diff options
| -rw-r--r-- | .gitattributes | 3 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19142-8.txt | 10058 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19142-8.zip | bin | 0 -> 176077 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19142-h.zip | bin | 0 -> 185363 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19142-h/19142-h.htm | 10343 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19142.txt | 10058 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | 19142.zip | bin | 0 -> 175986 bytes | |||
| -rw-r--r-- | LICENSE.txt | 11 | ||||
| -rw-r--r-- | README.md | 2 |
9 files changed, 30475 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/19142-8.txt b/19142-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..a9168fa --- /dev/null +++ b/19142-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10058 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil Doctor, by Sax Rohmer + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Devil Doctor + +Author: Sax Rohmer + +Release Date: August 29, 2006 [EBook #19142] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL DOCTOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Clarke, Sankar Viswanathan, and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + THE + DEVIL DOCTOR + + + + HITHERTO UNPUBLISHED ADVENTURES IN + THE CAREER OF THE MYSTERIOUS + DR. FU-MANCHU + + + BY + + + SAX ROHMER + + + + SIXTH EDITION + + + + METHUEN & CO. LTD. + 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. + LONDON + + + + _First Published (Crown 8vo) March 2nd, 1916_ + + * * * * * + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAP. + +I A MIDNIGHT SUMMONS + +II ELTHAM VANISHES + +III THE WIRE JACKET + +IV THE CRY OF A NIGHTHAWK + +V THE NET + +VI UNDER THE ELMS + +VII ENTER MR. ABEL SLATTIN + +VIII DR. FU-MANCHU STRIKES + +IX THE CLIMBER + +X THE CLIMBER RETURNS + +XI THE WHITE PEACOCK + +XII DARK EYES LOOK INTO MINE + +XIII THE SACRED ORDER + +XIV THE COUGHING HORROR + +XV BEWITCHMENT + +XVI THE QUESTING HANDS + +XVII ONE DAY IN RANGOON + +XVIII THE SILVER BUDDHA + +XIX DR. FU-MANCHU'S LABORATORY + +XX THE CROSSBAR + +XXI CRAGMIRE TOWER + +XXII THE MULATTO + +XXIII A CRY ON THE MOOR + +XXIV STORY OF THE GABLES + +XXV THE BELLS + +XXVI THE FIERY HAND + +XXVII THE NIGHT OF THE RAID + +XXVIII THE SAMURAI'S SWORD + +XXIX THE SIX GATES + +XXX THE CALL OF THE EAST + +XXXI "MY SHADOW LIES UPON YOU" + +XXXII THE TRAGEDY + +XXXIII THE MUMMY + + * * * * * + + + + +THE DEVIL DOCTOR + +CHAPTER I + +A MIDNIGHT SUMMONS + + +"When did you last hear from Nayland Smith?" asked my visitor. + +I paused, my hand on the siphon, reflecting for a moment. + +"Two months ago," I said: "he's a poor correspondent and rather +soured, I fancy." + +"What--a woman or something?" + +"Some affair of that sort. He's such a reticent beggar, I really know +very little about it." + +I placed a whisky and soda before the Rev. J. D. Eltham, also sliding +the tobacco jar nearer to his hand. The refined and sensitive face of +the clergyman offered no indication to the truculent character of the +man. His scanty fair hair, already grey over the temples, was silken +and soft-looking: in appearance he was indeed a typical English +churchman; but in China he had been known as "the fighting +missionary," and had fully deserved the title. In fact, this +peaceful-looking gentleman had directly brought about the Boxer +Risings! + +"You know," he said in his clerical voice, but meanwhile stuffing +tobacco into an old pipe with fierce energy, "I have often wondered, +Petrie--I have never left off wondering--" + +"What?" + +"That accursed Chinaman! Since the cellar place beneath the site of +the burnt-out cottage in Dulwich Village--I have wondered more than +ever." + +He lighted his pipe and walked to the hearth to throw the match in the +grate. + +"You see," he continued, peering across at me in his oddly nervous +way--"one never knows, does one? If I thought that Dr. Fu-Manchu lived; +if I seriously suspected that that stupendous intellect, that wonderful +genius, Petrie, er"--he hesitated characteristically--"survived, I +should feel it my duty--" + +"Well?" I said, leaning my elbows on the table and smiling slightly. + +"If that Satanic genius were not indeed destroyed, then the peace of +the world might be threatened anew at any moment!" + +He was becoming excited, shooting out his jaw in the truculent manner +I knew, and snapping his fingers to emphasize his words; a man +composed of the oddest complexities that ever dwelt beneath a clerical +frock. + +"He may have got back to China, doctor!" he cried, and his eyes had +the fighting glint in them. "Could you rest in peace if you thought +that he lived? Should you not fear for your life every time that a +night-call took you out alone? Why, man alive, it is only two years +since he was here amongst us, since we were searching every shadow for +those awful green eyes! What became of his band of assassins--his +stranglers, his dacoits, his damnable poisons and insects and +what-not--the army of creatures--" + +He paused, taking a drink. + +"You"--he hesitated diffidently--"searched in Egypt with Nayland +Smith, did you not?" + +I nodded. + +"Contradict me if I am wrong," he continued; "but my impression is +that you were searching for the girl--the girl--Kāramančh, I think +she was called?" + +"Yes," I replied shortly; "but we could find no trace--no trace." + +"You--er--were interested?" + +"More than I knew," I replied, "until I realized that I had--lost +her." + +"I never met Kāramančh, but from your account, and from others, she +was quite unusually--" + +"She was very beautiful," I said, and stood up, for I was anxious to +terminate that phase of the conversation. + +Eltham regarded me sympathetically; he knew something of my search +with Nayland Smith for the dark-eyed Eastern girl who had brought +romance into my drab life; he knew that I treasured my memories of her +as I loathed and abhorred those of the fiendish, brilliant Chinese +doctor who had been her master. + +Eltham began to pace up and down the rug, his pipe bubbling furiously; +and something in the way he carried his head reminded me momentarily +of Nayland Smith. Certainly, between this pink-faced clergyman, with +his deceptively mild appearance, and the gaunt, bronzed and +steely-eyed Burmese commissioner, there was externally little in +common; but it was some little nervous trick in his carriage that +conjured up through the smoke-haze one distant summer evening when +Smith had paced that very room as Eltham paced it now, when before my +startled eyes he had rung up the curtain upon the savage drama in +which, though I little suspected it then, Fate had cast me for a +leading rōle. + +I wondered if Eltham's thoughts ran parallel with mine. My own were +centred upon the unforgettable figure of the murderous Chinaman. These +words, exactly as Smith had used them, seemed once again to sound in +my ears: "Imagine a person, tall, lean and feline, high-shouldered, +with a brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven +skull and long magnetic eyes of the true cat green. Invest him with +all the cruel cunning of an entire Eastern race accumulated in one +giant intellect, with all the resources of science, past and present, +and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the 'Yellow Peril' +incarnate in one man." + +This visit of Eltham's no doubt was responsible for my mood; for this +singular clergyman had played his part in the drama of two years ago. + +"I should like to see Smith again," he said suddenly; "it seems a pity +that a man like that should be buried in Burma. Burma makes a mess of +the best of men, doctor. You said he was not married?" + +"No," I replied shortly, "and is never likely to be, now." + +"Ah, you hinted at something of the kind." + +"I know very little of it. Nayland Smith is not the kind of man to +talk much." + +"Quite so--quite so! And, you know, doctor, neither am I; but"--he was +growing painfully embarrassed--"it may be your due--I--er--I have a +correspondent, in the interior of China--" + +"Well?" I said, watching him in sudden eagerness. + +"Well, I would not desire to raise--vain hopes--nor to occasion, shall +I say, empty fears; but--er ... no, doctor!" He flushed like a girl. +"It was wrong of me to open this conversation. Perhaps, when I know +more--will you forget my words, for the time?" + +The 'phone bell rang. + +"Hullo!" cried Eltham--"hard luck, doctor!"--but I could see that he +welcomed the interruption. "Why!" he added, "it is one o'clock!" + +I went to the telephone. + +"Is that Dr. Petrie?" inquired a woman's voice. + +"Yes; who is speaking?" + +"Mrs. Hewett has been taken more seriously ill. Could you come at +once?" + +"Certainly," I replied, for Mrs. Hewett was not only a profitable +patient but an estimable lady. "I shall be with you in a quarter of an +hour." + +I hung up the receiver. + +"Something urgent?" asked Eltham, emptying his pipe. + +"Sounds like it. You had better turn in." + +"I should much prefer to walk over with you, if it would not be +intruding. Our conversation has ill prepared me for sleep." + +"Right!" I said, for I welcomed his company; and three minutes later +we were striding across the deserted common. + +A sort of mist floated amongst the trees, seeming in the moonlight +like a veil draped from trunk to trunk, as in silence we passed the +Mound Pond, and struck out for the north side of the common. + +I suppose the presence of Eltham and the irritating recollection of +his half-confidence were the responsible factors, but my mind +persistently dwelt upon the subject of Fu-Manchu and the atrocities +which he had committed during his sojourn in England. So actively was +my imagination at work that I felt again the menace which so long had +hung over me; I felt as though that murderous yellow cloud still cast +its shadow upon England. And I found myself longing for the company of +Nayland Smith. I cannot state what was the nature of Eltham's +reflections, but I can guess; for he was as silent as I. + +It was with a conscious effort that I shook myself out of this +morbidly reflective mood, on finding that we had crossed the common +and were come to the abode of my patient. + +"I shall take a little walk," announced Eltham; "for I gather that you +don't expect to be detained long? I shall never be out of sight of the +door, of course." + +"Very well," I replied, and ran up the steps. + +There were no lights to be seen in any of the windows, which +circumstance rather surprised me, as my patient occupied, or had +occupied when last I had visited her, a first-floor bedroom in the +front of the house. My knocking and ringing produced no response for +three or four minutes; then, as I persisted, a scantily clothed and +half-awake maid-servant unbarred the door and stared at me stupidly in +the moonlight. + +"Mrs. Hewett requires me?" I asked abruptly. + +The girl stared more stupidly than ever. + +"No, sir," she said: "she don't, sir; she's fast asleep!" + +"But some one 'phoned me!" I insisted, rather irritably, I fear. + +"Not from here, sir," declared the now wide-eyed girl. "We haven't got +a telephone, sir." + +For a few moments I stood there, staring as foolishly as she; then +abruptly I turned and descended the steps. At the gate I stood looking +up and down the road. The houses were all in darkness. What could be +the meaning of the mysterious summons? I had made no mistake +respecting the name of my patient; it had been twice repeated over the +telephone; yet that the call had not emanated from Mrs. Hewett's house +was now palpably evident. Days had been when I should have regarded +the episode as preluding some outrage, but to-night I felt more +disposed to ascribe it to a silly practical joke. + +Eltham walked up briskly. + +"You're in demand to-night, doctor," he said. "A young person called +for you almost directly you had left your house, and, learning where +you were gone, followed you." + +"Indeed!" I said, a trifle incredulously. "There are plenty of other +doctors if the case is an urgent one." + +"She may have thought it would save time as you were actually up and +dressed," explained Eltham; "and the house is quite near to here, I +understand." + +I looked at him a little blankly. Was this another effort of the +unknown jester? + +"I have been fooled once," I said. "That 'phone call was a hoax--" + +"But I feel certain," declared Eltham earnestly, "that this is +genuine! The poor girl was dreadfully agitated; her master has broken +his leg and is lying helpless: number 280 Rectory Grove." + +"Where is the girl?" I asked sharply. + +"She ran back directly she had given me her message." + +"Was she a servant?" + +"I should imagine so: French, I think. But she was so wrapped up I had +little more than a glimpse of her. I am sorry to hear that some one +has played a silly joke on you, but believe me"--he was very +earnest--"this is no jest. The poor girl could scarcely speak for +sobs. She mistook me for you, of course." + +"Oh!" said I grimly; "well, I suppose I must go. Broken leg, you +said?--and my surgical bag, splints and so forth, are at home!" + +"My dear Petrie!" cried Eltham, in his enthusiastic way, "you no doubt +can do something to alleviate the poor man's suffering immediately. I +will run back to your rooms for the bag and rejoin you at 280 Rectory +Grove." + +"It's awfully good of you, Eltham--" + +He held up his hand. + +"The call of suffering humanity, Petrie, is one which I may no more +refuse to hear than you." + +I made no further protest after that, for his point of view was +evident and his determination adamantine, but told him where he would +find the bag and once more set out across the moon-bright common, he +pursuing a westerly direction and I going east. + +Some three hundred yards I had gone, I suppose, and my brain had been +very active the while, when something occurred to me which placed a +new complexion upon this second summons. I thought of the falsity of +the first, of the improbability of even the most hardened practical +joker practising his wiles at one o'clock in the morning. I thought of +our recent conversation; above all I thought of the girl who had +delivered the message to Eltham, the girl whom he had described as a +French maid--whose personal charm had so completely enlisted his +sympathies. Now, to this train of thought came a new one, and, adding +it, my suspicion became almost a certainty. + +I remembered (as, knowing the district, I should have remembered +before) that there was no number 280 Rectory Grove. + +Pulling up sharply, I stood looking about me. Not a living soul was in +sight; not even a policeman. Where the lamps marked the main paths +across the common nothing moved; in the shadows about me nothing +stirred. But something stirred within me--a warning voice which for +long had lain dormant. + +What was afoot? + +A breeze caressed the leaves overhead, breaking the silence with +mysterious whisperings. Some portentous truth was seeking for +admittance to my brain. I strove to reassure myself, but the sense of +impending evil and of mystery became heavier. At last I could combat +my strange fears no longer. I turned and began to run towards the +south side of the common--towards my rooms--and after Eltham. + +I had hoped to head him off, but came upon no sign of him. An +all-night tramcar passed at the moment that I reached the high-road, +and as I ran around behind it I saw that my windows were lighted and +that there was a light in the hall. + +My key was yet in the lock when my housekeeper opened the door. + +"There's a gentleman just come, doctor," she began. + +I thrust past her and raced up the stairs to my study. + +Standing by the writing-table was a tall thin man, his gaunt face +brown as a coffee-berry and his steely grey eyes fixed upon me. My +heart gave a great leap--and seemed to stand still. + +It was Nayland Smith! + +"Smith!" I cried. "Smith, old man, by God, I'm glad to see you!" + +He wrung my hand hard, looking at me with his searching eyes; but +there was little enough of gladness in his face. He was altogether +greyer than when last I had seen him--greyer and sterner. + +"Where is Eltham?" I asked. + +Smith started back as though I had struck him. + +"Eltham!" he whispered--"_Eltham_! is Eltham here?" + +"I left him ten minutes ago on the common." + +Smith dashed his right fist into the palm of his left hand, and his +eyes gleamed almost wildly. + +"My God, Petrie!" he said, "am I fated _always_ to come too late?" + +My dreadful fears in that instant were confirmed. I seemed to feel my +legs totter beneath me. + +"Smith, you don't mean--" + +"I do, Petrie!" His voice sounded very far away. "Fu-Manchu is here; +and Eltham, God help him ... is his first victim!" + + + + +CHAPTER II + +ELTHAM VANISHES + + +Smith went racing down the stairs like a man possessed. Heavy with +such a foreboding of calamity as I had not known for two years, I +followed him--along the hall and out into the road. The very peace and +beauty of the night in some way increased my mental agitation. The sky +was lighted almost tropically with such a blaze of stars as I could +not recall to have seen since, my futile search concluded, I had left +Egypt. The glory of the moonlight yellowed the lamps speckled across +the expanse of the common. The night was as still as night can ever be +in London. The dimming pulse of a cab or car alone disturbed the +quietude. + +With a quick glance to right and left, Smith ran across on to the +common, and, leaving the door wide open behind me, I followed. The +path which Eltham had pursued terminated almost opposite to my house. +One's gaze might follow it, white and empty, for several hundred yards +past the pond, and farther, until it became overshadowed and was lost +amid a clump of trees. + +I came up with Smith, and side by side we ran on, whilst pantingly I +told my tale. + +"It was a trick to get you away from him!" cried Smith. "They meant no +doubt to make some attempt at your house, but, as he came out with +you, an alternative plan--" + +Abreast of the pond, my companion slowed down, and finally stopped. + +"Where did you last see Eltham?" he asked, rapidly. + +I took his arm, turning him slightly to the right, and pointed across +the moon-bathed common. + +"You see that clump of bushes on the other side of the road?" I said. +"There's a path to the left of it. I took that path and he took this. +We parted at the point where they meet--" + +Smith walked right down to the edge of the water and peered about over +the surface. + +What he hoped to find there I could not imagine. Whatever it had been +he was disappointed, and he turned to me again, frowning perplexedly, +and tugging at the lobe of his left ear, an old trick which reminded +me of gruesome things we had lived through in the past. + +"Come on," he jerked. "It may be amongst the trees." + +From the tone of his voice I knew that he was tensed up nervously, and +his mood but added to the apprehension of my own. + +"_What_ may be amongst the trees, Smith?" I asked. + +He walked on. + +"God knows, Petrie; but I fear--" + +Behind us, along the high-road, a tramcar went rocking by, doubtless +bearing a few belated workers homeward. The stark incongruity of the +thing was appalling. How little those weary toilers, hemmed about with +the commonplace, suspected that almost within sight from the car +windows, amid prosy benches, iron railings, and unromantic, flickering +lamps, two fellow-men moved upon the border of a horror-land! + +Beneath the trees a shadow carpet lay, its edges tropically sharp; and +fully ten yards from the first of the group, we two, hatless both, and +sharing a common dread, paused for a moment and listened. + +The car had stopped at the farther extremity of the common, and now +with a moan that grew to a shriek was rolling on its way again. We +stood and listened until silence reclaimed the night. Not a footstep +could be heard. Then slowly we walked on. At the edge of the little +coppice we stopped again abruptly. + +Smith turned and thrust his pistol into my hand. A white ray of light +pierced the shadows; my companion carried an electric torch. But no +trace of Eltham was discoverable. + +There had been a heavy shower of rain during the evening, just before +sunset, and although the open paths were dry again, under the trees +the ground was still moist. Ten yards within the coppice we came upon +tracks--the tracks of one running, as the deep imprints of the toes +indicated. + +Abruptly the tracks terminated; others, softer, joined them, two sets +converging from left and right. There was a confused patch, trailing +off to the west; then this became indistinct, and was finally lost, +upon the hard ground outside the group. + +For perhaps a minute, or more, we ran about from tree to tree, and +from bush to bush, searching like hounds for a scent, and fearful of +what we might find. We found nothing; and fully in the moonlight we +stood facing one another. The night was profoundly still. + +Nayland Smith stepped back into the shadows, and began slowly to turn +his head from left to right, taking in the entire visible expanse of +the common. Towards a point where the road bisected it he stared +intently. Then, with a bound, he set off! + +"Come on, Petrie!" he cried. "There they are!" + +Vaulting a railing he went away over a field like a madman. Recovering +from the shock of surprise, I followed him, but he was well ahead of +me, and making for some vaguely seen objects moving against the lights +of the roadway. + +Another railing was vaulted, and the corner of a second, triangular +grass patch crossed at a hot sprint. We were twenty yards from the +road when the sound of a starting motor broke the silence. We gained +the gravelled footpath only to see the tail-light of the car dwindling +to the north! + +Smith leant dizzily against a tree. + +"Eltham is in that car!" he gasped. "Just God! are we to stand here +and see him taken away to--?" + +He beat his fist upon the tree, in a sort of tragic despair. The +nearest cab-rank was no great distance away, but, excluding the +possibility of no cab being there, it might, for all practicable +purposes, as well have been a mile off. + +The beat of the retreating motor was scarcely audible; the lights +might but just be distinguished. Then, coming in an opposite +direction, appeared the headlamp of another car, of a car that raced +nearer and nearer to us, so that, within a few seconds of its first +appearance, we found ourselves bathed in the beam of its headlights. + +Smith bounded out into the road, and stood, a weird silhouette, with +upraised arms, fully in its course! + +The brakes were applied hurriedly. It was a big limousine, and its +driver swerved perilously in avoiding Smith and nearly ran into me. +But, the breathless moment past, the car was pulled up, head on to the +railings; and a man in evening clothes was demanding excitedly what +had happened. Smith, a hatless, dishevelled figure, stepped up to the +door. + +"My name is Nayland Smith," he said rapidly--"Burmese Commissioner." +He snatched a letter from his pocket and thrust it into the hands of +the bewildered man. "Read that. It is signed by another +Commissioner--the Commissioner of Police." + +With amazement written all over him, the other obeyed. + +"You see," continued my friend tersely, "it is _carte blanche_. I wish +to commandeer your car, sir, on a matter of life and death!" + +The other returned the letter. + +"Allow me to offer it!" he said, descending. "My man will take your +orders. I can finish my journey by cab. I am--" + +But Smith did not wait to learn whom he might be. + +"Quick!" he cried to the stupefied chauffeur. "You passed a car a +minute ago--yonder. Can you overtake it?" + +"I can try, sir, if I don't lose her track." + +Smith leapt in, pulling me after him. + +"Do it!" he snapped. "There are no speed limits for me. Thanks! Good +night, sir!" + +We were off! The car swung around and the chase commenced. + +One last glimpse I had of the man we had dispossessed, standing alone +by the roadside, and at ever-increasing speed, we leapt away in the +track of Eltham's captors. + +Smith was too highly excited for ordinary conversation, but he threw +out short, staccato remarks. + +"I have followed Fu-Manchu from Hong-Kong," he jerked. "Lost him at +Suez. He got here a boat ahead of me. Eltham has been corresponding +with some mandarin up-country. Knew that. Came straight to you. Only +got in this evening. He--Fu-Manchu--has been sent here to get Eltham. +My God! and he has him! He will question him! The interior of China--a +seething pot, Petrie! They had to stop the leakage of information. +_He_ is here for that." + +The car pulled up with a jerk that pitched me out of my seat, and the +chauffeur leapt to the road and ran ahead. Smith was out in a trice, +as the man, who had run up to a constable, came racing back. + +"Jump in, sir--jump in!" he cried, his eyes bright with the lust of +the chase; "they are making for Battersea!" + +And we were off again. + +Through the empty streets we roared on. A place of gasometers and +desolate waste lots slipped behind and we were in a narrow way where +gates of yards and a few lowly houses faced upon a prospect of high +blank wall. + +"Thames on our right," said Smith, peering ahead. "His rathole is by +the river as usual. _Hi_!"--he grabbed up the speaking-tube--"Stop! +Stop!" + +The limousine swung into the narrow sidewalk, and pulled up close by a +yard gate. I, too, had seen our quarry--a long, low-bodied car, +showing no inside lights. It had turned the next corner, where a +street lamp shone greenly not a hundred yards ahead. + +Smith leapt out, and I followed him. + +"That must be a cul-de-sac," he said, and turned to the eager-eyed +chauffeur. "Run back to that last turning," he ordered, "and wait +there, out of sight. Bring the car up when you hear a police-whistle." + +The man looked disappointed, but did not question the order. As he +began to back away, Smith grasped me by the arm and drew me forward. + +"We must get to that corner," he said, "and see where the car stands, +without showing ourselves." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE WIRE JACKET + + +I suppose we were not more than a dozen paces from the lamp when we +heard the thudding of the motor. The car was backing out! + +It was a desperate moment, for it seemed that we could not fail to be +discovered. Nayland Smith began to look about him, feverishly, for a +hiding place, a quest which I seconded with equal anxiety. And Fate +was kind to us--doubly kind as after events revealed. A wooden gate +broke the expanse of wall hard by upon the right, and, as the result +of some recent accident, a ragged gap had been torn in the panels +close to the top. + +The chain of the padlock hung loosely; and in a second Smith was up, +with his foot in this as in a stirrup. He threw his arm over the top +and drew himself upright. A second later he was astride the broken +gate. + +"Up you come, Petrie!" he said, and reached down his hand to aid me. + +I got my foot into the loop of chain, grasped at a projection in the +gate-post, and found myself up. + +"There is a crossbar, on this side to stand on," said Smith. + +He climbed over and vanished in the darkness. I was still astride the +broken gate when the car turned the corner, slowly, for there was +scanty room; but I was standing upon the bar on the inside and had my +head below the gap ere the driver could possibly have seen me. + +"Stay where you are until he passes," hissed my companion, below. +"There is a row of kegs under you." + +The sound of the motor passing outside grew loud--louder--then began +to die away. I felt about with my left foot, discerned the top of a +keg, and dropped, panting, beside Smith. + +"Phew!" I said--"that was a close thing! Smith--how do we know--?" + +"That we have followed the right car?" he interrupted. "Ask yourself +the question: what would any ordinary man be doing motoring in a place +like this at two o'clock in the morning?" + +"You are right, Smith," I agreed. "Shall we get out again?" + +"Not yet. I have an idea. Look yonder." + +He grasped my arm, turning me in the desired direction. + +Beyond a great expanse of unbroken darkness a ray of moonlight slanted +into the place wherein we stood, spilling its cold radiance upon rows +of kegs. + +"That's another door," continued my friend. I now began dimly to +perceive him beside me. "If my calculations are not entirely wrong, it +opens on a wharf gate--" + +A steam siren hooted dismally, apparently from quite close at hand. + +"I'm right!" snapped Smith. "That turning leads down to the gate. Come +on, Petrie!" + +He directed the light of the electric torch upon a narrow path through +the ranks of casks, and led the way to the farther door. A good two +feet of moonlight showed along the top. I heard Smith straining; +then-- + +"These kegs are all loaded with grease," he said, "and I want to +reconnoitre over that door." + +"I am leaning on a crate which seems easy to move," I reported. "Yes, +it's empty. Lend a hand." + +We grasped the empty crate, and, between us, set it up on a solid +pedestal of casks. Then Smith mounted to this observation platform and +I scrambled up beside him, and looked down upon the lane outside. + +It terminated as Smith had foreseen at a wharf gate some six feet to +the right of our post. Piled up in the lane beneath us, against the +warehouse door, was a stack of empty casks. Beyond, over the way, was +a kind of ramshackle building that had possibly been a dwelling-house +at some time. Bills were stuck in the ground-floor windows indicating +that the three floors were to let as offices; so much was discernible +in that reflected moonlight. + +I could hear the tide lapping upon the wharf, could feel the chill +from the near river and hear the vague noises which, night nor day, +never cease upon the great commercial waterway. + +"Down!" whispered Smith. "Make no noise! I suspected it. They heard +the car following!" + +I obeyed, clutching at him for support; for I was suddenly dizzy, and +my heart was leaping wildly--furiously. + +"You saw her?" he whispered. + +Saw her! Yes, I had seen her! And my poor dream-world was toppling +about me, its cities ashes and its fairness dust. + +Peering from the window, her great eyes wondrous in the moonlight and +her red lips parted, hair gleaming like burnished foam and her anxious +gaze set upon the corner of the lane--was Kāramančh ... Kāramančh +whom once we had rescued from the house of this fiendish Chinese +doctor; Kāramančh who had been our ally, in fruitless quest of +whom,--when, too late, I realized how empty my life was become--I had +wasted what little of the world's goods I possessed:--Kāramančh! + +"Poor old Petrie," murmured Smith. "I knew, but I hadn't the +heart--_He_ has her again--God knows by what chains he holds her. But +she's only a woman, old boy, and women are very much alike--very much +alike from Charing Cross to Pagoda Road." + +He rested his hand on my shoulder for a moment; I am ashamed to +confess that I was trembling; then, clenching my teeth with that +mechanical physical effort which often accompanies a mental one, I +swallowed the bitter draught of Nayland Smith's philosophy. He was +raising himself, to peer, cautiously, over the top of the door. I did +likewise. + +The window from which the girl had looked was nearly on a level with +our eyes, and as I raised my head above the woodwork, I quite +distinctly saw her go out of the room. The door, as she opened it, +admitted a dull light, against which her figure showed silhouetted for +a moment. Then the door was reclosed. + +"We must risk the other windows," rapped Smith. + +Before I had grasped the nature of his plan, he was over and had +dropped almost noiselessly upon the casks outside. Again I followed +his lead. + +"You are not going to attempt anything, single-handed--against _him_?" +I asked. + +"Petrie--Eltham is in that house. He has been brought here to be put +to the question, in the medięval, and Chinese, sense! Is there time to +summon assistance?" + +I shuddered. This had been in my mind, certainly, but so expressed it +was definitely horrible--revolting, yet stimulating. + +"You have the pistol," added Smith; "follow closely, and quietly." + +He walked across the tops of the casks and leapt down, pointing to +that nearest to the closed door of the house. I helped him place it +under the open window. A second we set beside it, and, not without +some noise, got a third on top. + +Smith mounted. + +His jaw muscles were very prominent and his eyes shone like steel; but +he was as cool as though he were about to enter a theatre and not the +den of the most stupendous genius who ever worked for evil. I would +forgive any man who, knowing Dr. Fu-Manchu, feared him; I feared him +myself--feared him as one fears a scorpion; but when Nayland Smith +hauled himself up on to the wooden ledge above the door and swung +thence into the darkened room, I followed and was in close upon his +heels. But I admired him, for he had every ampčre of his +self-possession in hand; my own case was different. + +He spoke close to my ear. + +"Is your hand steady? We may have to shoot." + +I thought of Kāramančh, of lovely dark-eyed Kāramančh, whom this +wonderful, evil product of secret China had stolen from me--for so I +now adjudged it. + +"Rely upon me!" I said grimly. "I--" + +The words ceased--frozen on my tongue. + +There are things that one seeks to forget, but it is my lot often to +remember the sound which at that moment literally struck me rigid with +horror. Yet it was only a groan; but, merciful God! I pray that it may +never be my lot to listen to such a groan again. + +Smith drew a sibilant breath. + +"It's Eltham!" he whispered hoarsely, "they're torturing--" + +"No, no!" screamed a woman's voice--a voice that thrilled me anew, +but with another emotion. "Not that, not--" + +I distinctly heard the sound of a blow. Followed a sort of vague +scuffling. A door somewhere at the back of the house opened--and shut +again. Some one was coming along the passage towards us! + +"Stand back!" Smith's voice was low, but perfectly steady. "Leave it +to me!" + +Nearer came the footsteps and nearer. I could hear suppressed sobs. +The door opened, admitting again the faint light--and Kāramančh came +in. The place was quite unfurnished, offering no possibility of +hiding; but to hide was unnecessary. + +Her slim figure had not crossed the threshold ere Smith had his arm +about the girl's waist and one hand clapped to her mouth. A stifled +gasp she uttered, and he lifted her into the room. + +"Shut the door, Petrie," he directed. + +I stepped forward and closed the door. A faint perfume stole to my +nostrils--a vague, elusive breath of the East, reminiscent of strange +days that, now, seemed to belong to a remote past. Kāramančh! that +faint, indefinable perfume was part of her dainty personality; it may +appear absurd--impossible--but many and many a time I had dreamt of +it. + +"In my breast pocket," rapped Smith; "the light." + +I bent over the girl as he held her. She was quite still, but I could +have wished that I had had more certain mastery of myself. I took the +torch from Smith's pocket and, mechanically, directed it upon the +captive. + +She was dressed very plainly, wearing a simple blue skirt, and white +blouse. It was easy to divine that it was she whom Eltham had mistaken +for a French maid. A brooch set with a ruby was pinned at the point +where the blouse opened--gleaming fierily and harshly against the soft +skin. Her face was pale and her eyes wide with fear. + +"There is some cord in my right-hand pocket," said Smith. "I came +provided. Tie her wrists." + +I obeyed him, silently. The girl offered no resistance, but I think I +never essayed a less congenial task than that of binding her white +wrists. The jewelled fingers lay quite listlessly in my own. + +"Make a good job of it!" rapped Smith significantly. + +A flush rose to my cheeks, for I knew well enough what he meant. + +"She is fastened," I said, and I turned the ray of the torch upon her +again. + +Smith removed his hand from her mouth but did not relax his grip of +her. She looked up at me with eyes in which I could have sworn there +was no recognition. But a flush momentarily swept over her face, and +left it pale again. + +"We shall have to--gag her--" + +"Smith, I can't do it!" + +The girl's eyes filled with tears and she looked up at my companion +pitifully. + +"Please don't be cruel to me," she whispered, with that soft accent +which always played havoc with my composure. "Every one--every one--is +cruel to me. I will promise--indeed I will swear, to be quiet. Oh, +believe me, if you can save him I will do nothing to hinder you." Her +beautiful head drooped. "Have some pity for me as well." + +"Kāramančh," I said, "we would have believed you once. We cannot now." + +She started violently. + +"You know my name!" Her voice was barely audible. "Yet I have never +seen you in my life--" + +"See if the door locks," interrupted Smith harshly. + +Dazed by the apparent sincerity in the voice of our lovely +captive--vacant from wonder of it all--I opened the door, felt for, +and found, a key. + +We left Kāramančh crouching against the wall; her great eyes were +turned towards me fascinatedly. Smith locked the door with much care. +We began a tip-toed progress along the dimly-lighted passage. + +From beneath a door on the left, and near the end, a brighter light +shone. Beyond that again was another door. A voice was speaking in the +lighted room; yet I could have sworn that Kāramančh had come, not from +there but from the room beyond--from the far end of the passage. + +But the voice!--who, having once heard it, could ever mistake that +singular voice, alternately guttural and sibilant. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu was speaking! + +"I have asked you," came with ever-increasing clearness (Smith had +begun to turn the knob), "to reveal to me the name of your +correspondent in Nan-Yang. I have suggested that he may be the +Mandarin Yen-Sun-Yat, but you have declined to confirm me. Yet I know" +(Smith had the door open a good three inches and was peering in) "that +some official, some high official, is a traitor. Am I to resort again +to _the question_ to learn his name?" + +Ice seemed to enter my veins at the unseen inquisitor's intonation of +the words "_the question_." This was the twentieth century; yet there, +in that damnable room.... + +Smith threw the door open. + +Through a sort of haze, born mostly of horror, but not entirely, I saw +Eltham, stripped to the waist and tied, with his arms upstretched, to +a rafter in the ancient ceiling. A Chinaman, who wore a slop-shop blue +suit and who held an open knife in his hand, stood beside him. Eltham +was ghastly white. The appearance of his chest puzzled me momentarily, +then I realized that a sort of _tourniquet_ of wire-netting was +screwed so tightly about him that the flesh swelled out in knobs +through the mesh. There was blood-- + +"God in heaven!" screamed Smith frenziedly, "_they have the +wire-jacket on him!_ Shoot down that damned Chinaman, Petrie! Shoot! +Shoot!" + +Lithely as a cat the man with the knife leapt around--but I raised the +Browning, and deliberately--with a cool deliberation that came to me +suddenly--shot him through the head. I saw his oblique eyes turn up to +the whites; I saw the mark squarely between his brows; and with no word +nor cry he sank to his knees and toppled forward with one yellow hand +beneath him and one outstretched, clutching--clutching--convulsively. +His pigtail came unfastened and began to uncoil, slowly, like a snake. + +I handed the pistol to Smith; I was perfectly cool, now; and I leapt +forward, took up the bloody knife from the floor and cut Eltham's +lashings. He sank into my arms. + +"Praise God," he murmured weakly. "He is more merciful to me than +perhaps I deserve. Unscrew ... the jacket, Petrie ... I think ... I was +very near to ... weakening. Praise the good God, who ... gave me ... +fortitude...." + +I got the screw of the accursed thing loosened, but the act of +removing the jacket was too agonizing for Eltham--man of iron though +he was. I laid him swooning on the floor. + +"Where is Fu-Manchu?" + +Nayland Smith, from just within the door, threw out the query in a +tone of stark amaze. I stood up--I could do nothing more for the poor +victim at the moment--and looked about me. + +The room was innocent of furniture, save for heaps of rubbish on the +floor, and a tin oil-lamp hung on the wall. The dead Chinaman lay +close beside Smith. There was no second door, the one window was +barred and from this room we had heard the voice, the unmistakable, +unforgettable voice, of Fu-Manchu. + +_But Dr. Fu-Manchu was not there!_ + +Neither of us could accept the fact for a moment; we stood there, +looking from the dead man to the tortured man who had only swooned, +in a state of helpless incredulity. + +Then the explanation flashed upon us both, simultaneously, and with a +cry of baffled rage Smith leapt along the passage to the second door. +It was wide open. I stood at his elbow when he swept its emptiness +with the ray of his pocket-lamp. + +There was a speaking-tube fixed between the two rooms! + +Smith literally ground his teeth. + +"Yet, Petrie," he said, "we have learnt something. Fu-Manchu had +evidently promised Eltham his life if he would divulge the name of his +correspondent. He meant to keep his word; it is a sidelight on his +character." + +"How so?" + +"Eltham has never seen Dr. Fu-Manchu, but Eltham knows certain parts +of China better than you know the Strand. Probably, if he saw +Fu-Manchu, he would recognize him for whom he really is, and this, it +seems, the Doctor is anxious to avoid." + +We ran back to where we had left Kāramančh. + +The room was empty! + +"Defeated, Petrie!" said Smith bitterly. "The Yellow Devil is loosed +on London again!" + +He leant from the window and the skirl of a police whistle split the +stillness of the night. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +THE CRY OF A NIGHTHAWK + + +Such were the episodes that marked the coming of Dr. Fu-Manchu to +London, that awakened fears long dormant and reopened old wounds--nay, +poured poison into them. I strove desperately, by close attention to +my professional duties, to banish the very memory of Kāramančh from my +mind; desperately, but how vainly! Peace was for me no more, joy was +gone from the world, and only mockery remained as my portion. + +Poor Eltham we had placed in a nursing establishment, where his +indescribable hurts could be properly tended; and his uncomplaining +fortitude not infrequently made me thoroughly ashamed of myself. +Needless to say, Smith had made such other arrangements as were +necessary to safeguard the injured man, and these proved so successful +that the malignant being whose plans they thwarted abandoned his +designs upon the heroic clergyman and directed his attention +elsewhere, as I must now proceed to relate. + +Dusk always brought with it a cloud of apprehension, for darkness must +ever be the ally of crime; and it was one night, long after the clocks +had struck the mystic hour, "when churchyards yawn," that the hand of +Dr. Fu-Manchu again stretched out to grasp a victim. I was dismissing +a chance patient. + +"Good night, Dr. Petrie," he said. + +"Good night, Mr. Forsyth," I replied; and having conducted my late +visitor to the door, I closed and bolted it, switched off the light, +and went upstairs. + +My patient was chief officer of one of the P. and O. boats. He had cut +his hand rather badly on the homeward run, and signs of poisoning +having developed, had called to have the wound treated, apologizing +for troubling me at so late an hour, but explaining that he had only +just come from the docks. The hall clock announced the hour of one as +I ascended the stairs. I found myself wondering what there was in Mr. +Forsyth's appearance which excited some vague and elusive memory. +Coming to the top floor, I opened the door of a front bedroom and was +surprised to find the interior in darkness. + +"Smith!" I called. + +"Come here and watch!" was the terse response. + +Nayland Smith was sitting in the dark at the open window and peering +out across the common. Even as I saw him, a dim silhouette, I could +detect that tensity in his attitude which told of high-strung nerves. + +I joined him. + +"What is it?" I asked curiously. + +"I don't know. Watch that clump of elms." + +His masterful voice had the dry tone in it betokening excitement. I +leaned on the ledge beside him and looked out. The blaze of stars +almost compensated for the absence of the moon, and the night had a +quality of stillness that made for awe. This was a tropical summer, +and the common, with its dancing lights dotted irregularly about it, +had an unfamiliar look to-night. The clump of nine elms showed as a +dense and irregular mass, lacking detail. + +Such moods as that which now claimed my friend are magnetic. I had no +thought of the night's beauty, for it only served to remind me that +somewhere amid London's millions was lurking an uncanny being, whose +life was a mystery, whose very existence was a scientific miracle. + +"Where's your patient?" rapped Smith. + +His abrupt query diverted my thoughts into a new channel. No footstep +disturbed the silence of the high-road. Where _was_ my patient? + +I craned from the window. Smith grabbed my arm. + +"Don't lean out," he said. + +I drew back, glancing at him surprisedly. + +"For Heaven's sake, why not?" + +"I'll tell you presently, Petrie. Did you see him?" + +"I did, and I can't make out what he is doing. He seems to have +remained standing at the gate for some reason." + +"He has seen it!" snapped Smith. "Watch those elms." + +His hand remained upon my arm, gripping it nervously. Shall I say that +I was surprised? I can say it with truth. But I shall add that I was +thrilled, eerily; for this subdued excitement and alert watching of +Smith's could only mean one thing: + +Fu-Manchu! + +And that was enough to set me watching as keenly as he; to set me +listening, not only for sounds outside the house but for sounds +within. Doubts, suspicions, dreads heaped themselves up in my mind. +Why was Forsyth standing there at the gate? I had never seen him +before, to my knowledge, yet there was something oddly reminiscent +about the man. Could it be that his visit formed part of a plot? Yet +his wound had been genuine enough. Thus my mind worked, feverishly; +such was the effect of an unspoken thought--Fu-Manchu. + +Nayland Smith's grip tightened on my arm. + +"There it is again, Petrie!" he whispered. "Look, look!" + +His words were wholly unnecessary. I, too, had seen it; a wonderful +and uncanny sight. Out of the darkness under the elms, low down upon +the ground, grew a vaporous blue light. It flared up, elfinish, then +began to ascend. Like an igneous phantom, a witch flame, it rose, +higher, higher, higher, to what I adjudged to be some twelve feet or +more from the ground. Then, high in the air, it died away again as it +had come! + +"For God's sake, Smith, what was it?" + +"Don't ask me, Petrie. I have seen it twice. We--" + +He paused. Rapid footsteps sounded below. Over Smith's shoulder I saw +Forsyth cross the road, climb the low rail, and set out across the +common. + +Smith sprang impetuously to his feet. + +"We must stop him!" he said hoarsely; then, clapping a hand to my +mouth as I was about to call out--"Not a sound, Petrie!" + +He ran out of the room and went blundering downstairs in the dark, +crying: + +"Out through the garden--the side entrance!" + +I overtook him as he threw wide the door of my dispensing room. +Through he ran and opened the door at the other end. I followed him +out, closing it behind me. The smell from some tobacco plants in a +neighbouring flower-bed was faintly perceptible; no breeze stirred; +and in the great silence I could hear Smith, in front of me, tugging +at the bolt of the gate. + +Then he had it open, and I stepped out, close on his heels, and left +the door ajar. + +"We must not appear to have come from your house," explained Smith +rapidly. "I will go along to the high-road and cross to the common a +hundred yards up, where there is a pathway, as though homeward bound +to the north side. Give me half a minute's start, then you proceed in +an opposite direction and cross from the corner of the next road. +Directly you are out of the light of the street lamps, get over the +rails and run for the elms!" + +He thrust a pistol into my hand and was off. + +While he had been with me, speaking in that incisive impetuous way of +his, his dark face close to mine, and his eyes gleaming like steel, I +had been at one with him in his feverish mood, but now, when I stood +alone in that staid and respectable by-way, holding a loaded pistol in +my hand, the whole thing became utterly unreal. + +It was in an odd frame of mind that I walked to the next corner, as +directed, for I was thinking, not of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the great and evil +man who dreamed of Europe and America under Chinese rule, not of +Nayland Smith, who alone stood between the Chinaman and the +realization of his monstrous schemes, not even of Kāramančh, the slave +girl, whose glorious beauty was a weapon of might in Fu-Manchu's +hand, but of what impression I must have made upon a patient had I +encountered one then. + +Such were my ideas up to the moment that I crossed to the common and +vaulted into the field on my right. As I began to run toward the elms +I found myself wondering what it was all about, and for what we were +come. Fifty yards west of the trees it occurred to me that if Smith +had counted on cutting Forsyth off we were too late, for it appeared +to me that he must already be in the coppice. + +I was right. Twenty paces more I ran, and ahead of me, from the elms, +came a sound. Clearly it came through the still air--the eerie hoot of +a nighthawk. I could not recall ever to have heard the cry of that +bird on the common before, but oddly enough I attached little +significance to it until, in the ensuing instant, a most dreadful +scream--a scream in which fear and loathing and anger were hideously +blended--thrilled me with horror. + +After that I have no recollection of anything until I found myself +standing by the southernmost elm. + +"Smith!" I cried breathlessly. "Smith! my God! where are you?" + +As if in answer to my cry came an indescribable sound, a mingled +sobbing and choking. Out from the shadows staggered a ghastly +figure--that of a man whose face appeared to be _streaked_. His eyes +glared at me madly, and he moved the air with his hands like one blind +and insane with fear. + +I started back; words died upon my tongue. The figure reeled, and the +man fell babbling and sobbing at my very feet. + +Inert I stood, looking down at him. He writhed a moment--and was +still. The silence again became perfect. Then, from somewhere beyond +the elms, Nayland Smith appeared. I did not move. Even when he stood +beside me, I merely stared at him fatuously. + +"I let him walk to his death, Petrie," I heard dimly. "God forgive +me--God forgive me!" + +The words aroused me. + +"Smith"--my voice came as a whisper--"for one awful moment I +thought--" + +"So did some one else," he rapped. "Our poor sailor has met the end +designed for _me_, Petrie!" + +At that I realized two things: I knew why Forsyth's face had struck me +as being familiar in some puzzling way, and I knew why Forsyth now lay +dead upon the grass. Save that he was a fair man and wore a slight +moustache, he was, in features and build, the double of Nayland Smith! + + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE NET + + +We raised the poor victim and turned him over on his back. I dropped +upon my knees, and with unsteady fingers began to strike a match. A +slight breeze was arising and sighing gently through the elms, but, +screened by my hands, the flame of the match took life. It illuminated +wanly the sun-baked face of Nayland Smith, his eyes gleaming with +unnatural brightness. I bent forward, and the dying light of the match +touched that other face. + +"Oh, God!" whispered Smith. + +A faint puff of wind extinguished the match. + +In all my surgical experience I had never met with anything quite so +horrible. Forsyth's livid face was streaked with tiny streams of +blood, which proceeded from a series of irregular wounds. One group of +these clustered upon his left temple, another beneath his right eye, +and others extended from the chin down to the throat. They were +black, almost like tattoo marks, and the entire injured surface was +bloated indescribably. His fists were clenched; he was quite rigid. + +Smith's piercing eyes were set upon me eloquently as I knelt on the +path and made my examination--an examination which that first glimpse +when Forsyth came staggering out from the trees had rendered +useless--a mere matter of form. + +"He's quite dead, Smith," I said huskily. "It's--unnatural--it--" + +Smith began beating his fist into his left palm and taking little, +short, nervous strides up and down beside the dead man. I could hear a +car skirling along the high-road, but I remained there on my knees +staring dully at the disfigured bloody face which but a matter of +minutes since had been that of a clean-looking British seaman. I found +myself contrasting his neat, squarely trimmed moustache with the +bloated face above it, and counting the little drops of blood which +trembled upon its edge. There were footsteps approaching. I arose. The +footsteps quickened, and I turned as a constable ran up. + +"What's this?" he demanded gruffly, and stood with his fists clenched, +looking from Smith to me and down at that which lay between us. Then +his hand flew to his breast; there was a silvern gleam and-- + +"Drop that whistle!" snapped Smith, and struck it from the man's hand. +"Where's your lantern? Don't ask questions!" + +The constable started back and was evidently debating upon his chances +with the two of us, when my friend pulled a letter from his pocket and +thrust it under the man's nose. + +"Read that!" he directed harshly, "and then listen to my orders." + +There was something in his voice which changed the officer's opinion +of the situation. He directed the light of his lantern upon the open +letter, and seemed to be stricken with wonder. + +"If you have any doubt," continued Smith--"you may not be familiar +with the Commissioner's signature--you have only to ring up Scotland +Yard from Dr. Petrie's house, to which we shall now return to disperse +it." He pointed to Forsyth. "Help us to carry him there. We must not +be seen; this must be hushed up. You understand? It must not get into +the Press--" + +The man saluted respectfully, and the three of us addressed ourselves +to the mournful task. By slow stages we bore the dead man to the edge +of the common, carried him across the road and into my house, without +exciting attention even on the part of those vagrants who nightly +slept out in the neighbourhood. + +We laid our burden upon the surgery table. + +"You will want to make an examination, Petrie," said Smith in his +decisive way, "and the officer here might 'phone for the ambulance. I +have some investigations to make also. I must have the pocket lamp." + +He raced upstairs to his room, and an instant later came running down +again. The front door banged. + +"The telephone is in the hall," I said to the constable. + +"Thank you, sir." + +He went out of the surgery as I switched on the lamp over the table +and began to examine the marks upon Forsyth's skin. These, as I have +said, were in groups and nearly all in the form of elongated +punctures; a fairly deep incision with a pear-shaped and superficial +scratch beneath it. One of the tiny wounds had penetrated the right +eye. + +The symptoms, or those which I had been enabled to observe as Forsyth +had first staggered into view from among the elms, were most puzzling. +Clearly enough the muscles of articulation and the respiratory +muscles had been affected; and now the livid face, dotted over with +tiny wounds (they were also on the throat), set me mentally groping +for a clue to the manner of his death. + +No clue presented itself; and my detailed examination of the body +availed me nothing. The grey herald of dawn was come when the police +arrived with the ambulance and took Forsyth away. + +I was just taking my cap from the rack when Nayland Smith returned. + +"Smith!" I cried, "have you found anything?" + +He stood there in the grey light of the hall-way tugging at the lobe +of his left ear. + +The bronzed face looked very gaunt, I thought, and his eyes were +bright with that febrile glitter which once I had disliked, but which +I had learned from experience to be due to tremendous nervous +excitement. At such times he could act with icy coolness, and his +mental faculties seemed temporarily to acquire an abnormal keenness. +He made no direct reply, but-- + +"Have you any milk?" he jerked abruptly. + +So wholly unexpected was the question that for a moment I failed to +grasp it. Then-- + +"Milk!" I began. + +"Exactly, Petrie! If you can find me some milk, I shall be obliged." + +I turned to descend to the kitchen, when-- + +"The remains of the turbot from dinner, Petrie, would also be welcome, +and I think I should like a trowel." + +I stopped at the stairhead and faced him. + +"I cannot suppose that you are joking, Smith," I said, "but--" + +He laughed dryly. + +"Forgive me, old man," he replied. "I was so preoccupied with my own +train of thought that it never occurred to me how absurd my request +must have sounded. I will explain my singular tastes later; at the +moment, hustle is the watchword." + +Evidently he was in earnest, and I ran downstairs accordingly, +returning with a garden trowel, a plate of cold fish, and a glass of +milk. + +"Thanks, Petrie," said Smith. "If you would put the milk in a jug--" + +I was past wondering, so I simply went and fetched a jug, into which +he poured the milk. Then, with the trowel in his pocket, the plate of +cold turbot in one hand and the milk-jug in the other, he