Toughey Spivits manfully bore up under the sixty-pound keg. The weight of rifle and pack, added to this, drew the sweat from his broad brow and took his wind.
They were in a suburb of the town when Mitchell called a halt so that he could choose between two roadways. Toughey thumped the keg to the ground and sat upon it, swabbing out his cap band and then selecting a cigarette from it.
“Wonder what’s in this thing,” said Toughey, scratching a match on the keg.
“Never mind what’s in it,” replied Mitchell. “All I know is, it’s going to Shunkien and in Shunkien it’ll arrive. This is Tuesday, isn’t it?”
“Yeah,” said Toughey.
“My orders is that we get this to Shunkien on Saturday. We got to average fifty miles a day.”
“Fifty miles a day!” growled Toughey. “Hell, Sarge, we can’t hoof it that fast. Not with this damned thing draggin’ me down like a sea anchor. It just ain’t human, that’s what.”
“Who said anything about anybody bein’ human?” replied Mitchell. “If your scuppers are under, I’ll take it.”
“Hell, it ain’t heavy. Do I hear guns?”
“It isn’t a symphony orchestra, that’s a cinch. They must be fighting out there someplace.”
“How we going to get through a battle?”
Mitchell shrugged. “How we going to get through two battles? Say, wait a minute. Don’t say I never take care of my troops.”
Mitchell let out a string of Chinese and walked across the street. Toughey watched him approach an alleyway and then come back with two scared coolies in the shafts of two dusty rickshaws.
“Stow your cargo,” said Mitchell, “and mount rickshaw.”
“Aye, aye, sir,” said Toughey with enthusiasm. He thumped the keg to the footboards and clambered in.
The two big coolies failed to understand anything about this. The two men in green uniforms were certainly white and therefore not Japanese, but what were white men in green uniforms doing in shattered Liaochow?
The two big coolies failed to understand anything about this. The two men in green uniforms were certainly white and therefore not Japanese, but what were white men in green uniforms doing in shattered Liaochow?
Mitchell barked a string of Chinese commands and the coolies bent their backs and trotted off. Toughey sat back and viewed the scenery.
“This ain’t bad,” said Toughey. “Why the hell hasn’t a landing party thought of this before? Say, do you suppose Davis would let me stow this guy away for future reference?”
Mitchell stretched out his long legs and lay back. “I don’t know how long this is going to last, but while it does, it’s the cat’s.”
The rickshaws rolled to the slap of bare feet. The big North Chinese were as tireless as a team of Clydes. The muscles in their glistening backs rippled and they trotted with the rhythm of metronomes.
The plains behind the city stretched out endlessly in all directions, strewn at intervals with the debris of war. The rear-guard action of the departing Chinese had not been without its casualties. Dogs and pigs wandered aimlessly through the fields. Occasionally the Marines passed a peasant sitting with head in hands beside the road, looking up bleakly and blankly at the strange foreign devils.
All went well for many kilometers and then the growing rumble of shellfire became very plain. It was five o’clock in the afternoon but the sun had long been hidden in the war-thickened air, and it was now twilight.
Rounding a curve in the road, they came upon the rear of the still-fighting Japanese army.
A cluster of huts, dwarfed by stacks of war supplies, was peopled by the soldiers in mustard.
Magically, a cordon of Japanese troops stretched with glittering bayonets before them.
“Halt,” said Mitchell, rather belatedly as the coolies had already stopped in shivering dismay.
A taii, gaudy with red bands, stepped forward and snapped, “Doko e yuku!”
“What’s he talkin’ about?” growled Toughey.
“That’s one lingo I don’t sling,” said Mitchell.
Toughey snorted. “Looks like an organ grinder’s monkey, damned if he don’t!”
“Ah,” bristled the Japanese staff lieutenant, “so I look like a monkey, eh?”
“Yeah,” said Toughey, feebly.
“Shut up,” said Mitchell. “Lieutenant, you will please remove your troops from across the road in order that we may pass.”
