“Lady Elizabeth Willoughby does my humble establishment much honor,” said he, in perfect English, sweeping his eyes over her without any attempt to conceal his avid interest in her ripe curves. There was a natural arrogance about him, an assurance of power. He had dealt with wealthy white women before, and strange tales were whispered of his dealings with some of them. The air of mystery and power about him made him seem a romantic figure to some European women. “The Bon is in the inner chamber,” he said. “There, too, are my real treasures. These,” he gestured contemptuously about him, “are only a show for tourists’. If milady would honor me—”
She rose and moved across the room, with the assured bearing of a woman of quality, certain of deference at all time. He drew back a satin curtain on which gilt dragons writhed, and following her through, drew it together behind them. They went along a narrow corridor, where the walls were hung with black velvet and the floor was carpeted with thick Bokhara rugs in which her feet sank deep.
A soft golden glow emanated from bronze lanterns, suspended from the gilt- inlaid ceiling. She felt her pulse quicken. She was on her way to the famous, yet mysterious, inner chamber of Woon Yuen, inaccessible to all but wealthy and beautiful women, and in which, rumor whispered, Woon Yuen had struck strange bargains; He did not always sell his antiques for money, and there were feminine collectors who would barter their virtue for a coveted relic.
Woon Yuen opened a bronze door, worked in gold and ebon inlay, and Arline entered a broad chamber, over a silvery plate of glass set in the threshold. She saw Woon Yuen glance down as she walked over it, and knew he was getting an eyeful. That mirror placed where a woman must walk over it to enter the chamber was a typical Chinese trick to allow the master of the establishment to get a more intimate glimpse of the charms of his fair customers, as reflected in the mirror. She didn’t care, but was merely amused at his ingenuity. Even Woon Yuen would hardly dare to make a pass at Lady Elizabeth Willoughby.
He closed the door and bowed her to an ornate mahogany chair.
“Please excuse me for a moment, milady. I will return instantly.”
He went out by another door, and she looked about her at a display whose richness might have shamed a shah’s treasure-house. Here indeed were the real treasures of Woon Yuen — what looked like the plunder of a thousand sultans’ palaces and heathen temples. Idols in jade, gold, and ivory grinned at her, and a less sophisticated woman would have blushed at some of the figures, depicting Oriental gods and goddesses in amorous poses of an astonishing variety. She could imagine the effect these things would have on some of his feminine visitors.
Even her eyes dilated a trifle at the sight of the smirking, pot-bellied monstrosity that was the ivory Bon, looted from God only knew what nameless monastery high in the forbidden Himalayas. Then every nerve tingled as she saw a gold-worked dragon head jutting from the wall beyond the figure. Quickly she turned her gaze back to the god, just as her host returned on silent, velvet-shod feet.
He smiled to see her staring at the idol and the female figure in its arms.
“That is only one of the conceptions of the god — the Tibetan. It is worth, to any collector — but let us delay business talk until after tea. If you will honor me—”
With his guest seated at a small ebon table, the Mongol struck a bronze gong, and tea was served by a slim, silent-footed Chinese girl, clad only in a filmy jacket which came a little below her budding hips, and which concealed none of her smooth-skinned, lemon-tinted charms.
This display, Arline knew, was in accord with the peculiar Chinese belief that a woman is put in a properly receptive mood for amorous advances by the sight of another woman’s exposed charms. She wondered, if, after all, Woon Yuen had designs — but he showed no signs of it.
The slave girl bowed herself humbly out with a last salaam that displayed her full breasts beneath the low-necked jacket, and Arline’s nerves tightened. Now was the time. She interrupted Woon Yuen’s polite trivialities.
“That little jade figure, over there on the ivory shelf,” she said, pointing. “Isn’t that a piece of Jum Shan’s work?”
“I will get it!”
As he rose and stepped to the shelf, she dropped the knock-out pellet into his tea-cup. It dissolved instantly, without discoloring the liquid. She was idly sipping her own tea when the Mongol returned and placed the tiny figure of a jade warrior before her.
