E. Hoffmann Price's Exotic Adventures Page 6

Chapter VI

  Ward managed to squeeze through the irregular opening he had clawed and poked into the time-weakened roof. Now that he was an escaping prisoner, he had no qualms about the food and water he had declined when Aminah offered them: but he ignored the bread. There was time only for a gulp of water, and no more than a short one. But it refreshed hint, and so did the prospect of slipping up on Mahmud as he took the Vishnu loot from concealment.

  With the emptied jar as his only weapon, Ward stole down the stairway. Once back at the level of his prison, he paused to listen. Mahmud was cursing, and in a good many tongues in addition to Arab. The fellow was talented. There were several Ward could not understand.

  His progress to the ground floor was slower. A chink in the wall or a hole in the floor were the usual places of concealment. But when he reached the murky gloom of the lower apartment, there was no light except the glow of a pipe. Mahmud was smoking, taking gurgling draughts of hashish. He squatted on the floor, and Ward could just distinguish his hawkish face. The Arab groaned. “Aminah, in the hands of those infidels!” Then he spat and growled, “Allah blacken me if I don’t rip their guts out!”

  Only his white turban was visible as he set aside his hookah. He was stirring in the gloom. Steel gleamed dimly. He must be sheathing a dagger. He stalked toward the front of the house, and Ward crept breathlessly after him.

  But Mahmud did not excavate in the front room. A hinge screeched, and he was on the street. His stride was fluent as a tiger’s; and while Ward cautiously followed him, Mahmud did not look back. Despite the threat the Hindu renegades held over his head, they had not defeated that fierce Arab. Ward could sense that from his gait, and the hand poised on a dagger haft.

  A small earthen pot was no weapon for the impending encounter, but Ward had nothing better. So he stalked his game toward the Alir Mosque. He was positive that Mahmud had not picked up any parcel in the darkness of his house. First a pipe had filled his hands, then steel.

  Mahmud swaggered toward the arched entrance of the mosque, whose minaret towered over the water front. Within, burning wicks floated in several bell-mouthed glass bowls. The wavering oil flames sent long shadows chasing across the walls. Ward, huddled in the darkness between two closely spaced columns, watched Mahmud stride purposefully among beggars who lay snoring on mats spread here and there. The house of Allah is the poor man’s house, and during the day, it is his club.

  Mahmud passed the fountain in which a true believer must at least ceremonially cleanse himself before prayer. He had not even removed his shoes. And then, somewhat closing the gap between them. Ward knew that he had mistaken the Arab’s reason for visiting the mosque. It was not to pray for his daughter’s safety, not for vengeance.

  Mahmud was kneeling in a far, dusky corner, but he did not face toward Mecca, nor was he making the familiar genuflections. There was the muted ring of steel, a click-scrape-thump. He was getting at something concealed in the masonry of the mosque, an ideal hiding place. Not even the law would lightly profane this place, and the Hindus who had trailed Mahmud—doubtless members of some sect who despised Vishnu as much as they did Allah—would be torn to small and ragged pieces if they as much as approached the sacred enclosure.

  Ward lost sight of Mahmud for a moment, when he swiftly rose and ducked into the gloom of a colonnade. The unexpected completion of the probing had caught him off guard. His heart was thumping, and his teeth clenched as he considered the chance that his quarry might elude him. Then, making all the haste he dared, Ward emerged from the mosque. He caught a glimpse of Mahmud, silhouetted against the mouth of a narrow alley.

  To slip up on Mahmud and smash the earthenware jar over his turban and then snatch the loot was no more hazardous than his previous maneuvers; but the Arab’s daughter complicated things. Such a course would condemn her to death. Ward could scarcely do that out of necessity, much less for profit.

  Other free lances might shrug it off by reasoning that she was just another Arab girl, and the daughter of a thoroughly worthless father; but Ward was squeamish about women, regardless of race. Though Aminah had neatly tricked him, he could not resent her loyalty and quick-wittedness in behalf of her father. Moreover, Ward had caught the despairing note in Mahmud’s lurid oaths as he set aside his hookah, swallowed his avarice, and set out to extricate Aminah.

