

Ling Foo's hand went into his box again. From a piece of cotton cloth he drew forth a necklace of apple-green jade, almost perfect.

"Oh, the lovely thing!" Jane seized the necklace. "To possess something like this! Isn't it glorious, captain?"

"Let me see it." Dennison inspected the necklace carefully. "It is genuine. Where did you get this?"

Ling Foo shrugged.

"Long ago, during the Boxer troubles, I bought it from a sailor."

"Ah, probably loot from the Peking palace. How much is it worth?"

Murder blazed up in Ling Foo's heart, but his face remained smilingly bland.

"What I can get for it. But if the lady wishes I will give it to her in exchange for the gla.s.s beads. I had no right to sell the beads," Ling Foo went on with a deprecating gesture. "I thought the man who owned them would never claim them. But he came this noon. Something belonging to his ancestor--and he demands it."

"Trade them? Good heavens, yes! Of all things! Here!" Jane unclasped the beads and thrust them toward Ling Foo's eager claw.

But Dennison reached out an intervening hand.

"Just a moment, Miss Norman. What's the game?" he asked of Ling Foo.

Ling Foo silently cursed all this meddler's ancestors from Noah down, but his face expressed only mild bewilderment.

"Game?"

"Yes. Why didn't you offer some other bits of jade? This string is worth two or three hundred gold; and this is patently a string of gla.s.s beads, handsomely cut, but nevertheless plain gla.s.s. What's the idea?"

"But I have explained!" protested Ling Foo. "The string is not mine. I have in honour to return it."

"Yes, yes! That's all very well. You could have told this lady that and offered to return her money. But a jade necklace like this one! No, Miss Norman; my advice is to keep the beads until we learn what's going on."

"But to let that jade go!" she wailed comically.

"The lady may keep the jade until to-morrow. She may have the night to decide. This is no hurry."

Ling Foo saw that he had been witless indeed. The thought of raising the bid of five hundred gold to a thousand or more had bemused him, blunted his ordinary cunning.

Inwardly he cursed his stupidity. But the appearance of a witness to the transaction had set him off his balance. The officer had spoken shrewdly.

The young woman would have returned the beads in exchange for the sum she had paid for them, and she would never have suspected--nor the officer, either--that the beads possessed unknown value. Still, the innocent covetousness, plainly visible in her eyes, told him that the game was not entirely played out; there was yet a dim chance. Alone, without the officer to sway her, she might be made to yield.

"The lady may wear the beads to-night if she wishes. I will return for them in the morning."

"But this does not explain the gla.s.s beads," said the captain.

"I will bring the real owner with me in the morning," volunteered Ling Foo. "He sets a high value on them through sentiment. Perhaps I was hasty."

Dennison studied the gla.s.s beads. Perhaps his suspicions were not on any too solid ground. Yet a string of jade beads like that in exchange!

Something was in the air.

"Well," said he, smiling at the appeal in the girl's eyes, "I don't suppose there will be any harm in keeping them overnight. We'll have a chance to talk it over."

Ling Foo's plan of attack matured suddenly. He would call near midnight.

He would somehow manage to get to her door. She would probably hand him the gla.s.s beads without a word of argument. Then he would play his game with the man who limped. He smiled inwardly as he put his wares back into the carved box. A thousand gold! At any rate, he would press the man into a corner. There was something about this affair that convinced Ling Foo that his noon visitor would pay high for two reasons: one, to recover the gla.s.s beads; the other, to keep out of the reach of the police.

Ling Foo considered that he was playing his advantage honestly. He hadn't robbed or murdered anybody. A business deal had slipped into his hands and it was only logical to make the most of it. He kotowed several times on the way out of the parlour, conscious, however, of the searching eyes of the man who had balked him.

"Well!" exclaimed Jane. "What in the world do you suppose is going on?"

"Lord knows, but something is going on. You couldn't buy a jade necklace like that under five hundred in New York. This apple-green seldom runs deep; the colour runs in veins and patches. The bulk of the quarried stone has the colour and greasy look of raw pork. No; I shouldn't put it on just now, not until you have washed it. You never can tell. I'll get you a germicide at the English apothecary's. Gla.s.s beads! Humph! Hanged if I can make it out. Gla.s.s; Occidental, too; maybe worth five dollars in the States. Put it on again. It's a great world over here. You're always stumbling into something unique. I'm coming over to dine with you to-night."