CHAPTER TWELVE.
THE PATHWAY OF GLASS.
Desperate as the situation undoubtedly was, Captain Frobisher was notthe man to yield without a struggle. He was cornered, and he knew it.Nothing short of a miracle could extricate him from the position inwhich the momentary panic of the other boarding party had placed him bythe withdrawal of the _Su-chen_; but he determined that, if he was todie, he would not die alone.
With this resolution, he renewed the fight with even greater desperationthan before, if that were possible; and so formidable a foe did hebecome that, for a few seconds, the pirates in front of him wavered andall but broke. His tall, strong figure, as he advanced bareheaded, withset teeth and gleaming eyes, and that long ruddily-gleaming strip ofsteel which played here, there, and everywhere with the swiftness oflight, made up a spectacle sufficiently awe-inspiring to terrify anyman, one would have thought; but many of the pirates were themselvesalmost as big and strong as Frobisher, and were thoroughly accustomed todesperate, hand-to-hand fighting. Their hesitation was therefore butmomentary, and the next instant they had closed round him like a pack ofhungry wolves, snarling and spitting curses at him, and even striving topull him down with their hands.
Gaining the opportunity of an instant's breathing space, Frobisherglanced quickly behind him to discover how many of his men were left tohim, and was horrified to find that, out of the forty men who hadfollowed him on to the deck of the junk, but ten remained on their feet,while of those ten, fully half were bleeding from more or less severewounds which would quickly put them _hors de combat_. There wastherefore not the smallest possibility of cutting a way through thedense throng that surrounded them and leaping over the side into thewater, as he had at first thought of doing; and there seemed nothing tobe done but to sell his life and the lives of his followers as dearly aspossible--for he was quite resolved to die rather than fall alive intothe hands of the pirates, having already heard something of the tendermercies of the Chinese to their prisoners.
Unhappily for Frobisher, however, he was unable to control circumstance,and, not having eyes in the back of his head, he was unaware of what washappening behind him. He did not know that a few seconds later hisfollowers were all cut down and slain, and that he remained fightingalone, without a single protector at his back, and with his enemiesswarming all round him. Neither did he observe the chief, whom he hadbeen trying to reach unsuccessfully ever since the beginning of thefight, made a brief signal to his men not to strike.
Consequently he was not a little astonished when he suddenly felthimself seized round the neck and body by half a dozen pairs of arms,which pinioned his own and left him helpless. In an instant his cutlasswas wrenched from his grasp and he was hurled to the deck, where moremen immediately flung themselves upon him, holding him firmly down, sothat he found it utterly impossible to move a limb.
Thereafter the business of binding him was comparatively easy, and hepresently found himself swathed from head to foot in coils of rope,until he resembled a mummy rather than a living man.
His captors then rolled him contemptuously out of the way against theshot-riddled bulwarks, and proceeded to take account of theircasualties. Where Frobisher had made his final stand the dead laythickest, and he noticed with grim satisfaction that there were very fewwounded men to be seen. His men and he had fought well, and he hadnothing with which to reproach himself. The pirate chief scowledheavily as he scanned the result of the fight; but although he hadunquestionably paid dearly in men for his victory, he had no compunctionin ordering the more severely wounded to be hove over the side.Probably there were no facilities for doctoring them, and the chiefperhaps thought they might as well die now as later on, and so save hima good deal of trouble in transporting them to the shore.
Just then the other junk bumped heavily alongside, and her men cameaboard, reporting that their craft had been so badly damaged that shewas in a sinking condition. Indeed her crew had hardly transferredthemselves before she disappeared beneath the muddy waters.
The fourth junk safely accounted for, Frobisher comforted himself withthe assurance that, with any sort of luck at all, the _Su-chen_ ought tobe able to make her way back to Tien-tsin, short-handed though she mustundoubtedly be; and, once there, he knew a report of the failure of theexpedition would be speedily carried to Wong-lih, provided the admiralhappened to be still there. The latter would then be quite certain tosend a rescue expedition up the Hoang-ho to recover any prisoners thepirates might have taken, or to avenge them if slain. Happily for theEnglishman's peace of mind, he did not know that, although the _Su-chen_did eventually reach Tien-tsin in safety, she arrived too late to catchthe admiral, who had left to visit some of the Southern Chinese portsand inspect the men-of-war on that station, and was not expected back,unless specially sent for, for at least a couple of months. And it wascertain that none of the Chinese officials at Tien-tsin would considerthe fact of Frobisher's capture and probable murder at the hands of thepirates as sufficient to justify the exertion of dispatching a messengerto recall Wong-lih, or even to give him news of the result of theexpedition. So, although he did not know it, there was little prospectof rescue for Murray Frobisher, for some time, at all events.
