Chapter XVI

THE MANDARIN WINS.

"Listen, honorable friends," said Tsan Ti, "while I talk to you instructively. In the words of the great Confucius, 'the cautious man seldom errs.' When I departed from you, amiable ones, on recovering the Eye of Buddha, I said that I was returning to my country by way of San Francisco. Such was my intention, of the moment, but further reflection dissuaded me. I decided to go to New York and proceed to China by the longer, but perhaps the safer, way.

"In the great city I discovered that I was being pursued and spied upon, and a great fear overcame me. Immediately I thought of Motor Matt. Should I visit him with possible dangers, I besought of myself, in order that I might preserve the precious relic from the temple at Honam? I thought of your bravery, never sufficiently to be praised, and I decided to make the risk. The cutter of precious stones was sent for, and I showed my ruby and asked that he make a counterfeit of it that would deceive any but a dealer in jewels. This was done, and quickly. I sent this comparatively valueless replica to you, Motor Matt, and told Charley Foo to let Grattan's man know what I had done. Also, the man was to be informed of my desire that Motor Matt should carry the stone about with him continually.

"What would happen? I inquired of myself. Most certainly, reflection made answer. Grattan will be upon the brave youth's track, and he will never rest until he secures the gem. This is as I desired, although I dared not so express myself in my letter which accompanied the false gem.

"After the package had left me, my heart failed. I feared I had exposed you to dangers which might cause your undoing. Hence, without lingering further, Sam Wing and I took this train for Catskill, I being of the intention to tell you what I had planned, and to let it be known, through Charley Foo, that the real gem was in my hands and not yours.

"And see, I have come too late. Grattan, the wise and unscrupulous, has taken the counterfeit ruby and is pleased to think he has cheated me, and that I shall pass by means of the yellow cord. All is well, and my plans are maturing most successfully. The five hundred gods of good fortune are smiling upon me. While Grattan goes his course, firmly believing he has the Eye of Buddha, I travel mine, knowing he has been justly deceived."

There was a little resentment in Matt's heart as he listened to the mandarin's explanation of his crafty ways and means for circumventing Grattan. Tsan Ti had thrown upon Matt the weight of the whole proceeding, and had not taken means to inform him of the true state of affairs. The king of the motor boys, had he understood the nature of the mandarin's scheme, could have worked out his part of it even more successfully than he had done while being kept in ignorance.

"You're a keen one, Tsan," grunted McGlory, "but I'm a Piute if I admire the free-and-easy fashion you have of making dupes of your friends."

"It is that which has pained me," admitted the mandarin, "and it is my regret which was carrying me speedily to Catskill to tell my widely known friend the exact truth. Fate was quicker in the race than I. Events have come swiftly to pass, and out of them rises Grattan with the false ruby. I have been fortunate, and while he goes to parts unknown, I shall hope to reach China before he discovers his error."

"Queer that Grattan, who knows the great ruby so well," said Matt, "could be fooled with a piece of glass of the same shape and size."

"And likewise of the exact color," returned Tsan Ti. "The color was most important of all. That Grattan was fooled shows how admirably the cutter of precious stones has done his work."

"You're really going to China this time, are you, Tsan Ti?"

"Of a certainty," declared the mandarin. "Now that you have been met most wonderfully on this train, I shall not get off at Catskill, but will accompany the cars to Buffalo. From there, without delay, I shall go on to Chicago, from there to Denver, and so to San Francisco, where I will embark on the first ship that will carry me across the Pacific."

Tsan Ti leaned over in front of Matt and called out something in Chinese to Sam Wing. Sam Wing lifted his nodding head with a start, and from his blouse produced a small sack of alligator skin, which he handed to his master.

The sack was stuffed with banknotes, and from the lot the mandarin extracted three five-hundred-dollar bills.

"Will you consider it of an insulting nature if I offer you these?" inquired the mandarin of Matt.

"I won't, if he does," chimed in McGlory.

"I think I'm entitled to the money, Tsan Ti," said Matt. "The way you Chinamen do business doesn't make much of a hit with me. Your little plot wouldn't have been hurt in the least if you had just mentioned in the letter you sent with that supposed ruby that the gem was false, and that you sent it to me hoping Grattan would get it and keep off your trail. I could have helped you even more in achieving your purpose."