made for the +door. He had it open, when another idea evidently occurred to him. + +"I'll trouble you for the pistol, Petrie." + +I handed him the pistol without a word. + +"Don't assume that I want to mystify you," he added, "but the presence +of any one else might jeopardize my plan. I don't expect to be long." + +The cold light of dawn flooded the hall-way momentarily; then the door +closed again and I went upstairs to my study, watching Nayland Smith +as he strode across the common in the early morning mist. He was +making for the Nine Elms, but I lost sight of him before he reached +them. + +I sat there for some time, watching for the first glow of sunrise. A +policeman tramped past the house, and, a while later, a belated +reveller in evening clothes. That sense of unreality assailed me +again. Out there in the grey mist a man who was vested with powers +which rendered him a law unto himself, who had the British Government +behind him in all that he might choose to do, who had been summoned +from Rangoon to London on singular and dangerous business, was +employing himself with a plate of cold turbot, a jug of milk, and a +trowel! + +Away to the right, and just barely visible, a tramcar stopped by the +common, then proceeded on its way, coming in a westerly direction. Its +lights twinkled yellowly through the greyness, but I was less +concerned with the approaching car than with the solitary traveller +who had descended from it. + +As the car went rocking by below me I strained my eyes in an endeavour +more clearly to discern the figure, which, leaving the high-road, had +struck-out across the common. It was that of a woman, who seemingly +carried a bulky bag or parcel. + +One must be a gross materialist to doubt that there are latent powers +in man which man, in modern times, neglects or knows not how to +develop. I became suddenly conscious of a burning curiosity respecting +this lonely traveller who travelled at an hour so strange. With no +definite plan in mind, I went downstairs, took a cap from the rack and +walked briskly out of the house and across the common in a direction +which I thought would enable me to head off the woman. + +I had slightly miscalculated the distance, as Fate would have it, and +with a patch of gorse effectually screening my approach, I came upon +her, kneeling on the damp grass and unfastening the bundle which had +attracted my attention. I stopped and watched her. + +She was dressed in bedraggled fashion in rusty black, wore a common +black straw hat and a thick veil; but it seemed to me that the +dexterous hands at work untying the bundle were slim and white, and I +perceived a pair of hideous cotton gloves lying on the turf beside +her. As she threw open the wrappings and lifted out something that +looked like a small shrimping-net, I stepped around the bush, crossed +silently the intervening patch of grass and stood beside her. + +A faint breath of perfume reached me--of a perfume which, like the +secret incense of Ancient Egypt, seemed to assail my soul. The glamour +of the Orient was in that subtle essence, and I only knew one woman +who used it. I bent over the kneeling figure. + +"Good morning," I said; "can I assist you in any way?" + +She came to her feet like a startled deer, and flung away from me with +the lithe movement of some Eastern dancing-girl. + +Now came the sun, and its heralding rays struck sparks from the jewels +upon the white fingers of this woman who wore the garments of a +mendicant. My heart gave a great leap. It was with difficulty that I +controlled my voice. + +"There is no cause for alarm," I added. + +She stood watching me; even through the coarse veil I could see how +her eyes glittered. I stooped and picked up the net. + +"Oh!" The whispered word was scarcely audible; but it was enough. I +doubted no longer. + +"This is a net for bird-snaring," I said. "What strange bird are you +seeking, _Kāramančh_?" + +With a passionate gesture Kāramančh snatched off the veil, and with it +the ugly black hat. The cloud of wonderful intractable hair came +rumpling about her face, and her glorious eyes blazed out upon me. How +beautiful they were, with the dark beauty of an Egyptian night; how +often had they looked into mine in dreams! + +To labour against a ceaseless yearning for a woman whom one knows, upon +evidence that none but a fool might reject, to be worthless--evil; is +there any torture to which the soul of man is subject, more pitiless? +Yet this was my lot, for what past sins assigned to me I was unable to +conjecture; and this was the woman, this lovely slave of a monster, this +creature of Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +"I suppose you will declare that you do not know me!" I said harshly. + +Her lips trembled, but she made no reply. + +"It is very convenient to forget, sometimes," I ran on bitterly, then +checked myself, for I knew that my words were prompted by a feckless +desire to hear her defence, by a fool's hope that it might be an +acceptable one. I looked again at the net contrivance in my hand; it +had a strong spring fitted to it and a line attached. Quite obviously +it was intended for snaring. "What were you about to do?" I demanded +sharply; but in my heart, poor fool that I was, I found admiration for +the exquisite arch of Kāramančh's lips, and reproach because they were +so tremulous. + +She spoke then. + +"Dr. Petrie--" + +"Well?" + +"You seem to be--angry with me, not so much because--of what I do, as +because I do not remember you. Yet--" + +"Kindly do not revert to the matter," I interrupted. "You have chosen, +very conveniently, to forget that once we were friends. Please +yourself; but answer my question." + +She clasped her hands with a sort of wild abandon. + +"Why do you treat me so?" she cried. She had the most fascinating +accent imaginable. "Throw me into prison, kill me if you like for what +I have done!" She stamped her foot. "For what I have done! But do not +torture me, try to drive me mad with your reproaches--that I forget +you! I tell you--again I tell you--that until you came one night, last +week, to rescue some one from"--(there was the old trick of hesitating +before the name of Fu-Manchu)--"from _him_, I had never, never seen +you!" + +The dark eyes looked into mine, afire with a positive hunger for +belief--or so I was sorely tempted to suppose. But the facts were +against her. + +"Such a declaration is worthless," I said, as coldly as I could. "You +are a traitress; you betray those who are mad enough to trust you--" + +"I am no traitress!" she blazed at me. Her eyes were magnificent. + +"This is mere nonsense. You think that it will pay you better to serve +Fu-Manchu than to remain true to your friends. Your 'slavery'--for I +take it you are posing as a slave again--is evidently not very harsh. +You serve Fu-Manchu, lure men to their destruction, and in return he +loads you with jewels, lavishes gifts--" + +"Ah! so!" + +She sprang forward, raising flaming eyes to mine; her lips were +slightly parted. With that wild abandon which betrayed the desert +blood in her veins, she wrenched open the neck of her bodice and +slipped a soft shoulder free of the garment. She twisted around, so +that the white skin was but inches removed from me. + +"These are some of the gifts that he lavishes upon me!" + +I clenched my teeth. Insane thoughts flooded my mind. For that creamy +skin was wealed with the marks of the lash! + +She turned, quickly rearranging her dress, and watching me the while. +I could not trust myself to speak for a moment, then-- + +"If I am a stranger to you, as you claim, why do you give me your +confidence?" I asked. + +"I have known you long enough to trust you!" she said simply, and +turned her head aside. + +"Then why do you serve this inhuman monster?" + +She snapped her fingers oddly, and looked up at me from under her +lashes. "Why do you question me if you think that everything I say is +a lie?" + +It was a lesson in logic--from a woman! I changed the subject. + +"Tell me what you came here to do," I demanded. + +She pointed to the net in my hands. + +"To catch birds; you have said so yourself." + +"What bird?" + +She shrugged her shoulders. + +And now a memory was born within my brain: it was that of the cry of +the nighthawk which had harbingered the death of Forsyth! The net was +a large and strong one; could it be that some horrible fowl of the +air--some creature unknown to Western naturalists--had been released +upon the common last night? I thought of the marks upon Forsyth's face +and throat; I thought of the profound knowledge of obscure and +dreadful things possessed by the Chinaman. + +The wrapping in which the net had been lay at my feet. I stooped and +took out from it a wicker basket. Kāramančh stood watching me and +biting her lip, but she made no move to check me. I opened the basket. +It contained a large phial, the contents of which possessed a pungent +and peculiar smell. + +I was utterly mystified. + +"You will have to accompany me to my house," I said sternly. + +Kāramančh upturned her great eyes to mine. They were wide with fear. +She was on the point of speaking when I extended my hand to grasp her. +At that, the look of fear was gone and one of rebellion held its +place. Ere I had time to realize her purpose, she flung back from me +with that wild grace which I had met with in no other woman, +turned--and ran! + +Fatuously, net and basket in hand, I stood looking after her. The idea +of pursuit came to me certainly; but I doubted if I could outrun her. +For Kāramančh ran, not like a girl used to town or even country life, +but with the lightness and swiftness of a gazelle; ran like the +daughter of the desert that she was. + +Some two hundred yards she went, stopped, and looked back. It would +seem that the sheer joy of physical effort had aroused the devil in +her, the devil that must lie latent in every woman with eyes like the +eyes of Kāramančh. + +In the ever-brightening sunlight I could see the lithe figure swaying; +no rags imaginable could mask its beauty. I could see the red lips and +gleaming teeth. Then--and it was music good to hear, despite its +taunt--she laughed defiantly, turned, and ran again! + +I resigned myself to defeat; I blush to add, gladly! Some evidences of +a world awakening were perceptible about me now. Feathered choirs +hailed the new day joyously. Carrying the mysterious contrivance which +I had captured from the enemy, I set out in the direction of my house, +my mind very busy with conjectures respecting the link between this +bird-snare and the cry like that of a nighthawk which we had heard at +the moment of Forsyth's death. + +The path that I had chosen led me around the border of the Mound +Pond--a small pool having an islet in the centre. Lying at the margin +of the pond I was amazed to see the plate and jug which Nayland Smith +had borrowed recently. + +Dropping my burden, I walked down to the edge of the water. I was +filled with a sudden apprehension. Then, as I bent to pick up the now +empty jug, came a hail: + +"All right, Petrie! Shall join you in a moment!" + +I started up, looked to right and left; but, although the voice had +been that of Nayland Smith, no sign could I discern of his presence! + +"Smith!" I cried. "Smith!" + +"Coming!" + +Seriously doubting my senses, I looked in the direction from which the +voice had seemed to proceed--and there was Nayland Smith. + +He stood on the islet in the centre of the pond, and, as I perceived +him, he walked down into the shallow water and waded across to me! + +"Good heavens!" I began. + +One of his rare laughs interrupted me. + +"You must think me mad this morning, Petrie!" he said. "But I have +made several discoveries. Do you know what that islet in the pond +really is?" + +"Merely an islet, I suppose." + +"Nothing of the kind; it is a burial mound, Petrie! It marks the site +of one of the Plague Pits where victims were buried during the Great +Plague of London. You will observe that although you have seen it +every morning for some years, it remains for a British Commissioner +lately resident in Burma to acquaint you with its history! +Hullo!"--the laughter was gone from his eyes, and they were steely +hard again--"what the blazes have we here?" + +He picked up the net. "What! A bird-trap!" + +"Exactly!" I said. + +Smith turned his searching gaze upon me. "Where did you find it, +Petrie?" + +"I did not exactly find it," I replied; and I related to him the +circumstances of my meeting with Kāramančh. + +He directed that cold stare upon me throughout the narrative, and +when, with some embarrassment, I had told him of the girl's escape-- + +"Petrie," he said succinctly, "you are an imbecile!" + +I flushed with anger, for not even from Nayland Smith, whom I esteemed +above all other men, could I accept such words uttered as he had +uttered them. We glared at one another. + +"Kāramančh," he continued coldly, "is a beautiful toy, I grant you; +but so is a cobra. Neither is suitable for playful purposes." + +"Smith!" I cried hotly, "drop that! Adopt another tone or I cannot +listen to you!" + +"You _must_ listen," he said, squaring his lean jaw truculently. "You +are playing, not only with a pretty girl who is the favourite of a +Chinese Nero, but with _my life_! And I object, Petrie, on purely +personal grounds!" + +I felt my anger oozing from me; for this was strictly just. I had +nothing to say and Smith continued: + +"You _know_ that she is utterly false, yet a glance or two from those +dark eyes of hers can make a fool of you! A woman made a fool of me +once, but I learned my lesson; you have failed to learn yours. If you +are determined to go to pieces on the rock that broke up Adam, do so! +But don't involve me in the wreck, Petrie, for that might mean a +yellow emperor of the world, and you know it!" + +"Your words are unnecessarily brutal, Smith," I said, feeling very +crestfallen, "but there--perhaps I fully deserve them all." + +"You _do_!" he assured me, but he relaxed immediately. "A murderous +attempt is made upon my life, resulting in the death of a perfectly +innocent man in no way concerned. Along you come and let an +accomplice, perhaps a participant, escape, merely because she has a +red mouth, or black lashes, or whatever it is that fascinates you so +hopelessly!" + +He opened the wicker basket, sniffing at the contents. + +"Ah!" he snapped, "do you recognize this odour?" + +"Certainly." + +"Then you have some idea respecting Kāramančh's quarry?" + +"Nothing of the kind!" + +Smith shrugged his shoulders. + +"Come along, Petrie," he said, linking his arm in mine. + +We proceeded. Many questions there were that I wanted to put to him, +but one above all. + +"Smith," I said, "what, in Heaven's name, were you doing on the mound? +Digging something up?" + +"No," he replied, smiling dryly, "burying something!" + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +UNDER THE ELMS + + +Dusk found Nayland Smith and me at the top bedroom window. We knew, +now that poor Forsyth's body had been properly examined, that he had +died from poisoning. Smith, declaring that I did not deserve his +confidence, had refused to confide in me his theory of the origin of +the peculiar marks upon the body. + +"On the soft ground under the trees," he said, "I found his tracks +right up to the point where--something happened. There were no other +fresh tracks for several yards around. He was attacked as he stood +close to the trunk of one of the elms. Six or seven feet away I found +some other tracks, very much like this." + +He marked a series of dots upon the blotting-pad, for this +conversation took place during the afternoon. + +"Claws!" I cried. "That eerie call! like the call of a nighthawk--is +it some unknown species of--flying thing?" + +"We shall see, shortly; possibly to-night," was his reply. "Since, +probably owing to the absence of any moon, a mistake was made"--his +jaw hardened at the thought of poor Forsyth--"another attempt along +the same lines will almost certainly follow--you know Fu-Manchu's +system?" + +So in the darkness, expectant, we sat watching the group of nine elms. +To-night the moon was come, raising her Aladdin's lamp up to the star +world and summoning magic shadows into being. By midnight the +high-road showed deserted, the common was a place of mystery; and save +for the periodical passage of an electric car, in blazing modernity, +this was a fit enough stage for an eerie drama. + +No notice of the tragedy had appeared in print; Nayland Smith was +vested with powers to silence the Press. No detectives, no special +constables, were posted. My friend was of opinion that the publicity +which had been given to the deeds of Dr. Fu-Manchu in the past, +together with the sometimes clumsy co-operation of the police, had +contributed not a little to the Chinaman's success. + +"There is only one thing to fear," he jerked suddenly; "he may not be +ready for another attempt to-night." + +"Why?" + +"Since he has only been in England for a short time, his menagerie of +venomous things may be a limited one at present." + +Earlier in the evening there had been a brief but violent +thunderstorm, with a tropical downpour of rain, and now clouds were +scudding across the blue of the sky. Through a temporary rift in the +veiling the crescent of the moon looked down upon us. It had a +greenish tint, and it set me thinking of the filmed, green eyes of +Fu-Manchu. + +The cloud passed and a lake of silver spread out to the edge of the +coppice; where it terminated at a shadow bank. + +"There it is, Petrie!" hissed Nayland Smith. + +A lambent light was born in the darkness; it rose slowly, unsteadily, +to a great height, and died. + +"It's under the trees, Smith!" + +But he was already making for the door. Over his shoulder: + +"Bring the pistol, Petrie!" he cried; "I have another. Give me at +least twenty yards' start or no attempt may be made. But the instant +I'm under the trees, join me." + +Out of the house we ran, and over on to the common, which latterly had +been a pageant-ground for phantom warring. The light did not appear +again; and as Smith plunged off toward the trees, I wondered if he +knew what uncanny thing was hidden there. I more than suspected that +he had solved the mystery. + +His instructions to keep well in the rear I understood. Fu-Manchu, or +the creature of Fu-Manchu, would attempt nothing in the presence of a +witness. But we knew full well that the instrument of death which was +hidden in the elm coppice could do its ghastly work and leave no clue, +could slay and vanish. For had not Forsyth come to a dreadful end +while Smith and I were within twenty yards of him? + +Not a breeze stirred, as Smith, ahead of me--for I had slowed my +pace--came up level with the first tree. The moon sailed clear of the +straggling cloud wisps which alone told of the recent storm; and I +noted that an irregular patch of light lay silvern on the moist ground +under the elms where otherwise lay shadow. + +He passed on, slowly. I began to run again. Black against the silvern +patch, I saw him emerge--and look up. + +"Be careful, Smith!" I cried--and I was racing under the trees to join +him. + +Uttering a loud cry, he leaped--away from the pool of light. + +"Stand back, Petrie!" he screamed. "Back! farther!" + +He charged into me, shoulder lowered, and sent me reeling! + +Mixed up with his excited cry I had heard a loud splintering and +sweeping of branches overhead; and now as we staggered into the +shadows it seemed that one of the elms was reaching down to touch us! +So, at least, the phenomenon presented itself to my mind in that +fleeting moment while Smith, uttering his warning cry, was hurling me +back. + +Then the truth became apparent. + +With an appalling crash, a huge bough fell from above. One piercing +awful shriek there was, a crackling of broken branches, and a choking +groan.... + +The crack of Smith's pistol close beside me completed my confusion of +mind. + +"Missed!" he yelled. "Shoot it, Petrie! On your left! For God's sake +don't miss it!" + +I turned. A lithe black shape was streaking past me. I +fired--once--twice. Another frightful cry made yet more hideous the +nocturne. + +Nayland Smith was directing the ray of a pocket torch upon the fallen +bough. + +"Have you killed it, Petrie?" he cried. + +"Yes, yes!" + +I stood beside him, looking down. From the tangle of leaves and twigs +an evil yellow face looked up at us. The features were contorted with +agony, but the malignant eyes, wherein light was dying, regarded us +with inflexible hatred. The man was pinned beneath the heavy bough; +his back was broken; and, as we watched, he expired, frothing slightly +at the mouth, and quitted his tenement of clay leaving those glassy +eyes set hideously upon us. + +"The pagan gods fight upon our side," said Smith strangely. "Elms have +a dangerous habit of shedding boughs in still weather--particularly +after a storm. Pan, god of the woods, with this one has performed +Justice's work of retribution." + +"I don't understand. Where was this man--?" + +"Up the tree, lying along the bough which fell, Petrie! That is why he +left no footmarks. Last night no doubt he made his escape by swinging +from bough to bough, ape-fashion, and descending to the ground +somewhere at the other side of the coppice." + +He glanced at me. + +"You are wondering, perhaps," he suggested, "what caused the +mysterious light? I could have told you this morning, but I fear I was +in a bad temper, Petrie. It's very simple; a length of tape soaked in +spirit or something of the kind, and sheltered from the view of any +one watching from your windows, behind the trunk of the tree; then, +the end ignited, lowered, still behind the tree, to the ground. The +operator swinging it around, the flame ascended, of course. I found +the unburned fragment of the tape used last night, a few yards from +here." + +I was peering down at Fu-Manchu's servant, the hideous yellow man who +lay dead in a bower of elm leaves. + +"He has some kind of leather bag beside him," I began. + +"Exactly!" rapped Smith. "In that he carried his dangerous instrument +of death; from that he released it!" + +"Released what?" + +"What your fascinating friend came to recapture this morning." + +"Don't taunt me, Smith!" I said bitterly. "Is it some species of +bird?" + +"You saw the marks on Forsyth's body, and I told you of those which I +had traced upon the ground here. They were caused by _claws_, Petrie!" + +"Claws! I thought so! But _what_ claws?" + +"The claws of a poisonous thing. I recaptured the one used last night, +killed it--against my will--and buried it on the mound. I was afraid +to throw it in the pond, lest some juvenile fisherman should pull it +out and sustain a scratch. I don't know how long the claws would +remain venomous." + +"You are treating me like a child, Smith," I said, slowly. "No doubt I +am hopelessly obtuse, but perhaps you will tell me what this Chinaman +carried in a leather bag and released upon Forsyth. It was something +which you recaptured, apparently with the aid of a plate of cold +turbot and a jug of milk. It was something, also, which Kāramančh had +been sent to recapture with the aid--" + +I stopped. + +"Go on," said Nayland Smith, turning the ray to the left; "what did +she have in the basket?" + +"Valerian," I replied mechanically. + +The ray rested upon the lithe creature that I had shot down. + +It was a black cat! + +"A cat will go through fire and water for valerian," said Smith; "but +I got first innings this morning with fish and milk! I had recognized +the imprints under the trees for those of a cat, and I knew that if a +cat had been released here it would still be hiding in the +neighbourhood, probably in the bushes. I finally located a cat, sure +enough, and came for bait! I laid my trap, for the animal was too +frightened to be approachable, and then shot it; I had to. That yellow +fiend used the light as a decoy. The branch which killed him jutted +out over the path at a spot where an opening in the foliage above +allowed some moon rays to penetrate. Directly the victim stood +beneath, the Chinaman uttered his bird-cry; the one below looked up, +and the cat, previously held silent and helpless in the leather sack, +was dropped accurately upon his head!" + +"But--" I was growing confused. + +Smith stooped lower. + +"The cat's claws are sheathed now," he said; "but if you could examine +them you would find that they are coated with a shining black +substance. Only Fu-Manchu knows what that substance is, Petrie; but +you and I know what it can do!" + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +ENTER MR. ABEL SLATTIN + + +"I don't blame you!" rapped Nayland Smith. "Suppose we say, then, a +thousand pounds if you show us the present hiding-place of Fu-Manchu, +the payment to be in no way subject to whether we profit by your +information or not?" + +Abel Slattin shrugged his shoulders, racially, and returned to the +armchair which he had just quitted. He reseated himself, placing his +hat and cane upon my writing-table. + +"A little agreement in black and white?" he suggested smoothly. + +Smith raised himself up out of the white cane chair, and, bending +forward over a corner of the table, scribbled busily upon a sheet of +notepaper with my fountain-pen. + +The while he did so, I covertly studied our visitor. He lay back in +the armchair, his heavy eyelids lowered deceptively. He was a thought +overdressed--a big man, dark-haired and well-groomed, who toyed with a +monocle most unsuitable to his type. During the preceding +conversation, I had been vaguely surprised to note Mr. Abel Slattin's +marked American accent. + +Sometimes, when Slattin moved, a big diamond which he wore upon the +third finger of his right hand glittered magnificently. There was a +sort of bluish tint underlying the dusky skin, noticeable even in his +hands but proclaiming itself significantly in his puffy face and +especially under the eyes. I diagnosed a labouring valve somewhere in +the heart system. + +Nayland Smith's pen scratched on. My glance strayed from our Semitic +caller to his cane, lying upon the red leather before me. It was of +most unusual workmanship, apparently Indian, being made of some kind +of dark brown, mottled wood, bearing a marked resemblance to a snake's +skin; and the top of the cane was carved in conformity, to represent +the head of what I took to be a puff-adder, fragments of stone, or +beads, being inserted to represent the eyes, and the whole thing being +finished with an artistic realism almost startling. + +When Smith had tossed the written page to Slattin, and he, having read +it with an appearance of carelessness, had folded it neatly and placed +it in his pocket, I said: + +"You have a curio here?" + +Our visitor, whose dark eyes revealed all the satisfaction which, by +his manner, he sought to conceal, nodded and took up the cane in his +hand. + +"It comes from Australia, doctor," he replied; "it's aboriginal work, +and was given to me by a client. You thought it was Indian? Everybody +does. It's my mascot." + +"Really?" + +"It is indeed. Its former owner ascribed magical powers to it! In +fact, I believe he thought that it was one of those staffs mentioned +in biblical history--" + +"Aaron's rod?" suggested Smith, glancing at the cane. + +"Something of the sort," said Slattin, standing up and again preparing +to depart. + +"You will 'phone us, then?" asked my friend. + +"You will hear from me to-morrow," was the reply. + +Smith returned to the cane armchair, and Slattin, bowing to both of +us, made his way to the door as I rang for the girl to show him out. + +"Considering the importance of his proposal," I began, as the door +closed, "you hardly received our visitor with cordiality." + +"I hate to have any relations with him," answered my friend; "but we +must not be squeamish respecting our instruments in dealing with Dr. +Fu-Manchu. Slattin has a rotten reputation--even for a private inquiry +agent. He is little better than a blackmailer--" + +"How do you know?" + +"Because I called on our friend Weymouth at the Yard yesterday and +looked up the man's record." + +"Whatever for?" + +"I knew that he was concerning himself, for some reason, in the case. +Beyond doubt he has established some sort of communication with the +Chinese group; I am only wondering--" + +"You don't mean--" + +"Yes--I do, Petrie! I tell you he is unscrupulous enough to stoop even +to that." + +No doubt Slattin knew that this gaunt, eager-eyed Burmese commissioner +was vested with ultimate authority in his quest of the mighty Chinaman +who represented things unutterable, whose potentialities for evil were +boundless as his genius, who personified a secret danger, the extent +and nature of which none of us truly understood. And, learning of +these things, with unerring Semitic instinct he had sought an opening +in this glittering Rialto. But there were _two_ bidders! + +"You think he may have sunk so low as to become a creature of +Fu-Manchu?" I asked, aghast. + +"Exactly! If it paid him well I do not doubt that he would serve that +master as readily as any other. His record is about as black as it +well could be. Slattin is, of course, an assumed name; he was known as +Lieutenant Pepley when he belonged to the New York Police, and he was +kicked out of the service for complicity in an unsavoury Chinatown +case." + +"Chinatown!" + +"Yes, Petrie, it made me wonder, too; and we must not forget that he +is undeniably a clever scoundrel." + +"Shall you keep any appointment which he may suggest?" + +"Undoubtedly. But I shall not wait until to-morrow." + +"What!" + +"I propose to pay a little informal visit to Mr. Abel Slattin +to-night." + +"At his office?" + +"No; at his private residence. If, as I more than suspect, his object +is to draw us into some trap, he will probably report his favourable +progress to his employer to-night!" + +"Then we should have followed him!" + +Nayland Smith stood up and divested himself of the old +shooting-jacket. + +"He _has_ been followed, Petrie," he replied, with one of his rare +smiles. "Two C.I.D. men have been watching the house all night!" + +This was entirely characteristic of my friend's farseeing methods. + +"By the way," I said, "you saw Eltham this morning. He will soon be +convalescent. Where, in Heaven's name, can he--" + +"Don't be alarmed on his behalf, Petrie," interrupted Smith. "His life +is no longer in danger." + +I stared, stupidly. + +"No longer in danger!" + +"He received, some time yesterday, a letter, written in Chinese, upon +Chinese paper, and enclosed in an ordinary business envelope, having a +typewritten address and bearing a London postmark." + +"Well?" + +"As nearly as I can render the message in English it reads: 'Although, +because you are a brave man, you would not betray your correspondent in +China, he has been discovered. He was a mandarin, and as I cannot write +the name of a traitor, I may not name him. He was executed four days +ago. I salute you and pray for your speedy recovery.--FU-MANCHU.'" + +"Fu-Manchu! But it is almost certainly a trap." + +"On the contrary, Petrie, Fu-Manchu would not have written in Chinese +unless he were sincere; and, to clear all doubt, I received a cable +this morning reporting that the Mandarin Yen-Sun-Yat was assassinated +in his own garden, in Nan-Yang, one day last week." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +DR. FU-MANCHU STRIKES + + +Together we marched down the slope of the quiet, suburban avenue; to +take pause before a small, detached house displaying the hatchet +boards of the estate agent. Here we found unkempt laurel bushes, and +acacias run riot, from which arboreal tangle protruded the notice: "To +be Let or Sold." + +Smith, with an alert glance to right and left, pushed open the wooden +gate and drew me in upon the gravel path. Darkness mantled all; for +the nearest street lamp was fully twenty yards beyond. + +From the miniature jungle bordering the path, a soft whistle sounded. + +"Is that Carter?" called Smith sharply. + +A shadowy figure uprose, and vaguely I made it out for that of a man +in the unobtrusive blue serge which is the undress uniform of the +Force. + +"Well?" rapped my companion. + +"Mr. Slattin returned ten minutes ago, sir," reported the constable. +"He came in a cab which he dismissed--" + +"He has not left again?" + +"A few minutes after his return," the man continued, "another cab came +up, and a lady alighted." + +"A lady!" + +"The same, sir, that has called upon him before." + +"Smith!" I whispered, plucking at his arm--"is it--?" + +He half turned, nodding his head; and my heart began to throb +foolishly. For now the manner of Slattin's campaign suddenly was +revealed to me. In our operations against the Chinese murder-group two +years before, we had had an ally in the enemy's camp--Kāramančh, the +beautiful slave, whose presence in those happenings of the past had +coloured the sometimes sordid drama with the opulence of old Arabia; +who had seemed a fitting figure for the romances of Bagdad during the +Caliphate--Kāramančh, whom I had thought sincere, whose inscrutable +Eastern soul I had presumed, fatuously, to have laid bare and +analysed. + +Now once again she was plying her old trade of go-between; professing +to reveal the secrets of Dr. Fu-Manchu, and all the time--I could not +doubt it--inveigling men into the net of this awful fisher. + +Yesterday, I had been her dupe; yesterday, I had rejoiced in my +captivity. To-day, I was not the favoured one; to-day I had not been +selected recipient of her confidences--confidences sweet, seductive, +deadly: but Abel Slattin, a plausible rogue, who, in justice, should +be immured in Sing Sing, was chosen out, was enslaved by those lovely +mysterious eyes, was taking to his soul the lies which fell from those +perfect lips, triumphant in a conquest that must end in his undoing; +deeming, poor fool, that for love of him this pearl of the Orient was +about to betray her master, to resign herself a prize to the victor! + +Companioned by these bitter reflections, I had lost the remainder of +the conversation between Nayland Smith and the police officer; now, +casting off the succubus memory which threatened to obsess me, I put +forth a giant mental effort to purge my mind of this uncleanness, and +became again an active participant in the campaign against the +Master--the director of all things noxious. + +Our plans being evidently complete, Smith seized my arm, and I found +myself again out upon the avenue. He led me across the road and into +the gate of a house almost opposite. From the fact that two upper +windows were illuminated, I adduced that the servants were retiring; +the other windows were in darkness, except for one on the ground floor +to the extreme left of the building, through the lowered venetian +blinds whereof streaks of light shone out. + +"Slattin's study!" whispered Smith. "He does not anticipate +surveillance, and you will note that the window is wide open!" + +With that my friend crossed the strip of lawn, and, careless of the +fact that his silhouette must have been visible to any one passing the +gate, climbed carefully up the artificial rockery intervening, and +crouched upon the window-ledge peering into the room. + +A moment I hesitated, fearful that if I followed I should stumble or +dislodge some of the lava blocks of which the rockery was composed. + +Then I heard that which summoned me to the attempt, whatever the cost. + +Through the open window came the sound of a musical voice--a voice +possessing a haunting accent, possessing a quality which struck upon +my heart and set it quivering as though it were a gong hung in my +bosom. + +Kāramančh was speaking. + +Upon hands and knees, heedless of damage to my garments, I crawled up +beside Smith. One of the laths was slightly displaced and over this my +friend was peering in. Crouching close beside him, I peered in also. + +I saw the study of a business man, with its files, neatly arranged +works of reference, roll-top desk, and Milner safe. Before the desk, +in a revolving chair, sat Slattin. He sat half-turned towards the +window, leaning back and smiling; so that I could note the gold crown +which preserved the lower left molar. In an armchair by the window, +close, very close, and sitting with her back to me, was Kāramančh! + +She, who, in my dreams, I always saw, was ever seeing, in an Eastern +dress, with gold bands about her white ankles, with jewel-laden +fingers, with jewels in her hair, wore now a fashionable costume and a +hat that could only have been produced in Paris. Kāramančh was the one +Oriental woman I had ever known who could wear European clothes; and +as I watched that exquisite profile, I thought that Delilah must have +been just such another as this; that, excepting the Empress Poppę, +history has record of no woman who, looking so innocent, was yet so +utterly vile. + +"Yes, my dear," Slattin was saying, and through his monocle ogling his +beautiful visitor, "I shall be ready for you to-morrow night." + +I felt Smith start at the words. + +"There will be a sufficient number of men?" + +Kāramančh put the question in a strangely listless way. + +"My dear little girl," replied Slattin, rising and standing looking +down at her, with his gold tooth twinkling in the lamplight, "there +will be a whole division, if a whole division is necessary." + +He sought to take her white gloved hand, which rested upon the chair +arm; but she evaded the attempt with seeming artlessness, and stood +up. Slattin fixed his bold gaze upon her. + +"So now, give me my orders," he said. + +"I am not prepared to do so, yet," replied the girl composedly; "but +now that I know you are ready, I can make my plans." + +She glided past him to the door, avoiding his outstretched arm with an +artless art which made me writhe; for once I had been the willing +victim of all these wiles. + +"But--" began Slattin. + +"I will ring you up in less than half an hour," said Kāramančh; and +without further ceremony, she opened the door. + +I still had my eyes glued to the aperture in the blind, when Smith +began tugging at my arm. + +"Down! you fool!" he hissed sharply; "if she sees us, all is lost!" + +Realizing this, and none too soon, I turned, and rather clumsily +followed my friend. I dislodged a piece of granite in my descent; but, +fortunately Slattin had gone out into the hall and could not well have +heard it. + +We were crouching around an angle of the house, when a flood of light +poured down the steps, and Kāramančh rapidly descended. I had a +glimpse of a dark-faced man who evidently had opened the door for her; +then all my thoughts were centred upon that graceful figure receding +from me in the direction of the avenue. She wore a loose cloak, and I +saw this fluttering for a moment against the white gate-posts; then +she was gone. + +Yet Smith did not move. Detaining me with his hand he crouched there +against a quick-set hedge; until, from a spot lower down the hill, we +heard the start of the cab, which had been waiting. Twenty seconds +elapsed, and from some other distant spot a second cab started. + +"That's Weymouth!" snapped Smith. "With decent luck, we should know +Fu-Manchu's hiding-place before Slattin tells us!" + +"But--" + +"Oh! as it happens he's apparently playing the game." In the +half-light, Smith stared at me significantly. "Which makes it all the +more important," he concluded, "that we should not rely upon his aid!" + +Those grim words were prophetic. + +My companion made no attempt to communicate with the detective (or +detectives) who shared our vigil; we took up a position close under +the lighted study window and waited--waited. + +Once, a taxi-cab laboured hideously up the steep gradient of the +avenue.... It was gone. The lights at the upper windows above us +became extinguished. A policeman tramped past the gateway, casually +flashing his lamp in at the opening. One by one the illuminated +windows in other houses visible to us became dull; then lived again as +mirrors for the pallid moon. In the silence, words spoken within the +study were clearly audible; and we heard some one--presumably the man +who had opened the door--inquire if his services would be wanted again +that night. + +Smith inclined his head and hung over me in a tense attitude, in order +to catch Slattin's reply. + +"Yes, Burke," it came, "I want you to sit up until I return; I shall +be going out shortly." + +Evidently the man withdrew at that; for a complete silence followed +which prevailed for fully half an hour. I sought cautiously to move my +cramped limbs, unlike Smith, who seeming to have sinews of piano-wire, +crouched beside me immovable, untiringly. Then loud upon the +stillness, broke the strident note of the telephone bell. + +I started, nervously, clutching at Smith's arm. It felt hard as iron +to my grip. + +"Hullo!" I heard Slattin call, "who is speaking?... Yes, yes! This is +Mr. A. S.... I am to come at once?... I know where--yes!... You will +meet me there?... Good!--I shall be with you in half an hour.... +Good-bye!" + +Distinctly I heard the creak of the revolving office-chair as Slattin +rose; then Smith had me by the arm, and we were flying swiftly away +from the door to take up our former post around the angle of the +building. This gained-- + +"He's going to his death!" rapped Smith beside me; "but Carter has a +cab from the Yard waiting in the nearest rank. We shall follow to see +where he goes--for it is possible that Weymouth may have been thrown +off the scent; then, when we are sure of his destination, we can take +a hand in the game! We--" + +The end of the sentence was lost to me--drowned in such a frightful +wave of sound as I despair to describe. It began with a high, thin +scream, which was choked off staccato fashion; upon it followed a loud +and dreadful cry uttered with all the strength of Slattin's lungs. + +"Oh, God!" he cried, and again--"Oh, God!" + +This in turn merged into a sort of hysterical sobbing. + +I was on my feet now, and automatically making for the door. I had a +vague impression of Nayland Smith's face beside me, the eyes glassy +with a fearful apprehension. Then the door was flung open, and, in the +bright light of the hall-way, I saw Slattin standing--swaying and +seemingly fighting with the empty air. + +"What is it? For God's sake, what has happened?" reached my ears +dimly--and the man Burke showed behind his master. White-faced I saw +him to be; for now Smith and I were racing up the steps. + +Ere we could reach him, Slattin, uttering another choking cry, pitched +forward and lay half across the threshold. + +We burst into the hall, where Burke stood with both his hands raised +dazedly to his head. I could hear the sound of running feet upon the +gravel, and knew that Carter was coming to join us. + +Burke, a heavy man with a lowering, bull-dog type of face, collapsed +on to his knees beside Slattin, and began softly to laugh in little +rising peals. + +"Drop that!" snapped Smith, and grasping him by the shoulders, he sent +him spinning along the hall-way, where he sank upon the bottom step of +the stairs, to sit with his outstretched fingers extended before his +face, and peering at us grotesquely through the crevices. + +There were rustlings and subdued cries from the upper part of the +house. Carter came in out of the darkness, carefully stepping over the +recumbent figure; and the three of us stood there in the lighted hall +looking down at Slattin. + +"Help me to move him back," directed Smith tensely; "far enough to +close the door." + +Between us we accomplished this, and Carter fastened the door. We were +alone with the shadow of Fu-Manchu's vengeance; for as I knelt beside +the body on the floor, a look and a touch sufficed to tell me that +this was but clay from which the spirit had fled! + +Smith met my glance as I raised my head, and his teeth came together +with a loud snap; the jaw muscles stood out prominently beneath the +dark skin; and his face was grimly set in that old, half-despairful +expression which I knew so well but which boded so ill for whomsoever +occasioned it. + +"Dead, Petrie--already?" + +"Lightning could have done the work no better. Can I turn him over?" + +Smith nodded. + +Together we stooped and rolled the heavy body on its back. A flood of +whispers came sibilantly from the stairway. Smith spun around rapidly, +and glared upon the group of half-dressed servants. + +"Return to your rooms!" he rapped imperiously: "let no one come into +the hall without my orders." + +The masterful voice had its usual result; there was a hurried retreat +to the upper landing. Burke, shaking like a man with an ague, sat on +the lower step, pathetically drumming his palms upon his uplifted +knees. + +"I warned him, I warned him!" he mumbled monotonously, "I warned him, +oh, I warned him!" + +"Stand up!" shouted Smith, "stand up and come here!" + +The man, with his frightened eyes turning to right and left, and +seeming to search for something in the shadows about him, advanced +obediently. + +"Have you a flask?" demanded Smith of Carter. + +The detective silently administered to Burke a stiff restorative. + +"Now," continued Smith, "you, Petrie, will want to examine him, I +suppose?" He pointed to the body. "And in the meantime I have some +questions to put to you, my man." + +He clapped his hand upon Burke's shoulder. + +"My God!" Burke broke out, "I was ten yards from him when it +happened!" + +"No one is accusing you," said Smith less harshly; "but since you were +the only witness, it is by your aid that we hope to clear the matter +up." + +Exerting a gigantic effort to regain control of himself, Burke nodded, +watching my friend with a childlike eagerness. During the ensuing +conversation, I examined Slattin for marks of violence; and of what I +found, more anon. + +"In the first place," said Smith, "you say that you warned him. When +did you warn him, and of what?" + +"I warned him, sir, that it would come to this--" + +"That _what_ would come to this?" + +"His dealings with the Chinamen!" + +"He had dealings with Chinamen?" + +"He accidentally met a Chinaman at an East End gaming-house, a man he +had known in 'Frisco--a man called Singapore Charlie--" + +"What! Singapore Charlie!" + +"Yes, sir, the same man that had a dope-shop, two years ago, down +Ratcliffe way--" + +"There was a fire--" + +"But Singapore Charlie escaped, sir." + +"And he is one of the gang?" + +"He is one of what we used to call, in New York, the Seven Group." + +Smith began to tug at the lobe of his left ear, reflectively, as I saw +out of the corner of my eye. + +"The Seven Group!" he mused. "That is significant. I always suspected +that Dr. Fu-Manchu and the notorious Seven Group were one and the +same. Go on, Burke." + +"Well, sir," the man continued more calmly, "the lieutenant--" + +"The lieutenant!" began Smith; then: "Oh! of course; Slattin used to +be a police lieutenant!" + +"Well, sir, he--Mr. Slattin--had a sort of hold on this Singapore +Charlie, and two years ago, when he first met him, he thought that +with his aid he was going to pull off the biggest thing of his life--" + +"Forestall _me_, in fact?" + +"Yes, sir; but you got in first with the big raid--and spoiled it." + +Smith nodded grimly, glancing at the Scotland Yard man, who returned +his nod with equal grimness. + +"A couple of months ago," resumed Burke, "he met Charlie again down +East, and the Chinaman introduced him to a girl--some sort of an +Egyptian girl." + +"Go on!" snapped Smith. "I know her." + +"He saw her a good many times--and she came here once or twice. She +made out that she and Singapore Charlie were prepared to give away the +boss of the Yellow gang--" + +"For a price, of course?" + +"I suppose so," said Burke; "but I don't know. I only know that I +warned him." + +"H'm!" muttered Smith. "And now, what took place to-night?" + +"He had an appointment here with the girl," began Burke. + +"I know all that," interrupted Smith. "I merely want to know what +took place after the telephone call." + +"Well, he told me to wait up, and I was dozing in the next room to the +study--the dining-room--when the 'phone bell aroused me. I heard the +lieutenant--Mr. Slattin--coming out, and I ran out too, but only in +time to see him taking his hat from the rack--" + +"But he wears no hat!" + +"He never got it off the peg! Just as he reached up to take it, he +gave a most frightful scream, and turned around like lightning as +though some one had attacked him from behind!" + +"There was no one else in the hall?" + +"No one at all. I was standing down there outside the dining-room just +by the stairs, but he didn't turn in my direction, he turned and +looked right behind him--where there was no one--nothing. His cries +were frightful." Burke's voice broke, and he shuddered feverishly. +"Then he made a rush for the front door. It seemed as though he had +not seen me. He stood there screaming; but, before I could reach him, +he fell...." + +Nayland Smith fixed a piercing gaze upon Burke. + +"Is that all you know?" he demanded slowly. + +"As God is my judge, sir, that's all I know, and all I saw. There was +no living thing near him when he met his death." + +"We shall see," muttered Smith. He turned to me. "What killed him, +Petrie?" he asked shortly. + +"Apparently something which occasioned a minute wound on the left +wrist," I replied, and, stooping, I raised the already cold hand in +mine. + +A tiny, inflamed wound showed on the wrist; and a certain puffiness +was becoming observable in the injured hand and arm. Smith bent down +and drew a quick, sibilant breath. + +"You know what this is, Petrie?" he cried. + +"Certainly. It was too late to employ a ligature and useless to +inject ammonia. Death was practically instantaneous. His heart...." + +There came a loud knocking and ringing. + +"Carter!" cried Smith, turning to the detective, "open that door to no +one--no one. Explain who I am--" + +"But if it is the inspector--?" + +"I said, open the door to _no one_!" snapped Smith. "Burke, stand +exactly where you are! Carter, you can speak to whoever knocks through +the letter-box. Petrie, don't move for your life! It may be here, in +the hall way!..." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE CLIMBER + + +Our search of the house of Abel Slattin ceased only with the coming of +the dawn and yielded nothing but disappointment. Failure followed upon +failure; for, in the grey light of the morning, our own quest +concluded, Inspector Weymouth returned to report that the girl, +Kāramančh, had thrown him off the scent. + +Again he stood before me, the big, burly friend of old and dreadful +days: a little greyer above the temples, which I set down for a record +of former horrors; but deliberate, stoical, thorough, as ever. His +blue eyes melted in the old generous way as he saw me, and he gripped +my hand in greeting. + +"Once again," he said, "your dark-eyed friend has been too clever for +me, doctor. But the track, as far as I could follow, leads to the old +spot. In fact"--he turned to Smith, who, grim-faced and haggard, +looked thoroughly ill in that grey light--"I believe Fu-Manchu's lair +is somewhere near the former opium-den of Shen-Yan--'Singapore +Charlie'!" + +Smith nodded. + +"We will turn our attention in that direction," he replied, "at a very +early date." + +Inspector Weymouth looked down at the body of Abel Slattin. + +"How was it done?" he asked softly. + +"Clumsily for Fu-Manchu," I replied. "A snake was introduced into the +house by some means--" + +"By Kāramančh!" rapped Smith. + +"Very possibly by Kāramančh," I continued firmly. "The thing has +escaped us." + +"My own idea," said Smith, "is that it was concealed about his +clothing. When he fell by the open door it glided out of the house. We +must have the garden searched thoroughly by daylight." + +"_He_"--Weymouth glanced at that which lay upon the floor--"must be +moved; but otherwise we can leave the place untouched, clear out the +servants, and lock the house up!" + +"I have already given orders to that effect," answered Smith. He spoke +wearily and with a note of conscious defeat in his voice. "Nothing has +been disturbed"--he swept his arm around comprehensively--"papers and +so forth you can examine at leisure." + +Presently we quitted that house upon which the fateful Chinaman had +set his seal, as the suburb was awakening to a new day. The clank of +milk-cans was my final impression of the avenue to which a dreadful +minister of death had come at the bidding of the death lord. We left +Inspector Weymouth in charge and returned to my rooms, scarcely +exchanging a word upon the way. + +Nayland Smith, ignoring my entreaties, composed himself for slumber in +the white cane chair in my study. About noon he retired to the +bath-room and, returning, made a pretence to breakfast; then resumed +his seat in the cane armchair. Carter reported in the afternoon, but +his report was merely formal. Returning from my round of professional +visits at half-past five, I found Nayland Smith in the same position; +and so the day waned into evening, and dusk fell uneventfully. + +In the corner of the big room by the empty fireplace, Nayland Smith +lay, his long, lean frame extended in the white cane chair. A tumbler, +from which two straws protruded, stood by his right elbow, and a +perfect continent of tobacco smoke lay between us, wafted towards the +door by the draught from an open window. He had littered the hearth +with matches and tobacco ash, being the most untidy smoker I had ever +met; and save for his frequent rappings out of his pipe bowl and +perpetual striking of matches, he had shown no sign of activity for +the past hour. Collarless and wearing an old tweed jacket, he had +spent the evening, as he had spent the day, in the cane chair, only +quitting it for some ten minutes, or less, to toy with dinner. + +My several attempts at conversation had elicited nothing but growls; +therefore, as dusk descended, having dismissed my few patients, I +busied myself collating my notes upon the renewed activity of the +Yellow Doctor, and was thus engaged when the 'phone bell disturbed me. +It was Smith who was wanted, however; and he went out eagerly, leaving +me to my task. + +At the end of a lengthy conversation, he returned from the 'phone and +began, restlessly, to pace the room. I made a pretence of continuing +my labours, but covertly I was watching him. He was twitching at the +lobe of his left ear, and his face was a study in perplexity. Abruptly +he burst out: + +"I shall throw the thing up, Petrie! Either I am growing too old to +cope with such an adversary as Fu-Manchu, or else my intellect has +become dull. I cannot seem to think clearly or consistently. For the +Doctor, this crime, this removal of Slattin, is clumsy--unfinished. +There are two explanations. Either he, too, is losing his old +cunning, or he has been interrupted!" + +"Interrupted!" + +"Take the facts, Petrie." Smith clapped his hands upon my table and +bent down, peering into my eyes. "Is it characteristic of Fu-Manchu to +kill a man by the direct agency of a snake and to implicate one of his +own damnable servants in this way?" + +"But we have found no snake!" + +"Kāramančh introduced one in some way. Do you doubt it?" + +"Certainly Kāramančh visited him on the evening of his death, but you +must be perfectly well aware that even if she had been arrested, no +jury could convict her." + +Smith resumed his restless pacings up and down. + +"You are very useful to me, Petrie," he rapped; "as a counsel for the +defence you constantly rectify my errors of prejudice. Yet I am +convinced that our presence at Slattin's house last night prevented +Fu-Manchu from finishing off this little matter as he had designed to +do." + +"What has given you this idea?" + +"Weymouth is responsible. He has rung me up from the Yard. The +constable on duty at the house where the murder was committed, reports +that some one, less than an hour ago, attempted to break in." + +"Break in!" + +"Ah! you are interested? _I_ thought the circumstance illuminating, +also!" + +"Did the officer see this person?" + +"No; he only heard him. It was some one who endeavoured to enter by +the bath-room window, which, I am told, may be reached fairly easily +by an agile climber." + +"The attempt did not succeed?" + +"No; the constable interrupted, but failed to make a capture or even +to secure a glimpse of the man." + +We were both silent for some moments; then-- + +"What do you propose to do?" I asked. + +"We must not let Fu-Manchu's servants know," replied Smith, "but +to-night I shall conceal myself in Slattin's house and remain there +for a week or a day--it matters not how long--until that attempt is +repeated. Quite obviously, Petrie, we have overlooked something which +implicates the murderer with the murder! In short, either by accident, +by reason of our superior vigilance, or by the clumsiness of his +plans, Fu-Manchu for once in an otherwise blameless career has left a +_clue_!" + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE CLIMBER RETURNS + + +In utter darkness we groped our way through into the hall of Slattin's +house, having entered, stealthily, from the rear; for Smith had +selected the study as a suitable base of operations. We reached it +without mishap, and presently I found myself seated in the very chair +which Kāramančh had occupied; my companion took up a post just within +the widely opened door. + +So we commenced our ghostly business in the house of the murdered +man--a house from which, but a few hours since, his body had been +removed. This was such a vigil as I had endured once before, when, +with Nayland Smith and another, I had waited for the coming of one of +Fu-Manchu's death agents. + +Of all the sounds which one by one now began to detach themselves from +the silence, there was a particular sound, homely enough at another +time, which spoke to me more dreadfully than the rest. It was the +ticking of the clock upon the mantelpiece; and I thought how this +sound must have been familiar to Abel Slattin, how it must have formed +part and parcel of his life, as it were, and how it went on +now--_tick_-_tick_-_tick_-_tick_--whilst he, for whom it had ticked, +lay unheeding--would never heed it more. + +As I grew more accustomed to the gloom, I found myself staring at the +office chair; once I found myself expecting Abel Slattin to enter the +room and occupy it. There was a little China Buddha upon a bureau in +one corner, with a gilded cap upon its head, and as some reflection of +the moonlight sought out this little cap, my thoughts grotesquely +turned upon the murdered man's gold tooth. + +Vague creakings from within the house, sounds as though of stealthy +footsteps upon the stairs, set my nerves tingling; but Nayland Smith gave +no sign, and I knew that my imagination was magnifying these ordinary night +sounds out of all proportion to their actual significance. Leaves rustled +faintly outside the window at my back: I construed their sibilant whispers +into the dreaded name--_Fu-Manchu_--_Fu-Manchu_--_Fu-Manchu_! + +So wore on the night; and, when the ticking clock hollowly boomed the +hour of one, I almost leapt out of my chair, so highly strung were my +nerves, and so appallingly did the sudden clangour beat upon them. +Smith, like a man of stone, showed no sign. He was capable of so +subduing his constitutionally high-strung temperament, at times, that +temporarily he became immune from human dreads. On such occasion he +would be icily cool amid universal panic; but, his object +accomplished, I have seen him in such a state of collapse, that utter +nervous exhaustion is the only term by which I can describe it. + +_Tick_-_tick_-_tick_-_tick_ went the clock, and, my heart still +thumping noisily in my breast, I began to count the tickings; _one_, +_two_, _three_, _four_, _five_, and so on to a hundred, and from one +hundred to many hundreds. + +Then, out from the confusion of minor noises, a new, arresting sound +detached itself. I ceased my counting; no longer I noted the +_tick_-_tick_ of the clock, nor the vague creakings, rustlings and +whispers. I saw Smith, shadowly, raise his hand in warning--in +needless warning; for I was almost holding my breath in an effort of +acute listening. + +From high up in the house this new sound came--from above the topmost +rooms, it seemed, up under the roof; a regular squeaking, oddly +familiar, yet elusive. Upon it followed a very soft and muffled thud; +then a metallic sound as of a rusty hinge in motion; then a new +silence, pregnant with a thousand possibilities more eerie than any +clamour. + +My mind was rapidly at work. Lighting the topmost landing of the house +was a sort of glazed trap, evidently set in the floor of a loft-like +place extending over the entire building. Somewhere in the red-tiled +roof above, there presumably existed a corresponding skylight or +lantern. + +So I argued; and, ere I had come to any proper decision, another +sound, more intimate, came to interrupt me. + +This time I could be in no doubt; some one was lifting the trap above +the stairhead--slowly, cautiously, and all but silently. Yet to my +ears, attuned to trifling disturbances, the trap creaked and groaned +noisily. + +Nayland Smith waved to me to take a stand on the other side of the +opened door--behind it, in fact, where I should be concealed from the +view of any one descending the stair. + +I stood up and crossed the floor to my new post. + +A dull thud told of the trap fully raised and resting upon some +supporting joist. A faint rustling (of discarded garments, I told +myself) spoke to my newly awakened, acute perceptions, of the visitor +preparing to lower himself to the landing. Followed a groan of +woodwork submitted to sudden strain--and the unmistakable pad of bare +feet upon the linoleum of the top corridor. + +I knew now that one of Dr. Fu-Manchu's uncanny servants had gained the +roof of the house by some means, had broken through the skylight and +had descended by means of the trap beneath on to the landing. + +In such a tensed-up state as I cannot describe, nor, at this hour +mentally reconstruct, I waited for the creaking of the stairs which +should tell of the creature's descent. + +I was disappointed. Removed scarce a yard from me as he was, I could +hear Nayland Smith's soft, subdued breathing; but my eyes were all for +the darkened hall-way, for the smudgy outline of the stair-rail with +the faint patterning in the background, which, alone, indicated the +wall. + +It was amid an utter silence, unheralded by even so slight a sound as +those which I had acquired the power of detecting--that I saw the +continuity of the smudgy line of stair-rail to be interrupted. + +A dark patch showed upon it, just within my line of sight, invisible +to Smith on the other side of the doorway, and some ten or twelve +stairs up. + +No sound reached me, but the dark patch vanished--and reappeared three +feet lower down. + +Still I knew that this phantom approach must be unknown to my +companion--and I knew that it was impossible for me to advise him of +it unseen by the dreaded visitor. + +A third time the dark patch--the hand of one who, ghostly, silent, was +creeping down into the hall-way--vanished and reappeared on a level +with my eyes. Then a vague shape became visible; no more than a blur +upon the dim design of the wall-paper ... and Nayland Smith got his +first sight of the stranger. + +The clock on the mantelpiece boomed out the half-hour. + +At that, such was my state (I blush to relate it), I uttered a faint +cry! + +It ended all secrecy--that hysterical weakness of mine. It might have +frustrated our hopes; that it did not do so was in no measure due to +me. But in a sort of passionate whirl, the ensuing events moved +swiftly. + +Smith hesitated not one instant. With a panther-like leap he hurled +himself into the hall. + +"The lights, Petrie!" he cried, "the lights! The switch is near the +street door!" + +I clenched my fists in a swift effort to regain control of my +treacherous nerves, and, bounding past Smith, and past the foot of the +stair, I reached out my hand to the switch, the situation of which, +fortunately, I knew. + +Around I came, in response to a shrill cry from behind me--an inhuman +cry, less a cry than the shriek of some enraged animal.... + +With his left foot upon the first stair, Nayland Smith stood, his lean +body bent perilously backward, his arms rigidly thrust out, and his +sinewy fingers gripping the throat of an almost naked man--a man whose +brown body glistened unctuously, whose shaven head was apish low, +whose bloodshot eyes were the eyes of a mad dog! His teeth, upper and +lower, were bared; they glistened, they gnashed, and a froth was on +his lips. With both his hands, he clutched a heavy stick, and +once--twice, he brought it down upon Nayland Smith's head! + +I leapt forward to my friend's aid; but as though the blows had been +those of a feather, he stood like some figure of archaic statuary, nor +for an instant relaxed the death-grip which he had upon his +adversary's throat. + +Thrusting my way up the stairs, I wrenched the stick from the hand of +the dacoit--for in this glistening brown man I recognized one of that +deadly brotherhood who hailed Dr. Fu-Manchu their Lord and Master. + + * * * * * + +I cannot dwell upon the end of that encounter; I cannot hope to make +acceptable to my readers an account of how Nayland Smith, glassy-eyed, +and with consciousness ebbing from him instant by instant, stood +there, a realization of Leighton's "Athlete," his arms rigid as iron +bars even after Fu-Manchu's servant hung limply in that frightful +grip. + +In his last moment of consciousness, with the blood from his wounded +head trickling down into his eyes, he pointed to the stick which I had +torn from the grip of the dacoit, and which I still held in my hand. + +"Not Aaron's rod, Petrie!" he gasped hoarsely ... "the rod of +Moses!