The business of disposing of the dead and badly wounded men having beencompleted, the pirate chief, whose name--from the number of times theword was used when he was being addressed--Frobisher guessed to beAh-fu, issued a few brief orders in barbarous-sounding, up-countryChinese; and the survivors of the fight got up the anchor, and slowlypoled the junk back to her berth behind the small headland where thefleet had been lying on the arrival of the _Su-chen_. Observing that,in his bound condition, nobody seemed to consider it necessary to standon guard over him, and being anxious to learn as much as possiblerespecting his present surroundings--with a view to future escape if hewere left alive long enough--Frobisher contrived to bring himself into akneeling position, after which he had not much difficulty in strugglingto his feet, and was thus able to look over the side and see what wasgoing on.
By the time that he had executed this manoeuvre the junk had left themain stream of the river and had entered the bight where the piratefleet was accustomed to be concealed; and, at the far end of this, abouta quarter of a mile from their present position, Frobisher distinguisheda small wharf, some two hundred feet in length by about thirty wide, andstanding about eight feet out of the water, toward which the junk wasbeing steered. This was no doubt the jetty where the pirates unloadedthe loot stolen from captured prizes, and whence they took aboard theirown stores of ammunition, provisions, and water. There was quite anumber of bamboo and thatch huts scattered about at the shore end of thejetty--evidently store-houses--while a stream of flashing, sparkling,crystal-clear water, tumbling down a narrow gully and cutting a tinychannel for itself across the sand to the river, was without doubt thesource of the pirates' water supply.
Frobisher noticed that at the end of the jetty a number of the men fromthe fort had collected, apparently awaiting the arrival of theircomrades of the maritime department; and as the junk came alongside,these individuals clambered aboard, and a vociferous conversationensued, during which fierce glances and threatening gestures weredirected toward the Englishman, who knew instinctively that the newarrivals were strongly urging that he should be put to death, as somesort of a sacrifice to the memory of the dead pirates, in whosedestruction he had played so large a part. Indeed, it seemed at onemoment as though he were to be slaughtered as he stood there, bound andhelpless; for the new-comers surged forward, knives and swords gleamingin their hands, pushing the junk's crew backward until the whole crowdhad gathered in a circle, with Frobisher in the centre. Frobisherexpected death at any moment, and he was at a loss to understand why thejunk's men seemed reluctant to let the others have their way, seeingthat they themselves had been eager enough to put an end to him but ashort time previously. Presently he noticed that Ah-fu had disappearedfrom the deck, and guessed that the men were merely waiting fo
r him toreturn before allowing the people from the fort to have their way.
Presently the pirate chief reappeared, and was immediately surrounded byan eager, gesticulating crowd, who pointed to Frobisher and handledtheir blades in sanguinary anticipation. But, holding up his hand forsilence, Ah-fu said a few words to his followers which produced animmediate and remarkable effect. Sheathing their weapons, they brokeout into shouts of laughter, and began to discuss with one another thedetails of what they evidently considered an excellent joke; andFrobisher, knowing something of the Chinese pirates' idea of amusement,felt that he would infinitely have preferred being killed on the spot tobeing kept alive to provide sport for these barbarians. Quen-lung hadcertainly been right when he had prophesied disaster as the result ofattacking the "Unconquerable"--as Frobisher afterwards found was indeedthe name of the sect to which the pirates belonged--although what reasonthe man had had for being so sure, the young Englishman was utterlyunable to guess.
The matter having evidently been settled entirely to the pirates'satisfaction, Frobisher's legs were unbound, so that he could walk, and,closely guarded by two men carrying long, broad-bladed knives, he wasled down the sloping gangway to the wharf, followed by the rest of thecrowd talking and laughing hilariously. Thence he was taken up thehill, a distance of a quarter of a mile, to the fort.
On reaching his destination he was amazed to note the enormous strengthof the building, and the consequently small amount of damage that hadbeen done by the fire of the gunboat. With the exception of the hole inthe tower, and a few splintered and starred "splashings" where themissiles had struck, very little actual injury seemed to have beeninflicted, notwithstanding the excellent practice of the _Su-chen's_gunners. The walls, he decided, must be enormously thick, thicker eventhan those of the fortress of Asan, which were stout enough to withstandanything less than heavy gun fire.
