Charlie Chan in the Temple of the Golden Horde

by Michael Collins

  Chan saw the curtain move at a high window in Betty Chan’s building. A quick movement, furtive, and it was the window of what had to be Betty Chan’s own apartment!

  Someone was in the girl’s rooms, and there had been no answer to his telephone calls.

  Chan watched.

  The movement of the curtain came again!

  Someone was looking down at the street. Chan tried the door behind him in the hidden doorway. It was open. He went through and along the corridor to the rear entrance. It opened out into one of the narrow back alleys of Chinatown, cluttered with trash cans and the high fire escapes.

  Chan went along the alley to the cross street, walked back to the corner and across the street out of sight from Betty Chan’s window. He slipped along in the shadow of the buildings to her entrance. No one seemed to be watching him, even the long-haired Chinese youth were gone now. He went into the building.

  It was dim inside, the stairs up narrow and dirty. Nothing seemed to move in the corridors. Chan went up as silent as a ghost. On the landing below the girl’s top-floor apartment, he stopped and listened. He heard nothing above. He went on up even more slowly.

  There was a faint sound behind the closed door of Betty Chan’s apartment. A soft sound like someone stepping quietly. Chan drew his small pistol. He went up to the third floor. Barely breathing, he listened just outside the door, and the sound came again - someone was walking very lightly inside the apartment as if on eggshells.

  Chan saw the iron ladder up to the roof. He climbed it, pushed open the trap, and emerged onto the flat roof in the sun. The fire escape on this building was in the front. He had seen that from below. He went down cautiously, and crouched with his pistol ready outside Betty Chan’s window.

  It was the bedroom window, not the window where he had seen the curtain move. The small bedroom inside was spotlessly neat and empty, the door into the other room closed. Chan climbed inside and stood quietly. Then he saw Betty Chan’s handbag and coat on the bed!

  He stared at the handbag and coat for a time - what woman went out without her handbag? Or her coat on a cool day?

  Chan looked at the closed door. Where was Betty Chan, and who was walking so softly out in the girl’s living room?

  The detective eased the safety off on his pistol, stepped close to the bedroom door. He listened again. He heard the clink of something metal against glass or china, armoire that was across the outside room from the bedroom door

  Chan took a breath and opened the door.

  He flung it open in a sweeping movement and jumped out into the living room with amazing agility for a man of his age and portliness.

  The cup crashed to the floor, and a woman’s scream echoed through the small living room.

  “Do not move, please!” Chan commanded.

  Then the detective blinked.

  Betty Chan lay on the floor of her small kitchenette.

  The girl had fainted There was no one else in the small apartment. Betty Chan was alone. It had been her scream; she had dropped the cup of tea and fainted dead away when Chan suddenly jumped into the room with his gun leveled.

  Surprised, Chan hurried to her. He got some water from the sink and gently revived her. She stared up at him still with terror on her face.

  “It is all right,” Chan smiled. “Only Inspector Chan.”

  “I… I thought… you -“

  Chan nodded. “Naturally you assumed I was an intruder I entered in so unfortunate a manner because my repeated telephone calls received no answer.”

  “It’s not your fault, Inspector,” Betty Chan said.

  The girl got up by herself and sat down in the nearest chair. She lit a cigarette, and her hands shook as she smoked. She looked up at Chan.

  “I was already frightened,” she said nervously. “That’s why I didn’t answer my telephone this morning.” She looked at Chan with her eyes wide and scared. “Inspector, someone’s been watching me! Early this morning someone tried to enter my apartment! I bolted the door, pushed a chair against it, and screamed, and he ran away! But I’ve seen them outside, watching! I know it!”

  “I’m not surprised, Betty,” Chan said. “yesterday, when you left my hotel, I observed men following you. Later, a man followed me.”

  “Is that what you tried to call to tell me?” Chan nodded. The girl seemed to shudder. “Who could they be, and what do they want?” she said. “You think they might have… killed Benny?”

  “Possibly. It’s also possible they are agents of a foreign government and their purpose is to steal the valuable scroll Benny carried.”

