by Kirk Munroe
CHAPTER VIII
JO'S ENEMIES PREPARE A TRAP
After the happy conclusion of the law-suit that had for so longdisturbed their peace of mind, our lads left the court-room in companywith a group of congratulatory friends. As they went out, Rob exclaimed,triumphantly, "I told you not to fret, Jo, and that everything wouldturn out all right."
"Yes, but it is through the goodness of Miss Lolimer."
"Who?" inquired Rob, with a puzzled expression. "Oh, you mean Annabel!Yes, isn't she fine? I say, Annabel, I don't know how we ever can thankyou enough for getting us out of that scrape. It was one of the mostplucky things I ever knew a girl to do."
"It wasn't half so plucky as the way you saved my 'turtle kitty' thattime; besides, I was so sorry for your friend, though I didn't know hewas your friend then."
"That's so. I forgot. Let me introduce him. Annabel--I mean MissLorimer--this is my friend, Joseph Lee, from China, only all the fellowscall him Chinese Jo."
"I'm ever so glad to know you, Mr. Lee," said the girl, at the sametime making a prim little bow that was half curtsey. "I never met aChinese boy before, and I think they are awfully interesting. I mean,"she added, quickly, and with a deep blush, "that we are going to Chinasometime, papa and I, and we want so much to know about the queer peopleout there. Not, of course, that you seem queer, because you are dressedin civilized--Oh, dear, what a stupid I am! But won't both of you cometo our house for luncheon? Papa said I might ask you, and he is going toinvite Mr. Hinckley and that Chinese gentleman who sat with the judge.Wasn't he perfectly splendid? Of course, I mean the judge, though theother is lovely, too, in his beautiful clothes."
"My dear," interrupted Mr. Lorimer, "this is Mr. Secretary of LegationWang, who, together with Mr. Hinckley and, I trust, these younggentlemen, will lunch with us."
Mr. Wang, who, being a graduate of Yale, was quite accustomed toAmerican ways, gravely shook hands with Annabel, as he also did withRob; but his exchange of greetings with his own young countryman wasquite different. Instead of shaking each other's hand and saying "Howdo you do, Mr. Wang? Happy to meet you, Mr. Lee," as is the Americancustom, they bowed profoundly to each other several times, all the whileclasping and shaking their own hands and uttering flowery compliments inChinese.
"How funny to shake one's own hand!" laughed Annabel, as she watchedwith delight this novel interchange of courtesies.
"It does not seem funny in our country, Miss Lorimer," said Mr. Wang,who had overheard the remark. "There all gentlemen, and ladies as well,wear their finger-nails so long that there would be danger of cutting,or at least scratching, each other's hands if they should exchange thecourteous salute in the American way. So we shake our own hands, toavoid injuring those of our friends."
"But why do you wear your finger-nails so long?" asked Annabel. "Ishould think it would be very uncomfortable, and that they would getbroken."
"It is an uncomfortable fashion, and a very silly one," replied Mr.Wang. "The long nails are so apt to get broken, as you suggest, thatthey often are protected by silver sheaths. The reason they are allowedto grow long is to show that their wearers are not obliged to labor withtheir hands. Chinese ladies for the same reason, or rather to show thatthey are not obliged to walk, but can afford to be carried about byservants, compress their feet until they are hopelessly and very nearlyhelplessly crippled for life."
"How dreadful!" exclaimed Annabel.
"Yes. Is it not? But is it any more dreadful than certain things doneat fashion's decree in your own country? For instance, in WashingtonI often see ladies dancing, or shivering through long dinners, inlow-necked and sleeveless gowns, which at the same time are so tightlycompressed at the waist as to cause present torture and future misery.I see fashionable men dressed in exact imitation of their own servants,and only to be distinguished from them by a round bit of glass worn withmuch effort, and with absurd distortions of the face, in front of theright eye--not at all to aid the sight, mind you, but simply becauseit is fashionable. Yes, both our nations are guilty of following manyabsurd fashions, and each laughs at the other on account of them; butto my mind the most foolish habit of all is for us to call each other'barbarians' because our fashions in silliness happen to differ."
In all this Annabel was so interested that the lunch-time conversationwas wholly turned upon Chinese topics, with the result that Mr. Wangproved himself not only to be highly educated, widely travelled, andliberal-minded, but one of the most entertaining conversationalistsany of them ever had met. So impressed were his hearers by what thisversatile Chinese gentleman told them, that when the luncheon was endedAnnabel regarded herself as one of the most fortunate girls in the worldbecause of her prospect of going to China; Mr. Lorimer was thinking ofthe same country as probably the most interesting place they shouldvisit during their travels; Mr. Hinckley found his views on the Chinesequestion greatly changed; Rob longed to get back to the land of hisbirth, and Jo was decidedly homesick.
For these reasons the Lorimers were pleased to learn that Mr. Wangproposed to remain in their city a day or two longer, while Mr.Hinckley was anxious to reach home and his own library, where he mightquietly review his newly received impressions. Rob was equally desirousof returning to Hatton and the lessons that must be learned before hecould hope to revisit China, while Jo was made happy by an invitationfrom Mr. Wang to remain with him during his stay in S---- and greetthe other young Chinese then being educated in that vicinity, whom thesecretary had invited to dine with him that very night.
