by Grant Allen
This was unspeakable suspense, in the very jaws of death. Why torture me so by such delays? Was it chance that had done it, or was Li Sing still playing with me? Was he trying intentionally to prolong my agony?
But no. Something had surely gone wrong with the working of the machine. There was a hitch, clearly. Li Sing lifted the knife slowly into place once more, and examined the weights and pulleys with close attention. Then he slid it up and down twice or thrice to try it, and felt with his hand for any obstruction in the channelled groove. At last he appeared to have found it. He chuckled to himself once more, and stood up on the platform, gazing benignly at the knife. All was ready now for the final attempt. At last my awful suspense would be ended — by death: and in two minutes more I should be free from a world that grows such things as these yellow-faced Chinamen!
CHAPTER VII.
THE CHANCE OF A MINUTE
The day is done, and the darkness
Falls from the wings of Night,
As a feather is wafted downward
From an eagle in his flight.”
— LONGFELLOW.
WHAT did he do then? Well, then, gentlemen, he adjusted the weights, and put my neck back on the block neatly, for he’d kicked me aside for a time with ms foot while he examined the machinery. He kicked me aside carelessly, as if I were a log of wood; but it was hardly a moment to stand on ceremony, you’ll admit, and I didn’t insist. In fact, I could neither move nor speak, to remonstrate in any way.
But that wasn’t just what I was going to tell you next. I’ve told this story so often now, I’ve got to tell it my own way, or I can’t get through with it. You see, I’ve been leaving Edith rather in the lurch all this time, and natural politeness prompts one to return to the lady. Well, this is how matters fared with her while I was tied up. Of course I wasn’t there to see it all myself; but I tell you as it was told to me afterward.
About eight o’clock that night the Sacramento was telegraphed from the Farallone Islands; and Joe Ashley, who was still on duty at the bureau, awaiting the packet — sent up a little note at the Palace Hotel, where I was staying, and where he expected to find me on the lookout for Edith’s arrival. Four hours later, almost as the clock was striking twelve, the vessel came to an anchor in the Golden Gate, and passengers were allowed to go ashore on the tender.
Now, it was part of Joe’s duty, as it happened, to see the tender land her mails; so he was down on the wharf, by good luck, when Edith arrived there. If he hadn’t been there, Heaven knows what might have happened. He recognized her the moment she came off the steamer — for he’d seen her photograph hanging up in my hut at Cooper’s Pike here — so he touched his hat, and went up to her like a friend. “Miss Deverel, I believe?” says Joe.
And Edith nodded.
“Well, Mr. Freke’s somewhere about on the lookout for you, miss,” Joe said, politely, for he was always a gentleman. “Confounded odd thing he ain’t here to the fore. He was up all night yesterday, waiting for you to arrive; and I sent him word to his hotel when the Sacramento was cabled from the Farallone Light, so he’s sure to be loafing around somewhere on the wharf. But I don’t see him. Jest you sit yourself down on this coil of rope, miss,” Joe went on, looking around, “and I’ll go up and find out if he’s fallen asleep in the waiting-room. You see, he was up all last night waiting for the cable, so he’s got a sort of an excuse for being sleepy this evening,” Joe says apologetically. For he felt my remissness demanded an apology. He had a tender heart, Joe, and he was sorry for Edith. And I must admit that nothing but circumstances over which I had no control — such as being tied on my back under the axe of a guillotine by a bloodthirsty Chinaman — would ever have excused my absence from the post of duty at such a moment. But circumstances, gentlemen, are sometimes too many for the best of us.
As for poor Edith, she felt naturally bewildered at finding herself left alone, this way, at twelve o’clock at night, on an open wharf, with a strange man, in a foreign city. If she grumbled a bit at my faithlessness, I can’t blame her very much; for you see, she could have very little idea indeed how precious little control I had over those detaining circumstances. However, there she sat, a little apart from the crowd, on a coil of rope, watching every one who passed with an eager eye, and waiting in vain for me to come and fetch her.