"It is to be regretted deeply that I did not," answered the mandarin humbly. "In my own country I would not have given two thoughts to the troubles I caused another, so long as my aim was just and wise; but here, in America, different standards rule, and that I brought dangers upon your head I shall never forget."

The door of the coach opened and a brakeman thrust in his head to call out the station of Catskill.

"That means us, pard," said McGlory. "Grab your money and let's hike."

Matt took the money and slowly placed it in his pocket.

"You bear no ill will, worthy one, and friend whose memory will always blossom in the gardens of my recollections?" asked Tsan Ti.

"It's all right, Tsan Ti," returned Matt, getting up. "You win, and are off for the Flowery Kingdom with the Eye of Buddha. Grattan loses, and he'll find it out sooner or later. As for Joe and me, we'll call accounts square. Good-by, and good luck to you." He took the mandarin's hand cordially.

"May the five hundred gods of good luck smile continually upon you," said Tsan Ti.

With that, Motor Matt and McGlory left the coach and dropped off the train.

"Back in Catskill!" said the cowboy, "and after being fooled by Bunce, and Grattan, and Tsan Ti!"

"We've fooled Grattan twice where he has fooled us once, Joe," returned Matt.

"Right you are, pard; and there's plenty of chance for Tsan Ti to run into a snag between here and China."

"I'm hoping he makes the trip without any trouble."

"I don't know but I hope the same thing, although I get a trifle hot under the collar every time I think of the way we fretted over a piece of colored glass."

They stood on the platform until the tail lights of the train had vanished from sight up the track.

"The mandarin is getting a good start on the home trail, anyhow," remarked McGlory, as he and Matt turned away to climb the slope that led to their hotel. "He's bound west by train, while Grattan is fooling around, somewhere on the Hudson, with the Iris. I wouldn't turn over my hand, after what Tsan Ti told us, to put the kibosh on Grattan, or even Bunce."

"Grattan and Bunce have got their deserts," asserted Matt. "They'll be punished enough when they discover that they've had all their trouble and taken so many chances for nothing more than a bogus ruby."

"Fine business," chuckled McGlory; "and yet," he added, with a perceptible change in his voice, "there's something about that Philo Grattan that makes a hit with me. Maybe I've got a yellow streak in my make-up, somewhere, and that it's wrong for me to own up to such a notion, but it's the truth."

"If Grattan was honest," said Matt, "he'd be a fellow any one could like. But his ideas are all wrong. He can't see where the harm comes in removing a valuable ruby from an idol in a heathen temple, but if he'd step into Tiffany's, in New York, and extract a gem like that from the show case and make off with it, his crime wouldn't be any the less."

"A heathen has got property rights," agreed the cowboy, "just the same as you or me—or Grattan, himself. Where do you suppose Grattan, and that choice assortment of tinhorns he has with him on the Iris, are going?"

"I don't know, pard, and what happens to them now doesn't bother me much. We're rid of them all, and I'm thankful for it. We've had too much of Tsan Ti, as well as of Grattan and Bunce."

"That's what you say now, but just let the mandarin write you one of those embroidered letters of his, asking for help, and you'll head in his direction just a-smoking."

"Not again, Joe. I know what the Yellow Peril is, now, and I'm going to fight shy of it."

"Amen to that, pard, and I hope you stick to it."

"I will."

"And there's nothing more between us and a high old time in Manhattan?"

"Nothing but a stretch of river—or of railroad track, Joe, if you'd rather go by train."

"Hooray!" jubilated McGlory.

THE END.

THE NEXT NUMBER (32) WILL CONTAIN

Motor Matt's Double-trouble;

OR,

THE LAST OF THE HOODOO.

The Red Jewel—Another End of the Yarn—Shock Number One—Shocks Two and Three—A Hot Starter—McGlory is Lost, and Found—"Pocketed"—Springing a Coup—Motor Matt's Chase—The Chase Concluded—A Double Capture—Another Surprise—Baiting a Trap—How the Trap was Sprung—Back to the Farm—Conclusion.

MOTOR STORIES

THRILLING ADVENTUREMOTOR FICTION

NEW YORK, September 25, 1909.

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