He was not permitted to examine the appearance of the building veryclosely, for, observing his hesitation, the two guards prodded himvindictively with the points of their knives, and pushed him before themthrough the massive stone gateway, which was protected by a strongportcullis at either end, as well as an iron double door between, strongenough to turn rifle bullets. Frobisher now realised that even if hehad succeeded in sinking all the junks and reaching the gate of the forthis difficulties would only have begun, and that his plan of blowing inthe gates with powder would have been completely frustrated by theexistence of the outer portcullis. These men certainly knew how toprotect themselves, and were determined not to be captured if humaningenuity could prevent it.
Once inside, Frobisher found himself in a spacious courtyard, roundwhich the fort was built. The windows of the different chambers lookedinward, thus allowing the outer walls to be entirely used for gunembrasures, rifle loopholes, and even arrow-slits, so varied were theweapons to be found in this robber stronghold.
Still in charge of the two guards, at a command from Ah-fu the prisonerwas marched through a doorway in the wall exactly opposite the maingateway, and was hurried through corridor after corridor--all of themonly dimly lighted by small openings in the outer wall--until he becameutterly confused and lost even the remotest idea of his bearings. Aftera walk of about five minutes the guards halted before an iron-bounddoor, which, upon being opened, disclosed a flight of steps. Down thesesteps he was hurried, finding himself, when at the bottom, at theentrance to another long passage, which looked as though it had beenhewn out of the solid sandstone, for there were no joints visible in itswalls.
Removing a lantern from a hook, one of the men lighted it, and thejourney was continued for quite ten minutes in a perfectly straightline, thus confirming Frobisher's impression that he was in anunderground passage leading from the fort to some other structure at aconsiderable distance, probably constructed to afford a means of escapein the extremely unlikely event of the fort ever being captured. At thefar end of this passage there were several iron-bound doors--acircumstance which Frobisher noted for future reference; and it wasthrough one of the middle ones that he was conducted, arriving at onceat the foot of another flight of stairs, similar to those at the otherend, and finally at a large, square, stone cell, lighted on three sidesby very small windows, high up in the walls--a most dismal-lookingprison. There was a low plank bench covered with straw and presumablyintended for a bed, two stools, and a bucket, these few articlesconstituting the entire contents of the chamber.
Frobisher's arms were now unbound, and he was thrust inside, the guardsholding themselves in readiness to frustrate any attempt at escape. Butthe prisoner was by this time far too stiff and numb after theconstriction of the ropes to make any such attempt; it was as much as hecould achieve to stagger to the apology for a bed, upon which he flunghimself at full length. He was utterly exhausted, and his body hadscarcely touched the straw before he was fast asleep, in which conditionhe remained for nearly twenty-four hours.
When he awoke he found that a coarse meal had been left for him, whilethe bucket had been filled with water; so he made a hearty meal, andthen proceeded to examine his cell by the light of the declining sun.His search, however, was fruitless: there was nothing out of which hemight construct a key, as he had done at Asan; the windows were scarcelysix inches square; in short, escape appeared an impossibility.
And now many days dragged out their slow length in dreary monotony; dayafter day his custodians brought him a supply of food; but, strangelyenough, the time passed without his being subjected to indignity andtorment for the amusement of the pirates, as he had fully expected mightbe the case. Possibly they were absent on some foray, and had postponedtheir entertainment until their return. Whatever might be the reason,however, the days slid past, without molestation to him, and lengthenedinto weeks, until, by the notches which he scored every morning on theedge of his bed, Frobisher found that he had been just thirteen weeks inconfinement. Thirteen weeks!--And, so far as he could tell, no attempthad been made by the Chinese authorities to rescue him or obtain hisrelease; at any rate, there had been no sounds of fighting, no report ofguns from the river; and he was being slowly forced to the conclusionthat his very existence had been forgotten, or else that it was thoughtnot worth while to throw away any more valuable Chinese lives in orderto effect the rescue of so unimportant a personage as an Englishmercenary.
Then, one morning, when Frobisher awoke and commenced to dress--for hehad made a practice of undressing at night, that he might feel thecleaner and more refreshed next day--he discovered, to his astonishment,that his boots had mysteriously disappeared during the night. Hesearched everywhere for them, but they were nowhere to be found. Forwhatever reason--and he puzzled himself to think of a satisfactory one--his foot-gear was undoubtedly missing, and there was an end of thematter. The curious happening vexed him considerably. It seemed suchan idiotic trick to play; and the more he thought about the matter themore convinced he became that this joke, or whatever it was intended tobe, had a deeper significance than he had at first imagined.
Since his arrival in China he had contrived to acquire a fragmentaryknowledge of the language, and by its means he endeavoured to ascertainfrom the man who nightly brought him food the reason for the apparentlysenseless prank; but the fellow either could not or would notunderstand, and Frobisher was obliged to give up the attempt.