Mr. Hinckley was more than willing that Jo should accept the invitation,and remain away from Hatton for a few days on account of the bitternessof feeling against him that the decision of the court was certainto have strengthened. So Jo remained behind when the Hinckleys tooktheir departure, and that evening, passed in company with Mr. Wangand a dozen companions of his own nationality, was the very happiesthe ever had known. They dined in a room by themselves, were served byChinese waiters procured from a near-by laundry, ate their rice withchop-sticks, drank amber-colored tea without sugar or cream, and didnot speak one word of anything but Chinese during the entire evening.The one drawback to their complete happiness was that during the dinnerMr. Wang received a telegram concerning some business that demandedhis presence in Boston the following morning. He therefore was obligedto leave S---- on a late train that same night, much to his own regretas well as that of his guests. His final instructions to Jo were toentertain his young friends at breakfast the following morning beforeseeing them off on the train for their respective places of study, andthen to remain in S---- until his return, which probably would be withintwo days.
This programme was faithfully carried out by our lad to the point ofescorting his friends to the railway-station and seeing them off. Onereason for his peculiar enjoyment of their company was that owing toRob's constant companionship his own advance in learning English, aswell as in acquiring general knowledge, had been so much more rapid thantheirs that his young companions acknowledged his superiority in theserespects with openly expressed wonder and admiration. Then, too, hisexperience in American law courts, that had resulted so triumphantly,caused him to rank among them as a sort of a hero, to be regarded withgreat respect.
All this was so flattering and so pleasant to Jo that after theirdeparture, when for the first time he found himself without companionsin a city of strangers, his extreme loneliness caused him to seekout the Chinese laundry near the hotel. There he would find otherfellow-countrymen, who, if not of his own rank, at least could talkto him in his native tongue; also he fancied that by them the recentflattery which so had pleased him would be continued. Nor was hemistaken, for when he reached the laundry its inmates received him withprofound kotows, indicating deep respect, and quickly provided him withtea and sweetmeats.
As Jo had been curious concerning the lives and occupations in Americaof these people, who, though belonging to the coolie or lowest class ofChinese, still were his countrymen, he spent more than an hour in thelaun
dry, asking questions and acquiring much information, such as noforeigner could have gained in a lifetime. So interested did he become,that, in order to realize more fully the nature of the work they weredoing, he took from one of them the flat-iron he was using and for a fewminutes operated it himself.
The young student was so intent upon this novel form of investigationas not to realize that he was performing actual laundry-work directlybefore an open window, through which he was plainly visible tooutsiders. Nor did he notice that a man, lounging on the opposite sideof the street, was keeping keen watch of his performance. Even if Johad noticed this man he would have paid no attention to him; nor wouldhe have known that all his movements of that day had been closelyfollowed by that same individual. But this was the case, and when Joappeared at the open window of the Chinese laundry, evidently engaged inironing a garment, the man smiled grimly. At the same time he produced apocket-camera having a telescopic lens, which for a moment was levelleddirectly at the unsuspecting lad.
"I reckon that'll settle his business," muttered the man to himself."Who would have thought of his playing into our hands by doing such afool thing?"
A little later Jo, while sitting in the reading-room of his hotel, washanded a telegram, the very first he ever had received. After carefullyreading the superscription, to make sure that it really was addressedto him, he tore open the brown envelope, nervously unfolded the yellowenclosure, and read as follows:
"BREVOORT HOUSE, NEW YORK CITY.
"Have important need of you here. Take first train. Wire time of your arrival. I will meet you at station.
"(Signed) WANG CHIH TUNG, Secretary, etc."
"Is there any answer, sir?" asked the boy who had delivered thisdespatch and who stood waiting while Jo read it. "Here are blanks if youwant them."
"Yes," replied our lad, speaking slowly, but thinking at top speed. "Iwant to send two of these same things. Can you take them and see thatthey go light away quick?"
"Yes, sir," replied the boy. "That is my business."
"Can you tell me how soon I can get a train for New York?"
"In ten minutes, if you hurry," answered the boy promptly.
"When will it get me to New York?"
"Ten thirty to-night."
"You are sure?"
"Sure, sir, as if I was a railroad time-table."
Relieved at so easily having obtained the information he wanted, andexcited at thus being summoned by so high a dignitary as Mr. Wang, Jowrote two despatches on blanks provided by the waiting boy, and gavethem to him for delivery at the nearest telegraph-office. One was to Mr.Wang, announcing the proposed hour of his reaching New York, and theother, telling of his intended trip to that city, was addressed to Mr.Hinckley. For each of these he paid the boy twenty-five cents, and then,having no time to lose, he hurried to the railway-station. There he hadbarely secured a ticket for New York when an express-train thundered upto the platform. Two minutes later it was rolling swiftly away, carryingas passengers Chinese Jo and the man who had followed his movements soclosely all that day.