“Genuine Jum Shan,” said he. “It dates from the tenth century!” He lifted his cup and emptied it at a draught, while she watched him with a tenseness which she could not wholly conceal. He sat the cup down empty, frowning slightly and twitching his lips at the taste.
“I would like to call your attention, milady—” he leaned forward, reaching toward the jade figure — then slumped down across the table, out cold. In an instant she was across the room, and her white, tapering fingers were at work on the teeth of the carved dragon’s head. There was an instinct in those fingers, a super-sensitiveness such as skilled cracksmen sometimes have.
In a few moments the jaws gaped suddenly, revealing a velvet-lined nest in the midst of which, like an egg of some fabled bird of paradise, burned and smoldered a great, smooth, round jewel.
She caught her breath as awedly she cupped it in her hands. It was a ruby, of such deep crimson that it looked darkly purple, the hue of old wine, and the blood that flows near the heart. It looked like the materialization of a purple nightmare. She could believe now the wild tales she had heard — that Woon Yuen worshiped it as a god, sucking madness from its sinister depths, that he performed terrible sacrifices to it —
“Lovely, is it not?”
The low voice cracked the tense stillness like the heart-stopping blast of an explosion. She whirled, gasping, then stood transfixed. Woon Yuen stood before her, smiling dangerously, his eyes slits of black fire. A frantic glance sped to the tea-table. There still sprawled a limp, bulky figure, idential to Woon Yuen in every detail.
“What — ?” she gasped weakly.
“My shadow,” he smiled. “I must be cautious. Long ago I hit upon the expedient of having a servant made up to resemble me, to fool my enemies. When I left the chamber a little while ago, he took my place, and I watched through the peep-hole. I supposed you were after the Heart.
“How did you guess?” She sensed the uselessness of denial.
“Why not? Has not every thief in China tried to steal it?” He spoke softly, but his eyes shone reddishly, and the veins swelled on his neck. “As soon as I learned you were not what you pretended, I knew you had come to steal something. Why not the ruby? I set my trap and let you walk into it. But I must congratulate you on your cleverness. Not one in a thousand could have discovered the way to open the dragon’s jaws.”
“How did you know I wasn’t Lady Elizabeth?” she whispered, dry-lipped; the great ruby seemed to burn her palms.
“I knew it when you walked across the mirror and I saw your lower extremities reflected there, I have never seen Lady Elizabeth, but all dealers in jade know her peculiarities by reputation. One of them is such a passion for jade that she always wears jade-green step-ins. Yours are lavender.”
“What are you going to do?” she panted, as he moved toward her.
A light akin to madness burned in his eyes.
“You have defamed the Heart by your touch! It must drink of all who touch it save me, its high priest! If a man, his blood! If a woman—”
No need for him to complete his abominable decree. The ruby fell to the thick carpet, rolled along it like a revolving, demoniac eyeball. She sprang back, shrieking, as Woon Yuen, no longer placid, but with his convulsed face a beast’s mask, caught her by the wrist. Against his thickly muscled arms her struggles were vain. As in a nightmare, she felt herself lifted and carried kicking and scratching, through heavily brocaded drapes into a curtained alcove. Her eyes swept the room helplessly; she saw the ivory Bon leering at her as through a mist. It seemed to mock her.
The alcove
was walled with mirrors. Only Chinese cruelty could have devised such an arrangement, where, whichever way she twisted her head she was confronted by the spectacle of her own humiliation, reflected from every angle. She was at once actor and spectator in a beastly drama. She could not escape the shameful sight of her own writhings and the eager brutish hands of Woon Yuen remorselessly subduing her hopeless, desperate struggles.
As she felt the greedy yellow fingers on her cringing flesh, she saw in the mirrors, her quivering white breasts, her dress torn — dishevelled, the scarlet skirt in startling contrast to the white thighs, with only a wisp of silk protecting them as they frantically flexed, twisted and writhed — then with a sucking gasp of breath between his grinding teeth, Woon Yuen tore the filmy underthings to rags on her body...
At the tea-table the senseless Chinese still sprawled, deaf to the frantic, agonized shrieks that rang again and again through the inner chamber of Woon Yuen.
