“Of course I did; and I took it for granted that Mr Jeffrey Lynn would come and share the burden of my enormously increasing work.”

“It is all explained in the letters, as I told you,” said Stan. “Uncle was coming, but the Chinese made an attack on the place.”

“Eh? What’s that?” cried the manager excitedly; and Stan gave him a brief account of what had passed, while every word was listened to eagerly.

“It was quite out of the question for my father to be left,” ended Stan at last, “and so I am sent to help instead.”

“Humph!” said the manager, looking grave. “It has come to that, has it? Restless, uncontrolled savages. Well,” he added, changing his tone again, “so they’ve sent a boy like you?”

“Yes.”

“And for want of decent help and companionship, I’m to make the best of you?”

“I suppose so,” said Stan coldly, and wishing the while that he was back at Hai-Hai, home, or anywhere but at this solitary hong.

“But I don’t think you’ll like the life here, young fellow,” said the manager, with an unpleasant smile. “There’s a very savage, piratical lot of Chinese about on this river. It has an awful character. If you’ll take my advice – Will you?”

“Of course,” said Stan quietly. “You must know better, from your experience here, than I do.”

“That’s right; I do. Well, then, you take it: go back by the next boat. It doesn’t look as if things are very safe at Hai-Hai, but it’s a paradise to this place here.”

“I’m sorry to hear that,” said Stan, “but I certainly can’t go back; I have come to stay.”

“Oh, very well!” said the manager. “I’ve warned you. I wash my hands of the whole affair. But I’ll promise you this: I’ll get your remains together.”

“My remains?” said Stan, aghast.

“Of course; they are sure to hack you to pieces – it’s a way they have. And there’ll be some difficulty, perhaps, in recovering your head. They generally carry that off as a trophy; but I’ll do my best to get you back to the old folks in a cask of Chinese palm-spirit. Will that do?”

During the past few moments Stan had felt a sensation as if cold steel of wondrously sharp edge were at work upon his back and across his neck; but the tone of the question brought him back to himself, and he replied calmly:

“Capitally. But, by the way, if the savage pirates come and treat me like that, where will you be?”

“Eh?” said the manager, staring. “Where shall I be?”

“Yes. Isn’t it just as likely that I should have to do this duty for you?”

“Oh, I see! Yes, of course; but – Ha, ha, ha! Come! you have got something in you after all. You are pretty sharp.”

“Just sharp enough to see that you are trying to frighten me.”

“Humph!” ejaculated the manager, with a dry smile. “But you’ve had a sample of what these people can do, and I won’t answer for it that they don’t try some of their capers here. Then you mean to risk it?”

“Of course,” said Stan. “My father and uncle sent me to help you.”

“Well, don’t blame me if you get your head taken off.”

“No,” said Stan coolly, and with a peculiar smile; “I don’t think I shall do that – then.”

“More do I,” said the manager grimly. “Well, here you are, and I suppose I must make the best of you.”

“I suppose so,” said Stan.

“You’ll have to work pretty hard – make entries and keep the day-book. I suppose you can do that?”

“I suppose so,” said the lad, “but I can’t say for certain till I try.”

“All right; then the sooner you try the better, because I’ve got enough to do here in keeping things straight; and if you find that you can’t, I shall just pack you off back to your father and uncle. You’re too young, and not the sort of chap I should have chosen for the job.”

“Indeed! What sort of a lad would you have chosen?”

“Oh, not a dandified, pomatumed fellow like you, who is so very particular about his collar and cuffs, and looks as if he’d be afraid to dirty his hands.”

“I don’t see that because a fellow is clean he is not so good for work,” said Stan.

“Oh, don’t you? Well, I’ve had some experience, my lad. I want here a fellow who knows how to rough it. You don’t.”

“But I suppose I can learn.”

“Learn? Of course you can, but you won’t. There! you’ve come, and I suppose, as I said before, I must make the best of you; but next time you see the heads of the firm, perhaps you’ll tell them that I don’t consider it part of my business as manager of this out-of-the-way place to lick their cubs into shape.”

“Hadn’t you better write and tell them so?” said the lad warmly.

“What!” roared the man. “Now just look here, young fellow; you and I had better come to an understanding at once. Whether it’s clerk, warehouseman, or Chinese coolie, I put up with no insolence. It’s a word and a blow with me, as sure as my name’s Sam Blunt.”

“Sam!” said the lad quietly. “What a name! Why did your people christen you that?”

The manager tilted his stool back till he could balance himself on two of its legs and let his head rest against the whitewashed wall of the bare-looking office, staring in astonishment at his visitor. Then leaning forward again, he came down on all four legs of his tall stool, caught up the big ebony ruler, and brought it down with a fresh bang upon the desk, which made the ink this time jump out of the little well in a fountain, as he stared fiercely at the lad, who returned his gaze perfectly unmoved.

“Well, of all,” – he said; he did not say what, but kept on staring.

“What sort of a fellow do you call yourself?” he cried at last.

“I don’t know,” was the cool reply.