“Pass? So you wish to pass? And where do you think you are going?” The lieutenant’s black brows lifted in mock surprise. “Perhaps you are carrying messages to the Chinese, eh? Perhaps you have contraband of war there, eh? No, no, it is impossible that you pass.”
Mitchell stepped out of the rickshaw. Standing very straight-backed, he was head and shoulders above the lieutenant.
“Sir,” said Mitchell, carefully, “I am Gunnery Sergeant James Mitchell of the United States Marines, in command of a landing party from the cruiser Miami of the Asiatic Station. My destination is the United States Consulate at Shunkien. You will please remove your troops instantly.”
The lieutenant carried a little stick and he tried to tie it into knots. “A sergeant! A sergeant and you dare speak to a ranking officer in this manner? How dare—”
“Get this,” said Mitchell. “A private in the United States Marines would rank an admiral in the Japanese Navy. Unless you order your troops to retire instantly, I shall be forced to report interference with the duties and operations of a landing party on a peaceful mission. Of course, if you wish to make an incident of this . . .”
The Japanese lieutenant was quite beyond speech. The infuriating lack of diplomacy in this American was enough to make his ancestors shriek in dismay.
Abruptly the lieutenant wheeled and scurried into a hut nearby. He was gone for some time.
“Maybe I hadn’t ought to have said that,” said Mitchell. “But he made me sore.”
“Aw, what the hell,” said Toughey. “You’n me could go a long ways toward cleanin’ up this batch of ———.”
The coolies were sweating terribly even though they had stopped working. They kept casting their eyes on the back trail.
Presently, the lieutenant appeared in the doorway and jerked his thumb at Mitchell, and Mitchell followed him into the presence of a very Buddha of a staff officer who sat in the middle of a meal big enough to feed half his army.
“This is the fellow,” said the staff officer. “Quick, where are your diplomatic passports?”
Mitchell was very prompt. He pulled back his overcoat collar and displayed the globe and eagle and anchor on his lapel. “There is my passport, sir.” He reached into his pocket and brought out a sheaf of onionskin paper. “And here are my orders.”
The staff officer wiped his hands on his tunic and took the orders. He mumbled over them for some time and then laid them down on his desk. “Very good. These are perfectly in order. You may proceed.”
Mitchell held out his hand. “My orders, please.”
“Ah, no. I can, of course, give you a receipt for them, but I am afraid that these will have to remain here as well as your coolies. We can allow no Chinese to pass through our lines and I see no mention of them here.”
Mitchell’s hand rested on the smoothly polished flap of his holster. He glanced around and saw that two sentries were very alert by the door.
He began to argue. But the staff officer was very polite, smiled and steadily shook his head in the negative.
There was a certain responsibility, said the staff officer, in letting two Marines through the lines. Without these papers to show in case of accident, the staff officer was sorry but he could not let the Marines continue.
And finally, fuming but baffled, Mitchell went back to the rickshaws.
“Get out,” ordered Mitchell.
Toughey groaned and got out. He put the rifle across his back and the keg on his shoulder and stood waiting for Mitchell to lead him on.
Mitchell took two si
lver dollars of his expense money and gave it to the Chinese coolies. They bit the silver and made it ring and then started to turn around to head back for Liaochow.
Mitchell jerked his head at Toughey. “March.”
The cordon opened up and they passed through, trudging up the dark roadway with the rumble of guns a steady concussion in their ears.
Behind them two pistol shots were sharp in the darkness.
Toughey gave Mitchell a quick look and said, “The dirty sons!”
Mitchell did not look back. He seemed to be watching a line of far-off flames which leaped redly into the sky.
Chapter Five
A dark and muttering midnight found Mitchell and Toughey slogging southwest with the din of war blazing all along the northern horizon. They had succeeded in skirting the main point of contention between the Japanese advance guard and the Chinese rear guard and had crossed the disrupted bed of the northwest-running railroad.
The sight of the blasted rails had been very discouraging to Toughey, as the last time he had had contact with them he had been riding a comfortable cushion.