An hour later a door opened into a narrow alley in the rear of Woon Yuen’s antique shop, and Arline was thrust roughly out, her breasts almost bare, her dress ripped to shreds. She fell sprawling from the force of the shove, and the door was slammed, with a brutal laugh. Dazedly she rose, shook down the remains of her skirt, drew her dress together, and tottered down the alley, sobbing hysterically.
Inside the room from which she had just been ejected, Woon Yuen turned to a lean, saturnine individual, whose pigtail was wound tightly about his head, and from whose wide silk girdle jutted the handle of a light hatchet.
“Yao Chin, take Yun Kang and follow her. There is always some man behind the scenes, when a woman steals. I let her go because I wished her to lead us to that man, send Yun Kang back to me. On no account kill him yourself. I, and only I, must feed the Heart with their vile blood — hers and his.”
The hatchetman bowed and left the room, his face showing nothing of his secret belief that Woon Yuen was crazy, not because he believed the Heart drank human blood, but because he, a rich merchant, insisted on doing murder which others of his class always left to hired slayers.
In the mouth of a little twisting alley that ran out upon a rotting abandoned wharf, Arline paused. Her face was haggard and desperate. She had reached the end of her trail. She had failed, and Tremayne would not accept any excuse. Ahead of her she saw only the black muzzles of a firing squad to which he would deliver her — but first there would be torture, inhuman torture, to wring from her secrets her captors would think she possessed. The world at large never knows the full story of the treatment of suspected spies.
With a low moan she covered her eyes with her arm and stumbled blindly toward the edge of the wharf — then a strong arm caught her waist and she looked up into the startled face of Wild Bill Clanton.
“What the hell are you fixin’ to do?”
“Let go!” she whimpered. “It’s my life! I can end it if I want to!”
“Not with me around,” he grunted, picking her up and carrying her back away from the wharf-lip. He sat down on a pile and took her on his lap, like a child. “Good thing I found you,” he grunted. “I had a hell of a time tracin’ you after you slugged me and ran up that alley, but I finally saw you duckin’ down this one. You pick the damndest places to stroll in. Now you tell me what the trouble is. A classy dame like you don’t need to go jumpin’ off of docks.”
He seemed to hold no grudge for that clout with the pitcher. There was possessiveness in the clasp of his arms about her supple body, but she found a comforting solidity in the breast muscles against which her flaxen head rested. There was a promise of security in his masculine strength. Suddenly she no longer resented his persistent pursuit of her. She needed his strength — needed a man who would fight for her.
In a few words she told him everything — the hold Tremayne had on her, the task he had set for her, and what had happened in Woon Yuen’s inner room.
He swore at the narrative.
“Ill get that yellow-belly for that! But first we’ll go to the Alley of Rats. Try to stall Tremayne along to give you another chance. In the meantime I’ll work on a Eurasian wench I know who could tell me plenty about him — and she will, too, or I’ll skin her alive. He’s been mixed up in plenty of crooked rackets. If we get somethin’ hot on him, we can shut his mouth, all right. And we’ll get somethin’, you can bet.”
When they entered the Alley of Rats, in a half-abandoned warehouse district in the native quarter, they did not see two furtive figures slinking after them, nor hear the taller whisper: “Yun Kang, go back and tell our master she had led us to a man! I will watch the alley till he comes.”
Clanton and Arline turned into a dingy doorway, and went down a corridor that seemed wholly deserted. Groping along it, in the dusk, she found the room she sought and led Clanton into it. She lit a candle stub stuck on a shelf, and turned to Clanton: “He’ll be here soon.”
“I’ll wait in the next room,” he said, reluctantly taking his arm from about her waist. “If he gets rough, I’ll come in.”
Alone in the candle-lighted room she tried to compose herself; her heart was beating a wild tattoo, loud in the stillness. Somewhere rats scampered noisily. Time dragged insufferably. Then quick, light steps sounded in the hall, and Duke Tremayne burst through the door, his eyes blazing with greed. They turned red as he read defeat in her eyes; his face contorted.
“Damn you!” His fingers were like talons as he gripped her shoulders. “You failed!”
