Finally a big, broad-shouldered Chinese mounted the well combing, waved his rifle about over his head and opened a tirade in strong, sharp tones.
"He is assuring the people," said our interpreter, "that they must do here what the Chinese have done in Kobdo and must secure from the Commissioner the assurance of an order to his guard not to prevent the carrying out of their plans. Also that the Chinese Commissioner must demand from the Russians all their weapons.
'Then we shall take vengeance on the Russians for their Blagoveschensk crime when they drowned three thousand Chinese in 1900. You remain here while I go to the Commissioner and talk with him.'"He jumped down from the well and quickly made his way to the gate toward the town. At once I saw the man who was lying with his head under the fence draw back out of his hole, take his white horse from the ditch and then run over to untie the other horse and lead them both back to our side, which was away from the city. He left the second horse there and hid himself around the corner of the hushun. The spokesman went out of the gate and, seeing his horse over on the other side of the enclosure, slung his rifle across his back and started for his mount. He had gone about half way when the stranger behind the corner of the fence suddenly galloped out and in a flash literally swung the man clear from the ground up across the pommel of his saddle, where we saw him tie the mouth of the semi-strangled Chinese with a cloth and dash off with him toward the west away from the town.
"Who do you suppose he is?" I asked of my friend, who answered up at once: "It must be Tushegoun Lama. . . ."His whole appearance did strongly remind me of this mysterious Lama avenger and his manner of addressing himself to his enemy was a strict replica of that of Tushegoun. Late in the night we learned that some time after their orator had gone to seek the Commissioner's cooperation in their venture, his head had been flung over the fence into the midst of the waiting audience and that eight gamins had disappeared on their way from the hushun to the town without leaving trace or trail. This event terrorized the Chinese mob and calmed their heated spirits.
The next day we received very unexpected aid. A young Mongol galloped in from Urga, his overcoat torn, his hair all dishevelled and fallen to his shoulders and a revolver prominent beneath his girdle. Proceeding directly to the market where the Mongols are always gathered, without leaving his saddle he cried out:
"Urga is captured by our Mongols and Chiang Chun Baron Ungern!
Bogdo Hutuktu is once more our Khan! Mongols, kill the Chinese and pillage their shops! Our patience is exhausted!"Through the crowd rose the roar of excitement. The rider was surrounded with a mob of insistent questioners. The old Mongol Sait, Chultun Beyli, who had been dismissed by the Chinese, was at once informed of this news and asked to have the messenger brought to him. After questioning the man he arrested him for inciting the people to riot, but he refused to turn him over to the Chinese authorities. I was personally with the Sait at the time and heard his decision in the matter. When the Chinese Commissioner, Wang Tsao-tsun, threatened the Sait for disobedience to his authority, the old man simply fingered his rosary and said:
"I believe the story of this Mongol in its every word and Iapprehend that you and I shall soon have to reverse our relationship."I felt that Wang Tsao-tsun also accepted the correctness of the Mongol's story, because he did not insist further. From this moment the Chinese disappeared from the streets of Uliassutai as though they never had been, and synchronously the patrols of the Russian officers and of our foreign colony took their places. The panic among the Chinese was heightened by the receipt of a letter containing the news that the Mongols and Altai Tartars under the leadership of the Tartar officer Kaigorodoff pursued the Chinese who were making off with their booty from the sack of Kobdo and overtook and annihilated them on the borders of Sinkiang. Another part of the letter told how General Bakitch and the six thousand men who had been interned with him by the Chinese authorities on the River Amyl had received arms and started to join with Ataman Annenkoff, who had been interned in Kuldja, with the ultimate intention of linking up with Baron Ungern. This rumour proved to be wrong because neither Bakitch nor Annenkoff entertained this intention, because Annenkoff had been transported by the Chinese into the Depths of Turkestan. However, the news produced veritable stupefaction among the Chinese.