--Slattin's stick!" + +Even in upon my anxiety for my friend, amazement intruded. + +"But," I began--and turned to the rack in which Slattin's favourite +cane at that moment reposed--had reposed at the time of his death. + +Yes! There stood Slattin's cane; we had not moved it; we had disturbed +nothing in that stricken house; there it stood, in company with an +umbrella and a malacca. + +I glanced at the cane in my hand. Surely there could not be two such +in the world? + +Smith collapsed on the floor at my feet. + +"Examine the one in the rack, Petrie," he whispered, almost inaudibly, +"but do not touch it. It may not be yet...." + +I propped him up against the foot of the stairs, and as the constable +began knocking violently at the street door, crossed to the rack and +lifted out the replica of the cane which I held in my hand. + +A faint cry from Smith--and as if it had been a leprous thing, I +dropped the cane instantly. + +"Merciful God!" I groaned. + +Although, in every other particular, it corresponded with that which I +held--which I had taken from the dacoit--which he had come to +substitute for the cane now lying upon the floor--in one dreadful +particular it differed. + +Up to the snake's head it was an accurate copy; _but the head lived_! + +Either from pain, fear, or starvation, the thing confined in the +hollow tube of this awful duplicate was become torpid. Otherwise, no +power on earth could have saved me from the fate of Abel Slattin; for +the creature was an Australian death-adder. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +THE WHITE PEACOCK + + +Nayland Smith wasted no time in pursuing the plan of campaign which he +had mentioned to Inspector Weymouth. Less than forty-eight hours after +quitting the house of the murdered Slattin I found myself bound along +Whitechapel Road upon strange enough business. + +A very fine rain was falling, which rendered it difficult to see +clearly from the windows; but the weather apparently had little effect +upon the commercial activities of the district. The cab was threading +a hazardous way through the cosmopolitan throng crowding the street. +On either side of me extended a row of stalls, seemingly established +in opposition to the more legitimate shops upon the inner side of the +pavement. + +Jewish hawkers, many of them in their shirt-sleeves, acclaimed the +rarity of the bargains which they had to offer; and, allowing for the +difference of costume, these tireless Israelites, heedless of climatic +conditions, sweating at their mongery, might well have stood, not in +a squalid London thoroughfare, but in an equally squalid market-street +of the Orient. + +They offered linen and fine raiment; from foot-gear to hair-oil their +wares ranged. They enlivened their auctioneering with conjuring tricks +and witty stories, selling watches by the aid of legerdemain, and +fancy vests by grace of a seasonable anecdote. + +Poles, Russians, Serbs, Roumanians, Jews of Hungary, and Italians of +Whitechapel mingled in the throng. Near East and Far East rubbed +shoulders. Pidgin English contested with Yiddish for the ownership of +some tawdry article offered by an auctioneer whose nationality defied +conjecture, save that always some branch of his ancestry had drawn +nourishment from the soil of Eternal Judęa. + +Some wearing men's caps, some with shawls thrown over their oily +locks, and some, more true to primitive instincts, defying, +bare-headed, the unkindly elements, bedraggled women--more often than +not burdened with muffled infants--crowded the pavements and the +roadway, thronged about the stalls like white ants about some choicer +carrion. + +And the fine drizzling rain fell upon all alike, pattering upon the +hood of the taxi-cab; trickling down the front windows; glistening +upon the unctuous hair of those in the street who were hatless; dewing +the bare arms of the auctioneers, and dripping, melancholy, from the +tarpaulin coverings of the stalls. Heedless of the rain above and of +the mud beneath, North, South, East and West mingled their cries, +their bids, their blandishments, their raillery, mingled their persons +in that joyless throng. + +Sometimes a yellow face showed close to one of the streaming windows; +sometimes a black-eyed, pallid face, but never a face wholly sane and +healthy. This was an underworld where squalor and vice went hand in +hand through the beautiless streets, a melting-pot of the world's +outcasts; this was the shadowland which last night had swallowed up +Nayland Smith. + +Ceaselessly I peered to right and left, searching amid that +rain-soaked company for any face known to me. Whom I expected to find +there, I know not, but I should have counted it no matter for surprise +had I detected amid that ungracious ugliness the beautiful face of +Kāramančh, the Eastern slave-girl, the leering yellow face of a +Burmese dacoit, the gaunt, bronze features of Nayland Smith; a hundred +times I almost believed that I had seen the ruddy countenance of +Inspector Weymouth, and once (at what instant my heart seemed to stand +still) I suffered from the singular delusion that the oblique green +eyes of Dr. Fu-Manchu peered out from the shadows between two stalls. + +It was mere phantasy, of course, the sick imaginings of a mind +overwrought. I had not slept and had scarcely tasted food for more +than thirty hours; for, following up a faint clue supplied by Burke, +Slattin's man, and, like his master, an ex-officer of New York Police, +my friend, Nayland Smith, on the previous evening, had set out in +quest of some obscene den where the man called Shen-Yan--former keeper +of an opium shop--was now said to be in hiding. Shen-Yan we knew to be +a creature of the Chinese doctor, and only a most urgent call had +prevented me from joining Smith upon this promising, though hazardous +expedition. + +At any rate, Fate willing it so, he had gone without me; and +now--although Inspector Weymouth, assisted by a number of C.I.D. men, +was sweeping the district about me--to the time of my departure +nothing whatever had been heard of Smith. The ordeal of waiting +finally had proved too great to be borne. With no definite idea of +what I proposed to do, I had thrown myself into the search, filled +with such dreadful apprehensions as I hope never again to experience. + +I did not know the exact situation of the place to which Smith was +gone, for owing to the urgent case which I have mentioned, I had been +absent at the time of his departure; nor could Scotland Yard enlighten +me upon this point. Weymouth was in charge of the case--under Smith's +direction--and since the inspector had left the Yard, early that +morning, he had disappeared as completely as Smith, no report having +been received from him. + +As my driver turned into the black mouth of a narrow, ill-lighted +street, and the glare and clamour of the greater thoroughfare died +behind me, I sank into the corner of the cab burdened with such a +sense of desolation as mercifully comes but rarely. + +We were heading now for that strange settlement off the West India +Dock Road, which, bounded by Limehouse Causeway and Pennyfields, and +narrowly confined within four streets, composes an unique Chinatown, a +miniature of that at Liverpool, and of the greater one in San +Francisco. Inspired with an idea which promised hopefully, I raised +the speaking-tube: + +"Take me first to the River Police Station," I directed; "along +Ratcliffe Highway." + +The man turned and nodded comprehendingly, as I could see through the +wet pane. + +Presently we swerved to the right and into an even narrower street. +This inclined in an easterly direction, and proved to communicate with +a wide thoroughfare along which passed brilliantly lighted electric +trams. I had lost all sense of direction, and when, swinging to the +left and to the right again, I looked through the window and perceived +that we were before the door of the Police Station, I was dully +surprised. + +In quite mechanical fashion I entered the depōt. Inspector Ryman, our +associate in one of the darkest episodes of the campaign with the +Yellow Doctor two years before, received me in his office. + +By a negative shake of the head, he answered my unspoken question. + +"The ten o'clock boat is lying off the Stone Stairs, doctor," he said, +"and co-operating with some of the Scotland Yard men who are dragging +that district--" + +I shuddered at the word "dragging"; Ryman had not used it literally, but +nevertheless it had conjured up a dread possibility--a possibility in +accordance with the methods of Dr. Fu-Manchu. All within space of an +instant I saw the tide of Limehouse Reach, the Thames lapping about the +green-coated timbers of a dock pier; and rising--falling--sometimes +disclosing to the pallid light a rigid hand, sometimes a horribly +bloated face--I saw the body of Nayland Smith at the mercy of those oily +waters. Ryman continued: + +"There is a launch out, too, patrolling the riverside from here to +Tilbury. Another lies at the breakwater." He jerked his thumb over his +shoulder. "Should you care to take a run down and see for yourself?" + +"No, thanks," I replied, shaking my head. "You are doing all that can +be done. Can you give me the address of the place to which Mr. Smith +went last night?" + +"Certainly," said Ryman; "I thought you knew it. You remember +Shen-Yan's place--by Limehouse Basin? Well, farther east--east of the +Causeway, between Gill Street and Three Colt Street--is a block of +wooden buildings. You recall them?" + +"Yes," I replied. "Is the man established there again, then?" + +"It appears so, but although you have evidently not been informed of +the fact, Weymouth raided the establishment in the early hours of this +morning!" + +"Well?" I cried. + +"Unfortunately with no result," continued the inspector. "The +notorious Shen-Yan was missing, and although there is no real doubt +that the place is used as a gaming-house, not a particle of evidence +to that effect could be obtained. Also--there was no sign of Mr. +Nayland Smith, and no sign of the American Burke, who had led him to +the place." + +"Is it certain that they went there?" + +"Two C.I.D. men, who were shadowing, actually saw the pair of them +enter. A signal had been arranged, but it was never given; and at +about half-past four the place was raided." + +"Surely some arrests were made?" + +"But there was no evidence!" cried Ryman. "Every inch of the +rat-burrow was searched. The Chinese gentleman who posed as the +proprietor of what he claimed to be a respectable lodging-house, +offered every facility to the police. What could we do?" + +"I take it that the place is being watched?" + +"Certainly," said Ryman. "Both from the river and from the shore. Oh! +they are not there! God knows where they are, but they are not +_there_!" + +I stood for a moment in silence, endeavouring to determine my course; +then, telling Ryman that I hoped to see him later, I walked out slowly +into the rain and mist, and nodding to the taxi-driver to proceed to +our original destination, I re-entered the cab. + +As we moved off, the lights of the River Police depōt were swallowed +up in the humid murk, and again I found myself being carried through +the darkness of those narrow streets, which, like a maze, hold secret +within their Labyrinth mysteries great, and at least as foul, as that +of Parsiphaė. + +The marketing centres I had left far behind me; to my right stretched +the broken range of riverside buildings, and beyond them flowed the +Thames, a stream heavily burdened with secrets as ever were Tiber or +Tigris. On my left, occasional flickering lights broke through the +mist, for the most part the lights of taverns; and saving these rents +in the veil, the darkness was punctuated with nothing but the faint +and yellow luminance of the street lamps. + +Ahead was a black mouth, which promised to swallow me up as it had +swallowed up my friend. + +In short, what with my lowered condition, and consequent frame of +mind, and what with the traditions, for me inseparable from that +gloomy quarter of London, I was in the grip of a shadowy menace which +at any moment might become tangible--I perceived, in the most +commonplace objects, the yellow hand of Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +When the cab stopped in a place of utter darkness, I aroused myself +with an effort, opened the door, and stepped out into the mud of a +narrow lane. A high brick wall frowned upon me from one side, and, +dimly perceptible, there towered a smoke stack beyond. On my right +uprose the side of a wharf building, shadowly, and some distance +ahead, almost obscured by the drizzling rain, a solitary lamp +flickered. + +I turned up the collar of my raincoat, shivering, as much at the +prospect as from physical chill. + +"You will wait here," I said to the man; and, feeling in my +breast-pocket, I added: "If you hear the note of a whistle, drive on +and rejoin me." + +He listened attentively and with a certain eagerness. I had selected +him that night for the reason that he had driven Smith and myself on +previous occasions and had proved himself a man of intelligence. +Transferring a Browning pistol from my hip-pocket to that of my +raincoat, I trudged on into the mist. + +The headlights of the taxi were swallowed up behind me, and just +abreast of the street lamp I stood listening. + +Save for the dismal sound of rain, and the trickling of water along +the gutters, all about me was silent. Sometimes this silence would be +broken by the distant, muffled note of a steam siren; and always, +forming a sort of background to the near stillness, was the remote din +of riverside activity. + +I walked on to the corner just beyond the lamp. This was the street in +which the wooden buildings were situated. I had expected to detect +some evidences of surveillance, but if any were indeed being observed, +it was effectively masked. Not a living creature was visible, peer as +I would. + +Plans I had none, and perceiving that the street was empty, and that +no lights showed in any of the windows, I passed on, only to find that +I had entered a cul-de-sac. + +A rickety gate gave access to a descending flight of stone steps, the +bottom invisible in the denser shadows of an archway, beyond which, I +doubted not, lay the river. + +Still uninspired by any definite design, I tried the gate and found +that it was unlocked. Like some wandering soul, as it has since seemed +to me, I descended. There was a lamp over the archway, but the glass +was broken, and the rain apparently had extinguished the light; as I +passed under it, I could hear the gas whistling from the burner. + +Continuing my way, I found myself upon a narrow wharf with the Thames +flowing gloomily beneath me. A sort of fog hung over the river, +shutting me in. Then came an incident. + +Suddenly, quite near, there arose a weird and mournful cry--a cry +indescribable, and inexpressibly uncanny! + +I started back so violently that how I escaped falling into the river +I do not know to this day. That cry, so eerie and so wholly +unexpected, had unnerved me; and realizing the nature of my +surroundings, and the folly of my presence alone in such a place, I +began to edge back towards the foot of the steps, away from the thing +that cried; when--a great white shape uprose like a phantom before +me!... + +There are few men, I suppose, whose lives have been crowded with so +many eerie happenings as mine, but this phantom thing which grew out +of the darkness, which seemed about to envelop me, takes rank in my +memory amongst the most fearsome apparitions which I have witnessed. + +I know that I was frozen with a sort of supernatural terror. I stood +there, my hands clenched, staring--staring--at that white shape, which +seemed to float. + +And as I stared, every nerve in my body thrilling, I distinguished the +outline of the phantom. With a subdued cry, I stepped forward. A new +sensation claimed me. In that one stride I passed from the horrible to +the bizarre. + +I found myself confronted with something tangible certainly, but +something whose presence in that place was utterly extravagant--could +only be reconcilable in the dreams of an opium slave. + +Was I awake? was I sane? Awake and sane beyond doubt, but surely +moving, not in the purlieus of Limehouse, but in the fantastic realms +of fairyland. + +Swooping, with open arms, I rounded up in an angle against the +building and gathered in this screaming thing which had inspired in me +so keen a terror. + +The great, ghostly fan was closed as I did so, and I stumbled back +towards the stair with my struggling captive tucked under my arm; I +mounted into one of London's darkest slums, carrying a beautiful white +peacock! + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +DARK EYES LOOK INTO MINE + + +My adventure had done nothing to relieve the feeling of unreality +which held me enthralled. Grasping the struggling bird firmly by the +body, and having the long white tail fluttering a yard or so behind +me, I returned to where the taxi waited. + +"Open the door!" I said to the man--who greeted me with such a stare +of amazement that I laughed outright, though my mirth was but hollow. + +He jumped into the road and did as I directed. Making sure that both +windows were closed, I thrust the peacock into the cab and shut the +door upon it. + +"For God's sake, sir--" began the driver. + +"It has probably escaped from some collector's place on the +riverside," I explained, "but one never knows. See that it does not +escape again, and if at the end of an hour, as arranged, you do not +hear from me, take it back with you to the River Police Station." + +"Right you are, sir," said the man, remounting his seat. "It's the +first time I ever saw a peacock in Limehouse!" + +It was the first time _I_ had seen one, and the incident struck me as +being more than odd; it gave me an idea, and a new, faint hope. I +returned to the head of the steps, at the foot of which I had met with +this singular experience, and gazed up at the dark building beneath +which they led. Three windows were visible, but they were broken and +neglected. One, immediately above the arch, had been pasted up with +brown paper, and this was now peeling off in the rain, a little stream +of which trickled down from the detached corner to drop, drearily, +upon the stone stairs beneath. + +Where were the detectives? I could only assume that they had directed +their attention elsewhere, for had the place not been utterly +deserted, surely I had been challenged. + +In pursuit of my new idea, I again descended the steps. The persuasion +(shortly to be verified) that I was close upon the secret hold of the +Chinaman, grew stronger, unaccountably. I had descended some eight +steps, and was at the darkest part of the archway or tunnel, when +confirmation of my theories came to me. + +A noose settled accurately upon my shoulders, was snatched tight about my +throat, and with a feeling of insupportable agony at the base of my skull, +and a sudden supreme knowledge that I was being strangled--hanged--I lost +consciousness! + +How long I remained unconscious, I was unable to determine at the +time, but I learned later that it was for no more than half an hour; +at any rate, recovery was slow. + +The first sensation to return to me was a sort of repetition of the +asphyxia. The blood seemed to be forcing itself into my eyes--I +choked--I felt that my end was come. And, raising my hands to my +throat, I found it to be swollen and inflamed. Then the floor upon +which I lay seemed to be rocking like the deck of a ship, and I glided +back again into a place of darkness and forgetfulness. + +My second awakening was heralded by a returning sense of smell; for I +became conscious of a faint, exquisite perfume. + +It brought me to my senses as nothing else could have done, and I sat +upright with a hoarse cry. I could have distinguished that perfume +amid a thousand others, could have marked it apart from the rest in a +scent bazaar. For me it had one meaning, and one meaning +only--Kāramančh. + +She was near to me, or had been near to me! + +And in the first moments of my awakening I groped about in the +darkness blindly seeking her. Then my swollen throat and throbbing +head, together with my utter inability to move my neck even slightly, +reminded me of the facts as they were. I knew in that bitter moment +that Kāramančh was no longer my friend; but, for all her beauty and +charm, was the most heartless, the most fiendish creature in the +service of Dr. Fu-Manchu. I groaned aloud in my despair and misery. + +Something stirred near to me in the room, and set my nerves creeping +with a new apprehension. I became fully alive to the possibilities of +the darkness. + +To my certain knowledge, Dr. Fu-Manchu at this time had been in +England for fully three months, which meant that by now he must be +equipped with all the instruments of destruction, animate and +inanimate, which dread experience had taught me to associate with him. + +Now, as I crouched there in that dark apartment, listening for a +repetition of the sound, I scarcely dared to conjecture what might +have occasioned it, but my imagination peopled the place with reptiles +which writhed upon the floor, with tarantulas and other deadly insects +which crept upon the walls, which might drop upon me from the ceiling +at any moment. + +Then, since nothing stirred about me, I ventured to move, turning my +shoulders, for I was unable to move my aching head; and I looked in +the direction from which a faint, very faint, light proceeded. + +A regular tapping sound now began to attract my attention, and, having +turned about, I perceived that behind me was a broken window, in +places patched with brown paper; the corner of one sheet of paper was +detached, and the rain trickled down upon it with a rhythmical sound. + +In a flash I realized that I lay in the room immediately above the +archway; and listening intently, I perceived above the other faint +sounds of the night, or thought that I perceived, the hissing of the +gas from the extinguished lamp-burner. + +Unsteadily I rose to my feet, but found myself swaying like a drunken +man. I reached out for support, stumbling in the direction of the +wall. My foot came in contact with something that lay there, and I +pitched forward and fell.... + +I anticipated a crash which would put an end to my hopes of escape, +but my fall was comparatively noiseless--for I fell upon the body of a +man who lay bound up with rope close against the wall! + +A moment I stayed as I fell, the chest of my fellow captive rising and +falling beneath me as he breathed. Knowing that my life depended upon +retaining a firm hold upon myself, I succeeded in overcoming the +dizziness and nausea which threatened to drown my senses, and, moving +back so that I knelt upon the floor, I fumbled in my pocket for the +electric lamp which I had placed there. My raincoat had been removed +whilst I was unconscious, and with it my pistol, but the lamp was +untouched. + +I took it out, pressed the button, and directed the ray upon the face +of the man beside me. + +It was Nayland Smith! + +Trussed up and fastened to a ring in the wall he lay, having a cork +gag strapped so tightly between his teeth that I wondered how he had +escaped suffocation. + +But although a greyish pallor showed through the tan of his skin, his +eyes were feverishly bright, and there, as I knelt beside him, I +thanked Heaven silently, but fervently. + +Then, in furious haste, I set to work to remove the gag. It was most +ingeniously secured by means of leather straps buckled at the back of +his head, but I unfastened these without much difficulty, and he spat +out the gag, uttering an exclamation of disgust. + +"Thank God, old man!" he said huskily. "Thank God that you are alive! +I saw them drag you in, and I thought...." + +"I have been thinking the same about you for more than twenty-four +hours," I said reproachfully. "Why did you start without--?" + +"I did not want you to come, Petrie," he replied. "I had a sort of +premonition. You see it was realized; and instead of being as helpless +as I, Fate has made you the instrument of my release. Quick! You have +a knife? Good!" The old, feverish energy was by no means extinguished +in him. "Cut the ropes about my wrists and ankles, but don't otherwise +disturb them." + +I set to work eagerly. + +"Now," Smith continued, "put that filthy gag in place again--but you +need not strap it so tightly! Directly they find that you are alive, +they will treat you the same--you understand? She has been here three +times--" + +"Kāramančh?..." + +"_Ssh_!" + +I heard a sound like the opening of a distant door. + +"Quick! the straps of the gag!" whispered Smith, "and pretend to +recover consciousness just as they enter--" + +Clumsily I followed his directions, for my fingers were none too +steady, replaced the lamp in my pocket, and threw myself upon the +floor. + +Through half-shut eyes, I saw the door open and obtained a glimpse of +a desolate, empty passage beyond. On the threshold stood Kāramančh. +She held in her hand a common tin oil lamp which smoked and flickered +with every movement, filling the already none too cleanly air with an +odour of burning paraffin. + +She personified the _outré_; nothing so incongruous as her presence in +that place could well be imagined. She was dressed as I remembered +once to have seen her two years before, in the gauzy silks of the +harźm. There were pearls glittering like great tears amid the cloud of +her wonderful hair. She wore broad gold bangles upon her bare arms, +and her fingers were laden with jewellery. A heavy girdle swung from +her hips, defining the lines of her slim shape, and about one white +ankle was a gold band. + +As she appeared in the doorway I almost entirely closed my eyes, but +my gaze rested fascinatedly upon the little red slippers which she +wore. + +Again I detected the exquisite, elusive perfume which, like a breath +of musk, spoke of the Orient; and, as always, it played havoc with my +reason, seeming to intoxicate me as though it were the very essence of +her loveliness. + +But I had a part to play, and throwing out one clenched hand so that +my fist struck upon the floor, I uttered a loud groan, and made as if +to rise upon my knees. + +One quick glimpse I had of her wonderful eyes, widely opened and +turned upon me with such an enigmatical expression as set my heart +leaping wildly--then, stepping back, Kāramančh placed the lamp upon +the boards of the passage and clapped her hands. + +As I sank upon the floor in assumed exhaustion, a Chinaman with a +perfectly impassive face, and a Burman whose pock-marked, evil +countenance was set in an apparently habitual leer, came running into +the room past the girl. + +With a hand which trembled violently, she held the lamp whilst the two +yellow ruffians tied me. I groaned and struggled feebly, fixing my +gaze upon the lamp bearer in a silent reproach which was by no means +without its effect. + +She lowered her eyes and I could see her biting her lip, whilst the +colour gradually faded from her cheeks. Then, glancing up again +quickly, and still meeting that reproachful stare, she turned her head +aside altogether, and rested one hand upon the wall, swaying slightly +as she did so. + +It was a singular ordeal for more than one of that incongruous group; +but in order that I may not be charged with hypocrisy or with seeking +to hide my own folly, I confess, here, that when again I found myself +in darkness, my heart was leaping not because of the success of my +strategy, but because of the success of that reproachful glance which +I had directed toward the lovely, dark-eyed Kāramančh, toward the +faithless evil Kāramančh! So much for myself. + +The door had not been closed ten seconds, ere Smith again was spitting +out the gag, swearing under his breath, and stretching his cramped +limbs free from their binding. Within a minute from the time of my +trussing, I was a free man again; save that look where I would--to +right, to left, or inward, to my own conscience--two dark eyes met +mine, enigmatically. + +"What now?" I whispered. + +"Let me think," replied Smith. "A false move would destroy us." + +"How long have you been here?" + +"Since last night." + +"Is Fu-Manchu--" + +"Fu-Manchu is here!" replied Smith grimly, "and not only Fu-Manchu, +but--another." + +"Another!" + +"A higher than Fu-Manchu, apparently. I have an idea of the identity +of this person, but no more than an idea. Something unusual is going +on, Petrie; otherwise I should have been a dead man twenty four hours +ago. Something even more important than my death engages Fu-Manchu's +attention--and this can only be the presence of the mysterious +visitor. Your seductive friend, Kāramančh, is arrayed in her very +becoming national costume in his honour, I presume." He stopped +abruptly; then added "I would give five hundred pounds for a glimpse +of that visitor's face!" + +"Is Burke--?" + +"God knows what has become of Burke, Petrie! We were both caught +napping in the establishment of the amiable Shen-Yan, where, amid a +very mixed company of poker players, we were losing our money like +gentlemen." + +"But Weymouth--" + +"Burke and I had both been neatly sand-bagged, my dear Petrie, and +removed elsewhere, some hours before Weymouth raided the gaming house. +Oh! I don't know how they smuggled us away with the police watching +the place; but my presence here is sufficient evidence of the fact. +Are you armed?" + +"No; my pistol was in my raincoat, which is missing." + +In the dim light from the broken window I could see Smith tugging +reflectively at the lobe of his left ear. + +"I am without arms, too," he mused. "We might escape from the +window--" + +"It's a long drop!" + +"Ah! I imagined so. If only I had a pistol, or a revolver--" + +"What should you do?" + +"I should present myself before the important meeting, which, I am +assured, is being held somewhere in this building; and to-night would +see the end of my struggle with the Fu-Manchu group--the end of the +whole Yellow menace! For not only is Fu-Manchu here, Petrie, with all +his gang of assassins, but he whom I believe to be the real head of +the group--a certain mandarin--is here also!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +THE SACRED ORDER + + +Smith stepped quietly across the room and tried the door. It proved to +be unlocked, and an instant later we were both outside in the passage. +Coincident with our arrival there, arose a sudden outcry from some +place at the westward end. A high-pitched, grating voice, in which +guttural notes alternated with a serpent-like hissing, was raised in +anger. + +"Dr. Fu-Manchu!" whispered Smith, grasping my arm. + +Indeed it was the unmistakable voice of the Chinaman, raised +hysterically in one of those outbursts which in the past I had +diagnosed as symptomatic of dangerous mania. + +The voice rose to a scream, the scream of some angry animal rather +than anything human. Then, chokingly, it ceased. Another short sharp +cry followed--but not in the voice of Fu-Manchu--a dull groan, and the +sound of a fall. + +With Smith still grasping my wrist, I shrank back into the doorway, as +something that looked in the darkness like a great ball of fluff came +rapidly along the passage toward me. Just at my feet the thing +stopped, and I made it out for a small animal. The tiny, gleaming eyes +looked up at me, and, chattering wickedly, the creature bounded past +and was lost from view. + +It was Dr. Fu-Manchu's marmoset. + +Smith dragged me back into the room which we had just left. As he +partly reclosed the door, I heard the clapping of hands. In a +condition of most dreadful suspense, we waited; until a new, ominous +sound proclaimed itself. Some heavy body was being dragged into the +passage. I heard the opening of a trap. Exclamations in guttural +voices told of a heavy task in progress; there was a great straining +and creaking--whereupon the trap was softly reclosed. + +Smith bent to my ear. + +"Fu-Manchu has chastised one of his servants," he whispered. "There +will be food for the grappling-irons to-night!" + +I shuddered violently, for, without Smith's words, I knew that a +bloody deed had been done in that house within a few yards of where we +stood. + +In the new silence, I could hear the drip, drip, drip of the rain +outside the window; then a steam siren hooted dismally upon the river, +and I thought how the screw of that very vessel, even as we listened, +might be tearing the body of Fu-Manchu's servant! + +"Have you some one waiting?" whispered Smith eagerly. + +"How long was I insensible?" + +"About half an hour." + +"Then the cabman will be waiting." + +"Have you a whistle with you?" + +I felt in my coat pocket. + +"Yes," I reported. + +"Good! Then we will take a chance." + +Again we slipped out into the passage and began a stealthy progress to +the west. Ten paces amid absolute darkness, and we found ourselves +abreast of a branch corridor. At the farther end, through a kind of +little window, a dim light shone. + +"See if you can find the trap," whispered Smith; "light your lamp." + +I directed the ray of the pocket lamp upon the floor, and there at my +feet was a square wooden trap. As I stooped to examine it, I glanced +back painfully, over my shoulder--and saw Nayland Smith tiptoeing away +from me along the passage toward the light! + +Inwardly I cursed his folly, but the temptation to peep in at that +little window proved too strong for me, as it had proved too strong +for him. + +Fearful that some board would creak beneath my tread, I followed; and +side by side we two crouched, looking into a small rectangular room. +It was a bare and cheerless apartment, with unpapered walls and +carpetless floor. A table and a chair constituted the sole furniture. + +Seated in the chair, with his back towards us, was a portly Chinaman +who wore a yellow, silken robe. His face it was impossible to see; but +he was beating his fists upon the table, and pouring out a torrent of +words in a thin, piping voice. So much I perceived at a glance, then, +into view at the distant end of the room, paced a tall, +high-shouldered figure--a figure, unforgettable, at once imposing and +dreadful, stately and sinister. + +With the long, bony hands behind him, fingers twining and intertwining +serpentinely about the handle of a little fan, and with the pointed +chin resting on the breast of the yellow robe, so that the light from +the lamp swinging in the centre of the ceiling gleamed upon the great, +dome-like brow, this tall man paced sombrely from left to right. + +He cast a sidelong, venomous glance at the voluble speaker out of +half-shut eyes; in the act they seemed to light up as with an internal +luminance; momentarily, they sparkled like emeralds; then their +brilliance was filmed over as one sees in the eyes of a bird when the +membrane is lowered. + +My blood seemed to chill, and my heart to double its pulsations; +beside me Smith was breathing more rapidly than usual. I knew now the +explanation of the feeling which had claimed me when first I had +descended the stone stairs. I knew what it was that hung like a miasma +over that house. It was the aura, the glamour, which radiated from +this wonderful and evil man as light radiates from radium. It was the +_vril_, the _force_, of Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +I began to move away from the window. But Smith held my wrist as in a +vice. He was listening raptly to the torrential speech of the Chinaman +who sat in the chair; and I perceived in his eyes the light of a +sudden comprehension. + +As the tall figure of the Chinese doctor came pacing into view again, +Smith, his head below the level of the window, pushed me gently along +the passage. + +Regaining the site of the trap, he whispered to me: + +"We owe our lives, Petrie, to the national childishness of the +Chinese! A race of ancestor worshippers is capable of anything, and +Dr. Fu-Manchu, the dreadful being who has rained terror upon Europe, +stands in imminent peril of disgrace for having lost a decoration." + +"What do you mean, Smith?" + +"I mean that this is no time for delay, Petrie! Here, unless I am +greatly mistaken, lies the rope by means of which you made your +entrance. It shall be the means of your exit. Open the trap!" + +Handing the lamp to Smith, I stooped and carefully raised the +trap-door. At which moment, a singular and a dramatic thing happened. + +A softly musical voice--the voice of my dreams!--spoke. + +"Not that way! Oh, God, not that way!" + +In my surprise and confusion I all but let the trap fall, but I +retained sufficient presence of mind to replace it gently. Standing +upright, I turned ... and there, with her little jewelled hand resting +upon Smith's arm, stood Kāramančh! + +In all my experience of him, I had never seen Nayland Smith so utterly +perplexed. Between anger, distrust and dismay, he wavered; and each +passing emotion was written legibly upon the lean bronzed features. +Rigid with surprise, he stared at the beautiful face of the girl. She, +although her hand still rested upon Smith's arm, had her dark eyes +turned upon me with that same enigmatical expression. Her lips were +slightly parted, and her breast heaved tumultuously. + +This ten seconds of silence in which we three stood looking at one +another encompassed the whole gamut of human emotion. The silence was +broken by Kāramančh. + +"They will be coming back that way!" she whispered, bending eagerly +toward me. (How, in the most desperate moments, I loved to listen to +that odd, musical accent!) "Please, if you would save your life, and +spare mine, trust me!" She suddenly clasped her hands together and +looked up into my face, passionately. "Trust me--just for once--and I +will show you the way!" + +Nayland Smith never removed his gaze from her for a moment, nor did he +stir. + +"Oh!" she whispered tremulously, and stamped one little red slipper +upon the floor. "_Won't_ you heed me? _Come_, or it will be too late!" + +I glanced anxiously at my friend; the voice of Dr. Fu-Manchu, now +raised again in anger, was audible above the piping tones of the other +Chinaman. And as I caught Smith's eye, in silent query--the trap at my +feet began slowly to lift! + +Kāramančh stifled a little sobbing cry; but the warning came too late. +A hideous yellow face, with oblique squinting eyes, appeared in the +aperture. + +I found myself inert, useless; I could neither think nor act. Nayland +Smith, however, as if instinctively, delivered a pitiless kick at the +head protruding above the trap. + +A sickening crushing sound, with a sort of muffled snap, spoke of a +broken jaw-bone; and with no word or cry, the Chinaman fell. As the +trap descended with a bang, I heard the thud of his body on the stone +stairs beneath. + +But we were lost. Kāramančh fled along one of the passages lightly as +a bird, and disappeared--as Dr. Fu-Manchu, his top lip drawn up above +his teeth in the manner of an angry jackal, appeared from the other. + +"This way!" cried Smith, in a voice that rose almost to a +shriek--"this way!"--and he led toward the room overhanging the steps. + +Off we dashed with panic swiftness, only to find that this retreat +also was cut off. Dimly visible in the darkness was a group of yellow +men, and despite the gloom, the curved blades of the knives which +they carried glittered menacingly. The passage was full of dacoits! + +Smith and I turned, together. The trap was raised again, and the +Burman, who had helped to tie me, was just scrambling up beside Dr. +Fu-Manchu, who stood there watching us, a shadowy, sinister figure. + +"The game's up, Petrie!" muttered Smith. "It has been a long fight, +but Fu-Manchu wins!" + +"Not entirely!" I cried. + +I whipped the police whistle from my pocket, and raised it to my lips; +but brief as the interval had been, the dacoits were upon me. + +A sinewy brown arm shot over my shoulder, and the whistle was dashed +from my grasp. Then came a riot of maėlstrom fighting, with Smith and +myself ever sinking lower amid a whirlpool, as it seemed, of +blood-lustful eyes, yellow fangs, and gleaming blades. + +I had some vague idea that the rasping voice of Fu-Manchu broke once +through the turmoil, and when, with my wrists tied behind me, I +emerged from the strife to find myself lying beside Smith in the +passage, I could only assume that the Chinaman had ordered his bloody +servants to take us alive; for saving numerous bruises and a few +superficial cuts, I was unwounded. + +The place was utterly deserted again, and we two panting captives +found ourselves alone with Dr. Fu-Manchu. The scene was unforgettable: +that dimly-lighted passage, its extremities masked in shadows, and the +tall, yellow-robed figure of the Satanic Chinaman towering over us +where we lay. + +He had recovered his habitual calm, and as I peered at him through the +gloom, I was impressed anew with the tremendous intellectual force of +the man. He had the brow of a genius, the features of a born ruler; +and even in that moment I could find time to search my memory, and to +discover that the face, saving the indescribable evil of its +expression, was identical with that of Seti I, the mighty Pharaoh who +lives in the Cairo Museum. + +Down the passage came leaping and gambolling the Doctor's marmoset. +Uttering its shrill, whistling cry, it leapt on to his shoulder, +clutched with its tiny fingers at the scanty, neutral-coloured hair +upon his crown, and bent forward, peering grotesquely into that still, +dreadful face. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu stroked the little creature and crooned to it, as a +mother to her infant. Only this crooning, and the laboured breathing +of Smith and myself, broke that impressive stillness. + +Suddenly the guttural voice began: + +"You come at an opportune time, Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith and Dr. +Petrie; at a time when the greatest man in China flatters me with a +visit. In my absence from home, a tremendous honour has been conferred +upon me, and, in the hour of this supreme honour, dishonour and +calamity have befallen! For my services to China--the New China, the +China of the future--I have been admitted by the Sublime Prince to the +Sacred Order of the White Peacock." + +Warming to his discourse, he threw wide his arms, hurling the +chattering marmoset fully five yards along the corridor. + +"Oh, god of Cathay!" he cried sibilantly, "in what have I sinned that +this catastrophe has been visited upon my head! Learn, my two dear +friends, that the sacred white peacock, brought to these misty shores +for my undying glory has been lost to me! Death is the penalty of such +a sacrilege; death shall be my lot, since death I deserve." + +Covertly Smith nudged me with his elbow. I knew what the nudge was +designed to convey; he would remind me of his words--anent the +childish trifles which sway the life of intellectual China. + +Personally, I was amazed. That Fu-Manchu's anger, grief, sorrow and +resignation were real, no one watching him, and hearing his voice, +could doubt. He continued: + +"By one deed, and one deed alone, may I win a lighter punishment. By +one deed, and the resignation of all my titles, all my lands, and all +my honours, may I merit to be spared to my work--which has only +begun." + +I knew now that we were lost, indeed; these were confidences which our +graves should hold inviolate! He suddenly opened fully those blazing +green eyes and directed their baneful glare upon Nayland Smith. + +"The Director of the universe," he continued softly, "has relented +toward me. To-night, you die! To-night, the arch-enemy of our caste +shall be no more. This is my offering--the price of redemption...." + +My mind was working again, and actively. I managed to grasp the +stupendous truth--and the stupendous possibility. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu was in the act of clapping his hands, when I spoke. + +"Stop!" I cried. + +He paused, and the weird film, which sometimes became visible in his +eyes, now obscured their greenness, and lent him the appearance of a +blind man. + +"Dr. Petrie," he said softly, "I shall always listen to you with +respect." + +"I have an offer to make," I continued, seeking to steady my voice. +"Give us our freedom, and I will restore your shattered honour--I will +restore the sacred peacock!" + +Dr. Fu-Manchu bent forward until his face was so close to mine that I +could see the innumerable lines which, an intricate network, covered +his yellow skin. + +"Speak!" he hissed. "You lift up my heart from a dark pit!" + +"I can restore your white peacock," I said; "I, and I alone, know +where it is!"