MOTOR STORIES

Issued Weekly. By subscription $2.50 per year. Copyright, 1909, by Street & Smith, 79-89 Seventh Avenue, New York, N. Y.

MOTOR MATT'S MANDARIN;

OR,

TURNING A TRICK FOR TSAN TI.

By the author of "MOTOR MATT."

CHARACTERS THAT APPEAR IN THIS STORY.

Matt King, otherwise Motor Matt. Joe McGlory, a young cowboy who proves himself a lad of worth and character, and whose eccentricities are all on the humorous side. A good chum to tie to—a point Motor Matt is quick to perceive. Tsan Ti, Mandarin of the Red Button, who appeals to Motor Matt for help in a very peculiar undertaking. Sam Wing, a San Francisco Chinaman, member of a tong that is amiably disposed toward Tsan Ti. Kien Lung, courier of the Chinese Regent, who respectfully delivers the yellow cord to Tsan Ti. Grattan, a masterful rogue who consummates one of the cleverest robberies in the annals of crime. Bunce, a sailor who assists Grattan and makes considerable trouble for the motor boys and the mandarin. Goldstein, a diamond broker with a penchant for dealing in stolen goods. Pryne, a brother-in-law of Grattan, who plays a short but important part in the events of the story.

CHAPTER I.

ON THE MOUNTAINSIDE.

"Sufferin' treadmills! Say, pard, here's where I drop down in the shade and catch my breath. How much farther have we got to go?"

"Not more than a mile, Joe."

"We must have gone a couple of hundred miles already."

"We've traveled about six miles, all told."

"Speak to me about that! A mile up and down is a heap longer than a mile on the straightaway. We've been hanging to this sidehill like a couple of flies to a wall. What do you say to a rest?"

"I'm willing, Joe; and here's a good place. Look out for that tree root. It's a bad one, and runs straight across the road."

Motor Matt and his cowboy pard, Joe McGlory, were pop-popping their way up a steep mountainside on a couple of motor cycles. They were bound for the Mountain House, a hotel on the very crest of the uplift.

A day boat had brought them down the Hudson River from Albany, and they had disembarked at Catskill Landing, hired the two machines, and started for the big hotel.

The motor cycles were making hard work of the climb—such hard work, in fact, that the boys, time and time again, had been compelled to get out of their saddles and lead the heavy wheels up a particularly steep place in the trail. This was trying labor, and McGlory's enthusiasm over the adventure had been on the wane for some time.

The big root of a tree, lying across the road like a half-buried railroad tie, was safely dodged, and under the shade of the tree to which the root belonged Matt and McGlory threw themselves down.

The cowboy mopped his dripping face with a handkerchief, pulled off his hat, and began fanning himself with it.

"One of these two-wheeled buzz carts is all right," he remarked, "where the motor does the work for you; but I'll be gad-hooked if there's any fun doin' the work for the motor. And what's it all about? You don't know, and I don't. We made this jump from the middle West to the effete East on the strength of a few lines of 'con'[Pg 2] talk. I wish people would leave you alone when they get into trouble. Every stranger knows, though, that all he's got to do is to send you a hurry-up call whenever anything goes crosswise, and that you'll break your neck to boil out on his part of the map and share his hard luck."

McGlory finished with a grunt of disgust.

"I've got a hunch, Joe," answered Matt, "that there's a whole lot to that letter."

"A whole lot of fake and false alarm. Read it again, if you've got breath enough."

"I've read it to you a dozen times already," protested Matt.

"Then make it thirteen times, pard. The more you read it, the more I realize what easy marks we are for paying any attention to it. It's fine discipline, pard, to keep thinking where you've made a fool of yourself."

Matt laughed as he drew an envelope out of his coat pocket. The envelope was addressed, in a queer hand, to "His Excellency, Motor Matt, Engaged in aëroplane performances with Burton's Big Consolidated Shows, Grand Rapids, Michigan." Drawing out the enclosed sheet, Matt unfolded it. There was a humorous gleam in his gray eyes as he read aloud the following:

"Honorable and Most Excellent Sir: It is necessary that I have of your wonderful aid in matters exceedingly great and important. I, a mandarin of the red button, with some store of English knowledge, and much trouble, appeal to king of motor boys with overwhelming desire that he come to me at Mountain House, near town named Catskill Landing, in State of New York. Noble and affluent sir, will it be insult should I offer one thousand dollars and expenses if I get my wish for your most remarkable help? Not so, for I promise with much goodness of heart. Let it be immediately that you come, and sooner if convenient. May your days be fragrant as the blossoms of paradise, your joys like the countless stars, and your years many and many. "'Tsan Ti, of the Red Button.'"