  And knowing how deeply greed is burned into the heart of the average Arab, Ward could not remain unmoved by that ruthless fellow’s sacrifice. Thus, as he trailed him, the American was racking his wits for some way of saving the girl’s neck and also seizing the plunder.

  But the next instant jerked Ward from thought to action. The Arab yelled as a patch of shadow detached itself from the gloom and for a moment masked his white turban. A descending knife glittered, and the alley echoed with wrathful Cantonese. Yet, despite the surprise, Mahmud was defending himself before he had fairly pitched to the ground.

  Ward dashed forward, yelling at the top of his voice, “Ya mumineen! O true believers! Help, in the name of Allah!” He made that dark quarter ring as though a full-blown riot were in progress, and some of the beggars in the mosque, aroused from their sleep, heard the cries of a Moslem in distress and echoed it as they came reeling out toward the excitement.

  Ward hurled the jar. It spattered to pieces against a wall. Mahmud’s assailant broke away before the disguised American could close in. The Arab regained his feet, took a step, then collapsed ; but though he did not overtake his assailant, that made no difference. The fellow dropped, groaning and gurgling. His knife had bitten deep, but he had also eaten steel.

  And as true believers came pouring into the alley, Ward was at Mahmud’s side, supporting him as he said. “He is done, brother.”

  “There is no god but Allah,” said the Arab. “Ay, wallah! Here is the slayer and the slain, and there is neither might nor majesty save in Allah, the merciful, the compassionate!”

  His wound had sobered him. He heard Ward solemnly say, “Brother, all things come from him! Verily, power is his!”

  Mahmud’s bloody fingers relaxed from the dagger hilt and sank into Ward’s wrist. Then be gasped, as robed figures closed in about them. “There is a parcel near me—I dropped it as I fell—swear that thou wilt take it—to—those who hold my daughter—Aminah—captive. It is the price of her life—”

  “Where?”

  “Deliver it—” said Mahmud.

  “Allah will reward thee. And so—will my purse—and if the girl pleases you—you are a true believer—she is yours and—”

  “Allah, by Allah, and again, by Allah!” Ward swore. “But where?”

  The bloody foam that drooled from the Arab’s mouth dripped down on Ward’s hand. Mahmud was fighting for breath. The crowd of spectators, some carrying torches, were babbling and chattering. And the police were approaching on the run. But despite the confusion, he managed to understand what Mahmud coughed in his ear. It was an address on Great Pagoda Street.

  Ward, under cover of lifting the dead man from the mire and setting him near the wall from whose angle his assailant had bounded, managed to snatch the parcel that Mahmud’s robe had half concealed. He groaned, bewailed the shattering of his jar, cursed as he knelt on a sharp fragment—and managed to hide the package in his own sash. It was hardly larger than a cigar box.

  And then the law closed in. The presence of the Moslems Ward had summoned kept the Sikh policemen from concentrating on him. He had obviously tried to save a true believer, yet he was no more involved than any of those others—all of which he had in mind when he gave the alarm.

  Yet endless moments passed before he knew that he would not be jockeyed into the awkward position of star witness; that his incoherent, muddle-headed report made him blend into the crowd, neither more nor less than any of his outraged fellow’s. But what clinched it all was the body of the Chinese assailant. Ward recognized the late Tsang Li’s gatekeeper; and w
hile the Sikhs who patrolled the warehouse district did not realize the significance of this, police headquarters would. Until then, it was just another case which death had conveniently closed.

  Ward sighed his relief when, making the most of a chance, he unobtrusively slipped from the indignant throng. He had to work fast, before the identity of the dead Arab was broadcast, and all the mysterious, clashing factions of Moulmein’s underworld interpreted the doubly fatal encounter.

  “Tsang Li’s gatekeeper,” he reasoned, “lost face for admitting an assassin into the master’s house. So, regardless of orders about postponing vengeance, this fellow struck. He must have been watching Mahmud’s house. Damn lucky he didn’t harpoon me by mistake—”

  He headed for the mosque near the railway jetty. There he washed Mahmud’s blood from his hands and garments, and ventured a look at the contents of the silk-wrapped parcel. It contained the miniature image of Vishnu, and its jewels were intact. He had a fortune in his hands—and also, a woman’s life.

