<h2 id="c10">X</h2>
<p>That stolid practicality which had made
Blake a successful operative asserted
itself in the matter of his approach to the Luiz
Camoes house, the house which had been
pointed out to him as holding Binhart.</p>
<p>He circled promptly about to the front of
that house, pressed a gold coin in the hand of
the half-caste Portuguese servant who opened
the door, and asked to be shown to the room
of the English tea merchant.</p>
<p>That servant, had he objected, would have
been promptly taken possession of by the detective,
and as promptly put in a condition
where he could do no harm, for Blake felt that
he was too near the end of his trail to be put
off by any mere side issue. But the coin and
the curt explanation that the merchant must be
seen at once admitted Blake to the house.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_140">[140]</div>
<p>The servant was leading him down the length
of the half-lit hall when Blake caught him by
the sleeve.</p>
<p>“You tell my rickshaw boy to wait! Quick,
before he gets away!”</p>
<p>Blake knew that the last door would be the
one leading to Binhart’s room. The moment
he was alone in the hall he tiptoed to this door
and pressed an ear against its panel. Then
with his left hand, he slowly turned the knob,
caressing it with his fingers that it might not
click when the latch was released. As he had
feared, it was locked.</p>
<p>He stood for a second or two, thinking.
Then with the knuckle of one finger he tapped
on the door, lightly, almost timidly.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_141">[141]</div>
<p>A man’s voice from within cried out, “Wait
a minute! Wait a minute!” But Blake, who
had been examining the woodwork of the door-frame,
did not choose to wait a minute. Any
such wait, he felt, would involve too much risk.
In one minute, he knew, a fugitive could either
be off and away, or could at least prepare himself
for any one intercepting that flight. So
Blake took two quick steps back, and brought
his massive shoulder against the door. It
swung back, as though nothing more than a
parlor match had held it shut. Blake, as he
stepped into the room, dropped his right hand
to his coat pocket.</p>
<p>Facing him, at the far side of the room, he
saw Binhart.</p>
<p>The fugitive sat in a short-legged reed chair,
with a grip-sack open on his knees. His coat
and vest were off, and the light from the oil
lamp at his side made his linen shirt a blotch
of white.</p>
<p>He had thrown his head up, at the sound of
the opening door, and he still sat, leaning forward
in the low chair in an attitude of startled
expectancy. There was no outward and apparent
change on his face as his eyes fell on
Blake’s figure. He showed neither fear nor
bewilderment. His career had equipped him
with histrionic powers that were exceptional.
As a bank-sneak and confidence-man he had
long since learned perfect control of his features,
perfect composure even under the most
discomforting circumstances.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_142">[142]</div>
<p>“Hello, Connie!” said the detective facing
him. He spoke quietly, and his attitude
seemed one of unconcern. Yet a careful observer
might have noticed that the pulse of his
beefy neck was beating faster than usual. And
over that great body, under its clothing, were
rippling tremors strangely like those that shake
the body of a leashed bulldog at the sight of a
street cat.</p>
<p>“Hello, Jim!” answered Binhart, with equal
composure. He had aged since Blake had last
seen him, aged incredibly. His face was thin
now, with plum-colored circles under the faded
eyes.</p>
<p>He made a move as though to lift down the
valise that rested on his knees. But Blake
stopped him with a sharp movement of his
right hand.</p>
<p>“That’s all right,” he said. “Don’t get
up!”</p>
<p>Binhart eyed him. During that few seconds
of silent tableau each man was appraising,
weighing, estimating the strength of the other.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_143">[143]</div>
<p>“What do you want, Jim?” asked Binhart,
almost querulously.</p>
<p>“I want that gun you’ve got up there under
your liver pad,” was Blake’s impassive answer.</p>
<p>“Is that all?” asked Binhart. But he made
no move to produce the gun.</p>
<p>“Then I want you,” calmly announced
Blake.</p>
<p>A look of gentle expostulation crept over
Binhart’s gaunt face.</p>
<p>“You can’t do it, Jim,” he announced. “You
can’t take me away from here.”</p>
<p>“But I’m going to,” retorted Blake.</p>
<p>“How?”</p>
<p>“I’m just going to take you.”</p>
<p>He crossed the room as he spoke.</p>
<p>“Give me the gun,” he commanded.</p>
<p>Binhart still sat in the low reed chair. He
made no movement in response to Blake’s command.</p>
<p>“What’s the good of getting rough-house,”
he complained.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_144">[144]</div>
<p>“Gi’ me the gun,” repeated Blake.</p>
<p>“Jim, I hate to see you act this way,” but
as Binhart spoke he slowly drew the revolver
from its flapped pocket. Blake’s revolver barrel
was touching the white shirt-front as the
movement was made. It remained there until
he had possession of Binhart’s gun. Then he
backed away, putting his own revolver back in
his pocket.</p>
<p>“Now, get your clothes on,” commanded
Blake.</p>
<p>“What for?” temporized Binhart.</p>
<p>“You’re coming with me!”</p>
<p>“You can’t do it, Jim,” persisted the other.
“You couldn’t get me down to the water-front,
in this town. They’d get you before
you were two hundred yards away from that
door.”</p>
<p>“I’ll risk it,” announced the detective.</p>
<p>“And I’d fight you myself, every move.