“No; I don’t suppose you do. But look here; I’m going to look over that and set it down to ignorance, as you are quite a stranger; and so let me tell you there’s only one man whom I allow to call me Sam Blunt, and I’m that man. Understand?”

The lad nodded.

“There! as you’re the son of one of the principals, and don’t know any better, I won’t quarrel with you.”

“That’s right,” said the lad coolly; and the man stared again.

“Because,” he continued, “I’m thinking that we shall have plenty of quarrelling to do with John Chinaman.”

“Is there any likelihood of our going to war?” said the lad quickly.

“Every likelihood,” said the man, watching his visitor keenly; “and if I were you I’d have a bad attack of fever while my shoes were good.”

“I didn’t know one could have, or not have, fever just as one liked.”

“I suppose not,” said his companion. “But you take my advice: you catch a bad fever at once. And then, as there is no doctor anywhere here, and I’m a horribly bad nurse, I’ll send you back to Hai-Hai at once for your people to set you right.”

“You mean sham illness?” said Stan sharply.

“What! Why, hang me if you’re not a smarter fellow than I took you for! Yes, that’s it; and then you’ll go back and be safe.”

“Safe from what?”

“Being made into mincemeat by the first party of Chinese pirates who come this way. They’re splendid for that, as I hinted to you before. Nothing they love better than chopping up a foreign devil like you.”

“Hadn’t you better have a fever too?” said the lad quietly.

“Oh, come! Better and better!” cried the other. “You’re not such a fool as you look, young fellow! No: I’ve got too much to do to go away from this go-down, and your people know it. That’s why they’ve sent you to get in my way and put me out of temper. I say, though; you’ve heard nothing about the breaking out of war?”

“Not a word since I’ve been in China. I heard something on my voyage.”

“Of course you haven’t, or your father and uncle wouldn’t have sent you down here. But you may take my word for it, there’s trouble coming – and that, too, before long. Did you see many piratical-looking war-junks as you came up the river?”

“N-no,” said Stan. “I saw several big mat-sailed barges with high sterns, and great eyes painted in their bows; but I thought they were trading-boats.”

“So they are, my lad – one day; they’re pirates the next. And perhaps on the very next they’re men-o’-war. Anything, according to circumstances, for I’ve found out that artful is the best word for describing a Chinaman. But there! you’ll soon know. Look here; after what I’ve told you, do you mean to stay?”

“Certainly,” said Stan.

“Very well, then. Come and have a look at my quarters. They’re a bit rough, but you say you won’t mind roughing it.”

“No,” said Stan; “I’ve come here to do the best I can.”

“Oh!” said the manager in a tone full of surprise; “that’s what you’ve come for, is it?”

“Of course,” said Stan, wondering at the tone the man had taken.

“Very well, then, we may as well shake hands. I was just thinking of sitting down to dinner when the junk came in sight, so you’ll come and join me – eh?”

“Yes,” said Stan; “I am getting hungry.”

“That’s right. I say, though, squire; you think me a regular ruffian, don’t you?”

“Yes,” said the lad quietly.

“Oh, come! That’s frank, anyhow.”

“It makes you rough and disposed to bully, living a solitary life like this, I suppose.”

“Humph!” said the manager, frowning; “but I don’t know what you mean by solitary. I have English clerks and checking-men, and a whole gang of coolies. Do you call that solitary?”

“But they are under you. I suppose you live a good deal by yourself.”

“Humph! Yes,” said the manager.

“And that, of course, makes you rough.”

“P’raps so. But you won’t find me so rough when you get used to me. There! come along and let’s see what my cook has got for us this evening. You’ll have to take pot-luck. Wing will contrive something better. Come on.”

There was a grim, satisfied smile in the manager’s countenance as he rose, took a great stride such as his long legs enabled him to do with ease, and clapping Stan on the shoulder, swung him round and looked him straight in the face.

“Why, youngster,” he said, “your father must have been wonderfully like you in the phiz when he was your age; but in downright style of speaking and ways you put me wonderfully in mind of your uncle Jeffrey.”

“Do I?” said Stan quietly.

“You do; but he’s a regular brick of a man.”

“That he is,” cried Stan warmly; “but that means I’m not a bit like him there.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” said the manager slowly. “One can’t say at the end of half-an-hour, but I’m beginning to think you will not be so very bad after all.”

“I hope not,” said Stan, smiling.

“I thought at first that you would be a regular stuck-up cub. But I don’t think so now. Look here, youngster; can you be honest?”

“I hope so.”

“Then tell me what you thought of me.”

“That you were a disagreeable bully.”

“Hah! That’s pretty blunt,” said the manager, frowning. “So that’s what you think of me, is it?”

“You asked me what I thought of you, not what I think.”

“Right; so I did. Then what do you think of me?”

“That you’re going to prove not so bad as I thought.”

“Dinnee all getting velly cold, cookee say, Mistee Blunt,” said Wing in a deprecating voice; and they both started to see that the Chinaman had entered quietly upon his thick, soft boot-soles.

“All right, Wing; coming,” cried the manager shortly. – “Come along, captain; you and I are going to be great friends.”