  A freelance had no business with qualms. He had learned that in the Shan States. And this was a richer prize. But Ward’s mind was made up when he set out for the house on Great Pagoda Street, leaning on a stout, staff-shaped stick he had picked up along the water front. Whether the Hindus recognized his imposture or not, there was more than a chance that they would try to knife him, just to get a dangerous character out of the way.

  A rickshaw turned the corner and into Great Pagoda Street. A man in whites and a straw hat rode in it. Ward shrank into a doorway, just as a second rickshaw overtook it. By the dim light that came from a Chinese shop window, he recognized the passengers of both vehicles: Marley Hampton, overtaken by his daughter as his own driver slowed down to look for an address.

  Hampton angrily exclaimed, “Win—what the devil are you doing here? Go back home!”

  “I won’t!” Her voice was low but tense. She leaned from her rickshaw to seize his arm. “Not unless you do, dad. I know what you’re up to. You’re crazy—you’ll get killed—”

  Hampton’s heavy face tightened with wrath. “Win,” he said, “you’re a grown woman, but by Heaven—I’ll—I’ll—”

  She recoiled from his expression, more than his half-striking gesture. She slumped wearily, and choked a sob. Hampton tossed her coolie a coin and a curse, ordered him away. Then he growled at his own man who moved on. But Win, suddenly regaining her spirit, halted her coolie and half hysterically cried after her father’s advancing vehicle, “I know where you’re going. I’ll call the police—”

  Then Ward slipped from cover, and before she could repeat the half-coherent threat that her father had either ignored or misunderstood, he was at her side. She froze, audibly gasped at the sudden apparition. The neighborhood was none too savory at that hour.

  “It’s all right,” said Ward in English. “Go home. Win. I’ll keep him out of a jam.”

  “Oh—Mr. Ward—Denis—” She could hardly believe her ears.

  “Right. Go back. It’s my party. And I’ll finish it.”

  “But he’ll be killed. So will you. I read all about what happened before you phoned me. You’re reported as probably murdered, and—”

  “I told Ling Fu to spread that,” Ward improvised. “Now run along, please. And do pull yourself together.” Then he said to her driver, in the vernacular, “Go by bright streets. I’ve got your license number, and I’ll cut you lengthwise if any one says even a word to her on the way. The Winthrop, and quick!”

  She could not understand, but the iron of his voice assured her, as it put fear into the coolie’s heart. Like most of Moulmein, he had heard of an Arab who would rather mince flesh than words, and before she could say more, her rickshaw was on its way.

  That left Ward to carry on. Dimly ahead of him he saw Hampton alight from his vehicle and dismiss the coolie. He was swallowed by a doorway near the one that Ward was seeking.

  “That damn pig-headed pilgrim! He’s asking for it. And he wouldn’t, if he had half Win’s sense!”

  Chapter VII

  The door Ward approached was shadowed by a deep archway. He knocked, and announced in Hindustani that mimicked Mahmud’s voice, “I am here, and if you have harmed her, I will eat your hearts.”

  A hashish cough made it doubly convincing. The door creaked open. A palm-oil lamp flickered in a far corner. Wavering shadows obscured Ward’s lace as well as the oily features of the two men who came forward to join the one who had admitted the dangerous caller. A slender Arab girl lay bound on the floor, in the light of the floating lamp wick. This must be Aminah, whom he had only seen passingly, by the false dawn. She was now unveiled, and a Hindu, squatting beside her, was ready to slice her throat with a broad-bladed kukri if she cried out, or her supposed father made a false move.

  “Where is it?” demanded the spokesman, extending a pudgy hand.

  Ward growled, “Let her speak first. Perhaps—Allah strike you dead—it were better for her to die, after being in your hands!”

  Aminah’s eyes widened. She had sensed the false note, and knew already that this was not Mahmud. Ward half exposed his parcel. There was an instinctive craning of necks as he fingered the wrappings. Aminah’s guard let his glance shift from his captive, and his kukri moved out of line.