They stumbled into a river bottom and for an hour poked into the huts along the banks to find a man who could find them a boat. Their luck held and soon they struck a roadway on the other side.
Toughey put the keg down and began to kick it along the uneven surface, occasionally swearing and rolling it up out of a ditch after a particularly hard boot.
“I’ll take it any time,” said Mitchell.
“Aw, what’s the matter? You think I’m fallin’ apart or something? I may have my twenty years in, but I’ve—”
“I was only trying to spell you,” said Mitchell. “Chengchu is a mile or two ahead, if I remember this country. We’ll try to get some rations there and maybe dig in for a few hours. We’ve made about twenty-five miles.”
“A hundred and seventy-five to go,” said Toughey and then, despite the bad meter, began to bawl, “A hundred and seventy-five miles to go, boys, a hundred and seventy-five miles to go. We’ll walk a while and rest a while when we’ve a hundred and seventy-four miles to go. A hundred and seventy-four miles to go, boys, a hundred and seventy-four miles to go. We’ll walk a while and rest a while when we’ve a hundred and seventy-three miles to go. A hundred and seventy-three miles to go, boys, a hundred and seventy-three miles to go. We’ll walk a while and—”
They both stopped.
Up ahead there rose a sound which might have been a binding machine or a riveting hammer or a kid running a big stick along a picket fence.
Scarlet tongues of fire were stabbing the ebon sky and a rosy glow marked the place where Chengchu once had been.
The sound, which might have been a signal clacker and wasn’t, stopped and then started up again.
“Somebody is having a party,” said Mitchell dryly.
Toughey looked to his commanding officer and then rolled the keg back until it was up against his leg. He took his rifle off his back and checked the magazine.
Brisk hoofbeats sounded ahead. Mitchell grabbed Toughey’s arm and Toughey grabbed the keg and they rolled off the road into a muddy ditch.
A squadron of Japanese cavalry rocketed by, heading east. Against the stars Mitchell saw two empty saddles. Something black was hanging down from one, bouncing as it hit rough spots in the road.
“Chinese troops ahead,” said Mitchell. “We’ve come up with their wing.” He wondered a moment about the possibility of nervous sentries and then turned to Toughey. “Come on.”
Toughey shouldered the keg and they stepped back up on the road to proceed short distances at a time, to stop and listen intently.
The town grew larger and the surrounding plain began to glow eerily from the light of the flaming town. Beneath the smoke, lorries were moving out, going west.
Expecting momentarily to be greeted by the machine gunner, they left the road and began to circle to the left. They stumbled from time to time over the debris of a battle so recent that the acrid fumes of smokeless powder still hung in the dust. Evidently the Japanese had been rolled back at this point but had bulged the Chinese center until the troops in Chengchu were in danger of being flanked.
Mitchell appreciated this in a vague way. He surmised that another Japanese army was coming up from the south and that another Chinese army was trying to stop its progress. The only thing he knew clearly was that this was a bewildering hodgepodge of yellow men with rifles.
The last lorry rumbled out of sight ahead of them and a squadron of Chinese troopers were momentarily silhouetted against the flames of a burning warehouse. All outposts were evidently drawn in and the cavalry was on the scout.
Mitchell warily approached the end of a street. They were tired and hungry and they read little likelihood of food in this gutted village. But Mitchell knew better than to go stumbling across the plains in darkness with cavalry nervously outriding.
The blasted houses presented an ugly sight. A Chinese soldier hung head down out of a window, fingertips touching the ground. An old woman was sprawled in the gutter, almost covered by the burst bag of possessions she had tried to save. A wounded and deserted Chinese soldier hitched himself slowly around the mounds in the street, leaving a squirming trail in the dust like a snake’s, inching himself west after the departing lorries.
Ahead, a cavalry patrol had stopped before the only building in town which had remained intact. It was the local hotel and before it stood an American car.
Mitchell called a halt and Toughey put down the keg with a weary thump.
“We better not run into that,” said Mitchell, pointing ahead at the clustered horsemen.
