The Red Dragon

 

My dear Miss Sheldon, you must believe me when I say that Manchuria is no place for a lady!” Blakely patted a stray black hair in place and frowned for emphasis. “Even the thought of your being in that country alarms me.”

 

Miss Betty Sheldon also frowned, though her eyes were more thoughtful than worried. Seated in the overstuffed armchair, she could look out over the roofs of Legation Street to the place where the Forbidden City gleamed red and yellow in the setting sun.

 

“Then,” said Betty, in a low, vibrant voice, “I shall have to forego the pleasure of being a lady.”

 

“You mean . . . you mean you’re actually going to discard all my earnest advice and go along? Certainly you can’t mean that! I understand, Miss Sheldon, that your father’s death has left you greatly upset. You must place some faith in the judgment of others. You’d never be able to make the journey. The Japanese swarm over that country. There are bandits, and excessive hardships. There are long marches which are completely without water.

 

“I advise you once more, Miss Sheldon, to let me handle this. I will take the chart and go after the Black Chest. You need only to remain here in Peking while I make the journey. Barring accidents, I should return within three months. After that, I am certain that you will have ample funds for your return to the United States.”

 

Betty Sheldon gave Blakely a cool stare. He was tall and gaunt, and his hair was a sheet of black oilcloth glued to his skull. His shirt bore a wing collar, clean and starched, but his fingernails were filled with ancient, dry dirt. His eyes were brittle things which stared behind you, and never straight at you.

 

“Now let me get this straight, Mr. Blakely. You are to take the chart and bring the Black Chest to me at Peking. Then—”

 

“Then you will reward me with ten per cent of the sale price of the contents of this mysterious Black Chest and we’ll call everything square.”

 

Betty Sheldon shook her head in perplexity. Her corn-colored hair shimmered under the impact of a ray of light and her eyes were as unfathomable, as blue as the deepest portion of the sea. She was very little more than five feet three, and when Blakely climbed out of his chair and paced the room, she felt like Gulliver in Brobdingnag—smaller, in fact.

 

Blakely shook a bony finger under her small, pert nose and his voice sounded like an off-key baritone horn. “Miss Sheldon, I was young once myself. In fact, I am still young.” He paused to brush imaginary dust from his black suit coat. “I know to what depths of folly the younger generation can stoop. This idea of yours is utterly ridiculous. You think—” he shook his finger again, and Betty thought she heard the bones rattle— “you think that you can saunter through Manchuria to this what-ever-it-is, dig a hole, pull out the Black Chest, and then saunter back through Manchuria and arrive in Peking intact. You think you could make your way, unaided, through a seething country, while having in your possession probably no less than a million dollars.”

 

“I didn’t say that the Black Chest was worth a million dollars,” protested Betty from the depths of the chair.

 

“Well, no doubt it is. Perhaps it is worth more than that. I know it’s valuable, or that old fool Sheldon—”

 

“I beg your pardon?”

 

“Eh? Oh, pardon me. That is what the natives called him. Anyway, Miss Sheldon, your father would never have risked his neck twice and yours once to try to get it out unless it was worth plenty. I’m convinced of that. He blew your entire fortune looking for it, didn’t he?”

 

“That’s beside the point, Mr. Blakely.”

 

“Yes, to be sure. But once again, let me state that there are Japanese soldiers in that country. They are utterly lawless. They shoot on sight and kill for the sport of it. And then there are bandits who seek to wipe out every white person who arrives in their vicinity. Some of these bandits stand on rocks, like this.” Blakely raised his arms and pretended to sight along a rifle. “And when they even see a dust cloud, they fire into it before they know who it is.”

 

“Where are the sound effects?” asked Betty Sheldon.

 

“Sound effects! I am sure, young lady, that we were speaking of—”

 

“Never mind.” She stepped away from the chair. Even with high heels and cocky hat she failed to reach his shoulder. “Never mind going over it again, Mr. Blakely. They sent me here from the US Legation. They told me you were a collector, a man schooled in these things. That you were in a position to give me valuable advice.”

 

“Of course I am!” cried Blakely, staring behind her and patting his hair. His mouth was slack, the lower lip protruding.

 

“But I find upon speaking to you that you are interested in only ten per cent of the Black Chest. You place your price at ten per cent. That was not clever of you—it is too little pay. Fifty per cent might have drawn me into a bargain. The ten only showed me that you had determined to cut me out completely. Please don’t trouble me further, and please do not mention this business to anyone.” She went to the door and placed her brown gloved hand on the knob.

 

“But where are you going?”

 

A small, wicked light came into being behind her eyes. “I think I shall ferret out the Red Dragon and see what he can offer me by way of a bargain.”

 

Blakely tottered. He clapped a hand over his forehead and fumbled for his chair, still staring at her, jaw slack. “The . . . the Red Dragon?”

 

She smiled, triumphantly. “Yes. The Red Dragon.”

 

“That devil? You’d . . . you’d actually trust your chart to the . . . the Red Dragon? But he’s no better than a thief! A white thief in a yellow land. He’s despicable!”

 

“Nevertheless, I am going.” She jerked the door open.

 

“But . . . but you’re not going to carry your chart about Peking with you?”

 

“It’s safest with me, Mr. Blakely.” Her heels clattered down the winding wooden steps as though a sergeant major sounded cadence for her. At the bottom she glanced back long enough to see Blakely’s blanched face peering out his door.