“I couldn’t help it!” she pleaded. “He knew I was a fake. Please don’t hurt me, Duke. I’ll try again—”
“Try again? You little fool! Do you think that Chinese devil will give you another chance?” Tremayne’s suavity was gone; he was like a madman. “You failed, after all my planning! All right! I’ll have a little profit out of you! Take off that dress—” Already in shreds, the garment ripped easily in his grasp, baring a white breast which quivered under his gaze.
The inner door swung open. Tremayne wheeled, drawing a pistol, but before he could fire, Clanton’s fist crashed against his jaw and stretched him senseless. Clanton bent and picked up the gun, then whirled as the hall door opened behind him. He stiffened as a tranquil voice spoke: “Do not move, my friend!”
He looked into the muzzle of a gun in Woon Yuen’s hand.
“So you are the man?” muttered the Mongol. “Good! The Heart drinks—”
He could fire before Clanton could lift the pistol he held. But behind the American Arline laughed suddenly, unexpectedly.
“It worked, Bill!” she exclaimed. “Our man will get the ruby while we hold Woon Yuen here! The fool! He hasn’t yet guessed that we tricked him to draw him away from his shop after I’d found where he hid the gem.”
Woon Yuen’s face went ashen. With a choking cry he fired, not at Clanton but at the girl. But his hand was shaking like a leaf. He missed, and like an echo of his shot came the crack of Clanton’s pistol. Woon Yuen dropped, drilled through the head.
“Good work, kid!” Clanton cried exultantly. “He fell for it — hard!”
“But they’ll hang us for this!” whimpered the girl. “Listen! Someone’s running up the hall! They’ve heard the shots!”
Stooping swiftly Clanton folded Duke Tremayne’s fingers about the butt of the smoking pistol, and then kicked the man heavily in the shins. Tremayne grunted and showed signs of returning consciousness. Clanton drew Arline into the other room and they watched through the crack of the door.
The hall door opened and Yao Chin came in like a panther, hatchet in hand. His eyes blazed at the sight of Woon Yuen on the floor, Tremayne staggering to his feet, a pistol in his hand. With one stride the hatchetman reached the reeling blackmailer. There was a flash of steel, an ugly butcher-shop crunch, and Tremayne slumped, his skull split. Yao Chin tossed the reeking hatchet to the floor beside his victim and turned away.
“Out of here, quick!” muttered Clanton, shaking Arline who seemed threatened with hysteria. “Up the alley — in the other di
rection.”
She regained her poise in their groping flight up the darkened alley, as Clanton muttered: “We’re in the clear now. Tremayne can’t talk, with his head split, and that hatchetman’ll tell his pals Tremayne shot their boss.”
“We’d better get out of town!” They had emerged into a narrow, lamp-lit street.
“Why? We’re safe from suspicion now.” A little tingle of pleasure ran through her as Clanton turned into a doorway and spoke to a grinning old Chinaman who bowed them into a small neat room, with curtained windows and a couch.
As the door closed behind the old Chinese, Clanton caught her hungrily to him, finding her red lips, now unresisting. Her arms went about his thick neck as he lifted her bodily from the floor. Willingly she yielded, responded to his eager caresses.
She had only exchanged masters, it was true, but this was different. There was a delicious sense of comfort and security in a strong man who could fight for her and protect her. There was pleasure in the dominance of his strong hands. With a blissful sigh she settled herself luxuriously in his powerful arms.
* * *
THE END
SHE DEVIL
A WILD BILL CLANTON STORY
First published in Spicy-Adventure Stories, April 1936
OUTSIDE, where dawn was just dispelling the fog-wisps from the South Pacific waters, the sea was calm, but a typhoon was raging in the cabin of the Saucy Wench. Most of the thunder was supplied by Captain Harrigan — vociferous oratory, charged with brimstone and sulphur, punctuated with resounding bangs of a hairy fist on the table across which he was bellowing damnation and destruction at Raquel O’Shane, who screamed back at him. Between them they were making so much noise they did not hear the sudden shouting that burst forth on deck.
Delphi Works of Robert E. Howard (Illustrated) (Series Four) Page 400