--and I strove not to shrink from the face so close to +mine. + +Upright shot the tall figure; high above his head Fu-Manchu threw his +arms--and a light of exaltation gleamed in the now widely-opened, +catlike eyes. + +"Oh, god!" he screamed frenziedly. "Oh, god of the Golden Age! like a +phoenix I arise from the ashes of myself!" He turned to me. "Quick! +Quick! make your bargain! End my suspense!" + +Smith stared at me like a man dazed; but, ignoring him, I went on: + +"You will release me, now, immediately. In another ten minutes it will +be too late; my friend will remain. One of your--servants--can +accompany me, and give the signal when I return with the peacock. Mr. +Nayland Smith and yourself, or another, will join me at the corner of +the street where the raid took place last night. We will then give you +ten minutes' grace, after which we shall take whatever steps we +choose." + +"Agreed!" cried Fu-Manchu. "I ask but one thing from an Englishman; +your word of honour?" + +"I give it." + +"I, also," said Smith hoarsely. + + * * * * * + +Ten minutes later, Nayland Smith and I, standing beside the cab, whose +lights gleamed yellowly through the mist, exchanged a struggling, +frightened bird for our lives--capitulated with the enemy of the white +race. + +With characteristic audacity--and characteristic trust in the British +sense of honour--Dr. Fu-Manchu came in person with Nayland Smith, in +response to the wailing signal of the dacoit who had accompanied me. +No word was spoken, save that the cabman suppressed a curse of +amazement; and the Chinaman, his sinister servant at his elbow, bowed +low--and left us, surely to the mocking laughter of the gods! + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +THE COUGHING HORROR + + +I leapt up in bed with a great start. + +My sleep was troubled often enough in those days which immediately +followed our almost miraculous escape from the den of Fu-Manchu; and +now, as I crouched there, nerves aquiver--listening--listening--I +could not be sure if this dank panic which possessed me had its origin +in nightmare or in something else. + +Surely a scream, a choking cry for help, had reached my ears; but now, +almost holding my breath in that sort of nervous tensity peculiar to +one aroused thus, I listened, and the silence seemed complete. Perhaps +I had been dreaming.... + +"Help! Petrie! _Help_!..." + +It was Nayland Smith in the room above me! + +My doubts were resolved; this was no trick of an imagination +disordered. Some dreadful menace threatened my friend. Not delaying +even to snatch my dressing-gown, I rushed out on to the landing, up +the stairs, bare-footed as I was, threw open the door of Smith's room +and literally hurled myself in. + +Those cries had been the cries of one assailed, had been uttered, I +judged, in the brief interval of a life and death struggle; had been +choked off.... + +A certain amount of moonlight found access to the room, without +spreading so far as the bed in which my friend lay. But at the moment +of my headlong entrance, and before I had switched on the light, my +gaze automatically was directed to the pale moonbeam streaming through +the window and down on to one corner of the sheep skin rug beside the +bed. + +There came a sound of faint and muffled coughing, + +What with my recent awakening and the panic at my heart, I could not +claim that my vision was true; but across this moonbeam passed a sort +of grey streak, for all the world as though some long thin shape had +been withdrawn, snakelike, from the room, through the open window.... +From somewhere outside the house, and below, I heard the cough again, +followed by a sharp cracking sound like the lashing of a whip. + +I depressed the switch, flooding the room with light, and as I leapt +forward to the bed a word picture of what I had seen formed in my +mind; and I found that I was thinking of a grey feather boa. + +"Smith!" I cried (my voice seemed to pitch itself, unwilled, in a very +high key), "Smith, old man!" + +He made no reply, and a sudden, sorrowful fear clutched at my +heart-strings. He was lying half out of bed flat upon his back, his +head at a dreadful angle with his body. As I bent over him and seized +him by the shoulders, I could see the whites of his eyes. His arms +hung limply, and his fingers touched the carpet. + +"My God!" I whispered, "what has happened?" + +I heaved him back on to the pillow, and looked anxiously into his +face. Habitually gaunt, the flesh so refined away by the consuming +nervous energy of the man as to reveal the cheekbones in sharp +prominence, he now looked truly ghastly. His skin was so sun-baked as +to have changed constitutionally; nothing could ever eradicate that +tan. But to-night a fearful greyness was mingled with the brown, his +lips were purple ... and there were marks of strangulation upon the +lean throat--ever darkening weals of clutching fingers. + +He began to breathe stertorously and convulsively, inhalation being +accompanied by a significant gurgle in the throat. But now my calm was +restored in face of a situation which called for professional +attention. + +I aided my friend's laboured respirations by the usual means, setting +to work vigorously; so that presently he began to clutch at his +inflamed throat which that murderous pressure had threatened to close. + +I could hear sounds of movements about the house, showing that not I +alone had been awakened by those hoarse screams. + +"It's all right, old man," I said, bending over him: "brace up!" + +He opened his eyes--they looked bleared and bloodshot--and gave me a +quick glance of recognition. + +"It's all right, Smith!" I said--"no! don't sit up; lie there for a +moment." + +I ran across to the dressing-table, whereon I perceived his flask to +lie, and mixed him a weak stimulant with which I returned to the bed. + +As I bent over him again, my housekeeper appeared in the doorway, pale +and wide-eyed. + +"There is no occasion for alarm," I said over my shoulder; "Mr. +Smith's nerves are overwrought and he was awakened by some disturbing +dream. You can return to bed, Mrs. Newsome." + +Nayland Smith seemed to experience much difficulty in swallowing the +contents of the tumbler which I held to his lips; and, from the way in +which he fingered the swollen glands, I could see that his throat, +which I had vigorously massaged, was occasioning him great pain. But +the danger was past, and already that glassy look was disappearing +from his eyes, nor did they protrude so unnaturally. + +"God, Petrie!" he whispered, "that was a near shave! I haven't the +strength of a kitten!" + +"The weakness will pass off," I replied; "there will be no collapse, +now. A little more fresh air...." + +I stood up, glancing at the windows, then back at Smith, who forced a +wry smile in answer to my look. + +"Couldn't be done, Petrie," he said huskily. + +His words referred to the state of the windows. Although the night was +oppressively hot, these were only opened some four inches at top and +bottom. Farther opening was impossible because of iron brackets +screwed firmly into the casements, which prevented the windows being +raised or lowered farther. + +It was a precaution adopted after long experience of the servants of +Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +Now, as I stood looking from the half-strangled man upon the bed to +those screwed-up windows, the fact came home to my mind that this +precaution had proved futile. I thought of the thing which I had +likened to a feather boa; and I looked at the swollen weals made by +clutching fingers upon the throat of Nayland Smith. + +The bed stood fully four feet from the nearest window. + +I suppose the question was written in my face; for, as I turned again +to Smith, who, having struggled upright, was still fingering his +injured throat ruefully--"God only knows, Petrie!" he said; "no human +arm could have reached me...." + +For us, the night was ended so far as sleep was concerned. Arrayed in +his dressing-gown, Smith sat in the white cane chair in my study with +a glass of brandy and water beside him, and (despite my official +prohibition) with the cracked briar, which had sent up its incense in +many strange and dark places of the East and which yet survived to +perfume these prosy rooms in suburban London, between his teeth. I +stood with my elbow resting upon the mantelpiece looking down at him +where he sat. + +"By God! Petrie," he said, yet again, with his fingers straying gently +over the surface of his throat, "that was a narrow shave--a damned +narrow shave!" + +"Narrower than perhaps you appreciate, old man," I replied. "You were +a most unusual shade of blue when I found you...." + +"I managed," said Smith evenly, "to tear those clutching fingers away +for a moment and to give a cry for help. It was only for a moment, +though. Petrie! they were fingers of steel--of steel!" + +"The bed...." I began. + +"I know that," rapped Smith. "I shouldn't have been sleeping in it, +had it been within reach of the window; but, knowing that the Doctor +avoids noisy methods, I had thought myself fairly safe so long as I +made it impossible for any one actually to enter the room...." + +"I have always insisted, Smith," I cried, "that there was danger! What +of poisoned darts? What of the damnable reptiles and insects which +form part of the armoury of Fu-Manchu?" + +"Familiarity breeds contempt, I suppose," he replied. "But as it +happened, none of those agents was employed. The very menace that I +sought to avoid reached me somehow. It would almost seem that Dr. +Fu-Manchu deliberately accepted the challenge of those screwed up +windows! Hang it all, Petrie! one cannot sleep in a room hermetically +sealed in weather like this! It's positively Burmese; and although I +can stand tropical heat, curiously enough the heat of London gets me +down almost immediately." + +"The humidity; that's easily understood. But you'll have to put up +with it in the future. After nightfall our windows must be closed +entirely, Smith." + +Nayland Smith knocked out his pipe upon the side of the fireplace. The +bowl sizzled furiously, but without delay he stuffed broad-cut mixture +into the hot pipe, dropping a liberal quantity upon the carpet during +the process. He raised his eyes to me, and his face was very grim. + +"Petrie," he said, striking a match on the heel of his slipper, "the +resources of Dr. Fu-Manchu are by no means exhausted. Before we quit +this room it is up to us to come to a decision upon a certain point." +He got his pipe well alight. "What kind of thing, what unnatural, +distorted creature, laid hands upon my throat to-night? I owe my life, +primarily, to you, old man, but secondarily, to the fact that I was +awakened, just before the attack, by the creature's _coughing_--by its +vile, high pitched _coughing_...." + +I glanced around at the books upon my shelves. Often enough, following +some outrage by the brilliant, Chinese doctor whose genius was +directed to the discovery of new and unique death agents, we had +obtained a clue in those works of a scientific nature which bulk +largely in the library of a medical man. There are creatures, there +are drugs, which, ordinarily innocuous, may be so employed as to +become inimical to human life; and in the distorting of nature, in the +disturbing of balances and the diverting of beneficent forces into +strange and dangerous channels, Dr. Fu-Manchu excelled. I had known +him to enlarge, by artificial culture, a minute species of fungus so +as to render it a powerful agent capable of attacking man; his +knowledge of venomous insects has probably never been paralleled in +the history of the world; whilst, in the sphere of pure toxicology, he +had, and has, no rival: the Borgias were children by comparison. But, +look where I would, think how I might, no adequate explanation of this +latest outrage seemed possible along normal lines. + +"There's the clue," said Nayland Smith, pointing to a little ash-tray +upon the table near by. "Follow it if you can." + +But I could not. + +"As I have explained," continued my friend, "I was awakened by a sound +of coughing; then came a death grip on my throat, and instinctively my +hands shot out in search of my attacker. I could not reach him; my +hands came in contact with nothing palpable. Therefore I clutched at +the fingers which were dug into my windpipe, and found them to be +small--as the marks show--and _hairy_. I managed to give that first +cry for help, and with all my strength I tried to unfasten the grip +that was throttling the life out of me. At last I contrived to move +one of the hands, and I called out again, though not so loudly. Then +both the hands were back again; I was weakening; but I clawed like a +madman at the thin, hairy arms of the strangling thing, and with a +blood-red mist dancing before my eyes, I seemed to be whirling madly +round and round until all became a blank. Evidently I used my nails +pretty freely--and there's the trophy." + +For the twentieth time, I should think, I raised the ash-tray in my +hand and held it immediately under the table lamp in order to examine +its contents. In the little brass bowl lay a blood-stained fragment of +greyish hair attached to a tatter of skin. This fragment of epidermis +had an odd bluish tinge, and the attached hair was much darker at the +roots than elsewhere. Saving its singular colour, it might have been +torn from the forearm of a very hirsute human; but although my +thoughts wandered, unfettered, north, south, east and west; although, +knowing the resources of Fu-Manchu, I considered all the recognized +Mongolian types, and, in quest of hirsute mankind, even roamed, far +north among the blubber-eating Esquimaux; although I glanced at +Australasia, at Central Africa, and passed in mental review the dark +places of the Congo, nowhere in the known world, nowhere in the +history of the human species, could I come upon a type of man +answering to the description suggested by our strange clue. + +Nayland Smith was watching me curiously as I bent over the little +brass ash-tray. + +"You are puzzled," he rapped in his short way. "So am I--utterly +puzzled. Fu-Manchu's gallery of monstrosities clearly has become +reinforced; for even if we identified the type, we should not be in +sight of our explanation." + +"You mean--" I began. + +"Fully four feet from the window, Petrie, and that window but a few +inches open! Look"--he bent forward, resting his chest against the +table, and stretched out his hand towards me--"you have a rule there; +just measure." + +Setting down the ash-tray, I opened out the rule and measured the +distance from the farther edge of the table to the tips of Smith's +fingers. + +"Twenty-eight inches--and _I_ have a long reach!" snapped Smith, +withdrawing his arm and striking a match to relight his pipe. "There's +one thing, Petrie, often proposed before, which now we must do without +delay. The ivy must be stripped from the walls at the back. It's a +pity, but we cannot afford to sacrifice our lives to our sense of the +ęsthetic. What do you make of the sound like the cracking of a whip?" + +"I make nothing of it, Smith," I replied wearily. "It might have been +a thick branch of ivy breaking beneath the weight of a climber." + +"Did it sound like it?" + +"I must confess that the explanation does not convince me, but I have +no better one." + +Smith, permitting his pipe to go out, sat staring straightly before +him, and tugging at the lobe of his left ear. + +"The old bewilderment is seizing me," I continued. "At first, when I +realized that Dr. Fu-Manchu was back in England, when I realized that +an elaborate murder-machine was set up somewhere in London, it seemed +unreal, fantastical. Then I met--Kāramančh! She, whom we thought to be +his victim, showed herself again to be his slave. Now, with Weymouth +and Scotland Yard at work, the old secret evil is established again in +our midst, unaccountably--our lives are menaced--sleep is a +danger--every shadow threatens death ... oh! it is awful." + +Smith remained silent; he did not seem to have heard my words. I knew +these moods and had learnt that it was useless to seek to interrupt +them. With his brows drawn down, and his deep-set eyes staring into +space, he sat there gripping his cold pipe so tightly that my own jaw +muscles ached sympathetically. No man was better equipped than this +gaunt British Commissioner to stand between society and the menace of +the Yellow Doctor; I respected his meditations, for, unlike my own, +they were informed by an intimate knowledge of the dark and secret +things of the East, of that mysterious East out of which Fu-Manchu +came, of that jungle of noxious things whose miasma had been wafted +Westward with the implacable Chinaman. + +I walked quietly from the room, occupied with my own bitter +reflections. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +BEWITCHMENT + + +"You say you have two pieces of news for me?" said Nayland Smith, +looking across the breakfast table to where Inspector Weymouth sat +sipping coffee. + +"There are two points--yes," replied the Scotland Yard man, whilst +Smith paused, egg-spoon in hand, and fixed his keen eyes upon the +speaker. "The first is this: the headquarters of the yellow group is +no longer in the East End." + +"How can you be sure of that?" + +"For two reasons. In the first place, that district must now be too +hot to hold Dr. Fu-Manchu; in the second place, we have just completed +a house-to-house inquiry which has scarcely overlooked a rathole or a +rat. That place where you say Fu-Manchu was visited by some Chinese +mandarin; where you, Mr. Smith, and"--glancing in my direction--"you, +doctor, were confined for a time--" + +"Yes?" snapped Smith, attacking his egg. + +"Well," continued the Inspector, "it is all deserted now. There is not +the slightest doubt that the Chinaman has fled to some other abode. I +am certain of it. My second piece of news will interest you very much, +I am sure. You were taken to the establishment of the Chinaman, +Shen-Yan, by a certain ex-officer of New York Police--Burke...." + +"Good God!" cried Smith, looking up with a start; "I thought they had +him!" + +"So did I," replied Weymouth grimly; "but they haven't! He got away in +the confusion following the raid, and has been hiding ever since with +a cousin--a nurseryman out Upminster way...." + +"Hiding?" snapped Smith. + +"Exactly--hiding. He has been afraid to stir ever since, and has +scarcely shown his nose outside the door. He says he is watched night +and day." + +"Then how ...!" + +"He realized that something must be done," continued the Inspector, +"and made a break this morning. He is so convinced of this constant +surveillance that he came away secretly, hidden under the boxes of a +market-wagon. He landed at Covent Garden in the early hours of this +morning and came straight away to the Yard." + +"What is he afraid of exactly?" + +Inspector Weymouth put down his coffee cup and bent forward slightly. + +"He knows something," he said in a low voice, "and _they_ are aware +that he knows it!" + +"And what is this he knows?" + +Nayland Smith stared eagerly at the detective. + +"Every man has his price," replied Weymouth, with a smile, "and Burke +seems to think that you are a more likely market than the police +authorities." + +"I see," snapped Smith. "He wants to see _me_?" + +"He wants you to go and see _him_," was the reply. "I think he +anticipates that you may make a capture of the person or persons +spying upon him." + +"Did he give you any particulars?" + +"Several. He spoke of a sort of gipsy girl with whom he had a short +conversation one day, over the fence which divides his cousin's flower +plantations from the lane adjoining." + +"Gipsy girl!" I whispered, glancing rapidly at Smith. + +"I think you are right, doctor," said Weymouth with his slow smile; +"it was Kāramančh. She asked him the way to somewhere or other and got +him to write it upon a loose page of his notebook, so that she should +not forget it." + +"You hear that, Petrie?" rapped Smith. + +"I hear it," I replied, "but I don't see any special significance in +the fact." + +"I do!" rapped Smith. "I didn't sit up the greater part of last night +thrashing my weary brains for nothing! But I am going to the British +Museum to-day, to confirm a certain suspicion." He turned to Weymouth. +"Did Burke go back?" he demanded abruptly. + +"He returned hidden under the empty boxes," was the reply. "Oh! you +never saw a man in such a funk in all your life!" + +"He may have good reasons," I said. + +"He _has_ good reasons!" replied Nayland Smith grimly; "if that man +really possesses information inimical to the safety of Fu-Manchu, he +can only escape doom by means of a miracle similar to that which +hitherto has protected you and me." + +"Burke insists," said Weymouth at this point, "that something comes +almost every night after dusk, slinking about the house--it's an old +farmhouse, I understand; and on two or three occasions he has been +awakened (fortunately for him he is a light sleeper) by sounds of +_coughing_ immediately outside his window. He is a man who sleeps with +a pistol under his pillow, and more than once, on running to the +window, he has had a vague glimpse of some creature leaping down from +the tiles of the roof, which slopes up to his room, into the flower +beds below...." + +"Creature!" said Smith, his grey eyes ablaze now, "you said +_creature_!" + +"I used the word deliberately," replied Weymouth, "because Burke seems +to have the idea that it goes on all fours." + +There was a short and rather strained silence. Then: + +"In descending a sloping roof," I suggested, "a human being would +probably employ his hands as well as his feet." + +"Quite so," agreed the Inspector. "I am merely reporting the +impression of Burke." + +"Has he heard no other sound?" rapped Smith; "one like the cracking of +dry branches, for instance?" + +"He made no mention of it," replied Weymouth, staring. + +"And what is the plan?" + +"One of his cousin's vans," said Weymouth, with his slight smile, "has +remained behind at Covent Garden and will return late this afternoon. +I propose that you and I, Mr. Smith, imitate Burke and ride down to +Upminster under the empty boxes." + +Nayland Smith stood up, leaving his breakfast half finished, and began +to wander up and down the room, reflectively tugging at his ear. Then +he began to fumble in the pockets of his dressing-gown and finally +produced the inevitable pipe, dilapidated pouch, and box of safety +matches. He began to load the much-charred agent of reflection. + +"Do I understand that Burke is actually too afraid to go out openly +even in daylight?" he asked suddenly. + +"He has not hitherto left his cousin's plantations at all," replied +Weymouth. "He seems to think that openly to communicate with the +authorities, or with you, would be to seal his death warrant." + +"He's right," snapped Smith. + +"Therefore he came and returned secretly," continued the inspector; +"and if we are to do any good, obviously we must adopt similar +precautions. The market wagon, loaded in such a way as to leave ample +space in the interior for us, will be drawn up outside the office of +Messrs. Pike and Pike, in Covent Garden, until about five o'clock this +afternoon. At say, half-past four, I propose that we meet there and +embark upon the journey." + +The speaker glanced in my direction interrogatively. + +"Include me in the programme," I said. "Will there be room in the +wagon?" + +"Certainly," was the reply; "it is most commodious, but I cannot +guarantee its comfort." + +Nayland Smith promenaded the room unceasingly, and presently he walked +out altogether, only to return ere the Inspector and I had had time to +exchange more than a glance of surprise, carrying a brass ash-tray. He +placed this on a corner of the breakfast table before Weymouth. + +"Ever seen anything like that?" he inquired. + +The Inspector examined the gruesome relic with obvious curiosity, +turning it over with the tip of his little finger and manifesting +considerable repugnance in touching it at all. Smith and I watched him +in silence, and, finally, placing the tray again upon the table, he +looked up in a puzzled way. + +"It's something like the skin of a water-rat," he said. + +Nayland Smith stared at him fixedly. + +"A water-rat? Now that you come to mention it, I perceive a certain +resemblance--yes. But"--he had been wearing a silk scarf about his +throat and now he unwrapped it--"did you ever see a water-rat that +could make marks like these?" + +Weymouth started to his feet with some muttered exclamation. + +"What is this?" he cried. "When did it happen, and how?" + +In his own terse fashion, Nayland Smith related the happenings of the +night. At the conclusion of the story: + +"By heaven!" whispered Weymouth, "the thing on the roof--the coughing +thing that goes on all fours, seen by Burke...." + +"My own idea exactly!" cried Smith. + +"Fu-Manchu," I said excitedly, "has brought some new, some dreadful +creature, from Burma...." + +"No, Petrie," snapped Smith, turning upon me suddenly. "Not from +Burma--from Abyssinia." + + * * * * * + +That day was destined to be an eventful one; a day never to be +forgotten by any of us concerned in those happenings which I have to +record. Early in the morning Nayland Smith set off for the British +Museum to pursue his mysterious investigations, and I, having +performed my brief professional round (for, as Nayland Smith had +remarked on one occasion, this was a beastly healthy district), I +found, having made the necessary arrangements, that, with over three +hours to spare, I had nothing to occupy my time until the appointment +in Covent Garden Market. My lonely lunch completed, a restless fit +seized me, and I felt unable to remain longer in the house. Inspired +by this restlessness, I attired myself for the adventure of the +evening, not neglecting to place a pistol in my pocket, and, walking +to the neighbouring Tube station, I booked to Charing Cross, and +presently found myself rambling aimlessly along the crowded streets. +Led on by what link of memory I know not, I presently drifted into New +Oxford Street, and looked up with a start--to learn that I stood +before the shop of a second-hand bookseller where once two years +before I had met Kāramančh. + +The thoughts conjured up at that moment were almost too bitter to be +borne, and without so much as glancing at the books displayed for +sale, I crossed the roadway, entered Museum Street, and, rather in +order to distract my mind than because I contemplated any purchase, +began to examine the Oriental pottery, Egyptian statuettes, Indian +armour, and other curios, displayed in the window of an antique +dealer. + +But, strive as I would to concentrate my mind upon the objects in the +window, my memories persistently haunted me, and haunted me to the +exclusion even of the actualities. The crowds thronging the pavement, +the traffic in New Oxford Street, swept past unheeded; my eyes saw +nothing of pot nor statuette, but only met, in a misty imaginative +world, the glance of two other eyes--the dark and beautiful eyes of +Kāramančh. In the exquisite tinting of a Chinese vase dimly +perceptible in the background of the shop, I perceived only the +blushing cheeks of Kāramančh; her face rose up, a taunting phantom, +from out of the darkness between a hideous, gilded idol and an Indian +sandal-wood screen. + +I strove to dispel this obsessing thought, resolutely fixing my +attention upon a tall Etruscan vase in the corner of the window, near +to the shop door. Was I losing my senses indeed? A doubt of my own +sanity momentarily possessed me. For, struggle as I would to dispel +the illusion--there, looking out at me over that ancient piece of +pottery, was the bewitching face of the slave-girl! + +Probably I was glaring madly, and possibly I attracted the notice of +the passers-by; but of this I cannot be certain, for all my attention +was centred upon that phantasmal face, with the cloudy hair, slightly +parted red lips, and the brilliant dark eyes which looked into mine +out of the shadows of the shop. + +It was bewildering--it was uncanny; for, delusion or verity, the +glamour prevailed. I exerted a great mental effort, stepped to the +door, turned the handle, and entered the shop with as great a show of +composure as I could muster. + +A curtain draped in a little door at the back of one counter swayed +slightly, with no greater violence than may have been occasioned by +the draught. But I fixed my eyes upon this swaying curtain almost +fiercely ... as an impassive half-caste of some kind who appeared to +be a strange cross between a Gręco-Hebrew and a Japanese, entered and +quite unemotionally faced me, with a slight bow. + +So wholly unexpected was this apparition that I started back. + +"Can I show you anything, sir?" inquired the new arrival, with a +second slight inclination of the head. + +I looked at him for a moment in silence. Then: + +"I thought I saw a lady of my acquaintance here a moment ago," I said. +"Was I mistaken?" + +"Quite mistaken, sir," replied the shopman, raising his black eyebrows +ever so slightly; "a mistake possibly due to a reflection in the +window. Will you take a look around now that you are here?" + +"Thank you," I replied, staring him hard in the face; "at some other +time." + +I turned and quitted the shop abruptly. Either I was mad, or Kāramančh +was concealed somewhere therein. + +However, realizing my helplessness in the matter, I contented myself +with making a mental note of the name which appeared above the +establishment--J. Salaman--and walked on, my mind in a chaotic +condition and my heart beating with unusual rapidity. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +THE QUESTING HANDS + + +Within my view, from the corner of the room where I sat in deepest +shadow, through the partly opened window (it was screwed, like our +own) were rows of glass-houses gleaming in the moonlight, and, beyond +them, orderly ranks of flower-beds extending into a blue haze of +distance. By reason of the moon's position, no light entered the room, +but my eyes, from long watching, were grown familiar with the +darkness, and I could see Burke quite clearly as he lay in the bed +between my post and the window. I seemed to be back again in those +days of the troubled past when first Nayland Smith and I had come to +grips with the servants of Dr. Fu-Manchu. A more peaceful scene than +this flower-planted corner of Essex it would be difficult to imagine; +but, either because of my knowledge that its peace was chimerical, or +because of that outflung consciousness of danger which actually, or in +my imagination, preceded the coming of the Chinaman's agents, to my +seeming the silence throbbed electrically and the night was laden with +stilly omens. + +Already cramped by my journey in the market-cart, I found it difficult +to remain very long in any one position. What information had Burke to +sell? He had refused, for some reason, to discuss the matter that +evening, and now, enacting the part allotted him by Nayland Smith, he +feigned sleep consistently, although at intervals he would whisper to +me his doubts and fears. + +All the chances were in our favour to-night; for whilst I could not +doubt that Dr. Fu-Manchu was set upon the removal of the ex-officer of +New York police, neither could I doubt that our presence in the farm +was unknown to the agents of the Chinaman. According to Burke, +constant attempts had been made to achieve Fu-Manchu's purpose, and +had only been frustrated by his (Burke's) wakefulness. There was every +probability that another attempt would be made to-night. + +Any one who has been forced by circumstance to undertake such a vigil +as this will be familiar with the marked changes (corresponding with +phases of the earth's movement) which take place in the atmosphere, at +midnight, at two o'clock, and again at four o'clock. During those four +hours falls a period wherein all life is at its lowest ebb, and every +physician is aware that there is a greater likelihood of a patient's +passing between midnight and 4 a.m., than at any other period during +the cycle of the hours. + +To-night I became specially aware of this lowering of vitality, and +now, with the night at that darkest phase which precedes the dawn, an +indescribable dread, such as I had known before in my dealings with +the Chinaman, assailed me, when I was least prepared to combat it. The +stillness was intense Then: + +"_Here it is!_" whispered Burke from the bed. + +The chill at the very centre of my being, which but corresponded with +the chill of all surrounding nature at that hour, became intensified, +keener, at the whispered words. + +I rose stealthily out of my chair, and from my nest of shadows +watched--watched intently, the bright oblong of the window.... + +Without the slightest heralding sound--a black silhouette crept up +against the pane ... the silhouette of a small, malformed head, a +dog-like head, deep-set in square shoulders. Malignant eyes peered +intently in. Higher it rose--that wicked head--against the window, +then crouched down on the sill and became less sharply defined as the +creature stooped to the opening below. There was a faint sound of +sniffing. + +Judging from the stark horror which I experienced myself, I doubted, +now, if Burke could sustain the rōle allotted him. In beneath the +slightly raised window came a hand, perceptible to me despite the +darkness of the room. It seemed to project from the black silhouette +outside the pane, to be thrust forward--and forward--and forward ... +that small hand with the outstretched fingers. + +The unknown possesses unique terrors; and since I was unable to +conceive what manner of thing this could be, which, extending its +incredibly long arms, now sought the throat of the man upon the bed, I +tasted of that sort of terror which ordinarily one knows only in +dreams. + +"Quick, sir--_quick_!" screamed Burke, starting up from the pillow. + +The questing hands had reached his throat! + +Choking down an urgent dread that I had of touching the thing which +had reached through the window to kill the sleeper, I sprang across +the room and grasped the rigid, hairy forearms. + +Heavens! Never have I felt such muscles, such tendons, as those +beneath the hirsute skin! They seemed to be of steel wire, and with a +sudden frightful sense of impotence, I realized that I was as +powerless as a child to relax that strangle-hold. Burke was making the +most frightful sounds and quite obviously was being asphyxiated before +my eyes! + +"Smith!" I cried, "Smith! Help! _help_! for God's sake!" + +Despite the confusion of my mind I became aware of sounds outside and +below me. Twice the thing at the window coughed; there was an +incessant, lash-like cracking, then some shouted words which I was +unable to make out; and finally the sharp report of a pistol. + +Snarling like that of a wild beast came from the creature with the +hairy arms, together with renewed coughing. But the steel grip relaxed +not one iota. I realized two things: the first, that in my terror at +the suddenness of the attack I had omitted to act as prearranged: the +second, that I had discredited the strength of the visitant, whilst +Smith had foreseen it. + +Desisting in my vain endeavour to pit my strength against that of the +nameless thing, I sprang back across the room and took up the weapon +which had been left in my charge earlier in the night, but which I had +been unable to believe it would be necessary to employ. This was a +sharp and heavy axe which Nayland Smith, when I had met him in Covent +Garden, had brought with him, to the great amazement of Weymouth and +myself. + +As I leapt back to the window and uplifted this primitive weapon, a +second shot sounded from below, and more fierce snarling, coughing, +and guttural mutterings assailed my ears from beyond the pane. + +Lifting the heavy blade, I brought it down with all my strength upon +the nearer of those hairy arms where it crossed the window-ledge, +severing muscle, tendon and bone as easily as a knife might cut +cheese.... + +A shriek--a shriek neither human nor animal, but gruesomely compound +of both--followed ... and merged into a choking cough. Like a flash +the other shaggy arm was withdrawn, and some vaguely seen body went +rolling down the sloping red tiles and crashed on to the ground +beneath. + +With a second piercing shriek, louder than that recently uttered by +Burke, wailing through the night from somewhere below, I turned +desperately to the man on the bed, who now was become significantly +silent. A candle with matches, stood upon a table hard by, and, my +fingers far from steady, I set about obtaining a light. This +accomplished, I stood the candle upon the little chest-of-drawers and +returned to Burke's side. + +"Merciful God!" I cried. + +Of all the pictures which remain in my memory, some of them dark +enough, I can find none more horrible than that which now confronted +me in the dim candle-light. Burke lay crosswise on the bed, his head +thrown back and sagging; one rigid hand he held in the air, and with +the other grasped the hairy forearm which I had severed with the axe; +for, in a death-like grip, the dead fingers were still fastened, +vice-like, at his throat. + +His face was nearly black, and his eyes projected from their sockets +horribly. Mastering my repugnance, I seized the hideous piece of +bleeding anatomy and strove to release it. It defied all my efforts; +in death it was as implacable as in life. I took a knife from my +pocket, and, tendon by tendon, cut away that uncanny grip from Burke's +throat.... + +But my labour was in vain. Burke was dead! + +I think I failed to realize this for some time. My clothes were +sticking clammily to my body; I was bathed in perspiration, and, +shaking furiously, I clutched at the edge of the window, avoiding the +bloody patch upon the ledge, and looked out over the roofs to where, +in the more distant plantations, I could hear excited voices. What had +been the meaning of that scream which I had heard but to which in my +frantic state of mind I had paid comparatively little attention? + +There was a great stirring all about me. + +"Smith!" I cried from the window; "Smith, for mercy's sake where are +you?" + +Footsteps came racing up the stairs. Behind me the door burst open and +Nayland Smith stumbled into the room. + +"God!" he said, and started back in the doorway. + +"Have you got it, Smith?" I demanded hoarsely. "In sanity's name what +is it--_what is it?_" + +"Come downstairs," replied Smith quietly, "and see for yourself." He +turned his head aside from the bed. + +Very unsteadily I followed him down the stairs and through the +rambling old house out into the stone-paved courtyard. There were +figures moving at the end of a long alleyway between the glass houses, +and one, carrying a lantern, stooped over something which lay upon the +ground. + +"That's Burke's cousin with the lantern," whispered Smith, in my ear; +"don't tell him yet." + +I nodded, and we hurried up to join the group. I found myself looking +down at one of those thickset Burmans whom I always associated with +Fu-Manchu's activities. He lay quite flat, face downward; but the back +of his head was a shapeless blood-clotted mass, and a heavy +stock-whip, the butt end ghastly because of the blood and hair which +clung to it, lay beside him. I started back appalled as Smith caught +my arm. + +"_It_ turned on its keeper!" he hissed in my ear. "I wounded it twice +from below, and you severed one arm; in its insensate fury, its +unreasoning malignity, it returned--and there lies its second +victim...." + +"Then...." + +"It's gone, Petrie! It has the strength of four men even now. Look!" + +He stooped, and from the clenched left hand of the dead Burman, +extracted a piece of paper and opened it. + +"Hold the lantern a moment," he said. + +In the yellow light he glanced at the scrap of paper. + +"As I expected--a leaf of Burke's notebook; it worked by _scent_." He +turned to me with an odd expression in his grey eyes. "I wonder what +piece of _my_ personal property Fu-Manchu has pilfered," he said, "in +order to enable it to sleuth _me_?" + +He met the gaze of the man holding the lantern. + +"Perhaps you had better return to the house," he said, looking him +squarely in the eyes. + +The other's face blanched. + +"You don't mean, sir--you don't mean...." + +"Brace up!" said Smith, laying his hand upon his shoulder. +"Remember--he chose to play with fire!" + +One wild look the man cast from Smith to me, then went off, +staggering, toward the farm. + +"Smith--" I began. + +He turned to me with an impatient gesture. + +"Weymouth has driven into Upminster," he snapped; "and the whole +district will be scoured before morning. They probably motored here, +but the sounds of the shots will have enabled whoever was with the car +to make good his escape. And--exhausted from loss of blood, its +capture is only a matter of time, Petrie." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +ONE DAY IN RANGOON + + +Nayland Smith returned from the telephone. Nearly twenty-four hours +had elapsed since the awful death of Burke. + +"No news, Petrie," he said shortly. "It must have crept into some +inaccessible hole to die." + +I glanced up from my notes. Smith settled into the white cane +armchair, and began to surround himself with clouds of aromatic smoke. +I took up a half-sheet of foolscap covered with pencilled writing in +my friend's cramped characters, and transcribed the following, in +order to complete my account of the latest Fu-Manchu outrage: + +"The Amharūn, a Semitic tribe allied to the Falashas, who have been +settled for many generations in the southern province of Shoa +(Abyssinia), have been regarded as unclean and outcast, apparently +since the days of Menelek--son of Suleyman and the Queen of +Sheba--from whom they claim descent. Apart from their custom of eating +meat cut from living beasts, they are accursed because of their +alleged association with the _Cynocephalus hamadryas_ (Sacred Baboon). +I, myself, was taken to a hut on the banks of the Hawash and shown a +creature ... whose predominant trait was an unreasoning malignity +toward ... and a ferocious tenderness for the society of its furry +brethren. Its powers of _scent_ were fully equal to those of a +bloodhound, whilst its abnormally long forearms possessed incredible +strength ... a _Cynocephalyte_ such as this, contracts phthisis even +in the more northern provinces of Abyssinia...." + +"You have not yet explained to me, Smith," I said, having completed +this note, "how you got in touch with Fu-Manchu; how you learnt that +he was not dead, as we had supposed, but living--active." + +Nayland Smith stood up and fixed his steely eyes upon me with an +indefinable expression in them. Then: + +"No," he replied; "I haven't. Do you wish to know?" + +"Certainly," I said with surprise; "is there any reason why I should +not?" + +"There is no real reason," said Smith; "or"--staring at me very +hard--"I hope there is no real reason." + +"What do you mean?" + +"Well"--he grabbed up his pipe from the table and began furiously to +load it--"I blundered upon the truth one day in Rangoon. I was +walking out of a house which I occupied there for a time, and as I +swung around the corner into the main street, I ran into--literally +ran into...." + +Again he hesitated oddly; then closed up his pouch and tossed it into +the cane chair. He struck a match. + +"I ran into Kāramančh," he continued abruptly, and began to puff away +at his pipe, filling the air with clouds of tobacco smoke. + +I caught my breath. This was the reason why he had kept me so long in +ignorance of the story. He knew of my hopeless, uncrushable sentiments +towards the gloriously beautiful but utterly hypocritical and evil +Eastern girl who was perhaps the most dangerous of all Dr. Fu-Manchu's +servants; for the power of her loveliness was magical, as I knew to my +cost. + +"What did you do?" I asked quietly, my fingers drumming upon the +table. + +"Naturally enough," continued Smith, "with a cry of recognition I held +out both my hands to her gladly. I welcomed her as a dear friend +regained; I thought of the joy with which _you_ would learn that I had +found the missing one; I thought how you would be in Rangoon just as +quickly as the fastest steamer would get you there...." + +"Well?" + +"Kāramančh started back and treated me to a glance of absolute +animosity! No recognition was there, and no friendliness--only a sort +of scornful anger." + +He shrugged his shoulders and began to walk up and down the room. + +"I do not know what _you_ would have done in the circumstances, +Petrie, but I--" + +"Yes?" + +"I dealt with the situation rather promptly, I think. I simply picked +her up without another word, right there in the public street, and +raced back into the house, with her kicking and fighting like a +little demon! She did not shriek or do anything of that kind, but +fought silently like a vicious wild animal. Oh! I had some scars, I +assure you; but I carried her up into my office, which fortunately was +empty at the time, plumped her down in a chair, and stood looking at +her." + +"Go on" I said rather hollowly; "what next?" + +"She glared at me with those wonderful eyes, an expression of +implacable hatred in them! Remembering all that we had done for her; +remembering our former friendship; above all, remembering _you_--this +look of hers almost made me shiver. She was dressed very smartly in +European fashion, and the whole thing had been so sudden that as I +stood looking at her I half expected to wake up presently and find it +all a day-dream. But it was real--as real as her enmity. I felt the +need for reflection, and having vainly endeavoured to draw her into +conversation, and elicited no other answer than this glare of +hatred--I left her there, going out and locking the door behind me." + +"Very high-handed?" + +"A Commissioner has certain privileges, Petrie; and any action I might +choose to take was not likely to be questioned. There was only one +window to the office, and it was fully twenty feet above the level; it +overlooked a narrow street off the main thoroughfare (I think I have +explained that the house stood on a corner), so I did not fear her +escaping. I had an important engagement which I had been on my way to +fulfil when the encounter took place, and now, with a word to my +native servant--who chanced to be downstairs--I hurried off." + +Smith's pipe had gone out as usual, and he proceeded to relight it, +whilst, my eyes lowered, I continued to drum upon the table. + +"This boy took her some tea later in the afternoon," he continued, +"and apparently found her in a more placid frame of mind. I returned +immediately after dusk, and he reported that when last he had looked +in, about half an hour earlier, she had been seated in an armchair +reading a newspaper (I may mention that everything of value in the +office was securely locked up!). I was determined upon a certain +course by this time, and I went slowly upstairs, unlocked the door, +and walked into the darkened office. I turned up the light ... the +place was empty!" + +"Empty!" + +"The window was open, and the bird flown! Oh! it was not so simple a +flight--as you would realize if you knew the place. The street, which +the window overlooked, was bounded by a blank wall, on the opposite +side, for thirty or forty yards along; and as we had been having heavy +rains, it was full of glutinous mud. Furthermore, the boy whom I had +left in charge had been sitting in the doorway immediately below the +office window watching for my return ever since his last visit to the +room above...." + +"She must have bribed him," I said bitterly, "or corrupted him with +her infernal blandishments." + +"I'll swear she did not," rapped Smith decisively. "I know my man, and +I'll swear she did not. There were no marks in the mud of the road to +show that a ladder had been placed there; moreover, nothing of the +kind could have been attempted whilst the boy was sitting in the +doorway; that was evident. In short, she did not descend into the +roadway and did not come out by the door...." + +"Was there a gallery outside the window?" + +"No; it was impossible to climb to right or left of the window or up +on to the roof. I convinced myself of that." + +"But, my dear man!" I cried, "you are eliminating every natural mode +of egress! Nothing remains but flight." + +"I am aware, Petrie, that nothing remains but flight; in other words, +I have never to this day understood how she quitted the room. I only +know that she did." + +"And then?" + +"I saw in this incredible escape the cunning hand of Dr. +Fu-Manchu--saw it at once. Peace was ended; and I set to work along +certain channels without delay. In this manner I got on the track at +last, and learnt, beyond the possibility of doubt, that the Chinese +doctor lived--nay! was actually on his way to Europe again!" + +There followed a short silence. Then-- + +"I suppose it's a mystery that will be cleared up some day," concluded +Smith; "but to date the riddle remains intact." He glanced at the +clock. "I have an appointment with Weymouth; therefore, leaving you to +the task of solving this problem which thus far has defied my own +efforts, I will get along." + +He read a query in my glance. + +"Oh! I shall not be late," he added; "I think I may venture out alone +on this occasion without personal danger." + +Nayland Smith went upstairs to dress, leaving me seated at my +writing-table deep in thought. My notes upon the renewed activity of +Dr. Fu-Manchu were stacked on my left hand, and, opening a new +writing-block, I commenced to add to them particulars of this +surprising event in Rangoon which properly marked the opening of the +Chinaman's second campaign. Smith looked in at the door on his way +out, but seeing me thus engaged, did not disturb me. + +I think I have made it sufficiently evident in these records that my +practice was not an extensive one, and my hour for receiving patients +arrived and passed with only two professional interruptions. + +My task concluded, I glanced at the clock, and determined to devote +the remainder of the evening to a little private investigation of my +own. From Nayland Smith I had preserved the matter a secret, largely +because I feared his ridicule; but I had by no means forgotten that I +had seen, or had strongly imagined that I had seen, Kāramančh--that +beautiful anomaly who (in modern London) asserted herself to be a +slave--in the shop of an antique dealer not a hundred yards from the +British Museum! + +A theory was forming in my brain, which I was burningly anxious to put +to the test. I remembered how, two years before, I had met Kāramančh +near to this same spot; and I had heard Inspector Weymouth assert +positively that Fu-Manchu's headquarters were no longer in the East +End, as of yore. There seemed to me to be a distinct probability that +a suitable centre had been established for his reception in this +place, so much less likely to be suspected by the authorities. Perhaps +I attached too great a value to what may have been a delusion; perhaps +my theory rested upon no more solid foundation than the belief that I +had seen Kāramančh in the shop of the curio dealer. If her appearance +there should prove to have been imaginary, the structure of my theory +would be shattered at its base. To-night I should test my premises, +and upon the result of my investigations determine my future action. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +THE SILVER BUDDHA + + +Museum Street certainly did not seem a likely spot for Dr. Fu-Manchu +to establish himself, yet, unless my imagination had strangely +deceived me, from the window of the antique dealer who traded under +the name of J. Salaman, those wonderful eyes of Kāramančh, like the +velvet midnight of the Orient, had looked out at me. + +As I paced slowly along the pavement toward that lighted window, my +heart was beating far from normally, and I cursed the folly which, +despite all, refused to die, but lingered on, poisoning my life. +Comparative quiet reigned in Museum Street, at no time a busy +thoroughfare, and, excepting another shop at the Museum end, +commercial activities had ceased there. The door of a block of +residential chambers almost immediately opposite to the shop which was +my objective, threw out a beam of light across the pavement; not more +than two or three people were visible upon either side of the street. + +I turned the knob of the door and entered the shop. + +The same dark and immobile individual whom I had seen before, and +whose nationality defied conjecture, came out from the curtained +doorway at the back to greet me. + +"Good evening, sir," he said monotonously, with a slight inclination +of the head; "is there anything which you desire to inspect?" + +"I merely wish to take a look round," I replied. "I have no particular +item in view." + +The shopman inclined his head again, swept a yellow hand +comprehensively about, as if to include the entire stock, and seated +himself on a chair behind the counter. + +I lighted a cigarette with such an air of nonchalance as I could +summon to the operation, and began casually to inspect the varied +articles of _virtu_ loading the shelves and tables about me. I am +bound to confess that I retain no one definite impression of this +tour. Vases I handled, statuettes, Egyptian scarabs, bead necklaces, +illuminated missals, portfolios of old prints, jade ornaments, +bronzes, fragments of rare lace, early printed books, Assyrian +tablets, daggers, Roman rings, and a hundred other curiosities, +leisurely, and I trust with apparent interest, yet without forming +the slightest impression respecting any one of them. + +Probably I employed myself in this way for half an hour or more, and +whilst my hands busied themselves among the stock of J. Salaman, my +mind was occupied entirely elsewhere. Furtively I was studying the +shopman himself, a human presentment of a Chinese idol; I was +listening and watching: especially I was watching the curtained +doorway at the back of the shop. + +"We close at about this time, sir," the man interrupted me, speaking +in the emotionless, monotonous voice which I had noted before. + +I replaced upon the glass counter a little Sekhet boat, carved in wood +and highly coloured, and glanced up with a start. Truly my methods +were amateurish; I had learnt nothing; I was unlikely to learn +anything. I wondered how Nayland Smith would have conducted such an +inquiry, and I racked my brains for some means of penetrating into the +recesses of the establishment. Indeed I had been seeking such a plan +for the past half an hour, but my mind had proved incapable of +suggesting one. + +Why I did not admit failure I cannot imagine, but, instead, I began to +tax my brains anew for some means of gaining further time; and, as I +looked about the place, the shopman very patiently awaiting my +departure, I observed an open case at the back of the counter. The +three lower shelves were empty, but upon the fourth shelf squatted a +silver Buddha. + +"I should like to examine the silver image yonder," I said; "what +price are you asking for it?" + +"It is not for sale, sir," replied the man, with a greater show of +animation than he had yet exhibited. + +"Not for sale!" I said, my eyes ever seeking the curtained doorway; +"how's that?" + +"It is sold." + +"Well, even so, there can be no objection to my examining it?" + +"It is not for sale, sir." + +Such a rebuff from a tradesman would have been more than sufficient to +call for a sharp retort at any other time, but now it excited the +strangest suspicions. The street outside looked comparatively +deserted, and prompted, primarily, by an emotion which I did not pause +to analyse, I adopted a singular measure; without doubt I relied upon +the unusual powers vested in Nayland Smith to absolve me in the event +of error. I made as if to go out into the street, then turned, leapt +past the shopman, ran behind the counter, and grasped at the silver +Buddha! + +That I was likely to be arrested for attempted larceny I cared not; +the idea that Kāramančh was concealed somewhere in the building ruled +absolutely, and a theory respecting this silver image had taken +possession of my mind. Exactly what I expected to happen at that +moment I cannot say, but what actually happened was far more startling +than anything I could have imagined. + +At the instant that I grasped the figure I realized that it was +attached to the woodwork; in the next I knew that it was a handle ... +as I tried to pull it toward me I became aware that this handle was +the handle of a door. For that door swung open before me, and I found +myself at the foot of a flight of heavily carpeted stairs. + +Anxious as I had been to proceed a moment before, I was now trebly +anxious to retire, and for this reason: on the bottom step of the +stairs, facing me, _stood Dr. Fu-Manchu!_ + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +DR. FU-MANCHU'S LABORATORY + + +I cannot conceive that any ordinary mortal ever attained to anything +like an intimacy with Dr. Fu-Manchu; I cannot believe that any man +could ever grow used to his presence, could ever cease to fear him. I +suppose I had set eyes upon Fu-Manchu some five or six times prior to +this occasion, and now he was dressed in the manner which I always +associated with him, probably because it was thus I first saw him. He +wore a plain yellow robe, and, his pointed chin resting upon his +bosom, he looked down at me, revealing a great expanse of the +marvellous brow with its sparse, neutral-coloured hair. + +Never in my experience have I known such _force_ to dwell in the +glance of any human eye as dwelt in that of this uncanny being. His +singular affliction (if affliction it were), the film or slight +membrane which sometimes obscured the oblique eyes, was particularly +evident at the moment that I crossed the threshold, but now as I +looked up at Dr. Fu-Manchu, it lifted--revealing the eyes in all their +emerald greenness. + +The idea of physical attack upon this incredible being seemed +childish--inadequate. But, following that first instant of +stupefaction, I forced myself to advance upon him. + +A dull, crushing blow descended on the top of my skull, and I became +oblivious of all things. + +My return to consciousness was accompanied by tremendous pains in my +head, whereby, from previous experience, I knew that a sandbag had +been used against me by some one in the shop, presumably by the +immobile shopman. This awakening was accompanied by none of those hazy +doubts respecting previous events and present surroundings which are +the usual symptoms of revival from sudden unconsciousness; even before +I opened my eyes, before I had more than a partial command of my +senses, I knew that, with my wrists handcuffed behind me, I lay in a +room which was also occupied by Dr. Fu-Manchu. This absolute certainty +of the Chinaman's presence was evidenced, not by my senses, but only +by an inner consciousness, and the same that always awakened into life +at the approach not only of Fu-Manchu in person but of certain of his +uncanny servants. + +A faint perfume hung in the air about me; I do not mean that of any +essence or of any incense, but rather the smell which is suffused by +Oriental furniture, by Oriental draperies; the indefinable but +unmistakable perfume of the East. + +Thus, London has a distinct smell of its own, and so has Paris, whilst +the difference between Marseilles and Suez, for instance, is even more +marked. Now the atmosphere surrounding me was Eastern, but not of the +East that I knew; rather it was Far Eastern. Perhaps I do not make +myself very clear, but to me there was a mysterious significance in +that perfumed atmosphere. I opened my eyes. + +I lay upon a long low settee, in a fairly large room which was +furnished, as I had anticipated, in an absolutely Oriental fashion. +The two windows were so screened as to have lost, from the interior +point of view, all resemblance to European windows, and the whole +structure of the room had been altered in conformity, bearing out my +idea that the place had been prepared for Fu-Manchu's reception some +time before his actual return. I doubt if, East or West, a duplicate +of that singular apartment could be found. + +The end in which I lay was, as I have said, typical of an Eastern +house, and a large, ornate lantern hung from the ceiling almost +directly above me. The farther end of the room was occupied by tall +cases, some of them containing books, but the majority filled with +scientific paraphernalia: rows of flasks and jars, frames of +test-tubes, retorts, scales, and other objects of the laboratory. At a +large and very finely carved table sat Dr. Fu-Manchu, a yellow and +faded volume open before him, and some dark red fluid, almost like +blood, bubbling in a test-tube which he held over the flame of a +Bunsen-burner. + +The enormously long nail of his right index finger rested upon the +opened page of the book, to which he seemed constantly to refer, +dividing his attention between the volume, the contents of the +test-tube, and the progress of a second experiment, or possibly a part +of the same, which was taking place upon another corner of the +littered table. + +A huge glass retort (the bulb was fully two feet in diameter), fitted +with a Liebig's Condenser, rested in a metal frame, and within the +bulb, floating in an oily substance, was a fungus some six inches +high, shaped like a toadstool, but of a brilliant and venomous orange +colour. Three flat tubes of light were so arranged as to cast violet +rays upward into the retort, and the receiver, wherein condensed the +product of this strange experiment, contained some drops of a red +fluid which may have been identical with that boiling in the +test-tube. + +These things I perceived at a glance; then the filmy eyes of Dr. +Fu-Manchu were raised from the book, turned in my direction, and all +else was forgotten. + +"I regret," came the sibilant voice, "that unpleasant measures were +necessary, but hesitation would have been fatal. I trust, Dr. Petrie, +that you suffer no inconvenience?" + +To this speech no reply was possible, and I attempted none. + +"You have long been aware of my esteem for your acquirements," +continued the Chinaman, his voice occasionally touching deep guttural +notes, "and you will appreciate the pleasure which this visit affords +me. I kneel at the feet of my silver Buddha. I look to you, when you +shall have overcome your prejudices--due to ignorance of my true +motives--to assist me in establishing that intellectual control which +is destined to be the new World Force. I bear you no malice for your +ancient enmity, and even now"--he waved one yellow hand toward the +retort--"I am conducting an experiment designed to convert you from +your misunderstanding, and to adjust your perspective." + +Quite unemotionally he spoke, then turned again to his book, his +test-tube and retort, in the most matter-of-fact way imaginable. I do +not think the most frenzied outburst on his part, the most fiendish +threats, could have produced such effect upon me as those cold and +carefully calculated words, spoken in that unique voice. In its tones, +in the glance of the green eyes, in the very pose of the gaunt, +high-shouldered body, there was power--force. + +I counted myself lost, and in view of the Doctor's words, studied the +progress of the experiment with frightful interest. But a few moments +sufficed in which to realize that, for all my training, I knew as +little of Chemistry--of Chemistry as understood by this man's +genius--as a junior student in surgery knows of trephining. The +process in operation was a complete mystery to me; the means and the +end were alike incomprehensible. + +Thus, in the heavy silence of that room, a silence only broken by the +regular bubbling from the test-tube, I found my attention straying +from the table to the other objects surrounding it; and at one of them +my gaze stopped and remained chained with horror. + +It was a glass jar, some five feet in height and filled with viscous +fluid of a light amber colour. Out from this peered a hideous, +dog-like face, low-browed, with pointed ears and a nose almost +hoggishly flat. By the death-grin of the face the gleaming fangs were +revealed; and the body, the long yellow-grey body, rested, or seemed +to rest, upon short, malformed legs, whilst one long limp arm, the +right, hung down straightly in the preservative. The left arm had been +severed above the elbow. + +Fu-Manchu, finding his experiment to be proceeding favourably, lifted +his eyes to me again. + +"You are interested in my poor _Cynocephalyte_?" he said; and his eyes +were filmed like the eyes of one afflicted with cataract. "He was a +devoted servant, Dr. Petrie, but the lower influences in his genealogy +sometimes conquered. Then he got out of hand; and at last he was so +ungrateful toward those who had educated him, that, in one of those +paroxysms of his, he attacked and killed a most faithful Burman, one +of my oldest followers." + +Fu-Manchu returned to his experiment. + +Not the slightest emotion had he exhibited thus far, but had chatted +with me as any other scientist might chat with a friend who casually +visits his laboratory. The horror of the thing was playing havoc with +my own composure, however. There I lay, fettered, in the same room +with this man whose existence was a menace to the entire white race, +whilst placidly he pursued an experiment designed, if his own words +were believable, to cut me off from my kind--to wreak some change, +psychological or physiological I knew not; to place me, it might be, +upon a level with such brute things as that which now hung, half +floating, in the glass jar! + +Something I know of the history of that ghastly specimen, that thing +neither man nor ape; for within my own knowledge had it not attempted +the life of Nayland Smith, and was it not _I_ who, with an axe, had +maimed it in the instant of one of its last slayings? + +Of these things Dr. Fu-Manchu was well aware, so that his placid +speech was doubly, trebly horrible to my ears. I sought, furtively, to +move my arms, only to realize that, as I had anticipated, the +handcuffs were chained to a ring in the wall behind me. The +establishments of Dr. Fu-Manchu were always well provided with such +contrivances as these. + +I uttered a short, harsh laugh. Fu-Manchu stood up slowly from the +table, and, placing the test-tube in a rack, deposited the latter +carefully upon a shelf at his side. + +"I am happy to find you in such good humour," he said softly. "Other +affairs call me; and, in my absence, that profound knowledge of +chemistry, of which I have had evidence in the past, will enable you +to follow with intelligent interest the action of these violet rays +upon this exceptionally fine specimen of Siberian _Amanita muscaria_. +At some future time, possibly when you are my guest in China--which +country I am now making arrangements for you to visit--I shall discuss +with you some lesser-known properties of this species; and I may say +that one of your first tasks when you commence your duties as +assistant in my laboratory in Kiangsu, will be to conduct a series of +twelve experiments, which I have outlined, into other potentialities +of this unique fungus." + +He walked quietly to a curtained doorway, with his catlike yet awkward +gait, lifted the drapery, and, bestowing upon me a slight bow of +farewell, went out of the room. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE CROSSBAR + + +How long I lay there alone I had no means of computing. My mind was +busy with many matters, but principally concerned with my fate in the +immediate future. That Dr. Fu-Manchu entertained for me a singular +kind of regard, I had had evidence before. He had formed the erroneous +opinion that I was an advanced scientist who could be of use to him in +his experiments, and I was aware that he cherished a project of +transporting me to some place in China where his principal laboratory +was situated. Respecting the means which he proposed to employ, I was +unlikely to forget that this man, who had penetrated further along +certain byways of science than seemed humanly possible, undoubtedly +was master of a process for producing artificial catalepsy. It was my +lot, then, to be packed in a chest (to all intents and purposes a dead +man for the time being) and dispatched to the interior of China! + +What a fool I had been. To think that I had learnt nothing from my +long and dreadful experience of the methods of Dr. Fu-Manchu; to think +that I had come _alone_ in quest of him; that, leaving no trace behind +me, I had deliberately penetrated to his secret abode! + +I have said that my wrists were manacled behind me, the manacles being +attached to a chain fastened in the wall. I now contrived, with +extreme difficulty, to reverse the position of my hands; that is to +say, I climbed backward through the loop formed by my fettered arms, +so that instead of the gyves being behind me, they now were in front. + +Then I began to examine them, learning, as I had anticipated, that +they fastened with a lock. I sat gazing at the steel bracelets in the +light of the lamp which swung over my head, and it became apparent to +me that I had gained little by my contortion. + +A slight noise disturbed these unpleasant reveries. It was nothing +less than the rattling of keys! + +For a moment I wondered if I had heard aright, or if the sound +portended the coming of some servant of the Doctor who was locking up +the establishment for the night. The jangling sound was repeated, and +in such a way that I could not suppose it to be accidental. Some one +was deliberately rattling a small bunch of keys in an adjoining room. + +And now my heart leapt wildly--then seemed to stand still. + +With a low whistling cry a little grey shape shot through the doorway +by which Fu-Manchu had retired, and rolled like a ball of fluff blown +by the wind, completely under the table which bore the weird +scientific appliances of the Chinaman; the advent of the grey object +was accompanied by a further rattling of keys. + +My fear left me, and a mighty anxiety took its place. This creature +which now crouched chattering at me from beneath the big table was +Fu-Manchu's marmoset, and in the intervals of its chatterings and +grimacing, it nibbled, speculatively, at the keys upon the ring which +it clutched in its tiny hands. Key after key it sampled in this +manner, evincing a growing dissatisfaction with the uncrackable nature +of its find. + +One of those keys might be that of the handcuffs! + +I could not believe that the tortures of Tantalus were greater than +were mine at this moment. In all my hopes of rescue or release, I had +included nothing so strange, so improbable as this. A sort of awe +possessed me; for if by this means the key which should release me +should come into my possession, how ever again could I doubt a +beneficent Providence? + +But they were not yet in my possession; moreover, the key of the +handcuffs might not be amongst the bunch. + +Were there no means whereby I could induce the marmoset to approach +me? + +Whilst I racked my brains for some scheme, the little animal took the +matter out of my hands. Tossing the ring with its jangling contents a +yard or so across the carpet in my direction, it leapt in pursuit, +picked up the ring, whirled it over its head, and then threw a +complete somersault around it. Now it snatched up the keys again, and +holding them close to its ear, rattled them furiously. Finally, with +an incredible spring, it leapt on to the chain supporting the lamp +above my head, and with the garish shade swinging and spinning wildly, +clung there looking down at me like an acrobat on a trapeze. The tiny, +bluish face, completely framed in grotesque whiskers, enhanced the +illusion of an acrobatic comedian. Never for a moment did it release +its hold upon the key-ring. + +My suspense now was almost intolerable. I feared to move, lest, +alarming the marmoset, it should run off again, taking the keys with +it. So as I lay there, looking up at the little creature swinging +above me, the second wonder of the night came to pass. + +A voice that I could never forget, strive how I would, a voice that +haunted my dreams by night, and for which by day I was ever listening, +cried out from some adjoining room: + +"_Ta'ala hina!_" it called. "_Ta'ala hina, Peko!_" + +It was Kāramančh! + +The effect upon the marmoset was instantaneous. Down came the bunch of +keys upon one side of the shade, almost falling on my head, and down +leapt the ape upon the other. In two leaps it had traversed the room +and had vanished through the curtained doorway. + +If ever I had need of coolness it was now; the slightest mistake would +be fatal! The keys had slipped from the mattress of the divan, and now +lay just beyond reach of my fingers. Rapidly I changed my position, +and sought, without undue noise, to move the keys with my foot. + +I had actually succeeded in sliding them back on to the mattress, +when, unheralded by any audible footstep, Kāramančh came through the +doorway, holding the marmoset in her arms. She wore a dress of fragile +muslin material, and out from its folds protruded one silk-stockinged +foot, resting in a high-heeled red shoe.... + +For a moment she stood watching me, with a sort of enforced composure; +then her glance strayed to the keys lying upon the floor. Slowly, and +with her eyes fixed again upon my face, she crossed the room, stooped, +and took up the key-ring. + +It was one of the poignant moments of my life; for by that simple act +all my hopes had been shattered! + +Any poor lingering doubt that I may have had left me now. Had the +slightest spark of friendship animated the bosom of Kāramančh, most +certainly she would have overlooked the presence of the keys--of the +keys which represented my one hope of escape from the clutches of the +fiendish Chinaman. + +There is a silence more eloquent than words. For half a minute or +more, Kāramančh stood watching me--forcing herself to watch me--and I +looked up at her with a concentrated gaze in which rage and reproach +must have been strangely mingled. + +What eyes she had!--of that blackly lustrous sort nearly always +associated with unusually dark complexions; but Kāramančh's complexion +was peachlike, or rather of an exquisite and delicate fairness which +reminded me of the petal of a rose. By some I have been accused of +romancing about this girl's beauty, but only by those who had not met +her; for indeed she was astonishingly lovely. + +At last her eyes fell, the long lashes drooped upon her cheeks. She +turned and walked slowly to the chair wherein Fu-Manchu had sat. +Placing the keys upon the table amid the scientific litter, she rested +one dimpled elbow upon the yellow page of the book, and with her chin +in her palm, again directed upon me that enigmatical gaze. + +I dared not think of the past, of the past in which this beautiful, +treacherous girl had played a part; yet, watching her, I could not +believe, even now, that she was false! My state was truly a pitiable +one; I could have cried out in sheer anguish. With her long lashes +partly lowered, she watched me awhile, then spoke; and her voice was +music which seemed to mock me; every inflection of that elusive accent +reopened, lancet-like, the ancient wound. + +"Why do you look at me so?" she said, almost in a whisper. "By what +right do you reproach me?--Have you ever offered me friendship, that I +should repay you with friendship? When first you came to the house +where I was, by the river--came to save some one from" (there was the +familiar hesitation which always preceded the name of Fu-Manchu) +"from--_him_, you treated me as your enemy, although--I would have +been your friend...." + +There was appeal in the soft voice, but I laughed mockingly, and threw +myself back upon the divan. Kāramančh stretched out her hands toward +me, and I shall never forget the expression which flashed into those +glorious eyes; but, seeing me intolerant of her appeal, she drew back +and quickly turned her head aside. Even in this hour of extremity, of +impotent wrath, I could find no contempt in my heart for her feeble +hypocrisy; with all the old wonder I watched that exquisite profile, +and Kāramančh's very deceitfulness was a salve--for had she not cared +she would not have attempted it! + +Suddenly she stood up, taking the keys in her hands, and approached +me. + +"Not by word, nor by look," she said quietly, "have you asked for my +friendship, but because I cannot bear you to think of me as you do, I +will prove that I am not the hypocrite and the liar you think me. You +will not trust me, but I will trust you." + +I looked up into her eyes, and knew a pagan joy when they faltered +before my searching gaze. She threw herself upon her knees beside me, +and the faint exquisite perfume inseparable from my memories of her, +became perceptible, and seemed as of old to Intoxicate me. The lock +clicked ... and I was free. + +Kāramančh rose swiftly to her feet as I stood up and outstretched my +cramped arms. For one delirious moment her bewitching face was close +to mine, and the dictates of madness almost ruled; but I clenched my +teeth and turned sharply aside. I could not trust myself to speak. + +With Fu-Manchu's marmoset again gambolling before us, we walked +through the curtained doorway into the room beyond. It was in +darkness, but I could see the slave-girl in front of me, a slim +silhouette, as she walked to a screened window, and, opening the +screen in the manner of a folding door, also threw up the window. + +"Look!" she whispered. + +I crept forward and stood beside her. I found myself looking down into +the Museum Street from a first-floor window! Belated traffic still +passed along New Oxford Street on the left, but not a solitary figure +was visible to the right, as far as I could see, and that was nearly +to the railings of the Museum. Immediately opposite, in one of the +flats which I had noticed earlier in the evening, another window was +opened. I turned, and in the reflected light saw that Kāramančh held a +cord in her hand. Our glances met in the semi-darkness. + +She began to haul the cord into the window, and, looking upward, I +perceived that it was looped in some way over the telegraph cables +which crossed the street at that point. It was a slender cord, and it +appeared to be passed across a joint in the cables almost immediately +above the centre of the roadway. As it was hauled in, a second and +stronger line attached to it was pulled, in turn, over the cables, and +thence in by the window. Kāramančh twisted a length of it around a +metal bracket fastened in the wall, and placed a light wooden crossbar +in my hand. + +"Make sure that there is no one in the street," she said, craning out +and looking to right and left, "then _swing across_. The length of the +rope is just sufficient to enable you to swing through the open window +opposite, and there is a mattress inside to drop upon. But release the +bar immediately, or you may be dragged back. The door of the room in +which you will find yourself is unlocked, and you have only to walk +down the stairs and out into the street." + +I peered at the crossbar in my hand, then looked hard at the girl +beside me. I missed something of the old fire of her nature; she was +very subdued, to-night. + +"Thank you, Kāramančh," I said softly. + +She suppressed a little cry as I spoke her name, and drew back into +the shadows. + +"I believe you are my friend," I said, "but I cannot understand. Won't +you help me to understand?" + +I took her unresisting hand, and drew her toward me. My very soul +seemed to thrill at the contact of her lithe body.... + +She was trembling wildly and seemed to be trying to speak, but +although her lips framed the words no sound followed. Suddenly +comprehension came to me. I looked down into the street, hitherto +deserted ... and into the upturned face of Fu-Manchu! + +Wearing a heavy fur-collared coat, and with his yellow, malignant +countenance grotesquely horrible beneath the shadow of a large tweed +motor cap, he stood motionless, looking up at me. That he had seen me, +I could not doubt; but had he seen my companion? + +In a choking whisper Kāramančh answered my unspoken question. + +"He has not seen me! I have done much for you; do in return a small +thing for me! Save my life!" + +She dragged me back from the window and fled across the room to the +weird laboratory where I had lain captive. Throwing herself upon the +divan, she held out her white wrists and glanced significantly at the +manacles. + +"Lock them upon me!" she said rapidly. "Quick! quick!" + +Great as was my mental disturbance, I managed to grasp the purpose of +this device. The very extremity of my danger found me cool. I fastened +the manacles, which so recently had confined my own wrists, upon the +slim wrists of Kāramančh. A faint and muffled disturbance, doubly +ominous because there was nothing to proclaim its nature, reached me +from some place below, on the ground floor. + +"Tie something around my mouth!" directed Kāramančh with nervous +rapidity. As I began to look about me: "Tear a strip from my dress," +she said; "do not hesitate--be quick! be quick!" + +I seized the flimsy muslin and tore off half a yard or so from the hem +of the skirt. The voice of Dr. Fu-Manchu became audible. He was +speaking rapidly, sibilantly, and evidently was approaching--would be +upon me in a matter of moments. I fastened the strip of fabric over +the girl's mouth and tied it behind, experiencing a pang half +pleasurable and half fearful as I found my hands in contact with the +foamy luxuriance of her hair. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu was entering the room immediately beyond. + +Snatching up the bunch of keys, I turned and ran, for in another +instant my retreat would be cut off. As I burst once more into the +darkened room I became aware that a door on the farther side of it was +open; and framed in the opening was the tall high-shouldered figure of +the Chinaman, still enveloped in his fur coat and wearing the +grotesque cap. As I saw him, so he perceived me; and as I sprang to +the window, he advanced. + +I turned desperately and hurled the bunch of keys with all my force +into the dimly seen face.... + +Either because they possessed a chatoyant quality of their own (as I +had often suspected), or by reason of the light reflected through the +open window, the green eyes gleamed upon me vividly like those of a +giant cat. One short guttural exclamation paid tribute to the accuracy +of my aim; then I had the crossbar in my hand. + +I threw one leg across the sill, and dire as was my extremity, +hesitated for an instant ere trusting myself to the flight.... + +A vice-like grip fastened upon my left ankle. + +Hazily I became aware that the dark room was become flooded with +figures. The whole yellow gang were upon me--the entire murder-group +composed of units recruited from the darkest places of the East! + +I have never counted myself a man of resource, and have always envied +Nayland Smith his possession of that quality, in him extraordinarily +developed; but on this occasion the gods were kind to me, and I +resorted to the only device, perhaps, which could have saved me. +Without releasing my hold upon the crossbar, I clutched at the ledge +with the fingers of both hands and swung back, into the room, my +right leg, which was already across the sill. With all my strength I +kicked out. My heel came in contact, in sickening contact, with a +human head; beyond doubt I had split the skull of the man who held me. + +The grip upon my ankle was released automatically; and now consigning +all my weight to the rope, I slipped forward, as a diver, across the +broad ledge and found myself sweeping through the night like a winged +thing.... + +The line, as Kāramančh had assured me, was of well-judged length. Down +I swept to within six or seven feet of the street level, then up, up, +at ever-decreasing speed, toward the vague oblong of the open window +beyond. + +I hope I have been successful, in some measure, in portraying the +varied emotions which it was my lot to experience that night, and it +may well seem that nothing more exquisite could remain for me. Yet it +was written otherwise; for as I swept up to my goal, describing the +inevitable arc which I had no power to check, I saw that _one_ awaited +me. + +Crouching forward half out of the open window was a Burmese dacoit, a +cross-eyed, leering being whom I well remembered to have encountered +two years before in my dealings with Dr. Fu-Manchu. One bare, sinewy +arm held rigidly at right angles before his breast, he clutched a long +curved knife and waited--waited--for the critical moment when my +throat should be at his mercy! + +I have said that a strange coolness had come to my aid; even now it +did not fail me, and so incalculably rapid are the workings of the +human mind that I remembered complimenting myself upon an achievement +which Smith himself could not have bettered, and this in the +immeasurable interval which intervened between the commencement of my +upward swing and my arrival on a level with the window. + +I threw my body back and thrust my feet forward. As my legs went +through the opening, an acute pain in one calf told me that I was not +to escape scathless from the night's mźlée. But the dacoit went +rolling over in the darkness of the room, as helpless in face of that +ramrod stroke as the veriest infant.... + +Back I swept upon my trapeze, a sight to have induced any passing +citizen to question his sanity. With might and main I sought to check +the swing of the pendulum, for if I should come within reach of the +window behind I doubted not that other knives awaited me. It was no +difficult feat, and I succeeded in checking my flight. Swinging there +above Museum Street I could even appreciate, so lucid was my mind, the +ludicrous element of the situation. + +I dropped. My wounded leg almost failed me; and greatly shaken, but +with no other serious damage, I picked myself up from the dust of the +roadway--to see the bar vanishing into the darkness above. It was a +mockery of Fate that the problem which Nayland Smith had set me to +solve should have been solved thus: for I could not doubt that by +means of the branch of a tall tree or some other suitable object +situated opposite to Smith's house in Rangoon, Kāramančh had made her +escape as to-night I had made mine. + +Apart from the acute pain in my calf I knew that the dacoit's knife +had bitten deeply by reason of the fact that a warm liquid was +trickling down into my boot. Like any drunkard I stood there in the +middle of the road looking up at the vacant window where the dacoit +had been, and up at the window above the shop of J. Salaman where I +knew Fu-Manchu to be. But for some reason the latter window had been +closed or almost closed, and as I stood there this reason became +apparent to me. + +The sound of running footsteps came from the direction of New Oxford +Street. I turned--to see two policemen bearing down upon me! + +This was a time for quick decisions and prompt action. I weighed all +the circumstances in the balance, and made the last vital choice of +the night; I turned and ran toward the British Museum as though the +worst of Fu-Manchu's creatures, and not my allies the police, were at +my heels! + +No one else was in sight, but, as I whirled into the Square, the red +lamp of a slowly retreating taxi became visible some hundred yards to +the left. My leg was paining me greatly, but the nature of the wound +did not interfere with my progress; therefore I continued my headlong +career, and ere the police had reached the end of Museum Street I had +my hand upon the door handle of the cab--for, the Fates being +persistently kind to me, the vehicle was for hire. + +"Dr. Cleeve's, Harley Street!" I shouted at the man. "Drive like hell! +It's an urgent case." + +I leapt into the cab. + +Within five seconds from the time that I slammed the door and dropped +back panting upon the cushions, we were speeding westward toward the +house of the famous pathologist, thereby throwing the police +hopelessly off the track. + +Faintly to my ears came the purr of a police whistle. The taxi-man +evidently did not hear the significant sound. Merciful Providence had +rung down the curtain; for to-night my rōle in the yellow drama was +finished. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +CRAGMIRE TOWER + + +Less than two hours later, Inspector Weymouth and a party from New +Scotland Yard raided the house in Museum Street. They found the stock +of J. Salaman practically intact, and, in the strangely appointed +rooms above, every evidence of a hasty outgoing. But of the +instruments, drugs and other laboratory paraphernalia not one item +remained. I would gladly have given my income for a year, to have +gained possession of the books, alone; for beyond all shadow of doubt, +I knew them to contain formulę calculated to revolutionize the science +of medicine. + +Exhausted, physically and mentally, and with my mind a +whispering-gallery of conjectures (it were needless for me to mention +_whom_ respecting), I turned in, gratefully, having patched up the +slight wound in my calf. + +I seemed scarcely to have closed my eyes, when Nayland Smith was +shaking me into wakefulness. + +"You are probably tired out," he said; "but your crazy expedition of +last night entitles you to no sympathy. Read this. There is a train in +an hour. We will reserve a compartment and you can resume your +interrupted slumbers in a corner seat." + +As I struggled upright in bed, rubbing my eyes sleepily, Smith handed +me the _Daily Telegraph_, pointing to the following paragraph upon the +literary page: + +"Messrs. M---- announce that they will publish shortly the +long-delayed work of Kegan Van Roon, the celebrated American +traveller, Orientalist and psychic investigator, dealing with his +recent inquiries in China. It will be remembered that Mr. Van Roon +undertook to motor from Canton to Siberia last winter, but met with +unforeseen difficulties in the province of Ho-Nan. He fell into the +hands of a body of fanatics and was fortunate to escape with his life. +His book will deal in particular with his experiences in Ho-Nan, and +some sensational revelations regarding the awakening of that most +mysterious race, the Chinese, are promised. For reasons of his own he +has decided to remain in England until the completion of his book +(which will be published simultaneously in New York and London), and +has leased Cragmire Tower, Somersetshire, in which romantic and +historical residence he will collate his notes and prepare for the +world a work ear-marked as a classic even before it is published." + +I glanced up from the paper, to find Smith's eyes fixed upon me +inquiringly. + +"From what I have been able to learn," he said evenly, "we should +reach Saul, with decent luck, just before dusk." + +As he turned and quitted the room without another word, I realized, in +a flash, the purport of our mission; I understood my friend's ominous +calm, betokening suppressed excitement. + +Fortune was with us (or so it seemed); and whereas we had not hoped to +gain Saul before sunset, as a matter of fact the autumn afternoon was +in its most glorious phase as we left the little village with its +old-time hostelry behind us and set out in an easterly direction, with +the Bristol Channel far away on our left and a gently sloping upland +on our right. + +The crooked high-street practically constituted the entire hamlet of +Saul, and the inn, The Wagoners, was the last house in the street. +Now, as we followed the ribbon of moor-path to the top of the rise, we +could stand and look back upon the way we had come; and although we +had covered fully a mile of ground, it was possible to detect the +sunlight gleaming now and then upon the gilt lettering of the inn +sign as it swayed in the breeze. The day had been unpleasantly warm, +but relieved by this same sea breeze, which, although but slight, had +in it the tang of the broad Atlantic. Behind us, then, the footpath +sloped down to Saul, unpeopled by any living thing; east and +north-east swelled the monotony of the moor right out to the hazy +distance where the sky began and the sea remotely lay hidden; west +fell the gentle gradient from the top of the slope which we had +mounted, and here, as far as the eye could reach, the country had an +appearance suggestive of a huge and dried-up lake. This idea was borne +out by an odd blotchiness, for sometimes there would be half a mile or +more of seeming moorland, then a sharply defined change (or it seemed +sharply defined from that bird's-eye point of view). A vivid greenness +marked these changes, which merged into a dun coloured smudge and +again into the brilliant green; then the moor would begin once more. + +"That will be the Tor of Glastonbury, I suppose," said Smith, suddenly +peering through his field-glasses in an easterly direction; "and +yonder, unless I am greatly mistaken, is Cragmire Tower." + +Shading my eyes with my hand, I also looked ahead, and saw the place +for which we were bound; one of those round towers, more common in +Ireland, which some authorities have declared to be of Phoenician +origin. Ramshackle buildings clustered untidily about its base, and to +it a sort of tongue of that oddly venomous green which patched the +lowlands shot out and seemed almost to reach the tower-base. The land +for miles around was as flat as the palm of my hand, saving certain +hummocks, lesser tors, and irregular piles of boulders which dotted +its expanse. Hills and uplands there were in the hazy distance, +forming a sort of mighty inland bay which I doubted not in some past +age had been covered by the sea. Even in the brilliant sunlight the +place had something of a mournful aspect, looking like a great +dried-up pool into which the children of giants had carelessly cast +stones. + +We met no living soul upon the moor. With Cragmire Tower but a quarter +of a mile off, Smith paused again, and raising his powerful glasses +swept the visible landscape. + +"Not a sign, Petrie," he said softly; "yet...." + +Dropping the glasses back into their case, my companion began to tug +at his left ear. + +"Have we been over-confident?" he said, narrowing his eyes in +speculative fashion. "No less than three times I have had the idea +that something, or some one, has just dropped out of sight, _behind_ +us, as I focussed...." + +"What do you mean, Smith?" + +"Are we"--he glanced about him as though the vastness were peopled +with listening Chinamen--"_followed_?" + +Silently we looked into one another's eyes, each seeking for the dread +which neither had named. Then: + +"Come on, Petrie!" said Smith, grasping my arm: and at quick march we +were off again. + +Cragmire Tower stood upon a very slight eminence, and what had looked +like a green tongue, from the moorland slopes above, was in fact a +creek, flanked by lush land, which here found its way to the sea. The +house which we were come to visit consisted in a low, two-storey +building, joining the ancient tower on the east, with two smaller +out-buildings. There was a miniature kitchen-garden, and a few stunted +fruit trees in the north-west corner; the whole being surrounded by a +grey stone wall. + +The shadow of the tower fell sharply across the path, which ran up +almost alongside of it. We were both extremely warm by reason of our +long and rapid walk on that hot day, and this shade should have been +grateful to us. In short, I find it difficult to account for the +unwelcome chill which I experienced at the moment that I found myself +at the foot of the time-worn monument. I know that we both pulled up +sharply and looked at one another as though acted upon by some mutual +disturbance. + +But not a sound broke the stillness save the remote murmuring, until a +solitary sea-gull rose in the air and circled directly over the tower, +uttering its mournful and unmusical cry. Automatically to my mind +sprang the lines of the poem: + + Far from all brother-men, in the weird of the fen, + With God's creatures I bide, 'mid the birds that I ken; + Where the winds ever dree, where the hymn of the sea + Brings a message of peace from the ocean to me. + +Not a soul was visible about the premises; there was no sound of human +activity and no dog barked. Nayland Smith drew a long breath, glanced +back along the way we had come, then went on, following the wall, I +beside him, until we came to the gate. It was unfastened, and we +walked up the stone path through a wilderness of weeds. Four windows +of the house were visible, two on the ground floor and two above. +Those on the ground floor were heavily boarded up, those above, though +glazed, boasted neither blinds nor curtains. Cragmire Tower showed not +the slightest evidence of tenancy. + +We mounted three steps and stood before a tremendously massive oaken +door. An iron bell-pull, ancient and rusty, hung on the right of the +door, and Smith, giving me an odd glance, seized the ring and tugged +it. + +From somewhere within the building answered a mournful clangour, a +cracked and toneless jangle, which, seeming to echo through empty +apartments, sought and found an exit apparently by way of one of the +openings in the round tower; for it was from above our heads that the +noise came to us. + +It died away, that eerie ringing--that clanging so dismal that it +could chill my heart even then with the bright sunlight streaming +down out of the blue; it awoke no other response than the mournful cry +of the sea-gull circling over our heads. Silence fell. We looked at +one another, and we were both about to express a mutual doubt, when, +unheralded by any unfastening of bolts or bars, the door was opened, +and a huge mulatto, dressed in white, stood there regarding us. + +I started nervously, for the apparition was so unexpected, but Nayland +Smith, without evidence of surprise, thrust a card into the man's +hand. + +"Take my card to Mr. Van Roon, and say that I wish to see him on +important business," he directed authoritatively. + +The mulatto bowed and retired. His white figure seemed to be swallowed +up by the darkness within, for beyond the patch of uncarpeted floor +revealed by the peeping sunlight, was a barn-like place of densest +shadow. I was about to speak, but Smith laid his hand upon my arm +warningly, as, out from the shadows, the mulatto returned. He stood on +the right of the door and bowed again. + +"Be pleased to enter," he said, in his harsh, negro voice. "Mr. Van +Roon will see you." + +The gladness of the sun could no longer stir me; a chill and sense of +foreboding bore me company as beside Nayland Smith I entered Cragmire +Tower. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +THE MULATTO + + +The room in which Van Roon received us was roughly of the shape of an +old-fashioned key-hole; one end if it occupied the base of the tower, +upon which the remainder had evidently been built. In many respects it +was a singular room, but the feature which caused me the greatest +amazement was this--it had no windows! + +In the deep alcove formed by the tower sat Van Roon at a littered +table, upon which stood an oil reading-lamp, green-shaded, of the +"Victoria" pattern, to furnish the entire illumination of the +apartment. That book-shelves lined the rectangular portion of this +strange study I divined, although that end of the place was dark as a +catacomb. The walls were wood-panelled, and the ceiling was +oaken-beamed. A small book shelf and tumble-down cabinet stood upon +either side of the table, and the celebrated American author and +traveller lay propped up in a long split-cane chair. He wore smoke +glasses, and had a clean-shaven, olive face, with a profusion of +jet-black hair. He was garbed in a dirty red dressing-gown, and a +perfect fog of cigar smoke hung in the room. He did not rise to greet +us, but merely extended his right hand, between two fingers whereof he +held Smith's card. + +"You will excuse the seeming discourtesy of an invalid, gentlemen?" he +said; "but I am suffering from undue temerity in the interior of +China!" + +He waved his hand vaguely, and I saw that two rough deal chairs stood +near the table. Smith and I seated ourselves, and my friend, leaning +his elbow upon the table, looked fixedly at the face of the man whom +we were come from London to visit. Although comparatively unfamiliar +to the British public, the name of Van Roon was well known in American +literary circles; for he enjoyed in the United States a reputation +somewhat similar to that which had rendered the name of our mutual +friend, Sir Lionel Barton, a household word in England. It was Van +Roon who, following in the footsteps of Madame Blavatsky, had sought +out the haunts of the fabled mahatmas in the Himalayas, and Van Roon +who had essayed to explore the fever swamps of Yucatan in quest of the +secret of lost Atlantis; lastly, it was Van Roon, who, with an +overland car specially built for him by a celebrated American firm, +had undertaken the journey across China. + +I studied the olive face with curiosity. Its natural impassivity was +so greatly increased by the presence of the coloured spectacles that +my study was as profitless as if I had scrutinized the face of a +carven Buddha. The mulatto had withdrawn, and in an atmosphere of +gloom and tobacco smoke Smith and I sat staring, perhaps rather +rudely, at the object of our visit to the West Country. + +"Mr. Van Roon," began my friend abruptly, "you will no doubt have seen +this paragraph. It appeared in this morning's _Daily Telegraph_." + +He stood up, and taking out the cutting from his notebook, placed it +on the table. + +"I have seen this--yes," said Van Roon, revealing a row of even white +teeth in a rapid smile. "Is it to this paragraph that I owe the +pleasure of seeing you here?" + +"The paragraph appeared in this morning's issue," replied Smith. "An +hour from the time of seeing it, my friend, Dr. Petrie, and I were +entrained for Bridgwater." + +"Your visit delights me, gentlemen, and I should be ungrateful to +question its cause; but frankly I am at a loss to understand why you +should have honoured me thus. I am a poor host, God knows; for what +with my tortured limb, a legacy from the Chinese devils whose secrets +I surprised, and my semi-blindness, due to the same cause, I am but +sorry company." + +Nayland Smith held up his right hand deprecatingly. Van Roon tendered +a box of cigars and clapped his hands, whereupon the mulatto entered. + +"I see that you have a story to tell me, Mr. Smith," he said; +"therefore I suggest whisky-and-soda--or you might prefer tea, as it +is nearly tea-time?" + +Smith and I chose the former refreshment, and the soft-footed +half-breed having departed upon his errand, my companion, leaning +forward earnestly across the littered table, outlined for Van Roon the +story of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the great and malign being whose mission in +England at that moment was none other than the stoppage of just such +information as our host was preparing to give to the world. + +"There is a giant conspiracy, Mr. Van Roon," he said, "which had its +birth in this very province of Ho-Nan, from which you were so +fortunate to escape alive; whatever its scope or limitations, a great +secret society is established among the yellow races. It means that +China, which has slumbered for so many generations, now stirs in that +age-long sleep. I need not tell _you_ how much more it means, this +seething in the pot...." + +"In a word," interrupted Van Roon, pushing Smith's glass across the +table, "you would say--" + +"That your life is not worth that!" replied Smith, snapping his +fingers before the other's face. + +A very impressive silence fell. I watched Van Roon curiously as he sat +propped up among his cushions, his smooth face ghastly in the green +light from the lamp-shade. He held the stump of a cigar between his +teeth, but, apparently unnoticed by him, it had long since gone out. +Smith, out of the shadows, was watching him, too. Then-- + +"Your information is very disturbing," said the American. "I am the +more disposed to credit your statement because I am all too painfully +aware of the existence of such a group as you mention, in China, but +that they had an agent here in England is something I had never +conjectured. In seeking out this solitary residence I have unwittingly +done much to assist their designs.... But--my dear Mr. Smith, I am +very remiss! Of course you will remain to-night, and I trust for some +days to come?" + +Smith glanced rapidly across at me, then turned again to our host. + +"It seems like forcing our company upon you," he said, "but in your +own interests I think it will be best to do as you are good enough to +suggest. I hope and believe that our arrival here has not been noticed +by the enemy; therefore it will be well if we remain concealed as much +as possible for the present, until we have settled upon some plan." + +"Hagar shall go to the station for your baggage," said the American +rapidly, and clapped his hands, his usual signal to the mulatto. + +Whilst the latter was receiving his orders I noticed Nayland Smith +watching him closely; and when he had departed: + +"How long has that man been in your service?" snapped my friend. + +Van Roon peered blindly through his smoked glasses. + +"For some years," he replied; "he was with me in India--and in China." + +"Where did you engage him?" + +"Actually, in St. Kitts." + +"H'm," muttered Smith, and automatically he took out and began to fill +his pipe. + +"I can offer you no company but my own, gentlemen," continued Van +Roon, "but unless it interfere, with your plans, you may find the +surrounding district of interest and worthy of inspection, between now +and dinner-time. By the way, I think I can promise you quite a +satisfactory meal, for Hagar is a model chef." + +"A walk would be enjoyable," said Smith, "but dangerous." + +"Ah! perhaps you are right. Evidently you apprehend some attempt upon +me?" + +"At any moment!" + +"To one in my crippled condition, an alarming outlook! However, I +place myself unreservedly in your hands. But really, you must not +leave this interesting district before you have made the acquaintance +of some of its historical spots. To me, steeped as I am in what I may +term the lore of the odd, it is a veritable wonderland, almost as +interesting, in its way, as the caves and jungles of Hindustan +depicted by Madame Blavatsky." + +His high-pitched voice, with a certain laboured intonation, not quite +so characteristically American as was his accent, rose even higher; he +spoke with the fire of the enthusiast. + +"When I learnt that Cragmire Tower was vacant," he continued, "I leapt +at the chance (excuse the metaphor, from a lame man!). This is a +ghost-hunter's paradise. The tower itself is of unknown origin, though +probably Phoenician, and the house traditionally sheltered Dr. +Macleod, the necromancer, after his flight from the persecution of +James of Scotland. Then, to add to its interest, it borders on +Sedgemoor, the scene of the bloody battle during the Monmouth rising, +whereat a thousand were slain on the field. It is a local legend that +the unhappy Duke and his staff may be seen, on stormy nights, crossing +the path which skirts the mire, after which this building is named, +with flaming torches held aloft." + +"Merely marsh-lights, I take it?" interjected Smith, gripping his pipe +hard between his teeth. + +"Your practical mind naturally seeks a practical explanation," smiled +Van Roon, "but I myself have other theories. Then in addition to the +charms of Sedgemoor--haunted Sedgemoor--on a fine day it is quite +possible to see the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey from here; and +Glastonbury Abbey, as you may know, is closely bound up with the +history of Alchemy. It was in the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey that the +adept Kelly, companion of Dr. Dee, discovered, in the reign of +Elizabeth, the famous caskets of St. Dunstan, containing the two +tinctures...." + +So he ran on, enumerating the odd charms of his residence, charms +which for my part I did not find appealing. Finally-- + +"We cannot presume further upon your kindness," said Nayland Smith, +standing up. "No doubt we can amuse ourselves in the neighbourhood of +the house until the return of your servant." + +"Look upon Cragmire Tower as your own, gentlemen!" cried Van Roon. +"Most of the rooms are unfurnished, and the garden is a wilderness, +but the structure of the brickwork in the tower may interest you +archęologically, and the view across the moor is at least as fine as +any in the neighbourhood." + +So, with his brilliant smile and a gesture of one thin yellow hand, +the crippled traveller made us free of his odd dwelling. As I passed +out from the room close at Smith's heels, I glanced back, I cannot say +why. Van Roon already was bending over his papers, in his +green-shadowed sanctuary, and the light shining down upon his smoked +glasses created the odd illusion that he was looking over the tops of +the lenses and not down at the table as his attitude suggested. +However, it was probably ascribable to the weird chiaroscuro of the +scene, although it gave the seated figure an oddly malignant +appearance, and I passed through the utter darkness of the outer room +to the front door. Smith opening it, I was conscious of surprise to +find dusk come--to meet darkness where I had looked for sunlight. + +The silver wisps which had raced along the horizon, as we came to +Cragmire Tower, had been harbingers of other and heavier banks. A +stormy sunset smeared crimson streaks across the skyline, where a +great range of clouds, like the oily smoke of a city burning, was +banked, mountain topping mountain, and lighted from below by this +angry red. As we came down the steps and out by the gate, I turned and +looked across the moor behind us. A sort of reflection from this +distant blaze encrimsoned the whole landscape. The inland bay glowed +sullenly, as if internal fires and not reflected light were at work; +a scene both wild and majestic. + +Nayland Smith was staring up at the cone-like top of the ancient tower +in a curious, speculative fashion. Under the influence of our host's +conversation I had forgotten the reasonless dread which had touched me +at the moment of our arrival, but now, with the red light blazing over +Sedgemoor, as if in memory of the blood which had been shed there, and +with the tower of unknown origin looming above me, I became very +uncomfortable again, nor did I envy Van Roon his eerie residence. The +proximity of a tower of any kind, at night, makes in some inexplicable +way for awe, and to-night there were other agents, too. + +"What's that?" snapped Smith suddenly, grasping my arm. + +He was peering southward, toward the distant hamlet, and, starting +violently at his words and the sudden grasp of his hand, I, too, +stared in that direction. + +"We were followed, Petrie," he almost whispered. "I never got a sight +of our follower, but I'll swear we were followed. Look! there's +something moving over yonder!" + +Together we stood staring into the dusk; then Smith burst abruptly +into one of his rare laughs, and clapped me upon the shoulder. + +"It's Hagar, the mulatto!" he cried, "and our grips. That +extraordinary American with his tales of witch-lights and haunted +abbeys has been playing the devil with our nerves." He glanced up at +the tower. "What a place to live in! Frankly, I don't think I could +stand it." + +Together we waited by the gate until the half-caste appeared on the +bend of the path with a grip in either hand. He was a great, muscular +fellow with a stoic face, and, for the purpose of visiting Saul, +presumably, he had doffed his white raiment and now wore a sort of +livery, with a peaked cap. + +Smith watched him enter the house. Then-- + +"I wonder where Van Roon obtains his provisions and so forth," he +muttered. "It's odd they knew nothing about the new tenant of Cragmire +Tower at 'The Wagoners.'" + +There came a sort of sudden expectancy into his manner for which I +found myself at a loss to account. He turned his gaze inland and stood +there tugging at his left ear and clicking his teeth together. He +stared at me, and his eyes looked very bright in the dusk, for a sort +of red glow from the sunset touched them; but he spoke no word, merely +taking my arm and leading me off on a rambling walk around and about +the house. Neither of us spoke a word until we stood at the gate of +Cragmire Tower again; then-- + +"I'll swear, now, that we were followed here to-day!" muttered Smith. + +The lofty place immediately within the doorway proved, in the light of +a lamp now fixed in an iron bracket, to be a square entrance hall +meagrely furnished. The closed study door faced the entrance, and on +the left of it ascended an open staircase up which the mulatto led the +way. We found ourselves on the floor above, in a corridor traversing +the house from back to front. An apartment on the immediate left was +indicated by the mulatto as that allotted to Smith. It was a room of +fair size, furnished quite simply but boasting a wardrobe cupboard, +and Smith's grip stood beside the white-enamelled bed. I glanced +around, and then prepared to follow the man, who had awaited me in the +doorway. + +He still wore his dark livery, and as I followed the lithe yet brawny +figure along the corridor, I found myself considering critically his +breadth of shoulder and the extraordinary thickness of his neck. + +I have repeatedly spoken of a sort of foreboding, an elusive stirring +in the depths of my being, of which I became conscious at certain +times in my dealings with Dr. Fu-Manchu and his murderous servants. +This sensation, or something akin to it, claimed me now, +unaccountably, as I stood looking into the neat bedroom, on the same +side of the corridor but at the extreme end, wherein I was to sleep. A +voiceless warning urged me to return; a kind of childish panic came +fluttering about my heart, a dread of entering the room, of allowing +the mulatto to come _behind me_. + +Doubtless this was no more than a subconscious product of my +observations respecting his abnormal breadth of shoulder. But whatever +the origin of the impulse, I found myself unable to disobey it. +Therefore, I merely nodded, turned on my heel and went back to Smith's +room. + +I closed the door, then turned to face Smith, who stood regarding me. + +"Smith," I said, "that man sends cold water trickling down my spine!" + +Still regarding me fixedly, my friend nodded his head. + +"You are curiously sensitive to this sort of thing," he replied +slowly; "I have noticed it before as a useful capacity. I don't like +the look of the man myself. The fact that he has been in Van Roon's +employ for some years goes for nothing. We are neither of us likely to +forget Kwee, the Chinese servant of Sir Lionel Barton, and it is quite +possible that Fu-Manchu has corrupted this man as he corrupted the +other. It is quite possible...." + +His voice trailed off into silence, and he stood looking across the +room with unseeing eyes, meditating deeply. It was quite dark, now, +outside, as I could see through the uncurtained window, which opened +upon the dreary expanse stretching out to haunted Sedgemoor. Two +candles were burning upon the dressing-table; they were but recently +lighted, and so intense was the stillness that I could distinctly hear +the spluttering of one of the wicks, which was damp. Without giving +the slightest warning of his intention, Smith suddenly made two +strides forward, stretched out his long arms, and snuffed the pair of +candles in a twinkling! + +The room became plunged in impenetrable darkness. + +"Not a word, Petrie!" whispered my companion. + +I moved cautiously to join him, but as I did so, perceived that he was +moving, too. Vaguely, against the window I perceived him silhouetted. +He was looking out across the moor, and-- + +"See! see!" he hissed. + +My heart thumping furiously in my breast, I bent over him; and for the +second time since our coming to Cragmire Tower, my thoughts flew to +"The Fenman." + + There are shades in the fen; ghosts of women and men + Who have sinned and have died, but are living again. + O'er the waters they tread, with their lanterns of dread, + And they peer in the pools--in the pools of the dead.... + +A light was dancing out upon the moor, a witch-light that came and +went unaccountably, up and down, in and out, now clearly visible, now +masked in the darkness! + +"Lock the door!" snapped my companion--"if there's a key." + +I crept across the room and fumbled for a moment; then-- + +"There is no key," I reported. + +"Then wedge the chair under the knob and let no one enter until I +return!" he said amazingly. + +With that he opened the window to its fullest extent, threw his leg +over the sill, and went creeping along a wide concrete ledge, in which +ran a leaded gutter, in the direction of the tower on the right! + +Not pausing to follow his instructions respecting the chair, I craned +out of the window, watching his progress, and wondering with what +sudden madness he was bitten. Indeed, I could not credit my senses, +could not believe that I heard and saw aright. Yet there out in the +darkness on the moor moved the will-o'-the-wisp, and ten yards along +the gutter crept my friend, like a great gaunt cat. Unknown to me he +must have prospected the route by daylight, for now I saw his design. +The ledge terminated only where it met the ancient wall of the tower, +and it was possible for an agile climber to step from it to the edge +of the unglazed window some four feet below, and to scramble from that +point to the stone fence and thence on to the path by which we had +come from Saul. + +This difficult operation Nayland Smith successfully performed, and, to +my unbounded amazement, went racing into the darkness toward the +dancing light, headlong, like a madman! The night swallowed him up, +and between my wonder and my fear my hands trembled so violently that +I could scarce support myself where I rested, with my full weight upon +the sill. + +I seemed now to be moving through the fevered phases of a nightmare. +Around and below me Cragmire Tower was profoundly silent, but a faint +odour of cookery was now perceptible. Outside, from the night, came a +faint whispering as of the distant sea, but no moon and no stars +relieved the impenetrable blackness. Only out over the moor the +mysterious light still danced and moved. + +One--two--three--four--five minutes passed. The light vanished and did +not appear again. Five more age-long minutes elapsed in absolute +silence, whilst I peered into the darkness of the night and listened, +muscles tensed, for the return of Nayland Smith. Yet two more minutes, +which embraced an agony of suspense, passed in the same fashion; then +a shadowy form grew, phantomesque, out of the gloom; a moment more, +and I distinctly heard the heavy breathing of a man nearly spent, and +saw my friend scrambling up toward the black embrasure in the tower. +His voice came huskily, pantingly: + +"Creep along and lend me a hand, Petrie! I am nearly winded." + +I crept through the window, steadied my quivering nerves by an effort +of the will, and reached the end of the ledge in time to take Smith's +extended hand and to draw him up beside me against the wall of the +tower. He was shaking with his exertions, and must have fallen, I +think, without my assistance. Inside the room again-- + +"Quick! light the candles!" he breathed hoarsely. "Did any one come?" + +"No one--nothing." + +Having expended several matches in vain, for my fingers twitched +nervously, I ultimately succeeded in relighting the candles. + +"Get along to your room!" directed Smith. "Your apprehensions are +unfounded at the moment, but you may as well leave both doors wide +open!" + +I looked into his face--it was very drawn and grim, and his brow was +wet with perspiration, but his eyes had the fighting glint, and I knew +that we were upon the eve of strange happenings. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +A CRY ON THE MOOR + + +Of the events intervening between this moment and that when death +called to us out of the night, I have the haziest recollections. An +excellent dinner was served in the bleak and gloomy dining-room by +the mulatto, and the crippled author was carried to the head of the +table by this same herculean attendant, as lightly as though he had +had but the weight of a child. + +Van Roon talked continuously, revealing a deep knowledge of all sorts +of obscure matters; and in the brief intervals, Nayland Smith talked +also, with almost feverish rapidity. Plans for the future were +discussed. I can recall no one of them. + +I could not stifle my queer sentiments in regard to the mulatto, and +every time I found him behind my chair I was hard put to it to repress +a shudder. In this fashion the strange evening passed; and to the +accompaniment of distant, muttering thunder, we two guests retired to +our chambers in Cragmire Tower. Smith had contrived to give me my +instructions in a whisper, and five minutes after entering my own +room, I had snuffed the candles, slipped a wedge, which he had given +me, under the door, crept out through the window on to the guttered +ledge, and joined Smith in his room. He, too, had extinguished his +candles, and the place was in darkness. As I climbed in, he grasped my +wrist to silence me, and turned me forcibly toward the window again. + +"Listen!" he said. + +I turned and looked out upon a prospect which had been a fit setting +for the witch scene in _Macbeth_. Thunderclouds hung low over the +moor, but through them ran a sort of chasm, or rift, allowing a bar of +lurid light to stretch across the drear, from east to west--a sort of +lane walled by darkness. There came a remote murmuring, as of a +troubled sea--a hushed and distant chorus; and sometimes in upon it +broke the drums of heaven. In the west lightning flickered, though but +faintly, intermittently. + +Then came the _call_. + +Out of the blackness of the moor it came, wild and distant--"_Help! +help!