Toughey sat down on the keg and planted his rifle butt in the dirt.
“Wonder what they’re up to,” said Mitchell. “If they’ll clear out, that car might be in running condition.”
“Car?” said Toughey, brightening.
Three of the Chinese were dismounted and inside. They came out now, leading a girl in a blue swagger coat.
At first Mitchell thought she was Chinese and then by the flaring flames across the street he saw her face. She was white!
She threw the three soldiers away from her. An officer was pouring a tirade of Chinese into her stubborn ears. She stood defiantly before them, glaring at them.
“Clear out!” she shouted at them. “Beat it! Leave me alone!”
The officer made a movement with his hand and the three soldiers strove to lay hands on her again. But she was too swift for that. She beat at their faces with her bare hands. Her hat came off and her platinum hair streamed down over her shoulders.
She whirled and ran, the Chinese following. Ahead of her she saw Mitchell and Toughey and, taking them for more Chinese, tried to turn and double back.
The three troopers were upon her instantly, seizing her arms.
Mitchell paced forward. The first man thought that an artillery shell had hit him. The second thought not at all. The third stood aghast, slack-armed, backing up. Behind him an arm sprang into being, whirled him around. Toughey gave him a solid punch in the chest which sent him rolling up against the corner of the hotel.
The girl was facing Mitchell. Her mouth was open in amazement and her bright blue eyes were very wide, made wider by mascara. “F’gawd sakes!” she gulped. “Th’ Marines!”
“Yes’m,” said Mitchell. “Will that car run?”
“Sure. How did you think I got here?”
“Oh, boy,” said Toughey, hugging his rifle to port and whirling to face the troopers.
The Chinese officer, his voice loud and shrill, advanced upon them. Behind him he knew that every carbine in his squadron was unlimbered.
Mitchell stepped forward to meet him. They talked swiftly and angrily.
“Where’s the rest of you guys?” demanded the girl.
“Ain’t two of us enough?” said Toughey out of the side of his face.
“That guy slings the lingo, don’t he?” said the girl.
“Yeah,”
said Toughey. “He slings the lingo and I sling the lead. This ain’t no tea party, sister.”
“You’re tellin’ me?”
Mitchell’s height was taut. His lean, tan face was stiff and the Chinese rapid-fired out of his mouth like a 1917 Browning.
“He sounds like a native,” said the girl. “How come?”
“His pa was a missionary around here once.”
She seemed to find this very funny and Toughey growled, “Shut up. We ain’t out of this yet by a hell of a ways.”
Mitchell was walking straight into the officer, and the Chinese, faced with such an irresistible force, could do nothing but give ground. Toughey and the girl moved up in Mitchell’s wake, Toughey kicking the keg along.
Mitchell turned. “He says everybody has got to get out of this area. He says he was just trying to make you move along. You’ve got to go someplace but he doesn’t know where and neither do I. What are we going to do with you?”
“Do you have to do anything with me?” said the girl.
“This is your car, isn’t it?” said Mitchell.
“In a way.”
“Then get into it.”
The girl got in and Toughey lifted the keg after her. The uncertain troopers sat their nervous horses, rifles in hand. One of them pulled slowly out of the group and rode around in back of the hotel. He was gone for some time and when he came back, Mitchell was sliding under the wheel of the car.
The trooper yelled to the officer and the officer whirled to shout at his men.
Mitchell stepped off the clutch and on the gas. The car shot away. The troopers surged ahead. A carbine banged and glass showered out of a window.
Toughey jabbed the glass out of the back. He fired and worked his bolt and fired again.
“And a bull’s-eye at one o’clock,” said Toughey. “And another bull’s-eye at one o’clock. Hey, slow up, you’re spoilin’ my aim!”
Mitchell stepped on the throttle and slewed the car around the end of the street and down another. Ahead they could see the lorries but the road forked to the left and they raced in that direction.
After ten minutes of speed, Mitchell eased up. “Who the hell ordered you to fire?”