The dark passage into which the lads had just been ushered was short, and was ended by a door of heavy planking before Alaric found a chance to ask his companion why they had come to such a very queer and mysterious place. The opening of that second door admitted them to another passage equally narrow, but well-lighted, and lined with a number of tiny rooms, each containing two bunks arranged like berths one above the other. By the dim light in these rooms Alaric could see that many of these berths were occupied by reclining figures, most of whom were Chinamen, though a few were unmistakably white. Some were smoking tiny metal-bowled pipes with long stems, while others lay in a motionless stupor.

The air was heavy with a peculiarly sickening odor that Alaric recognized at once. He had met it before during his travels among the health resorts of Continental Europe, in which are gathered human wrecks of every kind. Of them all none had seemed to the lad so pitiable as the wretched victims of the opium or morphine habit, which is the most degrading and deadly form of intemperance.

This boy, so ignorant of many of the commonest things of life, and yet wise far beyond his years concerning other phases, had often heard the opium habit discussed, and knew that the hateful drug was taken in many forms to banish pain, cause forgetfulness of sorrow, and produce a sleep filled with beautiful dreams. He knew, too, of the sad awakenings that followed – the dulled senses, the return, with redoubled force, of all the unhappiness that had only been driven away for a short time, and the cravings for other and yet larger doses of the deadly stuff.

He had heard his father say that opium, more than any other one thing, was the curse of China, and that one of the principal reasons why the lower grades of Chinese ought to be excluded from the United States was that they were introducing the habit of opium smoking, and spreading it abroad like a pestilence.

Knowing these things, Alaric was filled with horror at finding himself in a Chinese opium den, and wondered if Bonny realized the true character of the place. In order to find out he gained his comrade's side, and asked, in a low tone: "Do you know, Bonny, what sort of a place this is?"

"Yes, of course. It is Won Lung's joint."

"I mean, do you know what the men in those bunks are doing?"

"Certainly," replied Bonny, cheerfully. "They're hitting the pipe."

Perplexed as he was by these answers, Alaric still asked another question.

"But do you know what they are smoking in those pipes?"

"To be sure I do," answered the other, a trifle impatiently. "It's dope. Most any one would know that. Didn't you ever smell it before?"

"Dope!" Once before had Alaric heard the word during that eventful day, and he had even used it himself, without knowing its meaning. Now it flashed across him. Dope was opium, and that hateful drug was to form the sloop's cargo. The idea of such a thing was so repugnant to him that he might have entered a protest against it then and there, had not a sudden change of scene temporarily diverted his attention from the subject.

The passage they had been traversing ended in an open court, so foreign in its every detail that it appeared like a bit from some Chinese city lifted bodily and transported to the New World. The dingy buildings surrounding it were liberally provided with balconies, galleries, and odd little projecting windows, all of which were occupied by Chinamen gazing with languid interest at the busy scene below. From most of the galleries hung rows of gayly colored paper lanterns, which gave the place a very quaint and festive aspect.

On the pavement were dozens of other Chinamen, with here and there a demure-looking little woman and a few children. Heaps of queer-looking luggage, each piece done up in matting and fastened with narrow strips of rattan, were piled in the corners. At one side was an immense stove, or rather a huge affair of brick, containing a score or more of little charcoal stoves, each fitted for the cooking of a single kettle of rice or pot of tea. About this were gathered a number of men preparing their evening meal. Many of the others were comparing certificates and photographs, a proceeding that puzzled Alaric more than a little, for he was so ignorant of the affairs of his own country that he knew nothing of its Chinese Exclusion Law.

He began to learn something about it right there, however, and subsequently discovered that while Chinese gentlemen, scholars, and merchants are as freely admitted to travel, study, or reside in the United States as are similar classes from any other nation, the lower grades of Chinese, rated as laborers, are forbidden by law to set foot on American soil. This is because there are such swarming millions of them willing to work for very small wages, and live as no self-respecting white man could live; that, were they allowed to enter this country freely, they would quickly drive white laborers from the field and leave them to starve. Then, too, they bring with them and introduce opium-smoking, gambling, lotteries, and other equally pernicious vices. Besides all this, the Chinese in the United States, with here and there an exception, have no desire to become citizens, or to remain longer than is necessary to scrape together the few hundreds of dollars with which they can return to their own land and live out the rest of their days in luxury.

Many thousands of Chinese laborers had come to the United States before the exclusion law was passed, and these, by registering and allowing themselves to be photographed for future identification, obtain certificates which, while not permitting them to return if they once leave the country, allow them to remain here undisturbed. Any Chinaman found without such a protection is liable to be arrested and sent back to his own land.