_" + +"Smith!" I whispered--"what is it? What...." + +"Mr. Smith!" came the agonized cry ... "Nayland Smith, help! for God's +sake...." + +"Quick, Smith!" I cried, "quick, man! It's Van Roon--he's been dragged +out ... they are murdering him...." + +Nayland Smith held me in a vice-like grip, silent, unmoved! + +Louder and more agonized came the cry for aid, and I felt more than +ever certain that it was poor Van Roon who uttered it. + +"Mr. Smith! Dr. Petrie! for God's sake come ... or ... it will be ... +too ... late...." + +"Smith!" I said, turning furiously upon my friend, "if you are going +to remain here whilst murder is done, _I_ am not!" + +My blood boiled now with hot resentment. It was incredible, inhuman, +that we should remain there inert whilst a fellow-man, and our host to +boot, was being done to death out there in the darkness. I exerted all +my strength to break away; but although my efforts told upon him, as +his loud breathing revealed, Nayland Smith clung to me tenaciously. +Had my hands been free, in my fury I could have struck him; for the +pitiable cries, growing fainter now, told their own tale. Then Smith +spoke--shortly and angrily--breathing hard between the words. + +"Be quiet, you fool!" he snapped. "It's little less than an insult, +Petrie, to think me capable of refusing help where help is needed!" + +Like, a cold douche his words acted; in that instant I knew myself a +fool. + +"You remember the Call of Siva?" he said, thrusting me away +irritably, "--two years ago--and what it meant to those who obeyed it?" + +"You might have told me...." + +"_Told_ you! You would have been through the window before I had +uttered two words!" + +I realized the truth of his assertion, and the justness of his anger. + +"Forgive me, old man," I said, very crestfallen, "but my impulse was a +natural one, you'll admit. You must remember that I have been trained +never to refuse aid when aid is asked." + +"Shut up, Petrie!" he growled; "forget it." + +The cries had ceased, now, entirely, and a peal of thunder, louder +than any yet, echoed over distant Sedgemoor. The chasm of light +splitting the heavens closed in, leaving the night wholly black. + +"Don't talk!" rapped Smith; "act! You wedged your door?" + +"Yes." + +"Good. Get into that cupboard, have your Browning ready, and keep the +door very slightly ajar." + +He was in that mood of repressed fever which I knew and which always +communicated itself to me. I spoke no further word, but stepped into +the wardrobe indicated and drew the door nearly shut. The recess just +accommodated me, and through the aperture I could see the bed, +vaguely, the open window, and part of the opposite wall. I saw Smith +cross the floor, as a mighty clap of thunder boomed over the house. + +A gleam of lightning flickered through the gloom. + +I saw the bed for a moment, distinctly, and it appeared to me that +Smith lay therein, with the sheets pulled up over his head. The light +was gone and I could hear big drops of rain pattering upon the leaden +gutter below the open window. + +My mood was strange, detached, and characterized by vagueness. That +Van Roon lay dead upon the moor I was convinced; and--although I +recognized that it must be a sufficient one--I could not even dimly +divine the reason why we had refrained from lending him aid. To have +failed to save him, knowing his peril, would have been bad enough; to +have _refused_, I thought, was shameful. Better to have shared his +fate--yet.... + +The downpour was increasing, and beating now a regular tattoo upon the +gutter-way. Then, splitting the oblong of greater blackness which +marked the casement, quivered dazzlingly another flash of lightning in +which I saw the bed again, with that impression of Smith curled up in +it. The blinding light died out; came the crash of thunder, harsh and +fearsome, more imminently above the tower than ever. The building +seemed to shake. + +Coming as they did, horror and the wrath of heaven together, suddenly, +crashingly, black and angry after the fairness of the day, these +happenings and their setting must have terrorized the stoutest heart; +but somehow I seemed detached, as I have said, and set apart from the +whirl of events; a spectator. Even when a vague yellow light crept +across the room from the direction of the door, and flickered +unsteadily on the bed, I remained unmoved to a certain degree, +although passively alive to the significance of the incident. I +realised that the ultimate issue was at hand, but either because I was +emotionally exhausted, or from some other cause, the pending climax +failed to disturb me. + +Going on tiptoe, in stockinged feet, across my field of vision, passed +Kegan Van Roon! He was in his shirt-sleeves and held a lighted candle +in one hand whilst with the other he shaded it against the draught +from the window. He was a cripple no longer, and the smoked glasses +were discarded; most of the light, at the moment when first I saw him, +shone upon his thin, olive face, and at sight of his eyes much of the +mystery of Cragmire Tower was resolved. For they were oblique, very +slightly, but nevertheless unmistakably oblique. Though highly +educated, and possibly an American citizen, _Van Roon was a Chinaman!_ + +Upon the picture of his face as I saw it then, I do not care to +dwell. It lacked the unique horror of Dr. Fu-Manchu's unforgettable +countenance, but possessed a sort of animal malignancy which the +latter lacked.... He approached within three or four feet of the bed, +peering--peering. Then, with a timidity which spoke well for Nayland +Smith's reputation, he paused and beckoned to some one who evidently +stood in the doorway behind him. As he did so I saw that the legs of +his trousers were caked with greenish-brown mud nearly up to the +knees. + +The huge mulatto, silent-footed, crossed to the bed in three strides. +He was stripped to the waist, and excepting some few professional +athletes, I had never seen a torso to compare with that which, brown +and glistening, now bent over Nayland Smith. The muscular development +was simply enormous; the man had a neck like a column, and the thews +around his back and shoulders were like ivy tentacles wreathing some +gnarled oak. + +Whilst Van Roon, his evil gaze upon the bed, held the candle aloft, +the mulatto, with a curious preparatory writhing movement of the +mighty shoulders, lowered his outstretched fingers to the disordered +bed linen.... + +I pushed open the cupboard door and thrust out the Browning. As I did +so a dramatic thing happened. A tall, gaunt figure shot suddenly +upright from _beyond_ the bed. It was Nayland Smith! + +Upraised in his hand he held a heavy walking cane. I knew the handle +to be leaded, and I could judge of the force with which he wielded it +by the fact that it cut the air with a keen _swishing_ sound. It +descended upon the back of the mulatto's skull with a sickening thud, +and the great brown body dropped inert upon the padded bed--in which +not Smith, but his grip, reposed. There was no word, no cry. Then-- + +"Shoot, Petrie! Shoot the fiend! _Shoot_!..." + +Van Roon, dropping the candle, in the falling gleam of which I saw +the whites of the oblique eyes, turned and leapt from the room with +the agility of a wild cat. The ensuing darkness was split by a streak +of lightning ... and there was Nayland Smith scrambling around the +foot of the bed and making for the door in hot pursuit. + +We gained it almost together. Smith had dropped the cane, and now held +his pistol in his hand. Together we fired into the chasm of the +corridor, and in the flash, saw Van Roon hurling himself down the +stairs. He went silently in his stockinged feet, and our own clatter +was drowned by the awful booming of the thunder which now burst over +us again. + +Crack!--crack!--crack! Three times our pistols spat venomously after +the flying figure ... then we had crossed the hall below and were in +the wilderness of the night with the rain descending upon us in +sheets. Vaguely I saw the white shirt-sleeves of the fugitive near the +corner of the stone fence. A moment he hesitated, then darted away +inland, not toward Saul, but toward the moor and the cup of the inland +bay. + +"Steady, Petrie! steady!" cried Nayland Smith. He ran, panting, beside +me. "It is the path to the mire." He breathed sibilantly between every +few words. "It was out there ... that he hoped to lure us ... with the +cry for help." + +A great blaze of lightning illuminated the landscape as far as the eye +could see. Ahead of us a flying shape, hair lank and glistening in the +downpour, followed a faint path skirting that green tongue of morass +which we had noted from the upland. + +It was Kegan Van Roon. He glanced over his shoulder, showing a yellow, +terror-stricken face. We were gaining upon him. Darkness fell, and the +thunder cracked and boomed as though the very moor were splitting +about us. + +"Another fifty yards, Petrie," breathed Nayland Smith, "and after that +it's uncharted ground." + +On we went through the rain and the darkness; then-- + +"Slow up! slow up!" cried Smith. "It feels soft!" + +Indeed, already I had made one false step--and the hungry mire had +fastened upon my foot, almost tripping me. + +"Lost the path!" + +We stopped dead. The falling rain walled us in. I dared not move, for +I knew that the mire, the devouring mire, stretched, eager, close +about my feet. We were both waiting for the next flash of lightning, I +think, but, before it came, out of the darkness ahead of us rose a cry +that sometimes rings in my ears to this hour. Yet it was no more than +a repetition of that which had called to us, deathfully, awhile +before. + +"Help! help! for God's sake help! Quick! I am sinking...." + +Nayland Smith grasped my arm furiously. + +"We dare not move, Petrie--we dare not move!" he breathed. "It's God's +justice--visible for once." + +Then came the lightning; and--ignoring a splitting crash behind us--we +both looked ahead, over the mire. + +Just on the edge of the venomous green patch, not thirty yards away, I +saw the head and shoulders and upstretched, appealing arms of Van +Roon. Even as the lightning flickered and we saw him, he was gone; +with one last, long, drawn-out cry, horribly like the mournful wail of +a sea-gull, he was gone! + +The eerie light died, and in the instant before the sound of the +thunder came shatteringly, we turned about ... in time to see Cragmire +Tower, a blacker silhouette against the night, topple and fall! A red +glow began to be perceptible above the building. The thunder came +booming through the caverns of space. Nayland Smith lowered his wet +face close to mine and shouted in my ear: + +"Kegan Van Roon never returned from China. It was a trap. Those were +two creatures of Dr. Fu-Manchu...." + +The thunder died away, hollowly, echoing over the distant sea.... + +"That light on the moor to-night?" + +"You have not learnt the Morse Code, Petrie. It was a signal, and it +read: S M I T H ... S O S." + +"Well?" + +"I took the chance, as you know. And it was Kāramančh! She knew of the +plot to bury us in the mire. She had followed from London, but could +do nothing until dusk. God forgive me if I've mis-judged her--for we +owe her our lives to-night." + +Flames were bursting up from the building beside the ruin of the +ancient tower which had faced the storms of countless ages only to +succumb at last. The lightning literally had cloven it in twain. + +"The mulatto?..." + +Again the lightning flashed, and we saw the path and began to retrace +our steps. Nayland Smith turned to me; his face was very grim in that +unearthly light, and his eyes shone like steel. + +"I killed him, Petrie ... as I meant to do." + +From out over Sedgemoor it came, cracking and rolling and booming +towards us, swelling in volume to a stupendous climax, that awful +laughter of Jove the destroyer of Cragmire Tower. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +STORY OF THE GABLES + + +In looking over my notes dealing with the second phase of Dr. +Fu-Manchu's activities in England, I find that one of the worst hours +of my life was associated with the singular and seemingly inconsequent +adventure of the fiery hand. I shall deal with it in this place, +begging you to bear with me if I seem to digress. + +Inspector Weymouth called one morning, shortly after the Van Roon +episode, and entered upon a surprising account of a visit to a house +at Hampstead which enjoyed the sinister reputation of being +uninhabitable. + +"But in what way does the case enter into your province?" inquired +Nayland Smith, idly tapping out his pipe on a bar of the grate. + +We had not long finished breakfast, but from an early hour Smith had +been at his eternal smoking, which only the advent of the meal had +interrupted. + +"Well," replied the Inspector, who occupied a big armchair near the +window, "I was sent to look into it, I suppose, because I had nothing +better to do at the moment." + +"Ah!" jerked Smith, glancing over his shoulder. + +The ejaculation had a veiled significance; for our quest of Dr. +Fu-Manchu had come to an abrupt termination by reason of the fact that +all trace of that malignant genius, and of the group surrounding him, +had vanished with the destruction of Cragmire Tower. + +"The house is called The Gables," continued the Scotland Yard man, +"and I knew I was on a wild-goose chase from the first--" + +"Why?" snapped Smith. + +"Because I was there before, six months ago or so--just before your +present return to England--and I knew what to expect." + +Smith looked up with some faint dawning of interest perceptible in his +manner. + +"I was unaware," he said with a slight smile, "that the cleaning-up of +haunted houses came within the province of New Scotland Yard. I am +learning something." + +"In the ordinary way," replied the big man good-humouredly, "it +doesn't. But a sudden death always excites suspicion, and--" + +"A sudden death?" I said, glancing up; "you didn't explain that the +ghost had killed any one!" + +"I'm afraid I'm a poor hand at yarn-spinning, doctor," said Weymouth, +turning his blue, twinkling eyes in my direction. "Two people have +died at The Gables within the last six months." + +"You begin to interest me," declared Smith, and there came something +of the old, eager look into his gaunt face, as, having lighted his +pipe, he tossed the match-end into the hearth. + +"I had hoped for some little excitement, myself," confessed the +Inspector. "This dead-end, with not a shadow of a clue to the +whereabouts of the Yellow fiend, has been getting on my nerves--" + +Nayland Smith grunted sympathetically. + +"Although Dr. Fu-Manchu had been in England for some months, now," +continued Weymouth, "I have never set eyes upon him; the house we +raided in Museum Street proved to be empty; in a word, I am wasting my +time. So that I volunteered to run up to Hampstead and look into the +matter of The Gables, principally as a distraction. It's a queer +business, but more in the Psychical Research Society's line than mine, +I'm afraid. Still, if there were no Dr. Fu-Manchu it might be of +interest to you--and to you, Dr. Petrie--because it illustrates the +fact that, given the right sort of subject, death can be brought +about without any elaborate mechanism--such as our Chinese friends +employ." + +"You interest me more and more," declared Smith, stretching himself in +the long, white cane rest-chair. + +"Two men, both fairly sound, except that the first one had an +asthmatic heart, have died at The Gables without any one laying a +little finger upon them. Oh! there was no jugglery! They weren't +poisoned, or bitten by venomous insects, or suffocated, or anything +like that. They just died of fear--stark fear." + +With my elbows resting upon the table cover, and my chin in my hands, +I was listening attentively, now, and Nayland Smith, a big cushion +behind his head, was watching the speaker with a keen and speculative +look in those steely eyes of his. + +"You imply that Dr. Fu-Manchu has something to learn from The Gables?" +he jerked. + +Weymouth nodded stolidly. + +"I can't work up anything like amazement in these days," continued the +latter; "every other case seems stale and hackneyed alongside _the_ +case. But I must confess that when The Gables came on the books of the +Yard the second time, I began to wonder. I thought there might be some +tangible clue, some link connecting the two victims; perhaps some +evidence of robbery or of revenge--of some sort of motive. In short, I +hoped to find evidence of human agency at work, but, as before, I was +disappointed." + +"It's a legitimate case of a haunted house, then?" said Smith. + +"Yes; we find them occasionally, these uninhabitable places, where +there is _something_, something malignant and harmful to human life, +but something that you cannot arrest, that you cannot hope to bring +into court." + +"Ah," replied Smith slowly; "I suppose you are right. There are +historic instances, of course: Glamys Castle and Spedlins Tower in +Scotland, Peel Castle, Isle of Man, with its _Maudhe Dhug_, the grey +lady of Rainham Hall, the headless horses of Caistor, the Wesley ghost +of Epworth Rectory and others. But I have never come in personal +contact with such a case, and if I did I should feel very humiliated +to have to confess that there was _any_ agency which could produce a +_physical_ result--death,--but which was immune from physical +retaliation." + +Weymouth nodded his head again. + +"_I_ might feel a bit sour about it, too," he replied, "if it were not +that I haven't much pride left in these days, considering the show of +physical retaliation I have made against Dr. Fu-Manchu." + +"A home-thrust, Weymouth!" snapped Nayland Smith, with one of those +rare boyish laughs of his. "We're children to that Chinese doctor, +Inspector, to that weird product of a weird people who are as old in +evil as the Pyramids are old in mystery. But about The Gables?" + +"Well, it's an uncanny place. You mentioned Glamys Castle a moment +ago, and it's possible to understand an old stronghold like that being +haunted, but The Gables was only built about 1870; it's quite a modern +house. It was built for a wealthy Quaker family, and they occupied it, +uninterruptedly and apparently without anything unusual occurring for +over forty years. Then it was sold to a Mr. Maddison--and Mr. Maddison +died there six months ago." + +"Maddison?" said Smith sharply, staring across at Weymouth. "What was +he? Where did he come from?" + +"He was a retired tea-planter from Colombo," replied the Inspector. + +"Colombo?" + +"There was a link with the East, certainly, if that's what you are +thinking; and it was this fact which interested me at the time, and +which led me to waste precious days and nights on the case. But there +was no mortal connection between this liverish individual and the +schemes of Dr. Fu-Manchu. I'm certain of that." + +"And how did he die?" I asked interestedly. + +"He just died in his chair one evening, in the room which he used as a +library. It was his custom to sit there every night, when there were +no visitors, reading, until twelve o'clock or later. He was a +bachelor, and his household consisted of a cook, a housemaid, and a +man who had been with him for thirty years, I believe. At the time of +Mr. Maddison's death, his household had recently been deprived of two +of its members. The cook and housemaid both resigned one morning, +giving as their reason the fact that the place was haunted." + +"In what way?" + +"I interviewed the precious pair at the time, and they told me absurd +and various tales about dark figures wandering along the corridors and +bending over them in bed at night, whispering; but their chief trouble +was a continuous ringing of bells about the house." + +"Bells?" + +"They said that it became unbearable. Night and day there were bells +ringing all over the house. At any rate, they went, and for three or +four days The Gables was occupied only by Mr. Maddison and his man, +whose name was Stevens. I interviewed the latter also, and he was an +altogether more reliable witness; a decent, steady sort of man whose +story impressed me very much at the time." + +"Did he confirm the ringing?" + +"He swore to it--a sort of jangle, sometimes up in the air, near the +ceilings, and sometimes under the floor, like the shaking of silver +bells." + +Nayland Smith stood up abruptly and began to pace the room, leaving +great trails of blue-grey smoke behind him. + +"Your story is sufficiently interesting, Inspector," he declared, +"even to divert my mind from the eternal contemplation of the +Fu-Manchu problem. This would appear to be distinctly a case of an +'astral bell' such as we sometimes hear of in India." + +"It was Stevens," continued Weymouth, "who found Mr. Maddison. He +(Stevens) had been out on business connected with the household +arrangements, and at about eleven o'clock he returned, letting himself +in with a key. There was a light in the library, and getting no +response to his knocking, Stevens entered. He found his master sitting +bolt upright in a chair, clutching the arms with rigid fingers and +staring straight before him with a look of such frightful horror on +his face, that Stevens positively ran from the room and out of the +house. Mr. Maddison was stone dead. When a doctor, who lives at no +great distance away, came and examined him, he could find no trace of +violence whatever; he had apparently died of fright, to judge from the +expression on his face." + +"Anything else?" + +"Only this: I learnt, indirectly, that the last member of the Quaker +family to occupy the house had apparently witnessed the apparition, +which had led to his vacating the place. I got the story from the wife +of a man who had been employed as gardener there at that time. The +apparition--which he witnessed in the hall-way, if I remember +rightly--took the form of a sort of luminous hand clutching a long, +curved knife." + +"Oh, heavens!" cried Smith, and laughed shortly; "that's quite in +order!" + +"This gentleman told no one of the occurrence until after he had left +the house, no doubt in order that the place should not acquire an evil +reputation. Most of the original furniture remained, and Mr. Maddison +took the house furnished. I don't think there can be any doubt that +what killed him was fear at seeing a repetition--" + +"Of the fiery hand?" concluded Smith. + +"Quite so. Well, I examined The Gables pretty closely, and, with +another Scotland Yard man, spent a night in the empty house. We saw +nothing; but once, very faintly, we heard the ringing of bells." + +Smith spun around upon him rapidly. + +"You can swear to that?" he snapped. + +"I can swear to it," declared Weymouth stolidly. "It seemed to be over +our heads. We were sitting in the dining-room. Then it was gone, and +we heard nothing more whatever of an unusual nature. Following the +death of Mr. Maddison, The Gables remained empty until a while ago, +when a French gentleman, named Lejay, leased it--" + +"Furnished?" + +"Yes; nothing was removed--" + +"Who kept the place in order?" + +"A married couple living in the neighbourhood undertook to do so. The +man attended to the lawn and so forth, and the woman came once a week, +I believe, to clean up the house." + +"And Lejay?" + +"He came in only last week, having leased the house for six months. +His family were to have joined him in a day or two, and he, with the +aid of the pair I have just mentioned, and assisted by a French +servant he brought over with him, was putting the place in order. At +about twelve o'clock on the Friday night this servant ran into a +neighbouring house screaming 'the fiery hand!' and when at last a +constable arrived and a frightened group went up the avenue of The +Gables, they found M. Lejay, dead in the avenue, near the steps just +outside the hall door! He had the same face of horror...." + +"What a tale for the Press!" snapped Smith. + +"The owner has managed to keep it quiet so far, but this time I think +it will leak into the Press--yes." + +There was a short silence; then-- + +"And you have been down to The Gables again?" + +"I was there on Saturday, but there's not a scrap of evidence. The man +undoubtedly died of fright in the same way as Maddison. The place +ought to be pulled down; it's unholy." + +"Unholy is the word," I said. "I never heard anything like it. This M. +Lejay had no enemies?--there could be no possible motive?" + +"None whatever. He was a business man from Marseilles, and his affairs +necessitated his remaining in or near to London for some considerable +time; therefore, he decided to make his headquarters here, +temporarily, and leased The Gables with that intention." + +Nayland Smith was pacing the floor with increasing rapidity; he was +tugging at the lobe of his left ear and his pipe had long since gone +out. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +THE BELLS + + +I started to my feet as a tall, bearded man swung open the door and +hurled himself impetuously into the room. He wore a silk hat, which +fitted him very ill, and a black frock-coat which did not fit him at +all. + +"It's all right, Petrie!" cried the apparition; "I've leased The +Gables!" + +It was Nayland Smith! I stared at him in amazement. + +"The first time I have employed a disguise," continued my friend +rapidly, "since the memorable episode of the false pigtail." He threw +a small brown leather grip upon the floor. "In case you should care to +visit the house, Petrie, I have brought these things. My tenancy +commences to-night!" + +Two days had elapsed, and I had entirely forgotten the strange story +of The Gables which Inspector Weymouth had related to us; evidently it +was otherwise with my friend, and utterly at a loss for an explanation +of his singular behaviour, I stooped mechanically and opened the grip. +It contained an odd assortment of garments, and amongst other things +several grey wigs and a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles. + +Kneeling there with this strange litter about me, I looked up +amazedly. Nayland Smith, the unsuitable silk hat set right upon the +back of his head, was pacing the room excitedly, his fuming pipe +protruding from the tangle of factitious beard. + +"You see, Petrie," he began again, rapidly, "I did not entirely trust +the agent. I've leased the house in the name of Professor Maxton...." + +"But, Smith," I cried, "what possible reason can there be for +disguise?" + +"There's every reason," he snapped. + +"Why should you interest yourself in The Gables?" + +"Does no explanation occur to you?" + +"None whatever; to me the whole thing smacks of stark lunacy." + +"Then you won't come?" + +"I've never stuck at anything, Smith," I replied, "however +undignified, when it has seemed that my presence could be of the +slightest use." + +As I rose to my feet, Smith stepped in front of me, and the steely +grey eyes shone out strangely from the altered face. He clapped his +hands upon my shoulders. + +"If I assure you that your presence is necessary to my safety," he +said, "that if you fail me I must seek another companion--will you +come?" + +Intuitively, I knew that he was keeping something back, and I was +conscious of some resentment, but, nevertheless, my reply was a +foregone conclusion, and--with the borrowed appearance of an extremely +untidy old man--I crept guiltily out of my house that evening and into +the cab which Smith had waiting. + +The Gables was a roomy and rambling place lying back a considerable +distance from the road. A semi-circular drive gave access to the door, +and so densely wooded was the ground, that for the most part the drive +was practically a tunnel--a verdant tunnel. A high brick wall +concealed the building from the point of view of any one on the +roadway, but either horn of the crescent drive terminated at a heavy, +wrought-iron gateway. + +Smith discharged the cab at the corner of the narrow and winding road +upon which The Gables fronted. It was walled in on both sides; on the +left the wall being broken by tradesmen's entrances to the houses +fronting upon another street, and on the right following, +uninterruptedly, the grounds of The Gables. As we came to the gate-- + +"Nothing now," said Smith, pointing into the darkness of the road +before us, "except a couple of studios, until one comes to the Heath." + +He inserted the key in the lock of the gate and swung it creakingly +open. I looked into the black arch of the avenue, thought of the haunted +residence that lay hidden somewhere beyond, of those who had died in +it--especially of the one who had died there under the trees ... and +found myself out of love with the business of the night. + +"Come on!" said Nayland Smith briskly, holding the gate open; "there +should be a fire in the library, and refreshments, if the charwoman +has followed instructions." + +I heard the great gate clang to behind us. Even had there been any +moon (and there was none) I doubted if more than a patch or two of +light could have penetrated there. The darkness was extraordinary. +Nothing broke it, and I think Smith must have found his way by the aid +of some sixth sense. At any rate, I saw nothing of the house until I +stood some five paces from the steps leading up to the porch. A light +was burning in the hall-way, but dimly and inhospitably; of the faēade +of the building I could perceive little. + +When we entered the hall and the door was closed behind us, I began +wondering anew what purpose my friend hoped to serve by a vigil in +this haunted place. There was a light in the library, the door of +which was ajar, and on the large table were decanters, a siphon, and +some biscuits and sandwiches. A large grip stood upon the floor also. +For some reason which was a mystery to me, Smith had decided that we +must assume false names whilst under the roof of The Gables; and-- + +"Now, Pearce," he said, "a whisky-and-soda before we look around?" + +The proposal was welcome enough, for I felt strangely dispirited, and, +to tell the truth, in my strange disguise not a little ridiculous. + +All my nerves, no doubt, were highly strung, and my sense of hearing +unusually acute, for I went in momentary expectation of some uncanny +happening. I had not long to wait. As I raised the glass to my lips +and glanced across the table at my friend, I heard the first faint +sound heralding the coming of the bells. + +It did not seem to proceed from anywhere within the library, but from +some distant room, far away overhead. A musical sound it was, but +breaking in upon the silence of that ill-omened house, its music was +the music of terror. In a faint and very sweet cascade it rippled; a +ringing as of tiny silver bells. + +I set down my glass upon the table, and rising slowly from the chair +in which I had been seated, stared fixedly at my companion, who was +staring with equal fixity at me. I could see that I had not been +deluded; Nayland Smith had heard the ringing, too. + +"The ghosts waste no time!" he said softly. "This is not new to me; I +spent an hour here last night--and heard the same sound...." + +I glanced hastily around the room. It was furnished as a library, and +contained a considerable collection of works, principally novels. I +was unable to judge of the outlook, for the two lofty windows were +draped with heavy purple curtains which were drawn close. A +silk-shaded lamp swung from the centre of the ceiling, and immediately +over the table by which I stood. There was much shadow about the room; +and now I glanced apprehensively about me, but specially toward the +open door. + +In that breathless suspense of listening we stood awhile; then-- + +"There it is again!" whispered Smith tensely. + +The ringing of bells was repeated, and seemingly much nearer to us; in +fact it appeared to come from somewhere above, up near the ceiling of +the room in which we stood. Simultaneously we looked up, then Smith +laughed shortly. + +"Instinctive, I suppose," he snapped; "but what do we expect to see in +the air?" + +The musical sound now grew in volume; the first tiny peal seemed to be +reinforced by others and by others again, until the air around about +us was filled with the pealings of these invisible bell-ringers. + +Although, as I have said, the sound was rather musical than horrible, +it was, on the other hand, so utterly unaccountable as to touch the +supreme heights of the uncanny. I could not doubt that our presence +had attracted these unseen ringers to the room in which we stood, and +I knew quite well that I was growing pale. This was the room in which +at least one unhappy occupant of The Gables had died of fear. I +recognized the fact that if this mere overture were going to affect my +nerves to such an extent, I could not hope to survive the ordeal of +the night; a great effort was called for. I emptied my glass at a +draught, and stared across the table at Nayland Smith with a sort of +defiance. He was standing very upright and motionless, but his eyes +were turning right and left, searching every visible corner of the big +room. + +"Good!" he said in a very low voice. "The terrorizing power of the +Unknown is boundless, but we must not get in the grip of panic, or we +could not hope to remain in this house ten minutes." + +I nodded without speaking. Then Smith, to my amazement, suddenly began +to speak in a loud voice, a marked contrast to that, almost a whisper, +in which he had spoken formerly. + +"My dear Pearce," he cried, "do you hear the ringing of bells?" + +Clearly the latter words were spoken for the benefit of the unseen +intelligence controlling these manifestations; and although I regarded +such finesse as somewhat wasted, I followed my friend's lead and +replied in a voice as loud as his own: + +"Distinctly, Professor!" + +Silence followed my words, a silence in which both stood watchful and +listening. Then, very faintly, I seemed to detect the silvern ringing +receding away through distant rooms. Finally it became inaudible, and +in the stillness of The Gables I could distinctly hear my companion +breathing. For fully ten minutes we two remained thus, each +momentarily expecting a repetition of the ringing, or the coming of +some new and more sinister manifestation. But we heard nothing and saw +nothing. + +"Hand me that grip, and don't stir until I come back!" hissed Smith in +my ear. + +He turned and walked out of the library, his boots creaking very +loudly in that awe-inspiring silence. + +Standing beside the table, I watched the open door for his return, +crushing down a dread that _another_ form than his might suddenly +appear there. + +I could hear him moving from room to room, and presently, as I waited +in hushed, tense watchfulness, he came in, depositing the grip upon +the table. His eyes were gleaming feverishly. + +"The house is haunted, Pearce!" he cried. "But no ghost ever +frightened _me_! Come, I will show you your room." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +THE FIERY HAND + + +Smith walked ahead of me upstairs; he had snapped up the light in the +hall-way, and now he turned and cried back loudly: + +"I fear we should never get servants to stay here." + +Again I detected the appeal to a hidden Audience; and there was +something very uncanny in the idea. The house now was deathly still; +the ringing had entirely subsided. In the upper corridor my companion, +who seemed to be well acquainted with the position of the switches, +again turned up all the lights, and in pursuit of the strange comedy +which he saw fit to enact, addressed me continuously in the loud and +unnatural voice which he had adopted as part of his disguise. + +We looked into a number of rooms all well and comfortably furnished, +but although my imagination may have been responsible for the idea, +they all seemed to possess a chilly and repellent atmosphere. I felt +that to essay sleep in any one of them would be the merest farce, that +the place to all intents and purposes was uninhabitable, that +something incalculably evil presided over the house. + +And through it all, so obtuse was I that no glimmer of the truth +entered my mind. Outside again in the long, brightly lighted corridor, +we stood for a moment as if a mutual anticipation of some new event +pending had come to us. It was curious--that sudden pulling up and +silent questioning of one another; because, although we acted thus, no +sound had reached us. A few seconds later our anticipation was +realized. From the direction of the stairs it came--a low wailing in a +woman's voice; and the sweetness of the tones added to the terror of +the sound. I clutched at Smith's arm convulsively whilst that uncanny +cry rose and fell--rose and fell--and died away. + +Neither of us moved immediately. My mind was working with feverish +rapidity and seeking to run down a memory which the sound had stirred +into faint quickness. My heart was still leaping wildly when the +wailing began again, rising and falling in regular cadence. At that +instant I identified it. + +During the time Smith and I had spent together in Egypt, two years +before, searching for Kāramančh, I had found myself on one occasion in +the neighbourhood of a native cemetery near to Bedrasheen. Now, the +scene which I had witnessed there rose up again vividly before me, and +I seemed to see a little group of black-robed women clustered together +about a native grave; for the wailing which now was dying away again +in The Gables was the same, or almost the same, as the wailing of +those Egyptian mourners. + +The house was very silent, now. My forehead was damp with +perspiration, and I became more and more convinced that the uncanny +ordeal must prove too much for my nerves. Hitherto, I had accorded +little credence to tales of the supernatural, but face to face with +such manifestations as these, I realized that I would have faced +rather a group of armed dacoits, nay! Dr. Fu-Manchu himself, than have +remained another hour in that ill-omened house. + +My companion must have read as much in my face. But he kept up the +strange and, to me, purposeless comedy when presently he spoke. + +"I feel it to be incumbent upon me to suggest," he said, "that we +spend the night at an hotel after all." + +He walked rapidly downstairs and into the library and began to strap +up the grip. + +"Yet," he said, "there may be a natural explanation of what we've +heard; for it is noteworthy that we have actually _seen_ nothing. It +might even be possible to get used to the ringing and the wailing +after a time. Frankly, I am loath to go back on my bargain!" + +Whilst I stared at him in amazement, he stood there indeterminate as +it seemed. Then-- + +"Come, Pearce!" he cried loudly, "I can see that you do not share my +views; but for my own part I shall return to-morrow and devote further +attention to the phenomena." + +Extinguishing the light, he walked out into the hall-way, carrying the +grip in his hand. I was not far behind him. We walked toward the door +together, and-- + +"Turn the light out, Pearce," directed Smith; "the switch is at your +elbow. We can see our way to the door well enough, now." + +In order to carry out these instructions, it became necessary for me +to remain a few paces in the rear of my companion, and I think I have +never experienced such a pang of nameless terror as pierced me at the +moment of extinguishing the light; for Smith had not yet opened the +door, and the utter darkness of The Gables was horrible beyond +expression. Surely darkness is the most potent weapon of the Unknown. +I know that at the moment my hand left the switch I made for the door +as though the hosts of hell pursued me. I collided violently with +Smith. He was evidently facing toward me in the darkness, for at the +moment of our collision he grasped my shoulder as in a vice. + +"My God, Petrie! look behind you!" he whispered. + +I was enabled to judge of the extent and reality of his fear by the +fact that the strange subterfuge of addressing me always as Pearce was +forgotten. I turned in a flash.... + +Never can I forget what I saw. Many strange and terrible memories are +mine, memories stranger and more terrible than those of the average +man; but this _thing_ which now moved slowly down upon us through the +impenetrable gloom of that haunted place was (if the term be +understood) almost absurdly horrible. It was a medięval legend come to +life in modern London; it was as though some horrible chimera of the +black and ignorant past was become create and potent in the present. + +A luminous hand--a hand in the veins of which fire seemed to run so +that the texture of the skin and the shape of the bones within were +perceptible--in short a hand of glowing, fiery flesh, clutching a +short knife or dagger which also glowed with the same hellish, +infernal luminance, was advancing upon us where we stood--was not +three paces removed! + +What I did or how I came to do it, I can never recall. In all my years +I have experienced nothing to equal the stark panic which seized upon +me then. I know that I uttered a loud and frenzied cry: I know that I +tore myself like a madman from Smith's restraining grip.... + +"Don't touch it! Keep away, for your life!" I heard.... + +But, dimly I recollect that, finding the thing approaching yet +nearer, I lashed out with my fists--madly, blindly--and struck +something palpable.... + +What was the result, I cannot say. At that point my recollections +merge into confusion. Something or some one (Smith, as I afterwards +discovered) was hauling me by main force through the darkness; I fell +a considerable distance on to gravel which lacerated my hands and +gashed my knees. Then, with the cool night air fanning my brow, I was +running--running--my breath coming in hysterical sobs. Beside me fled +another figure.... And my definite recollections commence again at +that point. For this companion of my flight from The Gables threw +himself roughly against me to alter my course. + +"Not that way! not that way!" came pantingly. "Not on to the Heath ... +we must keep to the roads...." + +It was Nayland Smith. That healing realization came to me, bringing +such a gladness as no word of mine can express nor convey. Still we +ran on. + +"There's a policeman's lantern," panted my companion. "They'll attempt +nothing, now!" + + * * * * * + +I gulped down the stiff brandy-and-soda, then glanced across to where +Nayland Smith lay extended in the long cane chair. + +"Perhaps you will explain," I said, "for what purpose you submitted me +to that ordeal. If you proposed to correct my scepticism concerning +supernatural manifestations, you have succeeded." + +"Yes," said my companion musingly, "they are devilishly clever; but we +knew that already." + +I stared at him, fatuously. + +"Have you ever known me to waste my time when there was important work +to do?" he continued. "Do you seriously believe that my ghost-hunting +was undertaken for amusement? Really, Petrie, although you are very +fond of assuring me that I need a holiday, I think the shoe is on the +other foot!" + +From the pocket of his dressing-gown he took out a piece of silk +fringe which had apparently been torn from a scarf, and rolling it +into a ball, tossed it across to me. + +"Smell!" he snapped. + +I did as he directed--and gave a great start. The silk exhaled a faint +perfume, but its effect upon me was as though someone had cried aloud: +"_Kāramančh!_" + +Beyond doubt the silken fragment had belonged to the beautiful servant +of Dr. Fu-Manchu, to the dark-eyed, seductive Kāramančh. Nayland Smith +was watching me keenly. + +"You recognize it--yes?" + +I placed the piece of silk upon the table, slightly shrugging my +shoulders. + +"It was sufficient evidence in itself," continued my friend, "but I +thought it better to seek confirmation, and the obvious way was to +pose as a new lessee of The Gables...." + +"But, Smith--" I began. + +"Let me explain, Petrie. The history of The Gables seemed to be +susceptible of only one explanation; in short it was fairly evident to +me that the object of the manifestations was to ensure the place being +kept empty. This idea suggested another, and with them both in mind, I +set out to make my inquiries, first taking the precaution to disguise +my identity, to which end Weymouth gave me the freedom of Scotland +Yard's fancy wardrobe. I did not take the agent into my confidence, +but posed as a stranger who had heard that the house was to let +furnished and thought it might suit his purpose. My inquiries were +directed to a particular end, but I failed to achieve it at the time. +I had theories, as I have said, and when, having paid the deposit and +secured possession of the keys, I was enabled to visit the place +alone, I was fortunate enough to obtain evidence to show that my +imagination had not misled me. + +"You were very curious the other morning, I recall, respecting my +object in borrowing a large brace-and-bit. My object, Petrie, was to +bore a series of holes in the wainscoting of various rooms at The +Gables--in inconspicuous positions, of course...." + +"But, my dear Smith!" I cried, "you are merely adding to my +mystification." + +He stood up and began to pace the room in his restless fashion. + +"I had cross-examined Weymouth closely regarding the phenomenon of the +bell-ringing, and an exhaustive search of the premises led to the +discovery that the house was in such excellent condition that, from +ground-floor to attic, there was not a solitary crevice large enough +to admit of the passage of a mouse." + +I suppose I must have been staring very foolishly indeed, for Nayland +Smith burst into one of his sudden laughs. + +"A mouse, I said, Petrie!" he cried. "With the brace-and-bit I +rectified that matter. I made the holes I have mentioned, and before +each I set a trap baited with a piece of succulent, toasted cheese. +Just open that grip!" + +The light at last was dawning upon my mental darkness, and I pounced +upon the grip, which stood upon a chair near the window, and opened +it. A sickly smell of cooked cheese assailed my nostrils. + +"Mind your fingers!" cried Smith; "some of them are still set, +possibly." + +Out from the grip I began to take _mouse-traps_! Two or three of them +were still set, but in the case of the greater number the catches had +slipped. Nine I took out and placed upon the table, and all were +empty. In the tenth there crouched, panting, its soft furry body dank +with perspiration, a little white mouse! + +"Only one capture!" cried my companion, "showing how well fed the +creatures were. Examine his tail!" + +But already I had perceived that to which Smith would draw my +attention, and the mystery of the "astral bells" was a mystery no +longer. Bound to the little creature's tail, close to the root, with +fine soft wire such as is used for making up bouquets, were three tiny +silver bells. I looked across at my companion in speechless surprise. + +"Almost childish, is it not?" he said; "yet by means of this simple +device The Gables had been emptied of occupant after occupant. There +was small chance of the trick being detected, for, as I have said, +there was absolutely no aperture from roof to basement by means of +which one of them could have escaped into the building." + +"Then--" + +"They were admitted into the wall cavities and the rafters, from some +cellar underneath, Petrie, to which, after a brief scamper under the +floors and over the ceilings, they instinctively returned for the food +they were accustomed to receive, and for which, even had it been +possible (which it was not), they had no occasion to forage." + +I, too, stood up; for excitement was growing within me. I took up the +piece of silk from the table. + +"Where did you find this?" I asked, my eyes upon Smith's keen face. + +"In a sort of wine cellar, Petrie," he replied, "under the stair. +There is no cellar proper to The Gables--at least no such cellar +appears in the plans." + +"But--" + +"But there _is_ one beyond doubt--yes! It must be part of some older +building which occupied the site before The Gables was built. One can +only surmise that it exists, although such a surmise is a fairly safe +one, and the entrance to the subterranean portion of the building is +situated beyond doubt in the wine cellar. Of this we have at least two +evidences: the finding of the fragment of silk there, and the fact +that in one case at least--as I learnt--the light was extinguished in +the library unaccountably. This could only have been done in one way: +by manipulating the main switch, which is also in the wine cellar." + +"But, Smith!" I cried, "do you mean that _Fu-Manchu_ ...?" + +Nayland Smith turned in his promenade of the floor, and stared into my +eyes. + +"I mean that Dr. Fu-Manchu has had a hiding-place under The Gables for +an indefinite period!" he replied. "I always suspected that a man of +his genius would have a second retreat prepared for him, anticipating +the event of the first being discovered. Oh! I don't doubt it! The +place probably is extensive, and I am almost certain--though the point +has to be confirmed--that there is another entrance from the studio +further along the road. We know, now, why our recent searchings in the +East End have proved futile; why the house in Museum Street was +deserted: he has been lying low in this burrow at Hampstead!" + +"But the hand, Smith, the luminous hand...." + +Nayland Smith laughed shortly. + +"Your superstitious fears overcame you to such an extent, Petrie--and +I don't wonder at it; the sight was a ghastly one--that probably you +don't remember what occurred when you struck out at that same ghostly +hand?" + +"I seemed to hit something." + +"That was why we ran. But I think our retreat had all the appearance +of a rout, as I intended that it should. Pardon my playing upon your +very natural fears, old man, but you could not have _simulated_ panic +half so naturally! And if they had suspected that the device was +discovered, we might never have quitted The Gables alive. It was +touch-and-go for a moment." + +"But--" + +"Turn out the light!" snapped my companion. + +Wondering greatly, I did as he desired. I turned out the light ... and +in the darkness of my study I saw a fiery fist being shaken at me +threateningly!... The bones were distinctly visible, and the +luminosity of the flesh was truly ghastly. + +"Turn on the light again!" cried Smith. + +Deeply mystified, I did so ... and my friend tossed a little electric +pocket-lamp on to the writing table. + +"They used merely a small electric lamp fitted into the handle of a +glass dagger," he said with a sort of contempt. "It was very +effective, but the luminous hand is a phenomenon producible by anyone +who possesses an electric torch." + +"The Gables will be watched?" + +"At last, Petrie, I think we have Fu-Manchu--in his own trap!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +THE NIGHT OF THE RAID + + +"Dash it all, Petrie!" cried Smith, "this is most annoying!" + +The bell was ringing furiously, although midnight was long past. Whom +could my late visitor be? Almost certainly this ringing portended an +urgent case. In other words, I was not fated to take part in what I +anticipated would prove to be the closing scene of the Fu-Manchu +drama. + +"Every one is in bed," I said ruefully; "and how can I possibly see a +patient--in this costume?" + +Smith and I were both arrayed in rough tweeds, and anticipating the +labours before us, had dispensed with collars and wore soft mufflers. +It was hard to be called upon to face a professional interview dressed +thus, and having a big tweed cap pulled down over my eyes. + +Across the writing-table we confronted one another, in dismayed +silence, whilst, below, the bell sent up its ceaseless clangour. + +"It has to be done, Smith," I said regretfully. "Almost certainly it +means a journey and probably an absence of some hours." + +I threw my cap upon the table, turned up my coat to hide the absence +of collar, and started for the door. My last sight of Smith showed him +standing looking after me, tugging at the lobe of his ear and clicking +his teeth together with suppressed irritability. I stumbled down the +dark stairs, along the hall, and opened the front door. Vaguely +visible in the light of a street lamp which stood at no great distance +away, I saw a slender man of medium height confronting me. From the +shadowed face two large and luminous eyes looked out into mine. My +visitor, who, despite the warmth of the evening, wore a heavy +greatcoat, was an Oriental! + +I drew back, apprehensively; then:-- + +"Ah! Dr. Petrie!" he said in a softly musical voice which made me +start again, "to God be all praise that I have found you!" + +Some emotion, which at present I could not define, was stirring within +me. Where had I seen this graceful Eastern youth before? Where had I +heard that soft voice? + +"Do you wish to see me professionally?" I asked--yet even as I put +the question, I seemed to know it unnecessary. + +"So you know me no more?" said the stranger--and his teeth gleamed in +a slight smile. + +Heavens! I knew now what had struck that vibrant chord within me! The +voice, though infinitely deeper, yet had an unmistakable resemblance +to the dulcet tones of Kāramančh--of Kāramančh, whose eyes haunted my +dreams, whose beauty had done much to embitter my years. + +The Oriental youth stepped forward, with outstretched hand. + +"So you know me no more?" he repeated; "but I know _you_, and give +praise to Allah that I have found you!" + +I stepped back, pressed the electric switch, and turned, with leaping +heart, to look into the face of my visitor. It was a face of the +purest Greek beauty, a face that might have served as a model for +Praxiteles; the skin had a golden pallor, which, with the crisp black +hair and magnetic yet velvety eyes, suggested to my fancy that this +was the young Antinoüs risen from the Nile, whose wraith now appeared +to me out of the night. I stifled a cry of surprise, not unmingled +with gladness. + +It was Azīz--the brother of Kāramančh! + +Never could the entrance of a figure upon the stage of a drama have +been more dramatic than the coming of Azīz upon this night of all +nights. I seized the outstretched hand and drew him forward, then +reclosed the door and stood before him a moment in doubt. + +A vaguely troubled look momentarily crossed the handsome face; with +the Oriental's unerring instinct, he had detected the reserve of my +greeting. Yet, when I thought of the treachery of Kāramančh, when I +remembered how she, whom we had befriended, whom we had rescued from +the house of Fu-Manchu, now had turned like the beautiful viper that +she was to strike at the hand that caressed her; when I thought how +to-night we were set upon raiding the place where the evil Chinese +doctor lurked in hiding, were set upon the arrest of that malignant +genius and of all his creatures, Kāramančh amongst them, is it strange +that I hesitated? Yet, again, when I thought of my last meeting with +her, and of how, twice, she had risked her life to save me.... + +So, avoiding the gaze of the lad, I took his arm, and in silence we +two ascended the stairs and entered my study ... where Nayland Smith +stood bolt upright beside the table, his steely eyes fixed upon the +face of the new arrival. + +No look of recognition crossed the bronzed features, and Azīz, who had +started forward with outstretched hands, fell back a step and looked +pathetically from me to Nayland Smith, and from the grim Commissioner +back again to me. The appeal in the velvet eyes was more than I could +tolerate, unmoved. + +"Smith," I said shortly, "you remember Azīz?" + +Not a muscle visibly moved in Smith's face, as he snapped back: + +"I remember him perfectly." + +"He has come, I think, to seek our assistance." + +"Yes, yes!" cried Azīz, laying his hand upon my arm with a gesture +painfully reminiscent of Kāramančh--"I came only to-night to London. +Oh, my gentlemen! I have searched, and searched, and searched, until I +am weary. Often I have wished to die. And then at last I come to +Rangoon...." + +"To Rangoon!" snapped Smith, still with the grey eyes fixed almost +fiercely upon the lad's face. + +"To Rangoon--yes; and there I hear news at last. I hear that you have +seen her--have seen Kāramančh--that you are back in London." He was +not entirely at home with his English. "I know then that she must be +here, too. I ask them everywhere, and they answer 'yes.' Oh, Smith +Pasha!"--he stepped forward and impulsively seized both Smith's +hands--"You know where she is--take me to her!" + +Smith's face was a study in perplexity now. In the past we had +befriended the young Azīz, and it was hard to look upon him in the +light of an enemy. Yet had we not equally befriended his sister?--and +she.... + +At last Smith glanced across at me where I stood just within the +doorway. + +"What do you make of it, Petrie?" he said harshly. "Personally I take +it to mean that our plans have leaked out." He sprang suddenly back +from Azīz, and I saw his glance travelling rapidly over the slight +figure as if in quest of concealed arms. "I take it to be a trap!" + +A moment he stood so, regarding him, and despite my well-grounded +distrust of the Oriental character, I could have sworn that the +expression of pained surprise upon the youth's face was not simulated +but real. Even Smith, I think, began to share my view; for suddenly he +threw himself into the white cane rest-chair, and, still fixedly +regarding Azīz: + +"Perhaps I have wronged you," he said. "If I have, you shall know the +reason presently. Tell your own story!" + +There was a pathetic humidity in the velvet eyes of Azīz--eyes so like +those others that were ever looking into mine in dreams--as glancing +from Smith to me he began, hands outstretched, characteristically, +palms upward and fingers curling, to tell in broken English the story +of his search for Kāramančh.... + +"It was Fu-Manchu, my kind gentlemen--it was the _hākīm_ who is really +not a man at all, but an _efreet_. He found us again less than four +days after you had left us, Smith Pasha!... He found us in Cairo, and +to Kāramančh he made the forgetting of all things--even of me--even of +me...." + +Nayland Smith snapped his teeth together sharply; then: + +"What do you mean by that?" he demanded. + +For my own part I understood well enough, remembering how the +brilliant Chinese doctor once had performed such an operation as this +upon poor Inspector Weymouth; how, by means of an injection of some +serum, prepared (as Kāramančh afterwards told us) from the venom of a +swamp adder or similar reptile, he had induced _amnesia_, or complete +loss of memory. I felt every drop of blood recede from my cheeks. + +"Smith!" I began.... + +"Let him speak for himself," interrupted my friend sharply. + +"They tried to take us both," continued Azīz, still speaking in that +soft, melodious manner, but with deep seriousness. "I escaped, I, who +am swift of foot, hoping to bring help."