For ten minutes or more she waited there, shivering. Here was a pretty welcome, indeed, for an English bride to the country where she’d come to meet her future husband! At last Joe came back, more bewildered than ever. “I don’t understand this at all, miss,” he said. “It’s a most astonishing thing. Mr. Freke ain’t anywhere about in the waiting-rooms or saloon; and I’ve searched the whole wharf without finding a trace of him anyhow. This is darned strange,” Joe went on, looking sheepish himself at my not turning up. “All I can tell you is, he’s been down at the bureau of the Pacific every hour for the last twenty-four, a’most, to ask if the Sacramento was cabled from the Farallones; and he meant to come down as punctual as clockwork the moment she was due. I can’t make it out. It beats me altogether where the darned thing can have laid himself.”
“Oh, dear,” cried Edith, wringing her hands, and looking over the edge of the wharf, to where the lights were dancing on the ripples of the harbor; “you don’t think he can have fallen into the water, do you?”
“No, I don’t, miss,” says Joe, very positive, just to quiet her mind a bit; for the suggestion gave him quite a start, it seemed so very probable. “But anyhow, we can’t leave you sitting out like this till Mr. Freke turns up. I’ll tell you what I’ll do. I’ll hire a hack and drive you up to your friends; and then I’ll light out for Mr. Freke’s hotel, and hunt him up, and bring him along to the house to see you.”
“Oh, thank you,” said Edith, feeling quite grateful to the man for his kindness, for she didn’t know herself in the least what to do, and it was a comfort for her to have anybody at hand to advise her. Happily, it never even occurred to her innocent soul that he might be a crook — that’s American for a pickpocket — or she might have been afraid to accept his escort. But she was too simple for that. She thought no evil. So Joe — he was always a good fellow, Joe was — he hired a hack, and saw her luggage safely aboard, and piloted her up to her friend’s residence, on Jefferson Street, close to the Presidio Reservation. But as soon as he’d got her safely stowed away there — and of course, it took some time to get the hack and so forth — he hurried away at the top of his speed, with the very same horse, to the Palace Hotel, right down-town on Montgomery Street.
For he was frightened a bit what had become of me, Joe was.
The moment he reached there, he rushed into the bureau. Now, I suppose you know the Palace Hotel is the biggest establishment of its sort in the United States, and they keep open all night, with electric lights burning; and when Joe looked at the dock, he saw it was just on the stroke of two, for it’s a precious long drive from the Presidio to Montgomery.
“Hello, sir,” says Joe, to the hotel clerk at the register, “has 1427, Mr. Freke, of England, been toting around this evening?”
The hotel clerk looked at the key hung up on the peg, and shook his head. “Why, 1427 went out for a promenade at two o’clock this afternoon,” he said, “and hasn’t returned since. I guess he’s making a night of it away down in Chinatown.”
“By Jingo!” says Joe, growing pale.
“It’s worse than that, I’m afraid. Those blamed yellow men must have drugged him and robbed him.”
“Very likely,” says the hotel clerk, quite jauntily, going on with his books. “That’s a common event. A most ordinary occurrence of life in Chinatown.”
Well, when Joe heard that, he didn’t stop to wait a moment longer. He ran as fast as a pair of Kentucky legs could carry him to the nearest police-station, and there he set what he knew before a cute Western inspector.
“When did you last see him?” says the inspector.
“Four o’clock,” says Joe. “And then he
told me he was going to the Metropolitan Plastographic.”
“Halt there!” says the inspector. “That’s the first thing to try. We’ve a dew, anyway. There’s a yellow-skinned Mongolian sleeps there to keep watch. I know the fellow well. Li Sing’s his name. If murder and robbery’s up, it’s his friends that have done it. These fellows always belong to a gang, I believe. Not but what,” says he, “Li Sing’s always been a solitary, well-behaved sort of a chap. But there! you never know where you are with these yellow-skinned Mongolians!”