This ain’t Manhattan Borough, you know,
Jim; you can’t kidnap a white man. I’d have
you in irons for abduction the first ship we
struck. And at the first port of call I’d have
the best law sharps money could get. You
can’t do it, Jim. It ain’t law!”</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_145">[145]</div>
<p>“What t’ hell do I care for law,” was Blake’s
retort. “I want you and you’re going to come
with me.”</p>
<p>“Where am I going?”</p>
<p>“Back to New York.”</p>
<p>Binhart laughed. It was a laugh without
any mirth in it.</p>
<p>“Jim, you’re foolish. You couldn’t get
me back to New York alive, any more than you
could take Victoria Peak to New York!”</p>
<p>“All right, then, I’ll take you along the
other way, if I ain’t going to take you alive.
I’ve followed you a good many thousand
miles, Connie, and a little loose talk ain’t going
to make me lie down at this stage of the
game.”</p>
<p>Binhart sat studying the other man for a
moment or two.</p>
<p>“Then how about a little real talk, the kind
of talk that money makes?”</p>
<p>“Nothing doing!” declared Blake, folding his
arms.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_146">[146]</div>
<p>Binhart flickered a glance at him as he
thrust his own right hand down into the hand-bag
on his knees.</p>
<p>“I want to show you what you could get out
of this,” he said, leaning forward a little as he
looked up at Blake.</p>
<p>When his exploring right hand was lifted
again above the top of the bag Blake firmly
expected to see papers of some sort between
its fingers. He was astonished to see something
metallic, something which glittered
bright in the light from the wall lamp. The
record of this discovery had scarcely been carried
back to his brain, when the silence of the
room seemed to explode into a white sting, a
puff of noise that felt like a whip lash curling
about Blake’s leg. It seemed to roll off in a
shifting and drifting cloud of smoke.</p>
<p>It so amazed Blake that he fell back against
the wall, trying to comprehend it, to decipher
the source and meaning of it all. He was still
huddled back against the wall when a second
surprise came to him. It was the discovery
that Binhart had caught up a hat and a coat,
and was running away, running out through
the door while his captor stared after him.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_147">[147]</div>
<p>It was only then Blake realized that his
huddled position was not a thing of his own volition.
Some impact had thrown him against
the wall like a toppled nine-pin. The truth
came to him, in a sudden flash; Binhart had
shot at him. There had been a second revolver
hidden away in the hand bag, and Binhart
had attempted to make use of it.</p>
<p>A great rage against Binhart swept through
him. A still greater rage at the thought that
his enemy was running away brought Blake
lurching and scrambling to his feet. He was
a little startled to find that it hurt him to run.
But it hurt him more to think of losing Binhart.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_148">[148]</div>
<p>He dove for the door, hurling his great bulk
through it, tossing aside the startled Portuguese
servant who stood at the outer entrance.
He ran frenziedly out into the night, knowing
by the staring faces of the street-corner group
that Binhart had made the first turning and
was running towards the water-front. He
could see the fugitive, as he came to the corner;
and like an unpenned bull he swung about and
made after him. His one thought was to capture
his man. His one obsession was to haul
down Binhart.</p>
<p>Then, as he ran, a small trouble insinuated
itself into his mind. He could not understand
the swishing of his right boot, at every hurrying
stride. But he did not stop, for he could
already smell the odorous coolness of the water-front
and he knew he must close in on his man
before that forest of floating sampans and native
house-boats swallowed him up.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_149">[149]</div>
<p>A lightheadedness crept over him as he came
panting down to the water’s edge. The faces
of the coolies about him, as he bargained for a
sampan, seemed far away and misty. The
voices, as the flat-bottomed little skiff was
pushed off in pursuit of the boat which was
hurrying Binhart out into the night, seemed
remote and thin, as though coming from across
foggy water. He was bewildered by a sense
of dampness in his right leg. He patted it
with his hand, inquisitively, and found it wet.
He stooped down and felt his boot. It was
full of blood. It was overrunning with blood.
He remembered then. Binhart had shot him,
after all.</p>
<p>He could never say whether it was this discovery,
or the actual loss of blood, that filled
him with a sudden giddiness. He fell forward
on his face, on the bottom of the rocking
sampan.</p>
<p>He must have been unconscious for some
time, for when he awakened he was dimly
aware that he was being carried up the landing-ladder
of a steamer. He heard English
voices about him. A very youthful-looking
ship’s surgeon came and bent over him, cut
away his trouser-leg, and whistled.</p>
<p>“Why, he’s been bleeding like a stuck pig!”
he heard a startled voice, very close to him,
suddenly exclaim. And a few minutes later,
after being moved again, he opened his eyes
to find himself in a berth and the boyish-looking
surgeon assuring him it was all
right.</p>
<p>“Where’s Binhart?” asked Blake.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_150">[150]</div>
<p>“That’s all right, old chap, you just rest
up a bit,” said the placatory youth.</p>
<p>At nine the next morning Blake was taken
ashore at Hong Kong.</p>
<p>After eleven days in the English hospital
he was on his feet again. He was quite strong
by that time. But for several weeks after
that his leg was painfully stiff.</p>
<div class="pb" id="Page_151">[151]</div>
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