AN ADVENTURE IN THE LAMA CITY 137 



ther into the crowd of lamas, who also were becoming 

 excited. I was being separated from Yvette, and real- 

 izing that it would be dangerous to get far away from 

 her, I suddenly wrenched my arm free and threw the 

 Mongol to the ground ; then I rushed through the line 

 of lamas surrounding Yvette, and we backed up against 

 the cart. 



I had an automatic pistol in my pocket, but it would 

 have been suicide to shoot except as a last resort. When 

 a Mongol "starts anything" he is sure to finish it; he is 

 not like a Chinese, who will usually run at the first 

 shot. We stood for at least three minutes with that 

 wall of scowling brutes ten feet away. They were un- 

 decided what to do and were only waiting for a leader 

 to close in. One huge beast over six feet tall was just 

 in front of me, and as I stood with my fingers crooked 

 about the trigger of the automatic in my pocket, I 

 thought, "If you start, I'm going to nail you any- 

 way." 



Just at this moment of indecision our Mongol leaped 

 on my wife's pony, shouted that he was going to Duke 

 Loobitsan Yangsen, an influential friend of ours, and 

 dashed away. Instantly attention turned from us to 

 him. Fifty men were on horseback in a second, fly- 

 ing after him at full speed. I climbed into the cart, 

 shouting to Yvette to jump on Kublai Khan and run; 

 but she would not leave me. At full speed we dashed 

 down the hill, the plunging horses scattering lamas right 

 and left. Our young Mongol had saved us from a sit- 

 uation which momentarily might have become critical. 