So off the inspector started, with Joe in tow; and at twenty-five past two by the City Hall clock they were standing abreast ~ of the Metropolitan Plastographic.
And it was twenty-five past two, as I dare say you recollect, by my own watch, when Li Sing let the knife drop for the first time in that infernal guillotine.
When they reached the door, they looked about for a bell. But there wasn’t any, it seemed. Then the inspector said, “We’d better not disturb the fellow at his game, perhaps. Let’s go round to the back. He sleeps at the back, of course. Hello! What’s up? Why, there’s a light round yonder in the first-floor window!”
For the Chamber of Horrors, though on the ground floor from the front as you entered, was one floor up at the back of the house, the level of the street being raised somewhat above the natural surface.
“Let’s climb up,” says the inspector, “and see what’s afloat. Perhaps we shall find them dividing the swag there.”
Well, they both climbed up, and looked in at the window. The blind was down, but looking round the corner, through the chink of the sash, they could make out something. “Hello, this is odd.”
“This ain’t anything at all,” said the inspector; “I’ve seen Li Sing do all that a hundred times before. He’s only arranging the machinery of that durned guillotine. Though he’s chosen a most remarkable hour to do it in.”
“But what’s that under it?” Joe said, looking closer. “That ain’t the French king.... It ain’t dressed up right.... That’s not waxwork at all.... S’help me God, inspector, that’s a living man the brute’s got under it!”
At that precise moment, with a violent effort, I rolled myself out of the way of the axe; and Li Sing turned sharp round to put me back on the block again.
Before he could do it, however, the inspector and Joe both gave a shriek of horror. In a second they had crashed through the glass of the window, and burst like thunder into the dim-lighted room. Li Sing turned round without a cry or a word. For one instant he faced them, imperturbable still, with that sphinx-like smile upon his Mongolian features. Then the full consequences of the discovery seemed to dawn upon him suddenly. He flung up his hands, and let go the weights. That moment the flashing knife descended with lightning-like rapidity down the grooves in my direction.
How it all happened next, I could hardly tell for a moment, for I was blinded with blood, and stunned with horror. But I felt at least my head was still there. Li Sing had been standing on the platform, adjusting the mechanism, and was stooping to replace my neck on the fatal block, at the very second when Joe and the inspector entered. As he flung up his arms and let the weights go, the knife descended, striking him on the flat of his back, and knocking him down senseless on the platform above me. The blood spurted out from his broken spine, and he gave one wild shriek.
But I myself was unhurt. I was only terribly stunned and shaken.
In three minutes the inspector had cut away the ropes, and lifted me from the floor, and brought in some brandy. Li Sing lay writhing half insensible on the platform. He wasn’t dead. He lingered on for three days, indeed, and was conscious at times; but for the most part he lay delirious on a bed at the hospital, and merely muttered to himself feebly from time to time, “Plenty blood lun out. English gentleman stlanger in Flisco. Li Sing only want to tly piecey expeliment.”
On the third day he died, in fearful agonies. The injury to his spine was quite irreparable. And it was better so. If he had lived to be tried, the mob to a certainty would have caught him and lynched him.
Well, yes, of course, I was shaken a bit, no doubt. It was ten days before I was in a state to be married to Edith; and meanwhile, my hair turned white as snow. But Edith, when she saw it, fully accepted my apology for failing to meet her.
Why, certainly, I did my level best for Joe, of course.
He’s now the secretary of the Cooper’s Pike Natural Gas Supply Association.
Did you happen to notice that pleasant-looking gentleman in the yellow buggy, with the fast-trotting mare, that passed us with a nod this afternoon in the San Quentin Park?
Well, that’s Joe, gentlemen. He’s one of the most prominent citizens of Cooper’s Pike at the present moment; and Edith and I sometimes think that when our Eustace grows up, and comes home from Harvard, he might do worse than make a match of it some day with Joe Ashley’s Dolores.
