George Fenn - Stan Lynn - A Boy's Adventures in China

“Yes! What is it?”

“Hist, boy! Jump up and dress.”

“Oh, it’s you, father!” said the newly aroused sleeper, slipping out of bed – or, rather, off his bed, for the heat of an Eastern China night had made him dispense with bedclothes.

He made a frantic dash at his trousers, feeling confused and strange in the darkness, and hardly knowing whether he was dreaming or awake, as he whispered:

“Is anything the matter?”

There was no reply, and the lad became conscious of the fact that his father had passed out of the room after awakening him.

Dressing in the darkness is not pleasant. Buttons have a habit of making for the wrong holes, socks and collars and ties of slipping off the bedside chair and hiding underneath anywhere; while if it is very dark, elbows come in contact with pieces of furniture, and the back of the hair-brush is liable to come rap against the skull, instead of the yielding, bristly front.

Stanley Lynn went through divers experiences of this kind as he hurried on his clothes, wondering what was the matter the while, and coming to the conclusion that Uncle Jeff must have been taken ill and wanted the doctor.

The lad had just come to this decision when a faint click told him that the door had been reopened – proof of which came in the shape of a whisper:

“Dressed, boy?”

“Yes, father. Is Uncle Jeff ill?”

“Hi? No, my boy. But be very quiet; they don’t know that we are stirring.”

“Who don’t, father?”

“Bah! Don’t ask questions, boy,” said his father in an impatient whisper. “There, there! of course you want to know. Here, Stan, can you fight?”

“A little, father,” said the boy in a tone full of surprise. “I had two or three sets-to at school.”

“Pooh! Absurd! Look here, boy; your uncle Jeff was alarmed by sounds down by the warehouse entry, and looking out cautiously, he saw men at work by the big doors.”

“Robbers, father?” said the boy excitedly.

“Yes, robbers – river pirates.”

“And you want me to go for the police?”

“No, boy; I want you to help us to keep the wretches at bay. We shall be only three with you, and we can’t afford to reduce our numbers to two. Can you load and fire a pistol?”

“Yes, father; Tom Dicks and I used to go rabbit-shooting with one – ”

“Then you ought to be able to hit a man if you can shoot rabbits.”

The thought flashed across the boy’s brain that, though he and his fellow-pupil had gone shooting on the Clovelly cliffs times enough, they had never once hit a rabbit; but there was no time to communicate this fact to his father. “And besides,” he thought, “I dare say firing the pistol will be enough; the noise will frighten the men away.”

“Can you use a sword, Stan?”

“Yes, father. You know I had fencing lessons.”

“Bah!” muttered his elder impatiently. “Poking about a square skewer with a leather-covered button at the end! I mean a service sword – cut and thrust. There! you must try. Catch hold and come along. Loaded, mind.”

The last words were uttered as the boy felt the butt of a revolver thrust into one hand, the handle of a sword into the other.

“Tread softly, boy,” whispered his father. “This way.”

Stanley Lynn felt more confused than ever, for he had only returned from England two days before, after six years’ absence and work at a big school; and the home he had now come to in Hai-Hai was a very much larger and more important place than that he had quitted at Canton years before. Everything had seemed strange, even by day, in the big, roomy, lightly built place connected with the great warehouse and wharf, while the lower part of the former building was used as offices and sampling-rooms. He had not half mastered the intricacies of the place by the previous evening, while now in the darkness – woke up from a deep sleep – everything seemed puzzling in the extreme.

“Got him?” said a familiar voice out of the darkness.

“Yes.”

“That’s right. Don’t be alarmed, Stan. The rascals are breaking into the office, but I think if we keep up a little revolver-shooting they’ll soon go back to their boats.”

“Eh?” cried Stanley’s father. “Then they came in boats?”

“I’ve not seen them; but of course they came in boats. Hist!”

There was no need for the warning, for all held their breath and listened to a low, scratching, tearing noise suggestive of some tool being used to break open a door.

“They’re at the big side-entry,” said Stanley’s father.

“No; it’s the little office door, I’m sure,” said the gentleman whom Stanley’s father addressed as Jeff. “Now then, what shall we do? Go down and fire through the door, or give them a dose out of one of these windows?”

“It all comes of building a place so far from help,” said Stanley’s father, ignoring his brother’s question.

“Don’t grumble, man,” was the reply. “Why, in another year we shall be quite shut in.”

“Will that save us now?” said Stanley’s father bitterly.

“No, Noll, old fellow,” said his brother cheerfully. “We shall have to save ourselves this time – independently. – Like fighting, Stan?” he continued, turning to the boy.

“No, uncle; hate it,” said the lad laconically.

“Ha! I dare say this is not the only time you will be called upon to do things you don’t like. – Now, now, what is it to be – downstairs, and a few shots through the panels?”

“I suppose so – Take care, Stan; they are savage beasts to deal with.”

“Yes, the brutes!” said Uncle Jeff; “but he need not expose himself. We’ll do the work if he hands us the tools.”

“That I shan’t!” muttered the boy, gripping sword and pistol tightly. “Father doesn’t wish me to do that.”

“Come along,” said Uncle Jeff. “Shall I lead, Noll?”

“Yes; go on. – Take care how you come, Stan. And mind this, boy: if the enemy do begin to fire, throw yourself flat on your face at once.”

“Yes, father,” was the reply; and the next minute, as Stan judged, they were standing in a wide passage, listening to the scraping, tearing noise, which sounded dull and smothered, till all at once, after a faint rustling which indicated that Uncle Jeff had unlocked, unbarred, unbolted, and thrown open a door, the cracking and tearing sounded quite loud.

“Bless ’em!” whispered Uncle Jeff, “they mean silk. Never mind; we’ll give them lead instead. Be ready! Silence! They don’t know we’re here.”

As he spoke Uncle Jeff moved towards the spot from which the noise came, and Stan felt his arm grasped above the elbow by his father and guided in one particular direction till he touched his uncle in the dark.

In the brief moments which ensued, Stan, now fully awake not only to what was going on but to the danger of his position, seemed to see a group of rough-looking, semi-savage Chinese – with whose stolid, half-cunning, half-treacherous countenances he had become acquainted during his short sojourn in port – standing just outside the office door, looking on while three or four were plying crowbars and trying to prise open the stout door, which seemed to be bravely resisting their efforts, till all at once there was a sharp crack and the falling inside of a piece of wood.

As the wood fell with a soft, clattering sound all became silent, the attacking party evidently listening for the occupants of the house to raise an alarm, or at all events to make some sign.

But no one inside stirred until, after quite ten minutes – which seemed to Stan like sixty – the cracking and breaking of wood was heard again.