  That was when exposed rubies glowed redly in the dim light. Ward shot the statuette forward with a straight-arm move that launched it like a bullet. It smashed the girl’s guard squarely in the face, so that blood from his forehead blinded him and the impact stunned him. Then he lunged between the three, who were too close for effective stabbing. He whirled, smacking his staff across a hand that darted forward with a knife. The blade skated across the hard-packed dirt floor, and a man howled from the pain in his shattered wrist. Aminah screamed, her supple body whipping like a serpent, so that the blind slash of her captor did not quite reach its mark.

  Her bound legs upset the primitive lamp. The wick flared high, guttered out as Ward side-stepped a licking blade. He flailed his cudgel, and heard it snap in the dark. An inner door smashed open, just as one of his assailants tackled him in the dark, bearing him to the floor.

  Light poured through the opening. Ward, kicking a bare foot into the stomach of the man who was crawling toward him with a dagger, saw Marley Hampton and two Hindus charging in. Their foreheads were marked with Vishnu’s trident. Hampton’s face was blank with alarm; he looked as though a rabble had suddenly burst into a board of director’s meeting.

  But the two whose triple-streaked brows identified them as devotees of Vishnu lost no time in getting into action. Ward, however, was quicker. He wrenched the knife from the grasp of his stiffened opponent, jerked clear of the one whose thrust was on the way, and leaped for the door.

  They recoiled. Mahmud’s reputation made them hesitate. And in the howling confusion, no man’s voice could be distinguished. The American sidestepped before either could urge the other to take the lead. He seized the small table about which they had been sitting, and hurled it athwart them.

  One went down, cracking his head against the jamb. And then there was a hammering outside, at the door through which Hampton must have entered. Heavy voices boomed in Punjabi ; a squad of Sikhs were breaking in. The other devotee of Vishnu yelled and turned on Hampton, whom he seemed suddenly to suspect of treachery, of having baited a trap.

  They rolled into Aminah’s prison before Ward could intervene. The street door was splintering under the attack of the police. Ward plunged into the darkness after Hampton and his assailant, and seizing the bolt of the connecting door, he jerked it shut. He slapped the bolt home just as the Sikhs charged into the adjoining house; and above the uproar, he heard English voices.

  Ward closed in on Hampton and his assailant. The American’s coat ripped. That was all he needed to pick one from the other. He hammered a hard fist into the Hindu’s face, drove him end for end into a corner.


  “Cut it out, Hampton! This is Ward! You’re clear—get out—”

  “How—what the hell—” Hampton groped, hearing the welcome voice of a countryman.

  “Strike a match!”

  Hampton groaned; from the adjoining building came the confused rumble of raiders’ voices, Punjabi and English. They were at work at the connecting door. Then Hampton’s match flared.

  He was thoroughly shaken, and he clutched his side, where his coat had been ripped by a glancing knife—a long slash that could not be serious, as it must have grazed his ribs instead of sinking point-on.

  “Get out!” growled Ward, “before you’re pinched for being mixed up with the Vishnu treasure. Some one tipped the cops, and you’re sunk. Give me those matches!”

  “Where—how—Lord, they’re hammering at the street door—”

  “The window!” Ward boosted him to the sill. It was unglazed, and there were no bars. “Plow through. Maybe you’ll make it—”

  He struck a match. The emerald Vishnu lay near Aminah and the captor who had been knocked out when it bounced from his forehead. The girl had worked her wrists free of her bonds, but her ankles were still secured.

  “Sahib,” she cried, extending her hand. “Here—”

  “They won’t hurt you—it’s the police,” was Ward’s answer. He ignored her appeal, snatched the temple loot, and headed toward the window.

  But he had lost too much time, even in those scant seconds needed to get Hampton out of the way, and find the prize. The bolt hasp suddenly tore out, and the door crashed open. Flight was now hopeless; they’d jerk him from the sill, if they did not shoot him for resisting arrest or club him senseless.

  Ward lurched face down, letting the statuette tumble as it would. It had barely come to rest against a half-conscious Hindu when flashlights blazed, and the police plowed in. Ward, faking exhaustion to gain a few seconds, saw that white officials had accompanied the raid, and that the sergeant, who had two nights previous questioned him at headquarters, was in charge.