The jailer had hitherto been in the habit of closing the iron-bound doorbehind him with a slam, rattling the lock after him to make sure that itwas fastened, when he brought the prisoner's food; and this circumstancehad come to be so expected by Frobisher that when, on the evening of theday on which his boots had disappeared, the man simply pulled the doorto gently behind him and went off about his business without even tryingthe lock, the omission immediately attracted the Englishman's attention.
The man had never before been so careless, and Frobisher could notdecide whether he had been thinking of something else at the moment, andhad succumbed to an attack of absent-mindedness, or whether he hadsuddenly recollected so
mething that he had forgotten, and intended topay another visit to the cell. Whichever it might be, Frobisherbelieved he saw in the circumstance a possibility of escape of which heinstantly determined to avail himself.
With stealthy footsteps he crept across the stone-flagged floor,scarcely daring to breathe lest his movements should attract someinconvenient person's attention. He had, it is true, heard the jailerwalk away down the corridor; but perhaps, playing some stupid joke, theman had crept back noiselessly, and was even now outside the door,listening and chuckling to himself at the prisoner's foolishness inimagining that he would be careless enough to go away leaving the doorunfastened. The mere idea caused the beads of sweat to start out onFrobisher's forehead; disappointment would be too terrible!
But he swiftly pulled himself together, and, with fingers that trembledin spite of himself, he touched the old-fashioned latch and slowly, veryslowly, raised it, pulling the door gently toward him as he did so.
The door opened, and, scarcely daring to credit his senses, Frobisherpulled it still wider open, and a moment later was able to look out intothe corridor. There was an antiquated oil lantern hanging at the footof the stone stairway, placed there for the jailer's convenience, and byits light the prisoner was able to see that the corridor was empty.Then the incident of the door was no trick, after all, and the man hadreally suffered a lapse of memory. Twenty-four hours would elapsebefore he returned, and Frobisher's absence was discovered, and thelatter hoped by that time to be far away, if he could but find some modeof escaping undetected from the building. The first and most seriousobstacle in the way, the cell door, was overcome; now to find whetherhis luck would still hold, and if he could find another unguarded gateleading to freedom.
First of all, however, he must have some covering for his feet. He knewthat he could not walk far barefooted over rough ground; and, if pursuedunder such circumstances, capture would be certain and speedy. Hetherefore removed his shirt and undervest, and tearing them into strips,he swathed the wrappings round his feet somewhat after the mannerfollowed by the Spanish mountaineers. This done, he next had toascertain whether the remaining doors between himself and freedom werelocked or unlocked.
The first door he came to was the one at the foot of the stairs, and, asmight have been expected, this was closed; but it was not locked. Thepirates had clearly pinned their faith on the stanchness of the celldoor. Close to this, in the opposite wall of the passage, were theother doors which Frobisher had observed when being conducted to hisprison; and it was through one of these that he must pass if he was toescape at all. The passage itself, he remembered, simply communicatedwith the main building of the fort, and to travel by that path wastantamount to running into the arms of his captors.
With infinite care he tried the latch of the door on the left. It waslocked.
Then he turned the handle of the door on the right. That also waslocked; and his heart sank at the thought of the tremendous amount oflabour that would be needed to overcome this obstacle--if it werepossible to overcome it at all, of which he was more than doubtful.
While he was considering what to do first, his eye caught a faintglimmer of light shining on something on the wall, and he eagerlystretched out his hand to it. As he touched it his heart leaped, forthe object was a key--obviously the key of one, or both, of the doors.
He fitted it cautiously into the lock of the right-hand door and turnedit gently, and with a soft click the wards fell back and the door jarredslightly open.
Without wasting a moment, Frobisher pulled it wide and stepped outside,exulting in his new-found liberty. But, alas! his exultation was onlymomentary. An instant later he realised the cruel hoax that had beenplayed on him, for extending over a distance of many yards in everydirection was a sort of pavement of broken glass, pointed and keen-edgedas a forest of razors. The glass had been so firmly fixed in the groundthat it was impossible to remove it; and Frobisher instantly realisedthat his escape that way was most effectually barred. Even with strongboots on, it would have been a difficult enough matter to traverse thatglass-strewn patch without cutting one's feet to pieces; and with feetmerely protected by thin wrappings of wool and linen, the thing was animpossibility.
This, then, was the meaning of the removal of his boots; and, as herealised the sardonic cruelty of the men who could invent such a devicefor tormenting a prisoner, his heart almost failed him. It seemed asthough he were doomed to remain for ever immured in this horrible place.
A Chinese Command: A Story of Adventure in Eastern Seas Page 12