"Sounds like a skin game," grumbled McGlory, as Matt returned the letter to its envelope, and the latter to his pocket.

"It's the first time a stranger in trouble ever sent me a letter like that," remarked Matt.

"Regular josh. Button, button, who's got the button? Not us, pard, and we're It. There'll be no mandarin at the end of this blooming trail we're running out. You take it from me. Now——" McGlory broke off suddenly, his eyes fastened on the pitch of the road above. "Great hocus-pocus!" he exclaimed, jumping to his feet. "See what's coming!"

Matt, turning his eyes in the direction of his pard's pointing finger, was likewise brought up standing by the spectacle that met his gaze.

A bicycle was coasting down the steep path, coming with the speed of a limited express train; and some fifty feet behind this bicycle came another, moving at a rate equally swift.

In the saddle of the leading machine was a fat Chinaman—a Chinaman of consequence, to judge by his looks. He wore a black cap, yellow blouse and trousers and embroidered sandals. His thin, baggy garments fluttered and snapped about him as he shot down the road, and his pigtail, fully a yard long, and bound at the end with a ribbon, stood out straight behind him.

The Celestial behind was leaner and dressed in garments more subdued. It was exceedingly plain to the two boys that his heart was in his work, and that the end and aim of his labors was the overhauling of the man ahead.

"Wow!" wheezed the fat fugitive. "Wow! wow! wow!"

For about two seconds this stirring situation was before the eyes of Matt and McGlory. Then the tree root insinuated itself into proceedings.

The fugitive saw the root heaving across his path with a promise of disaster, but going around it was out of the question, and stopping the speeding wheel an impossibility.

The inevitable happened. Matt and McGlory saw the bicycle bound into the air and turn a half somersault. The fat Chinaman landed on his back with the wheel on top of him; then machine and Chinaman rolled over and over until the impetus of the flight was spent.

The two boys ran to the unfortunate bicyclist, gathered him up, and separated him from the broken wheel. The Celestial refused to be lifted to his feet, but contented himself with sitting up.

"My cap, excellent friend," he requested, pointing to where the cap was lying.

"Gee, but that was a jolt!" commiserated McGlory. "How do you feel about now?"

"Kindest regards for your inquiry," said the Chinaman, extracting a small stone from the collar of his blouse, and then emptying a pint of dust from one of his flowing sleeves. "I am variously shaken, thank you, but the terrible part is yet to come. Kindly recede until it is over, and add further to my obligations."

Matt had picked up the black cap. As he handed it to the Chinaman, he observed that there was a red button in the centre of the flat top.

He was astonished at the Chinaman's manner, no less than at his use of English. His clothes were all awry, and soiled with dust, but he seemed to mind that as little as he did his bruises.

Putting the cap on his head, he took a fan from somewhere about his person, waved the boys aside with it, then opened it with a "snap," and proceeded methodically to fan himself. His eyes were turned up the road.

Matt and McGlory exchanged wondering glances as they stepped apart.

The other Chinaman, having a greater space in which to manœuvre, had managed to avoid the tree root. By means of the brake he had caused his machine to slow down, and had then leaped off. After carefully leaning the bicycle against a tree, he approached his fat countryman in a most deferential manner. The latter nodded gravely from his seat on the ground.

The pursuer thereupon flung himself to his knees, and beat his forehead three times in the dust.

After that, the fat Chinaman said something. Presumably it was in his native tongue, for it sounded like heathen gibberish, and the boys could make nothing out of it.

But the lean Chinaman seemed to understand. Lifting himself and sitting back on his heels, he pushed a hand into the breast of his coat, and brought out a little black box about the size of a cigarette case. This, with every[Pg 3] sign of respect and veneration, he offered to the other Celestial.

The fat man took the box, waved his fan, and eased himself of a few more remarks. The lean fellow once more kotowed, then arose silently, regained his wheel, and vanished from sight down the road. The fat Mongolian was left balancing the black box in his hand and eying it with pensive interest.

"Well, speak to me about this!" breathed McGlory. "What do you make out of it, Matt?"

"Not a thing," whispered Matt. "That fellow has a red button in his cap."

McGlory showed traces of excitement.