These certificates, therefore, are so valuable that Chinamen going home with no intention of ever returning to this country find no difficulty in selling their papers to others, who propose to try and smuggle themselves into the United States from Canada or Mexico. There are always plenty who are anxious to make this attempt, for if they once get a foothold they can earn better wages here than anywhere else in the world. Of course, the purchaser of a certificate must look something like the attached photograph, and correspond to the personal description contained in it. To do this a Chinaman will scar his features with cuts or burns if necessary, and will make himself up to resemble any particular photograph as skilfully as a professional actor.

This, then, is what many of those whom Alaric and Bonny now encountered were doing, for the place into which they had come was a Chinese hotel in which all newly arrived Chinamen found shelter while waiting for work or for a chance to smuggle themselves into the United States, which is what ninety-nine out of every one hundred of them propose to do if possible.

As the lads stood together on the edge of this novel scene, while their guide went from group to group making to each a brief announcement, Alaric, seizing this first opportunity for acquiring definite information, asked: "What on earth are we here for, Bonny?"

"To find out how many passengers are ticketed for to-night's boat and get them started," was the reply.

"You don't mean that our passengers are to be Chinamen?"

"Yes, of course. I thought I told you so first thing this morning when you asked me what the sloop carried."

"No. You only said passengers and freight."

"I ought to have said 'chinks.' But what's the odds? 'Chinks' are passengers, aren't they?"

"Do you mean Chinamen? Are 'chinks' Chinamen?"

"That's right," replied Bonny.

"Well," said Alaric, who had been on the Coast long enough to imbibe all a Californian's contempt for natives of the Flowery Kingdom, "if I'd known that 'chinks' meant Chinamen, and dope meant opium, I should have been too much ashamed of what the Fancy carried ever to tell any one about it."

"I hope you won't," responded Bonny. "There isn't any necessity for you to that I know of."

"But I have already. There was a man on the wharf while I was getting aired who asked me what our cargo was. Just to see what he would say I told him 'chinks and dope,' though I hadn't the slightest idea of what either of them meant."

"My! but that's bad!" cried Bonny, with an anxious look on his face. "I only hope he wasn't a beak. They've been watching us pretty sharp lately, and I know the old man is in a regular tizzy-wizzy for fear we'll get nabbed."

Before Alaric could ask why they should be nabbed, Won Lung, the proprietor of the establishment, who also acted as interpreter, came to where they were standing, greeted Bonny as an old acquaintance, looked curiously at Alaric, and announced that thirty-six of his boarders had procured tickets for a passage to the Sound on the Fancy.

"We can't take but twenty of 'em on this trip," said the young mate, decidedly. "And with their dunnage we'll have to stow 'em like sardines, anyway. The others must wait till next time."

"Mebbe you tlake some man in clabin, some mebbe in fo'c's'le," suggested Won Lung, blandly.

"Mebbe we don't do anything of the kind," replied Bonny. "The trip may last several days, and I know I for one am not going to be crowded out of my sleeping-quarters. So, Mr. Lung, if you send down one man more than twenty he goes overboard. You savey that?"

"Yep, me sabby. Allee same me no likee."

"Sorry, but I can't help it. And you want to hustle 'em along too, for we are going to sail in half an hour. Got the stuff ready?"

"Yep, all leddy. Two hun'l poun'."

"Good enough. Send it right along with us."

A few minutes later our lads had left Won Lung's queer hotel and were out in the quiet streets accompanied by two Chinese coolies, who bore heavy burdens slung from the ends of stout bamboo poles carried across their shoulders.

As Bonny seemed disinclined to talk, Alaric refrained from asking questions, and the little party proceeded in silence through unfrequented streets to the place where their sloop lay. Here the burdens borne by the coolies were transferred to the cabin, where this part of the cargo was left with Captain Duff, and Alaric had no knowledge of where it was stowed.

While the captain was thus busy below, Bonny was giving the crew his first lesson in seamanship by pointing out three ropes that he called jib, throat, and peak halyards, showing him how to make them fast about their respective belaying-pins, and impressing upon him the importance of remembering them.

Shortly after this the score of long-queued passengers arrived with their odd-looking packages of personal belongings, were taken aboard in silence, and stowed in the hold until Alaric wondered if they were piled on top of one another like sticks of cord-wood.

Then the mooring-lines were cast off, and the Fancy drifted noiselessly out of the slip with the ebbing tide. Once clear of it the jib was hoisted, and she began to glide out of the harbor before a gentle, off-shore breeze.