  “But the scroll wasn’t stolen, was it?”

  “Perhaps Benny fooled them,” Chan said.

  “He would, you know! He was awful loyal to that Khan man, loved his job at the Temple,” Betty said sadly, and then she shook her head. “Only, the men I saw watching me outside sure didn’t look like foreign agents, Mr. Chan. They looked like thugs, you know, weird people all covered up in capes and big hats so I could hardly even see a face. Just standing down in the street last night late, not even hiding.”

  “Capes and hats? You are sure? They weren’t men in very ordinary suits? One tall and wearing a brown suit? Carrying, perhaps, newspapers? Very casual?”

  “Oh no, nothing at all like that, Inspector. These men were really weird, scary, and they acted like they wanted me to see them. The one who tried to break in made almost no sound when he ran away, like he was wearing sneakers.”

  Chan sat down slowly. He sat facing the young girl. His veiled eyes were points like dark stone. He seemed to be lost in thought for some minutes as he watched Betty Chan.

  “You have never seen these men before?”

  “No. I… They scared me, and I think they wanted to.”

  “Betty, think very deeply. When Benny returned from Hawaii, did he contact you? Did he, possibly, call you from Hawaii? Did anything happen that was unusual? Anything to indicate that Benny had done anything, was frightened of anyone?”

  “I never saw him, Mr. Chan, not since the day before he left for Honolulu this time. He was happy then, doing an important job always made him feel happy, useful. He must have gone directly from the airport to the Temple that night.”

  “No, the people at the Temple say he was late. They had expected him to return earlier. What would make him late?”

  “I don’t know. He didn’t have any friends outside of me and at the Temple.”

  “He was somewhere,” Chan said. “Time is missing. You are sure nothing strange happened, nothing -“

  Betty Chan blinked. “Well… There was one little thing, Inspector, now that I think. I’d forgotten all about it. It didn’t seem important, just very ordinary, and when Benny was found I forgot it.”

  “And you remember it now?”

  “Well, it was just that I was out a little late that evening, didn’t get home until about nine P.M. As I came in, my telephone was ringing. It stopped before I could get to it. I couldn’t think of anyone it could have been except Benny!”

  “He called you often?”

  “Yes - especially if he had troubles. My number is unlisted, so it had to be someone I knew - or a wrong number, I guess.”

  “Wrong number is possible,” Chan agreed thoughtfully. “Also, it is possible that your brother with a problem tried to call.”

  “Maybe if I’d been home -?” she trailed off, her face miserable as she thought of her dead brother trying to call her for help.

  “I’m sure it could not have changed events,” Chan said, and he stood up. “But events happen, and now I suggest you remain off the streets as much as possible.”

  “I’ve got to work, Mr. Chan. I can’t hide.”

  “You work where?”

  “At the Kung Fu Tze Book Store. Today is my day off.”

  Chan nodded. “Work and life must continue, and probably you are in no danger. But walk with care. If you see those men watching you again, seek safety and call myself or the police
.”

  “I will,” Betty Chan said. “What are you going to do?”

  “Deliver a valuable scroll to the Temple of Golden Horde,” Chan said, and smiled. “An opportunity, also, to pay a second visit to the Temple in the innocent guise of volunteer messenger.”

  “You suspect something at the Temple?”

  “I’m still very curious. A sick girl at the Temple may have seen more than she has yet told about the night your brother drowned. Some shadows appear to hang over the Temple. It may be something or nothing.”

  The eminent detective smiled, nodded, and left the neat little apartment. On his way down the narrow stairs, he suddenly stopped. Had a door just ahead been open an inch or two? Open - and closed quietly as Chan appeared coming down? He wasn’t sure.

  He went on down, closed the outer door without going through, and waited. He waited five minutes but nothing happened in the silent building.

  On the crowded street, as he caught a taxi to return to his hotel, he saw nothing suspicious. Only the hurrying throngs of the great city, the thousands of faces that could hide an equal number of secrets.