"Glory, and all hands round!" he gasped. "Have you any notion that the chink we're looking for has lammed into us in this violent fashion, right here on the mountainside?"

"Give it up. Watch; see what he's up to."

The fat Chinaman, laying aside his fan, took the box in his left palm, and, with the fingers of his right hand, pressed a spring.

The lid flew open. On top of something in the box lay a white card covered with Chinese hieroglyphics. The Chinaman lifted the card and read the written words. His yellow face turned to the color of old cheese, his eyes closed spasmodically, and his breath came quick and raspingly. McGlory grabbed Matt's arm.

"There's something on that card, Matt," said he, "that's got our fat friend on the run."

While the boys continued to look, the Chinaman laid aside the card, and drew from the box a pliable yellow cord, a yard in length.

That was all there was in the box, just the card and the cord.

Feeling that there was a deep mystery here, and a mystery in which he and his chum were concerned, the king of the motor boys stepped forward.

"Tsan Ti?" he queried.

Box and cord fell from the fat Chinaman's hands, and he turned an eagerly inquiring look in Matt's direction.

CHAPTER II.

THE YELLOW CORD.

"Excellent youth," said the Chinaman, "you pronounce my name. How is this?"

"I'm Motor Matt," answered the king of the motor boys, "and this is my chum, Joe McGlory. You asked us to come, and here we are. There's your letter to me."

Matt opened the written sheet and held it in front of Tsan Ti's face. The Celestial's face underwent a change. A flicker of hope ran through the fear and consternation.

"Omito fuh!" he muttered, rising slowly to his feet. "The five hundred gods have covered me with much disgrace, this last hour, but now they bring me a gleam of hope from the clouds of despair. By the plumes of the sacred peacock, I bow before you with much gratefulness."

He bowed—or tried to. His ponderous stomach interfered with the manœuvre, and he caught a crick in his back—the direct result, probably, of his recent spill.

"You are here to be of aid to the unfortunate mandarin, are you not, illustrious sirs?" went on Tsan Ti, leaning against a tree, and rubbing his right sandal up and down his left shin. Quite likely the left shin was barked, and the right sandal was affording it consolation.

"First aid to the injured, Tsan," grinned McGlory, getting a good deal of fun out of this novel encounter.

The cowboy had met many Chinamen, but never before one of this sort. The experience was mildly exciting.

"Wit," chanted Tsan Ti, "is the weapon of the wise, the idol of the fool; a runaway knock at laughter's door; arrows from the quiver of genius; intellectual lightning from the thunder clouds of talent; the lever of——"

"Sufferin' cats!" exploded McGlory. "What is he talking about? In that letter, Tsan, you speak about insulting us with a thousand plunks and expenses. Was that a rhinecaboo or the real thing?"

Without changing his countenance by so much as a line, Tsan Ti lifted the bottom of his blouse, and unbuttoned the pocket of a leather belt around his huge girth. From the pocket he took five gold double eagles in good American money.

"Have I the understanding," he asked, "that you will be of help to my distress?"

"Tell us, first," answered Matt, a little bewildered by the mandarin's queer talk and actions, "what it is you want."

"What I want, notable friend, is the Eye of Buddha, the great ruby which was stolen from the forehead of the idol in temple of Hai-chwang-sze, in the city named Canton. I, even I, now the most miserable of creatures, was guardian of the temple when this theft occurred. I fled to find the thief, and Kien Lung, by order of the Son of the Morning, our imperial regent, fled after me with that invitation to death, the yellow cord."

Tsan Ti pointed to the ground where the cord was lying. His flabby cheeks grew hueless, and he caught his breath.

"An invitation to death?" repeated Matt, staring at the yellow cord.

"It is so, gracious youth," explained Tsan Ti. "When our regent wishes one of his officials to efface himself, he sends the yellow cord. It is the death warrant. The card tells me that I have two weeks before it is necessary that I should strangle myself. This happy dispatch must be performed unless, through you, I can recover the Eye of Buddha. So runs the scroll."

"Speak to me about this!" muttered McGlory. "But look here, old man, you don't have to strangle yourself because some High Mucky Muck, a few thousand miles off, sends you the thing to do it with, do you?"

"Unless it is done," was the calm response, "I shall be disgraced for all time, and my memory reviled."

"Oh, blazes! I'd rather be a live Chinaman in disgrace, than a dead one with a monument a mile high."

"You converse without knowledge," said Tsan Ti.

"That's horse sense, anyhow."