What’s Bred in the Bone
Originally serialised in Tit-Bits in 1890, this novel was in fact the prize-winner from 20,000 entries in one of the richest literary awards ever offered. The convoluted and colourful plot turns on questions of heredity and atavism, dealing with the ancestry of the Waring twin brothers. The novel also introduces Elma Clifford, who comes on her mother’s side from a line of gypsy snake dancers, as she displays a periodic urge to dance wildly with a feather boa in her bedroom. A murderous judge, multiple mistaken identities and scenes of tribal life in South Africa also feature in the extraordinary plot. What’s Bred in the Bone is certainly a testament to the author’s versatility and cold-blooded grasp of the popular market.
The first edition’s title page
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I.
CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XIX.
CHAPTER XX.
CHAPTER XXI.
CHAPTER XXII.
CHAPTER XXIII.
CHAPTER XXIV.
CHAPTER XXV.
CHAPTER XXVI.
CHAPTER XXVII.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CHAPTER XXIX.
CHAPTER XXX.
CHAPTER XXXI.
CHAPTER XXXII.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
CHAPTER XXXV.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
CHAPTER XXXVIII.
CHAPTER XXXIX.
CHAPTER XL.
CHAPTER XLI.
CHAPTER XLII.
CHAPTER XLIII.
CHAPTER XLIV.
CHAPTER XLV.
CHAPTER I.
ELMA’S STRANGER.
It was late when Elma reached the station. Her pony had jibbed on the way downhill, and the train was just on the point of moving off as she hurried upon the platform. Old Matthews, the stout and chubby-cheeked station-master, seized her most unceremoniously by the left arm, and bundled her into a carriage. He had known her from a child, so he could venture upon such liberties.
“Second class, miss? Yes, miss. Here y’are. Look sharp, please. Any more goin’ on? All right, Tom! Go ahead there!” And lifting his left hand, he whistled a shrill signal to the guard to start her.
As for Elma, somewhat hot in the face with the wild rush for her ticket, and grasping her uncounted change, pence and all, in her little gloved hand, she found herself thrust, hap-hazard, at the very last moment, into the last compartment of the last carriage — alone — with an artist.
Now, you and I, to be sure, most proverbially courteous and intelligent reader, might never have guessed at first sight, from the y
oung man’s outer aspect, the nature of his occupation. The gross and clumsy male intellect, which works in accordance with the stupid laws of inductive logic, has a queer habit of requiring something or other, in the way of definite evidence, before it commits itself offhand to the distinct conclusion. But Elma Clifford was a woman; and therefore she knew a more excellent way. HER habit was, rather to look things once fairly and squarely in the face, and then, with the unerring intuition of her sex, to make up her mind about them firmly, at once and for ever. That’s one of the many glorious advantages of being born a woman. You don’t need to learn in order to know. You know instinctively. And yet our girls want to go to Girton, and train themselves up to be senior wranglers!
Elma Clifford, however, had NOT been to Girton, so, as she stumbled into her place, she snatched one hurried look at Cyril Wiring’s face, and knew at a glance he was a landscape painter.
Now, this was clever of her, even in a woman, for Cyril Waring, as he fondly imagined, was travelling that line that day disguised as a stock-broker. In other words, there was none of the brown velveteen affectation about his easy get-up. He was an artist, to be sure, but he hadn’t assiduously and obtrusively dressed his character. Instead of cutting his beard to a Vandyke point, or enduing his body in a Titianesque coat, or wearing on his head a slouched Rembrandt hat, stuck carelessly just a trifle on one side in artistic disorder, he was habited, for all the world like anybody else, in the grey tweed suit of the common British tourist, surmounted by the light felt hat (or bowler), to match, of the modern English country gentleman. Even the soft silk necktie of a delicate aesthetic hue that adorned his open throat didn’t proclaim him at once a painter by trade. It showed him merely as a man of taste, with a decided eye for harmonies of colour.