  IX

  A MESSAGE had been waiting for Charlie Chan at the hotel to call his office in Honolulu. He had done so, and as he drove once more down the peninsula in his rented Toyota, he considered the report of his staff.

  Benny Chan had done absolutely nothing unusual in Honolulu. The handyman had arrived exactly as he had four times before, had gone directly to the house of C.V. Soong in one of the most exclusive sections of Hawaii, and had left again the same day carrying a box exactly like the other four he had carried previously. He had stopped nowhere, met no one, encountered nothing out of the usual.

  Chan drove on to the high iron gates of the isolated Temple. In the sunlight, the eerie atmosphere that hung over the strange temple in the fog of night was gone. It was only a green, pleasant country estate where the tall Chinese pagoda was like a beautiful decoration set in its parklike grounds. Even the barred windows of the Sanctuary building had lost their ominous quality.

  Li Po, and C.V. Soong rose from their cushions in the Khan’s lush Oriental office. With the day, all shadows were dispelled here too, the drapes drawn open, and the sunlight streaming in through open windows. Old Soong greeted Chan with an outstretched hand.

  “I was beginning to worry, Inspector,” Soong beamed. “I should have known better. In the hands of Charlie Chan, all is safe.”

  “Some private business detained me,” Chan said, “but I’m glad to say the scroll is now delivered without incident.”

  He handed the brass-bound chest to the Khan.

  “Many thanks, Mr. Chan,” the Khan said. “It will be locked up at once. Have you learned any more about the tragic death of poor Benny?”

  “No, I have not.”

  Soong shook his head. “I’m afraid I acted somewhat irrationally, Inspector. I realize now that I’m not really sure those men were following me. The scroll made me jumpy, eh?”

  “Valuable treasures are often difficult to live with,” Chan said. He turned to the thin Khan. “You are sure all the other scrolls sent previously are safe?”

  “Oh, yes. Quite safe.”

  “Could some attempt have been made to steal them without you being aware of it? Some small incident overlooked, some insignificant evidence of unexpected visitors?”

  “No,” the Khan shook his head. “Not that I know. We are very concerned for our privacy here, Mr. Chan; alert for anything unusual. Alas, it is necessary because the local residents do not always like us in their midst, and we must be vigilant for any intrusions.”

  Chan nodded. “But it is odd. The theft of a single apple from a prize tree is very rare. Thieves do not often take one jewel from a large box and leave all the others.”

  “I’m sure that no one tried to steal the scroll,” the Khan said. “Poor Benny would not have resisted.”

  “You are sure Benny Chan would not resist a thief?” Chan asked.

  “I’m fairly sure,” the Khan said. “In many ways Benny was as intelligent as anyone - when the problem didn’t confuse him. He read the newspapers, knew that it was best not to resist a theft or mugging. Then, too, Mr. Chan, he was timid, as most retarded are.”

  “What would make him resist, perhaps confuse him and make him unsure whether to resist or run or both?”

  “Any conflict of choice, Inspector. The same thing that confuses all of us, only with Benny it was more acute. Mostly, I’d think he could only attack if he felt it threatened someone else he valued, loved.”

  “You mean,” Chan said, “Benny would have been most likely to resist danger if something he was loyal to was in danger also?”

  “Yes, that’s just what I mean. Like most of his kind, he was fiercely loyal. He would have been very confused by a conflict of fear for himself and fear for someone he was loyal to.”

  “Such as his sister,” Chan said, “or the Temple of Golden Horde?”

  The Khan nodded slowly, watching Chan. “Yes, Benny was very loyal to us, and to me personally. If we were threatened, I think he would have tried to fight, poor man. But I don’t see in what way we could have been in any danger.”

  “Perhaps just the theft of the scroll?” C.V. Soong said.

  The Khan shook his head. “No, Benny knew we valued the scrolls greatly, but I don’t believe the loss of one scroll would have made him feel we were in danger.”

  “But what else could there have been?” Soong said.

  The Khan shrugged. “I don’t know. Nothing. No, I have to think that Benny died fleeing from his private demons. What you in the West call an ‘accident’. Tragic.”