"Let's get at the nub of this thing, Tsan Ti," said Matt, feeling a deep interest in the strange Chinaman in spite of himself. "You were in charge of a Canton temple in which was an image of Buddha. That image had a ruby set in the forehead. The ruby was stolen. You ran away from China to find the thief, and this Kien Lung, as you call him, trailed after you with the yellow cord from the regent. The cord was accompanied by a written order to the effect that, if you did not succeed in recovering the ruby in two weeks, you must strangle[Pg 4] yourself. Before the cord was delivered to you, you sent that letter to me."

"What you say is true," answered Tsan Ti. "I have been for a long period endeavoring to keep away from Kien Lung. I knew what he had to give me, and I did not want it. Now that I have the cord, you can understand, out of courtesy I must slay myself—unless, through you, I regain the Eye of Buddha."

"How did you come to pick me out for an assistant?" went on Matt. "What you ought to have is a detective. This part of the country is full of detectives."

"I cannot trust the detectives. The ruby is valuable, and I am a discredited mandarin in a far country. The detectives would keep the ruby, and then there would be for me only death by the cord. I read in the public prints generous and never-to-be-forgotten things about Motor Matt, and my heart assures me that you are the one, and the only one, to come to my aid."

"You tune up like a professor," remarked McGlory. "Where'd you corral so much good pidgin, Tsan?"

"I was educated in one of your institutions of learning," was the reply. "But, illustrious sirs, shall we return to the hotel on the mountain top? I have this go-devil machine to pay for. It did not belong to me. A dozen of the machines were near the porch of the hotel, where I was drinking tea. I saw Kien Lung coming toward me along the porch, and I left my tea and sprang to one of the machines. I learned to ride while I was educating myself in this country. Kien Lung was also able to ride, but that I did not know until I saw him later. Shall we go on to the hotel? I am bruised and in much distress."

"We might just as well find out all you can tell us about the Eye of Buddha before we go to the hotel," returned Matt. "We are by ourselves, here, and I'd like to get all the information possible."

Tsan Ti picked up the card and the yellow cord. Thoughtfully he twisted the cord around and around his fat palm and tucked it into the black box. On the cord he placed the card, and over all closed the box lid. With a rumbling sigh, he dropped the black box into the breast of his blouse.

"Foreign devils," said he, once more bracing himself against the tree trunk, "call the temple of Hai-chwang-sze the Honam Joss House. It is by the beautiful river, in the suburb named Honam. Around the temple there is a wall. The avenue of a thousand delights leads from the great gate to the temple courts, and noble banyan trees shade the avenue. At vespers, some weeks ago, two foreign devils were present. The hour was five in the afternoon. One of the foreign devils was English, and wore a tourist hat with a pugree; the other had but a single eye. Lob Loo, a priest, told me what happened.

"The Englishman threw a shimmering ball upon the temple floor. Odors came from it, quick as an eyeflash. Quick as another eyeflash, the priests reeled where they stood, their senses leaving them. Lob Loo tells me the foreign devils had covered their faces suddenly with white masks. Then, after seeing that much, Lob Loo lost his five senses, and wandered in fields of darkness.

"When Lob Loo opened his eyes, he saw glass fragments on the floor, and a ladder of silk swinging from the neck of the god. The image, renowned sirs, is twenty feet in height, and to reach the ruby eye the foreign devils had to climb. The eye was gone. When Lob Loo told me these things, I was seized of a mighty fear, and fled to Hongkong. There the five hundred gods favored me, and I learned that a man in a tourist hat with a pugree, and another with a single eye, had sailed for San Francisco. Quickly I caught the next steamer, after sending cable messages to the leaders of a San Francisco tong who are Cantonese, and friends of mine. When the ship brought the thieves through the Golden Gate, some of the tong watched the landing. The thieves were in San Francisco three days, and Sam Wing followed them when they left for Chicago, then for New York, and then for these Catskill Mountains. When I reached San Francisco, the leading men of the tong had telegrams from Sam Wing. By use of the telegrams, I followed, and arrived here. Wing had left

a writing for me at the hotel, telling me to wait. I waited, but Wing had disappeared. I kept on waiting, and out of my discouragement, remarkable sir, I wrote to you. That is all, until this morning, when Kien Lung came with the yellow cord. Two weeks are left me. If the Eye of Buddha is not found in that time, then"—and Tsan Ti tapped the breast of his sagging blouse—"all that remains is the quick dispatch."