  “Can private demons be seen by others?” Chan asked softly.

  The Khan was silent. A furrow appeared between his dark eyes as if he were choosing the exact words he had to use to say what he had to say. At last he looked up at Chan,

  “It would depend, Inspector, on what you think can be seen, and who was seeing. I believe the spirits are real, solid - they exist. You of the West do not believe the spirits are real - they are visions, hallucinations. For you to see them out in the night would not be possible. You would deny what you saw, refuse to see, call it illusion, unreal. For we who believe, we would see even if the demons came in a dream - it would be real.”

  “Is young Angela Smith one who would see?”

  The Khan shook his head, “I do not know. She is a novice, a learner. The Snow Princess works with her, leads her belief, and I do not know how much she resists, how far she has come on the one true road.”

  “Perhaps now may be the time to find out,” Chan said. “Can we visit her? Talk more?”

  “Certainly,” the Khan said. “Come along, Inspector Chan, Mr. Soong.”

  The three of them went out into the cool sun of the Northern California winter, and across the parklike grounds of the remote estate to the Sanctuary building with its barred windows. In the hospital-like lobby, the burly female attendant in her dark kimono led them through the barred gate and along the silent corridors.

  They turned a corner in the rear, and the woman attendant glanced back at them. “The Smith girl has not left her room this morning, under sedation after last night. But by now -“

  She never finished. A tall man hurtled out of a doorway near the end of the corridor, and ran full tilt into her. Both went down in a flurry of arms, legs and flying kimono. The man was up first, already starting to run on. It was Carleton Sedgwick - wild-eyed and almost white.

  “She’s gone!” the lawyer cried, his voice almost in panic. “Gone! The door was open! We’ve got to -!”

  The Khan restrained Sedgwick. “Stop! Calm yourself, Carleton! Tell us calmly.” The Khan’s eyes stared ahead.

  “Escaped!” Sedgwick said, took two deep breaths. “Angela, she’s escaped from her room again! I must tell the Princess!”

  “Of course, come,” The Khan said. “We will find her, she cannot have gone far.”

  Sedgwick
took another shuddering breath, forcing himself to calm down, but his eyes still jumped in a violent panic. Chan watched the lawyer. Why was the man so agitated? What was so dangerous to Sedgwick about the escape of a disturbed girl who had come to the Temple looking for peace?

  The Khan, Soong and Sedgwick hurried away along the corridor. Chan remained silently where he was. He saw that for the moment they had all forgotten him. When they were gone, he turned and went along to the door where Sedgwick had run out. It was a small, narrow room furnished like a monk’s cell. The single window was barred, with no space for a girl to squeeze through.

  Chan looked at the door. There was a simple Yale lock, but it had been modified so that it could not be locked from inside. It locked only from outside. Chan looked at the lock, scowling. There was also a bolt on the outside! Locked, and bolted, there was no way out of the room.

  Chan considered the door and the lock for some minutes, examined it closely and found no marks of forcible exit.

  Still scowling thoughtfully, the detective went through the almost bare room. On the single dresser there was a double frame with the portrait photographs of a middle-aged man and woman, each photograph signed Love, Mother; Love, Dad.

  There was nothing at all in three of the dresser drawers, and only a pitiful few underclothes and small accessories in the fourth drawer. And two envelopes addressed to Angela, with a return address in Santa Barbara. The letters were gone from both envelopes.

  Chan took one envelope, and left the room. No one stopped him in the silent corridors. Outside, he walked in the sun toward his car. Far off near the pagoda he saw C.V. Soong alone. The Khan was nowhere in sight. But at the entrance to the office building, Carleton Sedgwick was waving his arms as he talked to the tiny Madame Li.

  Chan watched them from the shadows of a tall pine. The small woman seemed angry, speaking sharply to the lawyer. She reached out and slapped the tall man. He seemed to go rigid. They stood there for a moment, face to face like two animals at bay. Then Madame Li reached to touch Sedgwick’s arm. She held to him, turned, and went into the building. Sedgwick followed her slowly.