--He shook his head +sadly--"But, except the All Powerful, who is so powerful as the +_Hākīm_ Fu-Manchu? I hid, my gentlemen, and watched and waited, +one--two--three weeks. At last I saw her again, my sister Kāramančh; +but ah! she did not know me, did not know _me_, Azīz, her brother! She +was in an _arabeeyeh_, and passed me quickly along the _Sharia +en-Nahhāsin_. I ran, and ran, and ran, crying her name, but although +she looked back, she did not know me--she did not know me! I felt that +I was dying, and presently I fell--upon the steps of the Mosque of +Abu." + +He dropped the expressive hands wearily to his sides and sank his chin +upon his breast. + +"And then?" I said huskily--for my heart was fluttering like a captive +bird. + +"Alas! from that day to this I see her no more, my gentlemen. I travel +not only in Egypt but near and far, and still I see her no more until +in Rangoon I hear that which brings me to England again"--he extended +his palms naļvely--"and here I am--Smith Pasha." + +Smith sprang upright again and turned to me. + +"Either I am growing over-credulous," he said, "or Azīz speaks the +truth. But"--he held up his hand--"you can tell me all that at some +other time, Petrie! We must take no chances. Sergeant Carter is +downstairs with the cab; you might ask him to step up. He and Azīz can +remain here until our return." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +THE SAMURAI'S SWORD + + +The muffled drumming of sleepless London seemed very remote from us, +as side by side we crept up the narrow path to the studio. This was a +starry but moonless night, and the little dingy white building with a +solitary tree peeping, in silhouette above its glazed roof, bore an +odd resemblance to one of those tombs which form a city of the dead so +near to the city of feverish life, on the slopes of the Mokattam +Hills. This line of reflection proved unpleasant, and I dismissed it +sternly from my mind. + +The shriek of a train-whistle reached me, a sound which breaks the +stillness of the most silent London night, telling of the ceaseless, +febrile life of the great world-capital whose activity ceases not with +the coming of darkness. Around and about us a very great stillness +reigned, however, and the velvet dusk--which, with the star-jewelled +sky, was strongly suggestive of an Eastern night--gave up no sign to +show that it masked the presence of more than twenty men. Some +distance away on our right was The Gables, that sinister and deserted +mansion which we assumed, and with good reason, to be nothing less +than the gateway to the subterranean abode of Dr. Fu Manchu; before us +was the studio, which, if Nayland Smith's deductions were accurate, +concealed a second entrance to the same mysterious dwelling. + +As my friend, glancing cautiously all about him, inserted the key in +the lock, an owl hooted dismally almost immediately above our heads. I +caught my breath sharply, for it might be a signal; but, looking +upward, I saw a great black shape float slantingly from the tree +beyond the studio into the coppice on the right which hemmed in The +Gables. Silently the owl winged its uncanny flight into the greater +darkness of the trees, and was gone. Smith opened the door and we +stepped into the studio. Our plans had been well considered, and in +accordance with these, I now moved up beside my friend, who was dimly +perceptible to me in the starlight which found access through the +glass roof, and pressed the catch of my electric pocket-lamp.... + +I suppose that by virtue of my self-imposed duty as chronicler of the +deeds of Dr. Fu Manchu--the greatest and most evil genius whom the +later centuries have produced, the man who dreamt of a universal +Yellow Empire--I should have acquired a certain facility in describing +bizarre happenings. But I confess that it fails me now as I attempt in +cold English to portray my emotions when the white beam from the +little lamp cut through the darkness of the studio, and shone fully +upon the beautiful face of _Kāramančh_! + +Less than six feet away from me she stood, arrayed in the gauzy dress +of the harźm, her fingers and slim white arms laden with barbaric +jewelry! The light wavered in my suddenly nerveless hand, gleaming +momentarily upon bare ankles and golden anklets, upon little +red-leather shoes. + +I spoke no word, and Smith was as silent as I; both of us, I think, +were speechless rather from amazement than in obedience to the +evident wishes of Fu-Manchu's slave-girl. Yet I have only to close my +eyes at this moment to see her as she stood, one finger raised to her +lips, enjoining us to silence. She looked ghastly pale in the light of +the lamp, but so lovely that my rebellious heart threatened already to +make a fool of me. + +So we stood in that untidy studio, with canvases and easels heaped +against the wall and with all sorts of litter about us, a trio +strangely met, and one to have amused the high gods watching through +the windows of the stars. + +"Go back!" came in a whisper from Kāramančh. + +I saw the red lips moving and read a dreadful horror in the widely +opened eyes, in those eyes like pools of mystery to taunt the thirsty +soul. The world of realities was slipping past me; I seemed to be +losing my hold on things actual; I had built up an Eastern palace +about myself and Kāramančh, wherein, the world shut out, I might pass +the hours in reading the mystery of those dark eyes. Nayland Smith +brought me sharply to my senses. + +"Steady with the light, Petrie!" he hissed in my ear. "My scepticism +has been shaken to-night, but I am taking no chances." + +He moved from my side and forward toward that lovely, unreal figure +which stood immediately before the model's throne and its background +of plush curtains. Kāramančh started forward to meet him, suppressing +a little cry, whose real anguish could not have been simulated. + +"Go back! go back!" she whispered urgently, and thrust out her hands +against Smith's breast. "For God's sake, go back! I have risked my +life to come here to-night. _He knows_, and is ready...." + +The words were spoken with passionate intensity, and Nayland Smith +hesitated. To my nostrils was wafted that faint, delightful perfume +which, since one night, two years ago, it had come to disturb my +senses, had taunted me many times as the mirage taunts the parched +Sahara traveller. I took a step forward. + +"Don't move!" snapped Smith. + +Kāramančh clutched frenziedly at the lapels of his coat. + +"Listen to me!" she said beseechingly, and stamped one little foot +upon the floor--"listen to me! You are a clever man, but you know +nothing of a woman's heart--nothing--_nothing_--if seeing me, hearing +me, knowing, as you do know, what I risk, you can doubt that I speak +the truth. And I tell you that it is death to go behind those +curtains--that _he_...." + +"That's what I wanted to know!" snapped Smith. His voice quivered with +excitement. + +Suddenly grasping Kāramančh by the waist, he lifted her and set her +aside; then in three bounds he was on to the model's throne and had +torn the plush curtains bodily from their fastenings. + +How it occurred I cannot hope to make clear, for here my recollections +merge into a chaos. I know that Smith seemed to topple forward amid +the purple billows of velvet, and his muffled cry came to me: + +"Petrie! My God, Petrie!..." + +The pale face of Kāramančh looked up into mine and her hands were +clutching me, but the glamour of her personality had lost its hold, +for I knew--heavens how poignantly it struck home to me!--that Nayland +Smith was gone to his death. What I hoped to achieve, I know not, but +hurling the trembling girl aside, I snatched the Browning pistol from +my coat pocket, and with the ray of the lamp directed upon the purple +mound of velvet, I leaped forward. + +I think I realized that the curtains had masked a collapsible trap, a +sheer pit of blackness, an instant before I was precipitated into it, +but certainly the knowledge came too late. With the sound of a soft, +shuddering cry in my ears, I fell, dropping lamp and pistol, and +clutching at the fallen hangings. But they offered me no support. My +head seemed to be bursting; I could utter only a hoarse groan, as I +fell--fell--fell.... + + * * * * * + +When my mind began to work again, in returning consciousness, I found +it to be laden with reproach. How often in the past had we blindly +hurled ourselves into just such a trap as this? Should we never learn +that, where Fu-Manchu was, impetuosity must prove fatal? On two +distinct occasions in the past we had been made the victims of this +device, yet although we had had practically conclusive evidence that +this studio was used by Dr. Fu-Manchu, we had relied upon its floor +being as secure as that of any other studio, we had failed to sound +every foot of it ere trusting our weight to its support.... + +"There is such a divine simplicity in the English mind that one may +lay one's plans with mathematical precision, and rely upon the Nayland +Smiths and Dr. Petries to play their allotted parts. Excepting two +faithful followers, my friends are long since departed. But here, in +these vaults which time has overlooked and which are as secret and as +serviceable to-day as they were two hundred years ago, I wait +patiently, with my trap set, like the spider for the fly!..." + +To the sound of that taunting voice, I opened my eyes. As I did so I +strove to spring upright--only to realize that I was tied fast to a +heavy ebony chair inlaid with ivory, and attached by means of two iron +brackets to the floor. + +"Even children learn from experience," continued the unforgettable +voice, alternately guttural and sibilant, but always as deliberate as +though the speaker were choosing with care words which should +perfectly clothe his thoughts. "For 'a burnt child fears the fire,' +says your English adage. But Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith, who +enjoys the confidence of the India Office, and who is empowered to +control the movements of the Criminal Investigation Department, learns +nothing from experience. He is less than a child, since he has twice +rashly precipitated himself into a chamber charged with an anęsthetic +prepared, by a process of my own, from the _lycoperdon_ or Common +Puffball." + +I became fully master of my senses, and I became fully alive to a +stupendous fact. At last it was ended; we were utterly in the power of +Dr. Fu Manchu; our race was run. + +I sat in a low vaulted room. The roof was of ancient brickwork, but +the walls were draped with exquisite Chinese fabric having a green +ground whereon was a design representing a grotesque procession of +white peacocks. A green carpet covered the floor, and the whole of the +furniture was of the same material as the chair to which I was +strapped, viz. ebony inlaid with ivory. This furniture was scanty. +There was a heavy table in one corner of the dungeonesque place, on +which were a number of books and papers. Before this table was a +high-backed, heavily carven chair. A smaller table stood upon the +right of the only visible opening, a low door partially draped with +bead-work curtains, above which hung a silver lamp. On this smaller +table, a stick of incense, in a silver holder, sent up a pencil of +vapour into the air, and the chamber was loaded with the sickly sweet +fumes. A faint haze from the incense-stick hovered up under the roof. + +In the high-backed chair sat Dr. Fu Manchu, wearing a green robe upon +which was embroidered a design, the subject of which at first glance +was not perceptible, but which presently I made out to be a huge white +peacock. He wore a little cap perched upon the dome of his amazing +skull, and one clawish hand resting upon the ebony of the table, he +sat slightly turned toward me, his emotionless face a mask of +incredible evil. In spite of, or because of, the high intellect +written upon it, the face of Dr. Fu-Manchu was more utterly repellent +than any I have ever known, and the green eyes, eyes green as those of +a cat in the darkness, which sometimes burnt like witch-lamps, and +sometimes were horribly filmed like nothing human or imaginable, might +have mirrored not a soul, but an emanation of Hell, incarnate in this +gaunt, high-shouldered body. + +Stretched flat upon the floor lay Nayland Smith, partially stripped, +his arms thrown back over his head and his wrists chained to a stout +iron staple attached to the wall; he was fully conscious and staring +intently at the Chinese doctor. His bare ankles also were manacled, +and fixed to a second chain, which quivered tautly across the green +carpet and passed out through the doorway, being attached to something +beyond the curtain, and invisible to me from where I sat. + +Fu-Manchu was now silent. I could hear Smith's heavy breathing and +hear my watch ticking in my pocket. I suddenly realized that although +my body was lashed to the ebony chair, my hands and arms were free. +Next, looking dazedly about me, my attention was drawn to a heavy +sword which stood hilt upward against the wall within reach of my +hand. It was a magnificent piece, of Japanese workmanship; a long, +curved Damascened blade having a double-handed hilt of steel, inlaid +with gold, and resembling fine Kuft work. A host of possibilities +swept through my mind. Then I perceived that the sword was attached to +the wall by a thin steel chain some five feet in length. + +"Even if you had the dexterity of a Mexican knife-thrower," came the +guttural voice of Fu-Manchu, "you would be unable to reach me, dear +Dr. Petrie." + +The Chinaman had read my thoughts. + +Smith turned his eyes upon me momentarily, only to look away again in +the direction of Fu Manchu. My friend's face was slightly pale beneath +the tan, and his jaw muscles stood out with unusual prominence. By +this fact alone did he reveal the knowledge that he lay at the mercy +of this enemy of the white race, of this inhuman being who himself +knew no mercy, of this man whose very genius was inspired by the cool, +calculated cruelty of his race, of that race which to this day +disposes of hundreds, nay, thousands, of its unwanted girl-children by +the simple measure of throwing them down a well specially dedicated to +the purpose. + +"The weapon near your hand," continued the Chinaman imperturbably, "is +a product of the civilization of our near neighbours the Japanese, a +race to whose courage I prostrate myself in meekness. It is the sword +of a _samurai_, Dr. Petrie. It is of very great age, and was, until an +unfortunate misunderstanding with myself led to the extinction of the +family, a treasured possession of a noble Japanese house...." + +The soft voice, into which an occasional sibilance crept, but which +never rose above a cool monotone, gradually was lashing me into fury, +and I could see the muscles moving in Smith's jaws as he convulsively +clenched his teeth; whereby I knew that, impotent, he burned with a +rage at least as great as mine. But I did not speak, and did not move. + +"The ancient tradition of _seppuku_," continued the Chinaman, "or +_hara-kira_, still rules, as you know, in the great families of Japan. +There is a sacred ritual, and the _samurai_ who dedicates himself to +this honourable end, must follow strictly the ritual. As a physician, +the exact nature of the ceremony might possibly interest you, Dr. +Petrie, but a technical account of the two incisions which the +sacrificant employs in his self-dismissal, might, on the other hand, +bore Mr. Nayland Smith. Therefore I will merely enlighten you upon +one little point, a minor one, but interesting to the student of human +nature. In short, even a _samurai_--and no braver race has ever +honoured the world--sometimes hesitates to complete the operation. The +weapon near to your hand, my dear Dr. Petrie, is known as the Friend's +Sword. On such occasions as we are discussing, a trusty friend is +given the post--an honoured one--of standing behind the brave man who +offers himself to his gods, and should the latter's courage +momentarily fail him, the friend with the trusty blade (to which now I +especially direct your attention) diverts the hierophant's mind from +his digression, and rectifies his temporary breach of etiquette by +severing the cervical vertebrę of the spinal column with the friendly +blade--which you can reach quite easily, Dr. Petrie, if you care to +extend your hand." + +Some dim perception of the truth was beginning to creep into my mind. +When I say a perception of the truth, I mean rather of some part of +the purpose of Dr. Fu-Manchu; of the whole horrible truth, of the +scheme which had been conceived by that mighty, evil man, I had no +glimmering, but I foresaw that a frightful ordeal was before us both. + +"That I hold you in high esteem," continued Fu-Manchu, "is a fact +which must be apparent to you by this time, but in regard to your +companion, I entertain very different sentiments...." + +Always underlying the deliberate calm of the speaker, sometimes +showing itself in an unusually deep guttural, sometimes in an +unusually serpentine sibilant, lurked the frenzy of hatred which in +the past had revealed itself occasionally in wild outbursts. +Momentarily I expected such an outburst now, but it did not come. + +"One quality possessed by Mr. Nayland Smith," resumed the Chinaman, "I +admire; I refer to his courage. I would wish that so courageous a man +should seek his own end, should voluntarily efface himself from the +path of that world-movement which he is powerless to check. In short, +I would have him show himself a _samurai_. Always his friend, you +shall remain so to the end, Dr. Petrie. I have arranged for this." + +He struck lightly a little silver gong, dependent from the corner of +the table, whereupon, from the curtained doorway, there entered a +short, thickly built Burman whom I recognized for a dacoit. He wore a +shoddy blue suit, which had been made for a much larger man; but these +things claimed little of my attention, which automatically was +directed to the load beneath which the Burman laboured. + +Upon his back he carried a sort of wire box rather less than six feet +long, some two feet high, and about two feet wide. In short, it was a +stout framework covered with fine wire-netting on the tops, sides and +ends, but open at the bottom. It seemed to be made in five sections, +or to contain four sliding partitions which could be raised or lowered +at will. These were of wood, and in the bottom of each was cut a +little arch. The arches in the four partitions varied in size, so that +whereas the first was not more than five inches high, the fourth +opened almost to the wire roof of the box or cage; and a fifth, which +was but little higher than the first, was cut in the actual end of the +contrivance. + +So intent was I upon this device, the purpose of which I was wholly +unable to divine, that I directed the whole of my attention upon it. +Then, as the Burman paused in the doorway, resting a corner of the +cage upon the brilliant carpet, I glanced toward Dr. Fu-Manchu. He was +watching Nayland Smith, and revealing his irregular yellow teeth--the +teeth of an opium smoker--in the awful mirthless smile which I knew. + +"God!" whispered Smith, "the Six Gates!" + +"Your knowledge of my beautiful country serves you well," replied +Fu-Manchu gently. + +Instantly I looked to my friend ... and every drop of blood seemed to +recede from my heart, leaving it cold in my breast. If _I_ did not +know the purpose of the cage, obviously Smith knew it all too well. +His pallor had grown more marked, and although his grey eyes stared +defiantly at the Chinaman, I, who knew him, could read a deathly +horror in their depths. + +The dacoit, in obedience to a guttural order from Dr. Fu Manchu, +placed the cage upon the carpet, completely covering Smith's body, but +leaving his neck and head exposed. The seared and pock-marked face set +in a sort of placid leer, the dacoit adjusted the sliding partitions +to Smith's recumbent form, and I saw the purpose of the graduated +arches. They were intended to divide a human body in just such +fashion, and, as I realized, were most cunningly shaped to that end. +The whole of Smith's body lay now in the wire cage, each of the five +compartments whereof was shut off from its neighbour. + +The Burman stepped back and stood waiting in the doorway. Dr. Fu +Manchu, removing his gaze from the face of my friend, directed it now +upon me. + +"Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith shall have the honour of acting as +hierophant, admitting himself to the Mysteries," said Fu Manchu +softly, "and you, Dr. Petrie, shall be the Friend." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +THE SIX GATES + + +He glanced toward the Burman, who retired immediately, to re-enter a +moment later carrying a curious leather sack, in shape not unlike that +of a _sakkį_ or Arab water-carrier. Opening a little trap in the top +of the first compartment of the cage (that is, the compartment which +covered Smith's bare feet and ankles), he inserted the neck of the +sack, then suddenly seized it by the bottom and shook it vigorously. +Before my horrified gaze, four huge rats came tumbling out from the +bag into the cage! + +The dacoit snatched away the sack and snapped the shutter fast. A +moving mist obscured my sight, a mist through which I saw the green +eyes of Dr. Fu-Manchu fixed upon me, and through which, as from a +great distance, his voice, sunk to a snakelike hiss, came to my ears. + +"Cantonese rats, Dr. Petrie ... the most ravenous in the world ... +they have eaten nothing for nearly a week!" + +Then all became blurred as though a painter with a brush steeped in +red had smudged out the details of the picture. For an indefinite +period, which seemed like many minutes yet probably was only a few +seconds, I saw nothing and heard nothing; my sensory nerves were +dulled entirely. From this state I was awakened and brought back to +the realities by a sound which ever afterward I was doomed to +associate with that ghastly scene. + +This was the squealing of the rats. + +The red mist seemed to disperse at that, and with frightfully intense +interest, I began to study the awful torture to which Nayland Smith +was being subjected. The dacoit had disappeared, and Fu-Manchu +placidly was watching the four lean and hideous animals in the cage. +As I also turned my eyes in that direction, the rats overcame their +temporary fear, and began.... + +"You have been good enough to notice," said the Chinaman, his voice +still sunk in that sibilant whisper, "my partiality for dumb allies. +You have met my scorpions, my death-adders, my baboon-man. The uses of +such a playful little animal as a marmoset have never been fully +appreciated before, I think, but to an indiscretion of this last-named +pet of mine I seem to remember that you owed something in the past, +Dr. Petrie...." + +Nayland Smith stifled a deep groan. One rapid glance I ventured at his +face. It was a greyish hue now, and dank with perspiration. His gaze +met mine. + +The rats had almost ceased squealing. + +"Much depends upon yourself, doctor," continued Fu-Manchu, slightly +raising his voice. "I credit Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith with +courage high enough to sustain the raising of all the gates; but I +estimate the strength of your friendship highly, also, and predict +that you will use the sword of the _samurai_ certainly not later than +the time when I shall raise the third gate...." + +A low shuddering sound, which I cannot hope to describe, but alas! can +never forget, broke from the lips of the tortured man. + +"In China," resumed Fu-Manchu, "we call this quaint fancy the Six +Gates of Joyful Wisdom. The first gate, by which the rats are +admitted, is called the Gate of Joyous Hope; the second, the Gate of +Mirthful Doubt. The third gate is poetically named the Gate of True +Rapture, and the fourth, the Gate of Gentle Sorrow. I once was +honoured in the friendship of an exalted mandarin who sustained the +course of Joyful Wisdom to the raising of the fifth gate (called the +Gate of Sweet Desires) and the admission of the twentieth rat. I +esteem him almost equally with my ancestors. The sixth, or Gate +Celestial--whereby a man enters into the Joy of Complete +Understanding--I have dispensed with, here, substituting a Japanese +fancy of an antiquity nearly as great and honourable. The introduction +of this element of speculation I count a happy thought, and +accordingly take pride to myself." + +"The sword, Petrie!" whispered Smith. I should not have recognized his +voice, but he spoke quite evenly and steadily. "I rely upon you, old +man, to spare me the humiliation of asking mercy from that yellow +fiend!" + +My mind throughout this time had been gaining a sort of dreadful +clarity. I had avoided looking at the sword of _kara-kiri_, but my +thoughts had been leading me mercilessly up to the point at which we +were now arrived. No vestige of anger, of condemnation of the inhuman +being seated in the ebony chair, remained; that was past. Of all that +had gone before, and of what was to come in the future, I thought +nothing, knew nothing. Our long fight against the yellow group, our +encounters with the numberless creatures of Fu Manchu, the +dacoits--even Kāramančh--were forgotten, blotted out. I saw nothing of +the strange appointments of that subterranean chamber; but face to +face with the supreme moment of a lifetime, I was alone with my poor +friend--and God. + +The rats began squealing again. They were fighting.... + +"Quick, Petrie! Quick, man! I am weakening...." + +I turned and took up the _samurai_ sword. My hands were very hot and +dry, but perfectly steady, and I tested the edge of the heavy weapon +upon my left thumb-nail as quietly as one might test a razor blade. It +was keen, this blade of ghastly history, as any razor ever wrought in +Sheffield. I seized the graven hilt, bent forward in my chair, and +raised the Friend's Sword high above my head. With the heavy weapon +poised there, I looked into my friend's eyes. They were feverishly +bright, but never in all my days, nor upon the many beds of suffering +which it had been my lot to visit, had I seen an expression like that +within them. + +"The raising of the First Gate is always a crucial moment," came the +guttural voice of the Chinaman. + +Although I did not see him, and barely heard his words, I was aware +that he had stood up and was bending forward over the lower end of the +cage. + +"Now, Petrie! now! God bless you ... and good-bye...." + + * * * * * + +From somewhere--somewhere remote--I heard a hoarse and animal-like +cry, followed by the sound of a heavy fall. I can scarcely bear to +write of that moment, for I had actually begun the downward sweep of +the great sword when that sound came--a faint Hope, speaking of aid +where I had thought no aid possible. + +How I contrived to divert the blade, I do not know to this day; but I +do know that its mighty sweep sheared a lock from Smith's head and +laid open the scalp. With the hilt in my quivering hands I saw the +blade bite deeply through the carpet and floor above Nayland Smith's +skull. There, buried fully two inches in the woodwork, it stuck, and +still clutching the hilt, I looked to the right and across the room--I +looked to the curtained doorway. + +Fu-Manchu, with one long, claw-like hand upon the top of the first +gate, was bending over the trap, but his brilliant green eyes were +turned in the same direction as my own--upon the curtained doorway. + +Upright within it, her beautiful face as pale as death, but her great +eyes blazing with a sort of splendid madness, stood Kāramančh! + +She looked, not at the tortured man, not at me, but fully at Dr. +Fu-Manchu. One hand clutched the trembling draperies; now she suddenly +raised the other, so that the jewels on her white arm glittered in the +light of the lamp above the door. She held my Browning pistol! +Fu-Manchu sprang upright, inhaling sibilantly, as Kāramančh pointed +the pistol point-blank at his high skull and fired.... + +I saw a little red streak appear, up by the neutral-coloured hair, +under the black cap. I became as a detached intelligence, unlinked +with the corporeal, looking down upon a thing which for some reason I +had never thought to witness. + +Fu-Manchu threw up both arms, so that the sleeves of the green robe +fell back to the elbows. He clutched at his head and the black cap +fell behind him. He began to utter short, guttural cries; he swayed +backward--to the right--to the left--then lurched forward right across +the cage. There he lay, writhing, for a moment, his baneful eyes +turned up, revealing the whites; and the great grey rats, released, +began leaping about the room. Two shot like grey streaks past the slim +figure in the doorway, one darted behind the chair to which I was +lashed, and the fourth ran all around against the wall.... Fu-Manchu, +prostrate across the overturned cage, lay still, his massive head +sagging downward. + +I experienced a mental repetition of my adventure in the earlier +evening--I was dropping, dropping, dropping into some bottomless pit ... +warm arms were about my neck; and burning kisses upon my lips. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +THE CALL OF THE EAST + + +I seemed to haul myself back out of the pit of unconsciousness by the +aid of two little hands which clasped my own. I uttered a sigh that +was almost a sob, and opened my eyes. + +I was sitting in the big red-leathern armchair in my own study ... and +a lovely but truly bizarre figure, in a harźm dress, was kneeling on +the carpet at my feet; so that my first sight of the world was the +sweetest sight that the world had to offer me, the dark eyes of +Kāramančh, with tears trembling like jewels upon her lashes! + +I looked no further than that, heeded not if there were others in the +room beside we two, but, gripping the jewel-laden fingers in what must +have been a cruel clasp, I searched the depths of the glorious eyes in +ever-growing wonder. What change had taken place in those limpid, +mysterious pools? Why was a wild madness growing up within me like a +flame? Why was the old longing returned, ten-thousandfold, to snatch +that pliant, exquisite shape to my breast? + +No word was spoken, but the spoken words of a thousand ages could not +have expressed one tithe what was held in that silent communion. A +hand was laid hesitatingly on my shoulder. I tore my gaze away from +the lovely face so near to mine, and glanced up. + +Azīz stood at the back of my chair! + +"God is all merciful," he said. "My sister is restored to us" (I loved +him for the plural) "and she _remembers_." + +Those few words were enough; I understood now that this lovely girl, +who half knelt, half lay at my feet, was not the evil, perverted +creature of Fu-Manchu whom we had gone out to arrest with the other +vile servants of the Chinese doctor, but was the old, beloved +companion of two years ago, the Kāramančh for whom I had sought long +and wearily in Egypt, who had been swallowed up and lost to me in that +land of mystery. + +The loss of memory which Fu-Manchu had artificially induced was +subject to the same inexplicable laws which ordinarily rule in cases +of _amnesia_. The shock of her brave action that night had begun to +effect a cure; the sight of Azīz had completed it. + +Inspector Weymouth was standing by the writing-table. My mind cleared +rapidly now, and standing up, but without releasing the girl's hands, +so that I drew her up beside me, I said: + +"Weymouth--where is--? + +"He's waiting to see you, doctor," replied the Inspector. + +A pang, almost physical, struck at my heart. + +"Poor, dear old Smith!" I cried, with a break in my voice. + +Dr. Gray, a neighbouring practitioner, appeared in the doorway at the +moment that I spoke the words. + +"It's all right, Petrie," he said, reassuringly; "I think we took it +in time. I have thoroughly cauterised the wounds, and granted that no +complication sets in, he'll be on his feet again in a week or two." + +I suppose I was in a condition closely bordering upon the hysterical. +At any rate, my behaviour was extraordinary. I raised both my hands +above my head. + +"Thank God!" I cried at the top of my voice, "thank God!--thank God!" + +"Thank Him, indeed," responded the musical voice of Azīz. He spoke +with all the passionate devoutness of the true Moslem. + +Everything, even Kāramančh, was forgotten, and I started for the door +as though my life depended upon my speed. With one foot upon the +landing, I turned, looked back, and met the glance of Inspector +Weymouth. + +"What have you done with the--body?" I asked. + +"We haven't been able to get to it. That end of the vault collapsed +two minutes after we hauled you out!" + + * * * * * + +As I write, now, of these strange days, already they seem remote and +unreal. But, where other and more dreadful memories already are grown +misty, the memory of that evening in my rooms remains clear-cut and +intimate. It marked a crisis in my life. + +During the days that immediately followed, whilst Smith was slowly +recovering from his hurts, I made my plans, deliberately; I prepared +to cut myself off from old associations--prepared to exile myself, +gladly; how gladly I cannot hope to express in mere cold words. + +That my friend approved of my projects I cannot truthfully state, but +his disapproval at least was not openly expressed. To Kāramančh I said +nothing of my plans, but her complete reliance in my powers to protect +her, now, from all harm, was at once pathetic and exquisite. + +Since, always, I have sought in these chronicles, to confine myself to +the facts directly relating to the malignant activity of Dr. +Fu-Manchu, I shall abstain from burdening you with details of my +private affairs. As an instrument of the Chinese doctor, it has +sometimes been my duty to write of the beautiful Eastern girl; I +cannot suppose that my readers have any further curiosity respecting +her from the moment that Fate freed her from that awful servitude. +Therefore, when I shall have dealt with the episodes which marked our +voyage to Egypt--I had opened negotiations in regard to a practice in +Cairo--I may honourably lay down my pen. + +These episodes opened, dramatically upon the second night of the +voyage from Marseilles. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +"MY SHADOW LIES UPON YOU" + + +I suppose I did not awake very readily. Following the nervous +vigilance of the past six months, my tired nerves, in the enjoyment of +this relaxation, were rapidly recuperating. I no longer feared to +awaken to find a knife at my throat, no longer dreaded the darkness as +a foe. + +So that the voice may have been calling (indeed, _had_ been calling) +for some time, and of this I had been hazily conscious before finally +I awoke. Then, ere the new sense of security came to reassure me, the +old sense of impending harm set my heart leaping nervously. There is +always a certain physical panic attendant upon such awakenings in the +still of night, especially in novel surroundings. Now I sat up +abruptly, clutching at the rail of my berth and listening. + +There was a soft thudding on my cabin door, and a voice, low and +urgent, was crying my name. + +Through the port-hole the moonlight streamed into my room, and save +for a remote and soothing throb, inseparable from the progress of a +great steamship, nothing else disturbed the stillness; I might have +floated lonely upon the bosom of the Mediterranean. But there was the +drumming on the door again, and the urgent appeal: + +"Dr. Petrie! Dr. Petrie!" + +I threw off the bedclothes and stepped on to the floor of the cabin, +fumbling hastily for my slippers. A fear that something was amiss, +that some aftermath, some wraith of the dread Chinaman, was yet to +come to disturb our premature peace, began to haunt me. I threw open +the door. + +Upon the gleaming deck, blackly outlined against a wondrous sky, +stood a man who wore a blue greatcoat over his pyjamas, and whose +unstockinged feet were thrust into red slippers. It was Platts, the +Marconi operator. + +"I'm awfully sorry to disturb you, Dr. Petrie," he said, "and I was +even less anxious to arouse your neighbour; but somebody seems to be +trying to get a message, presumably urgent, through to you." + +"To me!" I cried. + +"I cannot make it out," admitted Platts, running his fingers through +dishevelled hair, "but I thought it better to arouse you. Will you +come up?" + +I turned without a word, slipped into my dressing-gown, and with +Platts passed aft along the deserted deck. The sea was as calm as a +great lake. Ahead, on the port bow, an angry flambeau burnt redly +beneath the peaceful vault of the heavens. Platts nodded absently in +the direction of the weird flames. + +"Stromboli," he said; "we shall be nearly through the Straits by +breakfast-time." + +We mounted the narrow stair to the Marconi deck. At the table sat +Platts' assistant with the Marconi attachment upon his head--an +apparatus which always set me thinking of the electric chair. + +"Have you got it?" demanded my companion as we entered the room. + +"It's still coming through," replied the other without moving, "but in +the same jerky fashion. Every time I get it, it seems to have gone +back to the beginning--just _Dr. Petrie_--_Dr. Petrie_." + +He began to listen again for the elusive message. I turned to Platts. + +"Where is it being sent from?" I asked. + +Platts shook his head. + +"That's the mystery," he declared. "Look!"--he pointed to the table; +"according to the Marconi chart, there's a Messageries boat due west +between us and Marseilles, and the homeward-bound P. & O. which we +passed this morning must be getting on that way also, by now. The +_Isis_ is somewhere ahead, but I've spoken all these, and the message +comes from none of them." + +"Then it may come from Messina." + +"It doesn't come from Messina," replied the man at the table, +beginning to write rapidly. + +Platts stepped forward and bent over the message which the other was +writing. + +"Here it is!" he cried excitedly; "we're getting it." + +Stepping in turn to the table, I leant over between the two and read +these words as the operator wrote them down: _Dr. Petrie_--_my +shadow_.... + +I drew a quick breath and gripped Platt's shoulder harshly. His +assistant began fingering the instrument with irritation. + +"Lost it again!" he muttered. + +"This message...." I began. + +But again the pencil was travelling over the paper:--_lies upon you +all_ ... _end of message_. + +The operator stood up and unclasped the receivers from his ears. +There, high above the sleeping ship's company, with the blue carpet of +the Mediterranean stretched indefinitely about us, we three stood +looking at one another. By virtue of a miracle of modern science, some +one, divided from me by mile upon mile of boundless ocean, had +spoken--and had been heard. + +"Is there no means of learning," I said, "from whence this message +emanated?" + +Platts shook his head, perplexedly. + +"They gave no code word," he said. "God knows who they were. It's a +strange business and a strange message. Have you any sort of idea, Dr. +Petrie, respecting the identity of the sender?" + +I stared him hard in the face; an idea had mechanically entered my +mind, but one of which I did not choose to speak, since it was opposed +to human possibility. + +But had I not seen with my own eyes the bloody streak across his +forehead as the shot fired by Kāramančh entered his high skull, had I +not known, so certainly as it is given to men to know, that the giant +intellect was no more, the mighty will impotent, I should have +replied: + +"The message is from Dr. Fu Manchu!" + +My reflections were rudely terminated and my sinister thoughts given +new stimulus, by a loud though muffled cry which reached me from +somewhere in the ship below. Both my companions started as violently +as I, whereby I knew that the mystery of the wireless message had not +been without its effect upon their minds also. But whereas they paused +in doubt, I leapt from the room and almost threw myself down the +ladder. + +It was Kāramančh who had uttered that cry of fear and horror! + +Although I could perceive no connection betwixt the strange message +and the cry in the night, intuitively I linked them, intuitively I +knew that my fears had been well grounded; that the shadow of Fu +Manchu still lay upon us. + +Kāramančh occupied a large stateroom aft on the main deck; so that I +had to descend from the upper deck on which my own room was situated +to the promenade deck, again to the main deck, and thence proceed +nearly the whole length of the alleyway. + +Kāramančh and her brother, Azīz, who occupied a neighbouring room, met +me, near the library. Kāramančh's eyes were wide with fear; her +peerless colouring had fled, and she was white to the lips. Azīz, who +wore a dressing-gown thrown hastily over his night attire, had his arm +protectively about the girl's shoulders. + +"The mummy!" she whispered tremulously, "the mummy!" + +There came a sound of opening doors, and several passengers, whom +Kāramančh's cries had alarmed, appeared in various stages of undress. +A stewardess came running from the far end of the alleyway, and I +found time to wonder at my own speed; for, starting from the distant +Marconi deck, yet I had been the first to arrive upon the scene. + +Stacey, the ship's doctor, was quartered at no great distance from the +spot, and he now joined the group. Anticipating the question which +trembled upon the lips of several of those about me-- + +"Come to Dr. Stacey's room," I said, taking Kāramančh's arm; "we will +give you something to enable you to sleep." I turned to the group. "My +patient has had severe nerve trouble," I explained, "and has developed +somnambulistic tendencies." + +I declined the stewardess's offer of assistance, with a slight shake +of the head, and shortly the four of us entered the doctor's cabin, on +the deck above. Stacey carefully closed the door. He was an old +fellow-student of mine, and already he knew much of the history of the +beautiful Eastern girl and her brother Azīz. + +"I fear there's mischief afoot, Petrie," he said. "Thanks to your +presence of mind, the ship's gossips need know nothing of it." + +I glanced at Kāramančh, who, since the moment of my arrival, had never +once removed her gaze from me; she remained in that state of passive +fear in which I had found her, the lovely face pallid; and she stared +at me fixedly in a childish, expressionless way which made me dread +that the shock to which she had been subjected, whatever its nature, +had caused a relapse into that strange condition of forgetfulness from +which a previous shock had aroused her. I could see that Stacey shared +my view, for-- + +"Something has frightened you," he said gently, seating himself on the +arm of Kāramančh's chair and patting her hand as if to reassure her. +"Tell us all about it." + +For the first time since our meeting that night, the girl turned her +eyes from me and glanced up at Stacey, a sudden warm blush stealing +over her face and throat and as quickly departing, to leave her even +more pale than before. She grasped Stacey's hand in both her own--and +looked again at me. + +"Send for Mr. Nayland Smith without delay!" she said, and her sweet +voice was slightly tremulous. "He must be put on his guard!" + +I started up. + +"Why?" I said. "For God's sake tell us what has happened!" + +Azīz, who evidently was as anxious as myself for information, and who +now knelt at his sister's feet looking up at her with that strange +love, which was almost adoration, in his eyes, glanced back at me and +nodded his head rapidly. + +"Something "--Kāramančh paused, shuddering violently--"some dreadful +thing, like a mummy escaped from its tomb, came into my room to-night +through the port-hole...." + +"Through the port-hole?" echoed Dr. Stacey amazedly. + +"Yes, yes, through the port-hole! A creature tall and very, very thin. +He wore wrappings--yellow wrappings, swathed about his head, so that +only his eyes, his evil gleaming eyes, were visible.... From waist to +knees he was covered, also, but his body, his feet, and his legs were +bare...." + +"Was he--?" I began. + +"He was a brown man, yes." Kāramančh, divining my question, nodded, +and the shimmering cloud of her wonderful hair, hastily confined, +burst free and rippled about her shoulders. "A gaunt, fleshless brown +man, who bent, and writhed bony fingers--so!" + +"A thug!" I cried. + +"He--it--the mummy thing--would have strangled me if I had slept, for +he crouched over the berth--seeking--seeking...." + +I clenched my teeth convulsively. + +"But I was sitting up--" + +"With the light on?" interrupted Stacey in surprise. + +"No," added Kāramančh; "the light was out." She turned her eyes toward +me, as the wonderful blush overspread her face once more. "I was +sitting thinking. It all happened within a few seconds, and quite +silently. As the mummy crouched over the berth, I unlocked the door +and leapt out into the passage. I think I screamed; I did not mean to. +Oh, Dr. Stacey, there is not a moment to spare! Mr. Nayland Smith must +be warned immediately. Some horrible servant of Dr. Fu-Manchu is on +the ship!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +THE TRAGEDY + + +Nayland Smith leant against the edge of the dressing-table, attired in +pyjamas. The little stateroom was hazy with smoke, and my friend +gripped the charred briar between his teeth and watched the blue-grey +clouds arising from the bowl, in an abstracted way. I knew that he was +thinking hard, and from the fact that he had exhibited no surprise +when I had related to him the particulars of the attack upon +Kāramančh, I judged that he had half anticipated something of the +kind. Suddenly he stood up, staring at me fixedly. + +"Your tact has saved the situation, Petrie," he snapped. "It failed +you momentarily, though, when you proposed to me just now that we +should muster the lascars for inspection. Our game is to pretend that +we know nothing--that we believe Kāramančh to have had a bad dream." + +"But, Smith--" I began. + +"It would be useless, Petrie," he interrupted me. "You cannot suppose +that I overlooked the possibility of some creature of the Doctor's +being among the lascars. I can assure you that not one of them answers +to the description of the midnight assailant. From the girl's account +we have to look (discarding the idea of a revivified mummy) for a man +of unusual height--and there's no lascar of unusual height on board; +and from the visible evidence, that he entered the stateroom through +the port-hole, we have to look for a man more than normally thin. In a +word, the servant of Dr. Fu-Manchu who attempted the life of Kāramančh +is either in hiding in the ship, or if visible, is disguised." + +With his usual clarity, Nayland Smith had visualized the facts of the +case; I passed in mental survey each one of the passengers, and those +of the crew whose appearances were familiar to me, with the result +that I had to admit the justice of my friend's conclusions. Smith +began to pace the narrow strip of carpet between the dressing-table +and the door. Suddenly he began again. + +"From our knowledge of Fu-Manchu--and of the group surrounding him +(and, don't forget, _surviving_ him)--we may further assume that the +wireless message was no gratuitous piece of melodrama, but that it was +directed to a definite end. Let us endeavour to link up the chain a +little. You occupy an upper-berth; so do I. Experience of the Chinaman +has formed a habit in both of us: that of sleeping with closed +windows. Your port was fastened and so was my own. Kāramančh is +quartered on the main deck, and her brother's stateroom opens into the +same alleyway. Since the ship is in the Straits of Messina, and the +glass set fair, the stewards have not closed the port-holes nightly +at present. We know that that of Kāramančh's stateroom was open. +Therefore, in any attempt upon our quarter, Kāramančh would +automatically be selected for the victim, since failing you or myself +she may be regarded as being the most obnoxious to Dr. Fu-Manchu." + +I nodded comprehendingly. Smith's capacity for throwing the white +light of reason into the darkest places often amazed me. + +"You may have noticed," he continued, "that Kāramančh's room is +directly below your own. In the event of any outcry, you would be +sooner upon the scene than I should, for instance, because I sleep on +the opposite side of the ship. This circumstance I take to be the +explanation of the wireless message, which, because of its hesitancy +(a piece of ingenuity very characteristic of the group), led to your +being awakened and invited up to the Marconi deck; in short, it gave +the would-be assassin a better chance of escaping before your +arrival." + +I watched my friend in growing wonder. The strange events, seemingly +having no link, took their place in the drama, and became well-ordered +episodes in a plot that only a criminal genius could have devised. As +I studied the keen, bronzed face, I realized to the full the +stupendous mental power of Dr. Fu-Manchu, measuring it by the +criterion of Nayland Smith's. For the cunning Chinaman, in a sense, +had foiled this brilliant man before me, whereby if by naught else I +might know him a master of his evil art. + +"I regard the episode," continued Smith, "as a posthumous attempt of +the Doctor's; a legacy of hate which may prove more disastrous than +any attempt made upon us by Fu-Manchu in life. Some fiendish member of +the murder group is on board the ship. We must, as always, meet guile +with guile. There must be no appeal to the Captain, no public +examination of passengers and crew. One attempt has failed; I do not +doubt that others will be made. At present, you will enact the rōle of +physician-in-attendance upon Kāramančh, and will put it about for whom +it may interest that a slight return of her nervous trouble is causing +her to pass uneasy nights. I can safely leave this part of the case to +you, I think?" + +I nodded rapidly. + +"I haven't troubled to make inquiries," added Smith, "but I think it +probable that the regulation respecting closed ports will come into +operation immediately we have passed the Straits, or at any rate +immediately there is any likelihood of bad weather." + +"You mean--" + +"I mean that no alteration should be made in our habits. A second +attempt along similar lines is to be apprehended--to-night. After that +we may begin to look out for a new danger." + +"I pray we may avoid it," I said fervently. + +As I entered the saloon for breakfast in the morning, I was subjected +to solicitous inquiries from Mrs. Prior, the gossip of the ship. Her +room adjoined Kāramančh's, and she had been one of the passengers +aroused by the girl's cries in the night. Strictly adhering to my +rōle, I explained that my patient was threatened with a second nervous +breakdown, and was subject to vivid and disturbing dreams. One or two +other inquiries I met in the same way, ere escaping to the corner +table reserved to us. + +That iron-bound code of conduct which rules the Anglo-Indian, in the +first days of the voyage had threatened to ostracise Kāramančh and +Azīz, by reason of the Eastern blood to which their brilliant but +peculiar type of beauty bore witness. Smith's attitude, however--and, +in a Burmese Commissioner, it constituted something of a law--had done +much to break down the barriers; the extraordinary beauty of the girl +had done the rest. So that now, far from finding themselves shunned, +the society of Kāramančh and her romantic-looking brother was +universally courted. The last inquiry that morning, respecting my +interesting patient, came from the Bishop of Damascus, a benevolent +old gentleman whose ancestry was not wholly innocent of Oriental +strains, and who sat at a table immediately behind me. As I settled +down to my porridge, he turned his chair slightly and bent to my ear. + +"Mrs. Prior tells me that your charming friend was disturbed last +night," he whispered. "She seems rather pale this morning; I sincerely +trust that she is suffering no ill effect." + +I swung around, with a smile. Owing to my carelessness, there was a +slight collision, and the poor bishop, who had been invalided to +England after typhoid, in order to undergo special treatment, +suppressed an exclamation of pain, although his fine dark eyes gleamed +kindly upon me through the pebbles of his gold-rimmed pince-nez. + +Indeed, despite his Eastern blood, he might have posed for a Sadler +picture, his small and refined features seeming out of place above the +bulky body. + +"Can you forgive my clumsiness?" I began. + +But the bishop raised his small, slim-fingered hand of old-ivory hue +deprecatingly. + +His system was supercharged with typhoid bacilli, and, as sometimes +occurs, the superfluous "bugs" had sought exit. He could only walk +with the aid of two stout sticks, and bent very much at that. His left +leg had been surgically scraped to the bone, and I appreciated the +exquisite torture to which my awkwardness had subjected him. But he +would entertain no apologies, pressing his inquiry respecting +Kāramančh, in the kindly manner which had made him so deservedly +popular on board. + +"Many thanks for your solicitude," I said; "I have promised her sound +repose to-night, and since my professional reputation is at stake, I +shall see that she secures it." + +In short, we were in pleasant company, and the day passed happily +enough and without notable event. Smith spent some considerable time +with the chief officer, wandering about unfrequented parts of the +ship. I learnt later that he had explored the lascars' quarters, the +forecastle, the engine-room, and had even descended to the stoke-hold; +but this was done so unostentatiously that it occasioned no comment. + +With the approach of evening, in place of that physical contentment +which usually heralds the dinner-hour, at sea, I experienced a fit of +the seemingly causeless apprehension which too often in the past had +harbingered the coming of grim events; which I had learnt to associate +with the nearing presence of one of Fu-Manchu's death-agents. In view +of the facts, as I afterwards knew them to be, I cannot account for +this. + +Yet, in an unexpected manner, my forebodings were realized. That night +I was destined to meet a sorrow surpassing any which my troubled life +had known. Even now I experience great difficulty in relating the +matters which befell, in speaking of the sense of irrevocable loss +which came to me. Briefly, then, at about ten minutes before the +dining hour, whilst all the passengers, myself included, were below, +dressing, a faint cry arose from somewhere aft on the upper deck--a +cry which was swiftly taken up by other voices, so that presently a +deck-steward echoed it immediately outside my own stateroom: + +"Man overboard! Man overboard!" + +All my premonitions rallying in that one sickening moment, I sprang +out on the deck, half dressed as I was, and leaping past the boat +which swung nearly opposite my door, craned over the rail, looking +astern. + +For a long time I could detect nothing unusual. The engine-room +telegraph was ringing--and the motion of the screws momentarily +ceased; then, in response to further ringing, recommenced, but so as +to jar the whole structure of the vessel; whereby I knew that the +engines were reversed. Peering intently into the wake of the ship, I +was but dimly aware of the ever-growing turmoil around me, of the +swift mustering of a boat's crew, of the shouted orders of the third +officer. Suddenly I saw it--the sight which was to haunt me for +succeeding days and nights. + +Half in the streak of the wake and half out of it, I perceived the +sleeve of a white jacket, and, near to it, a soft felt hat. The sleeve +rose up once into clear view, seemed to describe a half-circle in the +air, then sank back again into the glassy swell of the water. Only the +hat remained floating upon the surface. + +By the evidence of the white sleeve alone I might have remained +unconvinced, although upon the voyage I had become familiar enough +with the drill shooting-jacket, but the presence of the grey felt hat +was almost conclusive. + +The man overboard was Nayland Smith! + +I cannot hope, writing now, to convey in any words at my command, a +sense, even remote, of the utter loneliness which in that dreadful +moment closed coldly down upon me. + +To spring overboard to the rescue was a natural impulse, but to have +obeyed it would have been worse than quixotic. In the first place, the +drowning man was close upon half a mile astern; in the second place, +others had seen the hat and the white coat as clearly as I; among them +the third officer, standing upright in the stern of the boat--which, +with commendable promptitude, had already been swung into the water. +The steamer was being put about, describing a wide arc around the +little boat dancing on the deep blue rollers.... + +Of the next hour, I cannot bear to write at all. Long as I had known +him, I was ignorant of my friend's powers as a swimmer, but I judged +that he must have been a poor one from the fact that he had sunk so +rapidly in a calm sea. Except the hat, no trace of Nayland Smith +remained when the boat got to the spot. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII + +THE MUMMY + + +Dinner was out of the question that night for all of us. Kāramančh, +who had spoken no word, but, grasping my hands, had looked into my +eyes--her own glassy with unshed tears--and then stolen away to her +cabin, had not since reappeared. Seated upon my berth, I stared +unseeingly before me, upon a changed ship, a changed sea and sky--upon +another world. The poor old Bishop, my neighbour, had glanced in +several times, as he hobbled by, and his spectacles were unmistakably +humid; but even he had vouchsafed no word, realizing that my sorrow +was too deep for such consolation. + +When at last I became capable of connected thought, I found myself +faced by a big problem. Should I place the facts of the matter, as I +knew them to be, before the Captain? or could I hope to apprehend +Fu-Manchu's servant by the methods suggested by my poor friend? That +Smith's death was an accident, I did not believe for a moment; it was +impossible not to link it with the attempt upon Kāramančh. In my +misery and doubt, I determined to take counsel with Dr. Stacey. I +stood up, and passed out on to the deck. + +Those passengers whom I met on my way to his room regarded me in +respectful silence. By contrast, Stacey's attitude surprised and even +annoyed me. + +"I'd be prepared to stake all I possess--although it's not much," he +said, "that this was not the work of your hidden enemy." + +He blankly refused to give me his reasons for the statement and +strongly advised me to watch and wait but to make no communication to +the Captain. + +At this hour I can look back and savour again something of the +profound dejection of that time. I could not face the passengers; I +even avoided Kāramančh and Azīz. I shut myself in my cabin and sat +staring aimlessly into the growing darkness. The steward knocked, +once, inquiring if I needed anything, but I dismissed him abruptly. So +I passed the evening and the greater part of the night. + +Those groups of promenaders who passed my door invariably were +discussing my poor friend's tragic end; but as the night wore on, the +deck grew empty, and I sat amid a silence that in my miserable state I +welcomed more than the presence of any friend, saving only the one +whom I should never welcome again. + +Since I had not counted the bells, to this day I have only the vaguest +idea respecting the time whereat the next incident occurred which it +is my duty to chronicle. Perhaps I was on the verge of falling asleep, +seated there as I was; at any rate, I could scarcely believe myself +awake, when, unheralded by any footsteps to indicate his coming, some +one who seemed to be crouching outside my stateroom, slightly raised +himself and peered in through the port-hole--which I had not troubled +to close. + +He must have been a fairly tall man to have looked in at all, and +although his features were indistinguishable in the darkness, his +outline, which was clearly perceptible against the white boat beyond, +was unfamiliar to me. He seemed to have a small and oddly swathed +head, and what I could make out of the gaunt neck and square shoulders +in some way suggested an unnatural thinness; in short, the smudgy +silhouette in the port-hole was weirdly like that of a _mummy_! + +For some moments I stared at the apparition; then, rousing myself from +the apathy into which I had sunk, I stood up very quickly and stepped +across the room. As I did so the figure vanished, and when I threw +open the door and looked out upon the deck ... the deck was wholly +untenanted! + +I realized at once that it would be useless, even had I chosen the +course, to seek confirmation of what I had seen from the officer on +the bridge: my own cabin, together with the one adjoining--that of the +Bishop--was not visible from the bridge. + +For some time I stood in my doorway, wondering in a disinterested +fashion which now I cannot explain, if the hidden enemy had revealed +himself to me, or if disordered imagination had played me a trick. +Later, I was destined to know the truth of the matter, but when at +last I fell into a troubled sleep, that night, I was still in some +doubt upon the point. + +My state of mind when I awakened on the following day was +indescribable; I found it difficult to doubt that Nayland Smith would +meet me on the way to the bath-room as usual, with the cracked briar +fuming between his teeth. I felt myself almost compelled to pass +around to his stateroom in order to convince myself that he was not +really there. The catastrophe was still unreal to me, and the world a +dream-world. Indeed, I retain scarcely any recollections of the +traffic of that day, or of the days that followed it until we reached +Port Said. + +Two things only made any striking appeal to my dulled intelligence at +that time. These were: the aloof attitude of Dr. Stacey, who seemed +carefully to avoid me; and a curious circumstance which the second +officer mentioned in conversation one evening as we strolled up and +down the main deck together. + +"Either I was fast asleep at my post, Dr. Petrie," he said, "or last +night, in the middle watch, someone or something came over the side of +the ship just aft the bridge, slipped across the deck, and +disappeared." + +I stared at him wonderingly. + +"Do you mean something that came up out of the sea?" I said. + +"Nothing could very well have come up out of the sea," he replied, +smiling slightly, "so that it must have come up from the deck below." + +"Was it a man?" + +"It looked like a man, and a fairly tall one, but he came and was gone +like a fish, and I saw no more of him up to the time I was relieved. +To tell you the truth, I did not report it because I thought I must +have been dozing; it's a dead slow watch, and the navigation on this +part of the run is child's play." + +I was on the point of telling him what I had seen myself, two evenings +before, but for some reason I refrained from doing so, although I +think, had I confided in him, he would have abandoned the idea that +what he had seen was phantasmal; for the pair of us could not very +well have been dreaming. Some malignant presence haunted the ship; I +could not doubt this; yet I remained passive, sunk in a lethargy of +sorrow. + +We were scheduled to reach Port Said at about eight o'clock in the +evening, but by reason of the delay occasioned so tragically, I learnt +that in all probability we should not arrive earlier than midnight, +whilst passengers would not go ashore until the following morning. +Kāramančh, who had been staring ahead all day, seeking a first glimpse +of her native land, was determined to remain up until the hour of our +arrival, but after dinner a notice was posted up stating that we +should not be in before two a.m. Even those passengers who were the +most enthusiastic thereupon determined to postpone, for a few hours, +their first glimpse of the land of the Pharaohs and even to forgo the +sight--one of the strangest and most interesting in the world--of Port +Said by night. + +For my own part, I confess that all the interest and hope with which I +had looked forward to our arrival had left me, and often I detected +tears in the eyes of Kāramančh; whereby I knew that the coldness in my +heart had manifested itself even to her. I had sustained the greatest +blow of my life, and not even the presence of so lovely a companion +could entirely recompense me for the loss of my dearest friend. + +The lights on the Egyptian shore were faintly visible when the last +group of stragglers on deck broke up. I had long since prevailed upon +Kāramančh to retire, and now, utterly sick at heart, I sought my own +stateroom, mechanically undressed, and turned in. + +It may, or may not be singular that I had neglected all precautions +since the night of the tragedy; I was not even conscious of a desire +to visit retribution upon our hidden enemy; in some strange fashion I +took it for granted that there would be no further attempts upon +Kāramančh, Azīz, or myself. I had not troubled to confirm Smith's +surmise respecting the closing of the port-holes; but I know now for a +fact that, whereas they had been closed from the time of our leaving +the Straits of Messina, to-night, in sight of the Egyptian coasts, the +regulation was relaxed again. I cannot say if this is usual, but that +it occurred on this ship is a fact to which I can testify--a fact to +which my attention was to be drawn dramatically. + +The night was steamingly hot, and because I welcomed the circumstance +that my own port was widely opened, I reflected that those on the +lower decks might be open also. A faint sense of danger stirred within +me; indeed, I sat upright and was about to spring out of my berth when +that occurred which induced me to change my mind. + +All passengers had long since retired, and a midnight silence +descended upon the ship, for we were not yet close enough to port for +any unusual activities to have commenced. + +Clearly outlined in the open port-hole there suddenly arose that same +grotesque silhouette which I had seen once before. + +Prompted by I know not what, I lay still and simulated heavy +breathing; for it was evident to me that I must be partly visible to +the watcher, so bright was the night. For ten--twenty--thirty seconds +he studied me in absolute silence, that gaunt thing so like a mummy; +and, my eyes partly closed, I watched him, breathing heavily all the +time. Then making no more noise than a cat, he moved away across the +deck, and I could judge of his height by the fact that his small +swathed head remained visible almost to the time that he passed to the +end of the white boat which swung opposite my stateroom. + +In a moment I slipped quietly to the floor, crossed and peered out of +the port-hole; so that at last I had a clear view of the sinister +mummy-man. He was crouching under the bow of the boat, and attaching +to the white rails, below, a contrivance of a kind with which I was +not entirely unfamiliar. This was a thin ladder of silken rope, having +bamboo rungs, with two metal hooks for attaching it to any suitable +object. + +The one thus engaged was, as Kāramančh had declared, almost +superhumanly thin. His loins were swathed in a sort of linen garment, +and his head so bound about, turban fashion, that only his gleaming +eyes remained visible. The bare limbs and body were of a dusky yellow +colour, and, at sight of him, I experienced a sudden nausea. + +My pistol was in my cabin-trunk, and to have found it in the dark, +without making a good deal of noise, would have been impossible. +Doubting how I should act, I stood watching the man with the swathed +head whilst he threw the end of the ladder over the side, crept past +the bow of the boat, and swung his gaunt body over the rail, +exhibiting the agility of an ape. One quick glance fore and aft he +gave, then began to swarm down the ladder; in which instant I knew his +mission. + +With a choking cry, which forced itself unwilled from my lips, I tore +at the door, threw it open, and sprang across the deck. Plans, I had +none, and since I carried no instrument wherewith to sever the ladder, +the murderer might indeed have carried out his design for all that I +could have done to prevent him, were it not that another took a hand +in the game.... + +At the moment that the mummy-man--his head now on a level with the +deck--perceived me, he stopped dead. Coincident with his stopping, the +crack of a pistol sounded--from immediately beyond the boat. + +Uttering a sort of sobbing sound, the creature fell--then clutched, +with straining yellow fingers, at the rails, and, seemingly by dint of +a great effort, swarmed along aft some twenty feet, with incredible +swiftness and agility, and clambered on to the deck. + +A second shot cracked sharply; and a voice (God, was I mad?) cried: +"Hold him, Petrie!" + +Rigid with fearful astonishment I stood, as out from the boat above me +leapt a figure attired solely in shirt and trousers. The new-comer +leapt away in the wake of the mummy-man--who had vanished around the +corner by the smokeroom. Over his shoulder he cried back at me: + +"The Bishop's stateroom! See that no one enters!" + +I clutched at my head--which seemed to be fiery hot; I realized, in my +own person, the sensations of one who knows himself mad. + +For the man who pursued the mummy was _Nayland Smith_! + + * * * * * + +I stood in the Bishop's stateroom, Nayland Smith, his gaunt face wet +with perspiration, beside me, handling certain odd-looking objects +which littered the place, and lay about amid the discarded garments of +the absent cleric. + +"Pneumatic pads!" he snapped. "The man was a walking air-cushion!" He +gingerly fingered two strange rubber appliances. "For distending the +cheeks," he muttered, dropping them disgustedly on the floor. "His +hands and wrists betrayed him, Petrie. He wore his cuffs unusually +long but could not entirely hide his bony wrists. To have watched him, +whilst remaining myself unseen, was next to impossible; hence my +device of tossing a dummy overboard, calculated to float for less than +ten minutes! It actually floated nearly fifteen, as a matter of fact, +and I had some horrible moments!" + +"Smith!" I said, "how could you submit me ...?" + +He clapped his hands on my shoulders. + +"My dear old chap--there was no other way, believe me. From that boat +I could see right into his stateroom, but, once in, I dare not leave +it--except late at night, stealthily! The second spotted me one night +and I thought the game was up, but evidently he didn't report it." + +"But you might have confided...." + +"Impossible! I'll admit I nearly fell to the temptation that first +night; for I could see into your room as well as into his!" He slapped +me boisterously on the back, but his grey eyes were suspiciously +moist. "Dear old Petrie! Thank God for our friends! But you'd be the +first to admit, old man, that you're a dead poor actor! Your portrayal +of grief for the loss of a valued chum would not have convinced a soul +on board! + +"Therefore I made use of Stacey, whose callous attitude was less +remarkable. Gad, Petrie! I nearly bagged our man the first night! The +elaborate plan--Marconi message to get you out of the way, and so +forth--had miscarried, and he knew the port-hole trick would be +useless once we got into the open sea. He took a big chance. He +discarded his clerical guise and peeped into your room--you +remember?--but you were awake, and I made no move when he slipped back +to his own cabin; I wanted to take him red-handed." + +"Have you any idea ...?" + +"Who he is? No more than _where_ he is! Probably some creature of Dr. +Fu-Manchu specially chosen for the purpose; obviously a man of +culture, and probably of thug ancestry. I hit him--in the shoulder; +but even then he ran like a hare. We've searched the ship, without +result. He may have gone overboard and chanced the swim to shore...." + +We stepped out on to the deck. Around us was that unforgettable +scene--Port Said by night. The ship was barely moving through the +glassy water, now. Smith took my arm and we walked forward. Above us +was the mighty peace of Egypt's sky ablaze with splendour; around and +about us moved the unique turmoil of the clearing-house of the Near +East. + +"I would give much to know the real identity of the Bishop of +Damascus," muttered Smith. + +He stopped abruptly, snapping his teeth together and grasping my arm +as in a vice. Hard upon his words had followed the rattling clangour +as the great anchor was let go; but horribly intermingled with the +metallic roar there came to us such a fearful inarticulate shrieking +as to chill one's heart. + +The anchor plunged into the water of the harbour; the shrieking +ceased. Smith turned to me, and his face was tragic in the light of +the arc lamp swung hard by. + +"We shall never know," he whispered. "God forgive him--he must be in +bloody tatters now. Petrie, the poor fool was hiding in the +_chain-locker!_" + +A little hand stole into mine. I turned quickly. Kāramančh stood +beside me. I placed my arm about her shoulders, drawing her close; and +I blush to relate that all else was forgotten. + +For a moment, heedless of the fearful turmoil forward, Nayland Smith +stood looking at us. Then he turned, with his rare smile, and walked +aft. + +"Perhaps you're right, Petrie!" he said. + + * * * * * + + + + +Uniform with this Volume + + +36 De Profundis Oscar Wilde + +37 Lord Arthur Savile's Crime Oscar Wilde + +38 Selected Poems Oscar Wilde + +39 An Ideal Husband Oscar Wilde + +40 Intentions Oscar Wilde + +41 Lady Windermere's Fan Oscar Wilde + +77 Selected Prose Oscar Wilde + +85 The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde + +146 A Woman of No Importance Oscar Wilde + +43 Harvest Home E. V. Lucas + +44 A Little of Everything E. V. Lucas + +78 The Best of Lamb E. V. Lucas + +141 Variety Lane E. V. Lucas + +292 Mixed Vintages E. V. Lucas + +45 Vailima Letters Robert Louis Stevenson + +80 Selected Letters Robert Louis Stevenson + +46 Hills and the Sea Hilaire Belloc + +96 A Picked Company Hilaire Belloc + +193 On Nothing Hilaire Belloc + +226 On Everything Hilaire Belloc + +254 On Something Hilaire Belloc + +47 The Blue Bird Maurice Maeterlinck + +214 Select Essays Maurice Maeterlinck + +50 Charles Dickens G. K. Chesterton + +94 All Things Considered G. K. Chesterton + +346 Tremendous Trifles G. K. Chesterton + +54 The Life of John Ruskin W. G. Collingwood + +57 Sevastopol and other Stories Leo Tolstoy + +91 Social Evils and their Remedy Leo Tolstoy + +223 Two Generations Leo Tolstoy + +253 My Childhood and Boyhood Leo Tolstoy + +286 My Youth Leo Tolstoy + +58 The Lore of the Honey-Bee Tickner Edwardes + +63 Oscar Wilde Arthur Ransome + +64 The Vicar of Morwenstow S. Baring-Gould + +76 Home Life in France M. Betham-Edwards + +83 Reason and Belief Sir Oliver Lodge + +93 The Substance of Faith Sir Oliver Lodge + +116 The Survival of Man Sir Oliver Lodge + +284 Modern Problems Sir Oliver Lodge + +95 The Mirror of the Sea Joseph Conrad + +126 Science from an Easy Chair Sir Ray Lankester + +326 More Science from an Easy Chair Sir Ray Lankester + +149 A Shepherd's Life W. H. Hudson + +200 Jane Austen and her Times G. E. Mitton + +218 R. L. S. Francis Watt + +285 The Old Time Parson P. H. Ditchfield + +287 The Customs of Old England F. J. Snell + +71 The Gates of Wrath Arnold Bennett + +81 The Card Arnold Bennett + +125 The Regent Arnold Bennett + +288 A Great Man Arnold Bennett + +316 Whom God Hath Joined Arnold Bennett + +355 A Man from the North Arnold Bennett + +4 Spanish Gold G. A. Birmingham + +87 Lalage's Lovers G. A. Birmingham + +108 The Adventures of Dr. Whitty G. A. Birmingham + +349 The Island Mystery G. A. Birmingham + +296 William, by the Grace of God Marjorie Bowen + +342 Jean of the Lazy A B. M. Bower + +261 Tarzan of the Apes Edgar Rice Burroughs + +304 The Return of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +368 The Beasts of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +382 The Son of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +383 Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar Edgar Rice Burroughs + +384 Jungle Tales of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +385 A Princess of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs + +392 The Gods of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs + +393 The Warlord of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs + +315 The Flying Inn G. K. Chesterton + +212 Under Western Eyes Joseph Conrad + +325 A Set of Six Joseph Conrad + +143 Sandy Married Dorothea Conyers + +1 The Mighty Atom Marie Corelli + +2 Jane Marie Corelli + +3 Boy Marie Corelli + +231 Cameos Marie Corelli + +336 The O'Ruddy Stephen Crane and + Robert Barr + +18 Round the Red Lamp Sir A. Conan Doyle + +332 Rachel Jane H. Findlater + +396 Tongues of Conscience Robert Hichens + +20 Light Freights W. W. Jacobs + +92 White Fang Jack London + +374 Ninety-six Hours' Leave Stephen McKenna + +389 The Sixth Sense Stephen McKenna + +330 The Fortune of Christina McNab S. Macnaughtan + +303 The Carissima Lucas Malet + +391 Clementina A. E. W. Mason + +289 The Rest Cure W. B. Maxwell + +334 Bellamy Elinor Mordaunt + +215 Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo E. Phillips Oppenheim + +295 The Hillman E. Phillips Oppenheim + +276 Mary All-alone John Oxenham + +329 '1914' John Oxenham + +399 The Closed Book Wm. Le Queux + +113 Lavender and Old Lace Myrtle Reed + +135 A Spinner in the Sun Myrtle Reed + +343 The Shadow of Victory Myrtle Reed + +137 The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu Sax Rohmer + +290 The Devil Doctor Sax Rohmer + +293 The Si-Fan Mysteries Sax Rohmer + +352 Tales of Secret Egypt Sax Rohmer + +388 The Orchard of Tears Sax Rohmer + +395 The Golden Scorpion Sax Rohmer + +229 My Friend the Chauffeur C. N. and A. M. Williamson + +279 The War Wedding C. N. and A. M. Williamson + +344 This Woman to this Man C. N. and A. M. Williamson + +9 The Unofficial Honeymoon Dolf Wyllarde + +A short Selection only. + + * * * * * + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil Doctor, by Sax Rohmer + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL DOCTOR *** + +***** This file should be named 19142-8.txt or 19142-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/4/19142/ + +Produced by David Clarke, Sankar Viswanathan, and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/19142-8.zip b/19142-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..d5f308f --- /dev/null +++ b/19142-8.zip diff --git a/19142-h.zip b/19142-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..433768f --- /dev/null +++ b/19142-h.zip diff --git a/19142-h/19142-h.htm b/19142-h/19142-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3cfe8fa --- /dev/null +++ b/19142-h/19142-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,10343 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"> + <head> + <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=iso-8859-1" /> + <title> + The Project Gutenberg eBook of The Devil Doctor, by Sax Rohmer + </title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; /* all headings centered */ + clear: both; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + clear: both; + } + a[name] { position:absolute; } + a:link {color:#0000ff; background-color:#FFFFFF; + text-decoration:none; } + a:visited {color:#0000ff; background-color:#FFFFFF; + text-decoration:none; } + a:hover { color:#ff0000; background-color:#FFFFFF; } + + table { width:80%; padding: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} +table.tb1 { width:100%; padding: 1em; margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;} + .tocch { text-align: right; vertical-align: top;} + .tocpg {text-align: right; vertical-align: bottom;} + .tr {margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; margin-top: 5%; margin-bottom: 5%; padding: 2em; background-color: #f6f2f2; color: black; border: solid black 1px;} +.f1 { font-size:smaller; } +.f2 { float:left; font-size:50px;line-height:38px;padding-top:2px; padding-right:0.05em; + } +body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + .pagenum { /* uncomment the next line for invisible page numbers */ + /* visibility: hidden; */ + position: absolute; + left: 92%; + font-size: smaller; + text-align: right; + font-style:normal; + } /* page numbers */ + + + .center {text-align: center;} + .smcap {font-variant: small-caps;} + + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem span.i0 {display: block; margin-left: 0em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + .poem span.i4 {display: block; margin-left: 4em; padding-left: 3em; text-indent: -3em;} + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> + </head> +<body> + + +<pre> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil Doctor, by Sax Rohmer + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Devil Doctor + +Author: Sax Rohmer + +Release Date: August 29, 2006 [EBook #19142] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL DOCTOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Clarke, Sankar Viswanathan, and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + + + +<h1>THE<br /> + +DEVIL DOCTOR</h1> +<h3 class="center">HITHERTO UNPUBLISHED ADVENTURES IN<br /> + + THE CAREER OF THE MYSTERIOUS<br /> + + DR. FU-MANCHU</h3> + + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> +<h4>BY</h4> +<p> </p> + <h2>SAX ROHMER</h2> + <p> </p> + <p> </p> + +<h4>SIXTH EDITION</h4> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> +<p> </p> + <h3>METHUEN & CO. LTD.</h3> +<h3>36 ESSEX STREET W.C.</h3> +<h3>LONDON</h3> +<p> </p> +<h4><i>First Published (Crown 8vo) March 2nd, 1916</i></h4> +<p> </p> +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span></p> +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> +<table summary="Contents"> +<tr><td class="tocch f1">CHAP.</td> + <td> </td> + <td> </td><td class="tocpg f1">PAGE</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">I</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">A Midnight Summons</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_9">9</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">II</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">Eltham Vanishes</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_17">17</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">III</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">The Wire Jacket</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_23">23</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">IV</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">The Cry of a Nighthawk</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_32">32</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">V</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">The Net</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_38">38</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">VI</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">Under the Elms</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_51">51</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">VII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">Enter Mr. Abel Slattin</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_57">57</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">VIII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">Dr. Fu-Manchu Strikes</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_61">61</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">IX</td> + <td> </td> + <td><a href="#CHAPTER_IX"><span class="smcap">The Climber</span></a></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_72">72</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">X</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">The Climber Returns</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_76">76</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XI</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">The White Peacock</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_82">82</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">Dark Eyes Look into Mine</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_91">91</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XIII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">The Sacred Order</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_98">98</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XIV</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">The Coughing Horror</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_108">108</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XV</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">Bewitchment</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_116">116</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XVI</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">The Questing Hands</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_124">124</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XVII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">One Day in Rangoon</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_130">130</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XVIII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">The Silver Buddha</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_136">136</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XIX</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">Dr. Fu-Manchu's Laboratory</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_140">140</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XX</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX">The Crossbar</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_146">146</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXI</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">Cragmire Tower</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_158">158</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII">The Mulatto</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_163">163</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXIII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">A Cry on the Moor</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_175">175</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXIV</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV">Story of the Gables</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_184">184</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXV</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXV">The Bells</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_191">191</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXVI</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVI">The Fiery Hand</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_197">197</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXVII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVII">The Night of the Raid</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_206">206</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXVIII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXVIII">The Samurai's Sword</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_212">212</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXIX</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIX">The Six Gates</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_222">222</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXX</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXX">The Call of the East</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_227">227</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXI</td> + <td> </td> + <td>"<span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXI">My Shadow Lies upon You</a></span>"</td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_231">231</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXII">The Tragedy</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_237">237</a></td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">XXXIII</td> + <td> </td> + <td><span class="smcap"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXXIII">The Mummy</a></span></td> +<td class="tocpg"><a href="#Page_244">244</a></td></tr> +</table> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="THE_DEVIL_DOCTOR" id="THE_DEVIL_DOCTOR"></a>THE DEVIL DOCTOR</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_I" id="CHAPTER_I"></a>CHAPTER I</h2> + +<h3>A MIDNIGHT SUMMONS</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">W</span></p> +<p> + +hen did you last hear from Nayland Smith?" asked my visitor.</p> + +<p>I paused, my hand on the siphon, reflecting for a moment.</p> + +<p>"Two months ago," I said: "he's a poor correspondent and rather +soured, I fancy."</p> + +<p>"What—a woman or something?"</p> + +<p>"Some affair of that sort. He's such a reticent beggar, I really know +very little about it."</p> + +<p>I placed a whisky and soda before the Rev. J. D. Eltham, also sliding +the tobacco jar nearer to his hand. The refined and sensitive face of +the clergyman offered no indication to the truculent character of the +man. His scanty fair hair, already grey over the temples, was silken +and soft-looking: in appearance he was indeed a typical English +churchman; but in China he had been known as "the fighting +missionary," and had fully deserved the title. In fact, this +peaceful-looking gentleman had directly brought about the Boxer +Risings!</p> + +<p>"You know," he said in his clerical voice, but meanwhile stuffing +tobacco into an old pipe with fierce energy, "I have often wondered, +Petrie—I have never left off wondering—"</p> + +<p>"What?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span></p> + +<p>"That accursed Chinaman! Since the cellar place beneath the site of +the burnt-out cottage in Dulwich Village—I have wondered more than +ever."</p> + +<p>He lighted his pipe and walked to the hearth to throw the match in the +grate.</p> + +<p>"You see," he continued, peering across at me in his oddly nervous +way—"one never knows, does one? If I thought that Dr. Fu-Manchu +lived; if I seriously suspected that that stupendous intellect, that +wonderful genius, Petrie, er"—he hesitated +characteristically—"survived, I should feel it my duty—"</p> + +<p>"Well?" I said, leaning my elbows on the table and smiling slightly.</p> + +<p>"If that Satanic genius were not indeed destroyed, then the peace of +the world might be threatened anew at any moment!"</p> + +<p>He was becoming excited, shooting out his jaw in the truculent manner +I knew, and snapping his fingers to emphasize his words; a man +composed of the oddest complexities that ever dwelt beneath a clerical +frock.</p> + +<p>"He may have got back to China, doctor!" he cried, and his eyes had +the fighting glint in them. "Could you rest in peace if you thought +that he lived? Should you not fear for your life every time that a +night-call took you out alone? Why, man alive, it is only two years +since he was here amongst us, since we were searching every shadow for +those awful green eyes! What became of his band of assassins—his +stranglers, his dacoits, his damnable poisons and insects and +what-not—the army of creatures—"</p> + +<p>He paused, taking a drink.</p> + +<p>"You"—he hesitated diffidently—"searched in Egypt with Nayland +Smith, did you not?"</p> + +<p>I nodded.</p> + +<p>"Contradict me if I am wrong," he continued; "but my impression is +that you were searching for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> the girl—the girl—Kâramanèh, I think +she was called?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," I replied shortly; "but we could find no trace—no trace."</p> + +<p>"You—er—were interested?"</p> + +<p>"More than I knew," I replied, "until I realized that I had—lost +her."</p> + +<p>"I never met Kâramanèh, but from your account, and from others, she +was quite unusually—"</p> + +<p>"She was very beautiful," I said, and stood up, for I was anxious to +terminate that phase of the conversation.</p> + +<p>Eltham regarded me sympathetically; he knew something of my search +with Nayland Smith for the dark-eyed Eastern girl who had brought +romance into my drab life; he knew that I treasured my memories of her +as I loathed and abhorred those of the fiendish, brilliant Chinese +doctor who had been her master.</p> + +<p>Eltham began to pace up and down the rug, his pipe bubbling furiously; +and something in the way he carried his head reminded me momentarily +of Nayland Smith. Certainly, between this pink-faced clergyman, with +his deceptively mild appearance, and the gaunt, bronzed and +steely-eyed Burmese commissioner, there was externally little in +common; but it was some little nervous trick in his carriage that +conjured up through the smoke-haze one distant summer evening when +Smith had paced that very room as Eltham paced it now, when before my +startled eyes he had rung up the curtain upon the savage drama in +which, though I little suspected it then, Fate had cast me for a +leading rôle.</p> + +<p>I wondered if Eltham's thoughts ran parallel with mine. My own were +centred upon the unforgettable figure of the murderous Chinaman. These +words, exactly as Smith had used them, seemed once again to sound in +my ears: "Imagine a person, tall, lean and feline, high-shouldered, +with a brow<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span> like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven +skull and long magnetic eyes of the true cat green. Invest him with +all the cruel cunning of an entire Eastern race accumulated in one +giant intellect, with all the resources of science, past and present, +and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the 'Yellow Peril' +incarnate in one man."</p> + +<p>This visit of Eltham's no doubt was responsible for my mood; for this +singular clergyman had played his part in the drama of two years ago.</p> + +<p>"I should like to see Smith again," he said suddenly; "it seems a pity +that a man like that should be buried in Burma. Burma makes a mess of +the best of men, doctor. You said he was not married?"</p> + +<p>"No," I replied shortly, "and is never likely to be, now."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you hinted at something of the kind."</p> + +<p>"I know very little of it. Nayland Smith is not the kind of man to +talk much."</p> + +<p>"Quite so—quite so! And, you know, doctor, neither am I; but"—he was +growing painfully embarrassed—"it may be your due—I—er—I have a +correspondent, in the interior of China—"</p> + +<p>"Well?" I said, watching him in sudden eagerness.</p> + +<p>"Well, I would not desire to raise—vain hopes—nor to occasion, shall +I say, empty fears; but—er ... no, doctor!" He flushed like a girl. +"It was wrong of me to open this conversation. Perhaps, when I know +more—will you forget my words, for the time?"</p> + +<p>The 'phone bell rang.</p> + +<p>"Hullo!" cried Eltham—"hard luck, doctor!"—but I could see that he +welcomed the interruption. "Why!" he added, "it is one o'clock!"</p> + +<p>I went to the telephone.</p> + +<p>"Is that Dr. Petrie?" inquired a woman's voice.</p> + +<p>"Yes; who is speaking?"</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Hewett has been taken more seriously ill. Could you come at +once?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Certainly," I replied, for Mrs. Hewett was not only a profitable +patient but an estimable lady. "I shall be with you in a quarter of an +hour."</p> + +<p>I hung up the receiver.</p> + +<p>"Something urgent?" asked Eltham, emptying his pipe.</p> + +<p>"Sounds like it. You had better turn in."</p> + +<p>"I should much prefer to walk over with you, if it would not be +intruding. Our conversation has ill prepared me for sleep."</p> + +<p>"Right!" I said, for I welcomed his company; and three minutes later +we were striding across the deserted common.</p> + +<p>A sort of mist floated amongst the trees, seeming in the moonlight +like a veil draped from trunk to trunk, as in silence we passed the +Mound Pond, and struck out for the north side of the common.</p> + +<p>I suppose the presence of Eltham and the irritating recollection of +his half-confidence were the responsible factors, but my mind +persistently dwelt upon the subject of Fu-Manchu and the atrocities +which he had committed during his sojourn in England. So actively was +my imagination at work that I felt again the menace which so long had +hung over me; I felt as though that murderous yellow cloud still cast +its shadow upon England. And I found myself longing for the company of +Nayland Smith. I cannot state what was the nature of Eltham's +reflections, but I can guess; for he was as silent as I.</p> + +<p>It was with a conscious effort that I shook myself out of this +morbidly reflective mood, on finding that we had crossed the common +and were come to the abode of my patient.</p> + +<p>"I shall take a little walk," announced Eltham; "for I gather that you +don't expect to be detained long? I shall never be out of sight of the +door, of course."</p> + +<p>"Very well," I replied, and ran up the steps.</p> + +<p>There were no lights to be seen in any of the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span> windows, which +circumstance rather surprised me, as my patient occupied, or had +occupied when last I had visited her, a first-floor bedroom in the +front of the house. My knocking and ringing produced no response for +three or four minutes; then, as I persisted, a scantily clothed and +half-awake maid-servant unbarred the door and stared at me stupidly in +the moonlight.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Hewett requires me?" I asked abruptly.</p> + +<p>The girl stared more stupidly than ever.</p> + +<p>"No, sir," she said: "she don't, sir; she's fast asleep!"</p> + +<p>"But some one 'phoned me!" I insisted, rather irritably, I fear.</p> + +<p>"Not from here, sir," declared the now wide-eyed girl. "We haven't got +a telephone, sir."</p> + +<p>For a few moments I stood there, staring as foolishly as she; then +abruptly I turned and descended the steps. At the gate I stood looking +up and down the road. The houses were all in darkness. What could be +the meaning of the mysterious summons? I had made no mistake +respecting the name of my patient; it had been twice repeated over the +telephone; yet that the call had not emanated from Mrs. Hewett's house +was now palpably evident. Days had been when I should have regarded +the episode as preluding some outrage, but to-night I felt more +disposed to ascribe it to a silly practical joke.</p> + +<p>Eltham walked up briskly.</p> + +<p>"You're in demand to-night, doctor," he said. "A young person called +for you almost directly you had left your house, and, learning where +you were gone, followed you."</p> + +<p>"Indeed!" I said, a trifle incredulously. "There are plenty of other +doctors if the case is an urgent one."</p> + +<p>"She may have thought it would save time as you were actually up and +dressed," explained Eltham; "and the house is quite near to here, I +understand."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span></p> + +<p>I looked at him a little blankly. Was this another effort of the +unknown jester?</p> + +<p>"I have been fooled once," I said. "That 'phone call was a hoax—"</p> + +<p>"But I feel certain," declared Eltham earnestly, "that this is +genuine! The poor girl was dreadfully agitated; her master has broken +his leg and is lying helpless: number 280 Rectory Grove."</p> + +<p>"Where is the girl?" I asked sharply.</p> + +<p>"She ran back directly she had given me her message."</p> + +<p>"Was she a servant?"</p> + +<p>"I should imagine so: French, I think. But she was so wrapped up I had +little more than a glimpse of her. I am sorry to hear that some one +has played a silly joke on you, but believe me"—he was very +earnest—"this is no jest. The poor girl could scarcely speak for +sobs. She mistook me for you, of course."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said I grimly; "well, I suppose I must go. Broken leg, you +said?—and my surgical bag, splints and so forth, are at home!"</p> + +<p>"My dear Petrie!" cried Eltham, in his enthusiastic way, "you no doubt +can do something to alleviate the poor man's suffering immediately. I +will run back to your rooms for the bag and rejoin you at 280 Rectory +Grove."</p> + +<p>"It's awfully good of you, Eltham—"</p> + +<p>He held up his hand.</p> + +<p>"The call of suffering humanity, Petrie, is one which I may no more +refuse to hear than you."</p> + +<p>I made no further protest after that, for his point of view was +evident and his determination adamantine, but told him where he would +find the bag and once more set out across the moon-bright common, he +pursuing a westerly direction and I going east.</p> + +<p>Some three hundred yards I had gone, I suppose, and my brain had been +very active the while, when something occurred to me which placed a +new com<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span>plexion upon this second summons. I thought of the falsity of +the first, of the improbability of even the most hardened practical +joker practising his wiles at one o'clock in the morning. I thought of +our recent conversation; above all I thought of the girl who had +delivered the message to Eltham, the girl whom he had described as a +French maid—whose personal charm had so completely enlisted his +sympathies. Now, to this train of thought came a new one, and, adding +it, my suspicion became almost a certainty.</p> + +<p>I remembered (as, knowing the district, I should have remembered +before) that there was no number 280 Rectory Grove.</p> + +<p>Pulling up sharply, I stood looking about me. Not a living soul was in +sight; not even a policeman. Where the lamps marked the main paths +across the common nothing moved; in the shadows about me nothing +stirred. But something stirred within me—a warning voice which for +long had lain dormant.</p> + +<p>What was afoot?</p> + +<p>A breeze caressed the leaves overhead, breaking the silence with +mysterious whisperings. Some portentous truth was seeking for +admittance to my brain. I strove to reassure myself, but the sense of +impending evil and of mystery became heavier. At last I could combat +my strange fears no longer. I turned and began to run towards the +south side of the common—towards my rooms—and after Eltham.</p> + +<p>I had hoped to head him off, but came upon no sign of him. An +all-night tramcar passed at the moment that I reached the high-road, +and as I ran around behind it I saw that my windows were lighted and +that there was a light in the hall.</p> + +<p>My key was yet in the lock when my housekeeper opened the door.</p> + +<p>"There's a gentleman just come, doctor," she began.</p> + +<p>I thrust past her and raced up the stairs to my study.</p> + + + +<p>Standing by the writing-table was a tall thin man, his gaunt face +brown as a coffee-berry and his steely grey eyes fixed upon me. My +heart gave a great leap—and seemed to stand still.</p> + +<p>It was Nayland Smith!</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried. "Smith, old man, by God, I'm glad to see you!"</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span></p> +<p>He wrung my hand hard, looking at me with his searching eyes; but +there was little enough of gladness in his face. He was altogether +greyer than when last I had seen him—greyer and sterner.</p> + +<p>"Where is Eltham?" I asked.</p> + +<p>Smith started back as though I had struck him.</p> + +<p>"Eltham!" he whispered—"<i>Eltham</i>! is Eltham here?"</p> + +<p>"I left him ten minutes ago on the common."</p> + +<p>Smith dashed his right fist into the palm of his left hand, and his +eyes gleamed almost wildly.</p> + +<p>"My God, Petrie!" he said, "am I fated <i>always</i> to come too late?"</p> + +<p>My dreadful fears in that instant were confirmed. I seemed to feel my +legs totter beneath me.</p> + +<p>"Smith, you don't mean—"</p> + +<p>"I do, Petrie!" His voice sounded very far away. "Fu-Manchu is here; +and Eltham, God help him ... is his first victim!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_II" id="CHAPTER_II"></a>CHAPTER II</h2> + +<h3>ELTHAM VANISHES</h3> + + +<p><span class="f2">S </span></p> +<p> +mith went racing down the stairs like a man possessed. Heavy with +such a foreboding of calamity as I had not known for two years, I +followed him—along the hall and out into the road. The very peace and +beauty of the night in some way increased my mental agitation. The sky +was lighted almost<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span> tropically with such a blaze of stars as I could +not recall to have seen since, my futile search concluded, I had left +Egypt. The glory of the moonlight yellowed the lamps speckled across +the expanse of the common. The night was as still as night can ever be +in London. The dimming pulse of a cab or car alone disturbed the +quietude.</p> + +<p>With a quick glance to right and left, Smith ran across on to the +common, and, leaving the door wide open behind me, I followed. The +path which Eltham had pursued terminated almost opposite to my house. +One's gaze might follow it, white and empty, for several hundred yards +past the pond, and farther, until it became overshadowed and was lost +amid a clump of trees.</p> + +<p>I came up with Smith, and side by side we ran on, whilst pantingly I +told my tale.</p> + +<p>"It was a trick to get you away from him!" cried Smith. "They meant no +doubt to make some attempt at your house, but, as he came out with +you, an alternative plan—"</p> + +<p>Abreast of the pond, my companion slowed down, and finally stopped.</p> + +<p>"Where did you last see Eltham?" he asked, rapidly.</p> + +<p>I took his arm, turning him slightly to the right, and pointed across +the moon-bathed common.</p> + +<p>"You see that clump of bushes on the other side of the road?" I said. +"There's a path to the left of it. I took that path and he took this. +We parted at the point where they meet—"</p> + +<p>Smith walked right down to the edge of the water and peered about over +the surface.</p> + +<p>What he hoped to find there I could not imagine. Whatever it had been +he was disappointed, and he turned to me again, frowning perplexedly, +and tugging at the lobe of his left ear, an old trick which reminded +me of gruesome things we had lived through in the past.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Come on," he jerked. "It may be amongst the trees."</p> + +<p>From the tone of his voice I knew that he was tensed up nervously, and +his mood but added to the apprehension of my own.</p> + +<p>"<i>What</i> may be amongst the trees, Smith?" I asked.</p> + +<p>He walked on.</p> + +<p>"God knows, Petrie; but I fear—"</p> + +<p>Behind us, along the high-road, a tramcar went rocking by, doubtless +bearing a few belated workers homeward. The stark incongruity of the +thing was appalling. How little those weary toilers, hemmed about with +the commonplace, suspected that almost within sight from the car +windows, amid prosy benches, iron railings, and unromantic, flickering +lamps, two fellow-men moved upon the border of a horror-land!</p> + +<p>Beneath the trees a shadow carpet lay, its edges tropically sharp; and +fully ten yards from the first of the group, we two, hatless both, and +sharing a common dread, paused for a moment and listened.</p> + +<p>The car had stopped at the farther extremity of the common, and now +with a moan that grew to a shriek was rolling on its way again. We +stood and listened until silence reclaimed the night. Not a footstep +could be heard. Then slowly we walked on. At the edge of the little +coppice we stopped again abruptly.</p> + +<p>Smith turned and thrust his pistol into my hand. A white ray of light +pierced the shadows; my companion carried an electric torch. But no +trace of Eltham was discoverable.</p> + +<p>There had been a heavy shower of rain during the evening, just before +sunset, and although the open paths were dry again, under the trees +the ground was still moist. Ten yards within the coppice we came upon +tracks—the tracks of one running, as the deep imprints of the toes +indicated.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span></p> + +<p>Abruptly the tracks terminated; others, softer, joined them, two sets +converging from left and right. There was a confused patch, trailing +off to the west; then this became indistinct, and was finally lost, +upon the hard ground outside the group.</p> + +<p>For perhaps a minute, or more, we ran about from tree to tree, and +from bush to bush, searching like hounds for a scent, and fearful of +what we might find. We found nothing; and fully in the moonlight we +stood facing one another. The night was profoundly still.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stepped back into the shadows, and began slowly to turn +his head from left to right, taking in the entire visible expanse of +the common. Towards a point where the road bisected it he stared +intently. Then, with a bound, he set off!</p> + +<p>"Come on, Petrie!" he cried. "There they are!"</p> + +<p>Vaulting a railing he went away over a field like a madman. Recovering +from the shock of surprise, I followed him, but he was well ahead of +me, and making for some vaguely seen objects moving against the lights +of the roadway.</p> + +<p>Another railing was vaulted, and the corner of a second, triangular +grass patch crossed at a hot sprint. We were twenty yards from the +road when the sound of a starting motor broke the silence. We gained +the gravelled footpath only to see the tail-light of the car dwindling +to the north!</p> + +<p>Smith leant dizzily against a tree.</p> + +<p>"Eltham is in that car!" he gasped. "Just God! are we to stand here +and see him taken away to—?"</p> + +<p>He beat his fist upon the tree, in a sort of tragic despair. The +nearest cab-rank was no great distance away, but, excluding the +possibility of no cab being there, it might, for all practicable +purposes, as well have been a mile off.</p> + +<p>The beat of the retreating motor was scarcely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span> audible; the lights +might but just be distinguished. Then, coming in an opposite +direction, appeared the headlamp of another car, of a car that raced +nearer and nearer to us, so that, within a few seconds of its first +appearance, we found ourselves bathed in the beam of its headlights.</p> + +<p>Smith bounded out into the road, and stood, a weird silhouette, with +upraised arms, fully in its course!</p> + +<p>The brakes were applied hurriedly. It was a big limousine, and its +driver swerved perilously in avoiding Smith and nearly ran into me. +But, the breathless moment past, the car was pulled up, head on to the +railings; and a man in evening clothes was demanding excitedly what +had happened. Smith, a hatless, dishevelled figure, stepped up to the +door.</p> + +<p>"My name is Nayland Smith," he said rapidly—"Burmese Commissioner." +He snatched a letter from his pocket and thrust it into the hands of +the bewildered man. "Read that. It is signed by another +Commissioner—the Commissioner of Police."</p> + +<p>With amazement written all over him, the other obeyed.</p> + +<p>"You see," continued my friend tersely, "it is <i>carte blanche</i>. I wish +to commandeer your car, sir, on a matter of life and death!"</p> + +<p>The other returned the letter.</p> + +<p>"Allow me to offer it!" he said, descending. "My man will take your +orders. I can finish my journey by cab. I am—"</p> + +<p>But Smith did not wait to learn whom he might be.</p> + +<p>"Quick!" he cried to the stupefied chauffeur. "You passed a car a +minute ago—yonder. Can you overtake it?"</p> + +<p>"I can try, sir, if I don't lose her track."</p> + +<p>Smith leapt in, pulling me after him.</p> + +<p>"Do it!" he snapped. "There are no speed limits for me. Thanks! Good +night, sir!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span></p> + +<p>We were off! The car swung around and the chase commenced.</p> + +<p>One last glimpse I had of the man we had dispossessed, standing alone +by the roadside, and at ever-increasing speed, we leapt away in the +track of Eltham's captors.</p> + +<p>Smith was too highly excited for ordinary conversation, but he threw +out short, staccato remarks.</p> + +<p>"I have followed Fu-Manchu from Hong-Kong," he jerked. "Lost him at +Suez. He got here a boat ahead of me. Eltham has been corresponding +with some mandarin up-country. Knew that. Came straight to you. Only +got in this evening. He—Fu-Manchu—has been sent here to get Eltham. +My God! and he has him! He will question him! The interior of China—a +seething pot, Petrie! They had to stop the leakage of information. +<i>He</i> is here for that."</p> + +<p>The car pulled up with a jerk that pitched me out of my seat, and the +chauffeur leapt to the road and ran ahead. Smith was out in a trice, +as the man, who had run up to a constable, came racing back.</p> + +<p>"Jump in, sir—jump in!" he cried, his eyes bright with the lust of +the chase; "they are making for Battersea!"</p> + +<p>And we were off again.</p> + +<p>Through the empty streets we roared on. A place of gasometers and +desolate waste lots slipped behind and we were in a narrow way where +gates of yards and a few lowly houses faced upon a prospect of high +blank wall.</p> + +<p>"Thames on our right," said Smith, peering ahead. "His rathole is by +the river as usual. <i>Hi</i>!"—he grabbed up the speaking-tube—"Stop! +Stop!"</p> + +<p>The limousine swung into the narrow sidewalk, and pulled up close by a +yard gate. I, too, had seen our quarry—a long, low-bodied car, +showing no inside lights. It had turned the next corner, where<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> a +street lamp shone greenly not a hundred yards ahead.</p> + +<p>Smith leapt out, and I followed him.</p> + +<p>"That must be a cul-de-sac," he said, and turned to the eager-eyed +chauffeur. "Run back to that last turning," he ordered, "and wait +there, out of sight. Bring the car up when you hear a police-whistle."</p> + +<p>The man looked disappointed, but did not question the order. As he +began to back away, Smith grasped me by the arm and drew me forward.</p> + +<p>"We must get to that corner," he said, "and see where the car stands, +without showing ourselves."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_III" id="CHAPTER_III"></a>CHAPTER III</h2> + +<h3>THE WIRE JACKET</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">I</span></p> +<p> suppose we were not more than a dozen paces from the lamp when we +heard the thudding of the motor. The car was backing out!</p> + +<p>It was a desperate moment, for it seemed that we could not fail to be +discovered. Nayland Smith began to look about him, feverishly, for a +hiding place, a quest which I seconded with equal anxiety. And Fate +was kind to us—doubly kind as after events revealed. A wooden gate +broke the expanse of wall hard by upon the right, and, as the result +of some recent accident, a ragged gap had been torn in the panels +close to the top.</p> + +<p>The chain of the padlock hung loosely; and in a second Smith was up, +with his foot in this as in a stirrup. He threw his arm over the top +and drew himself upright. A second later he was astride the broken +gate.</p> + +<p>"Up you come, Petrie!" he said, and reached down his hand to aid me.</p> + +<p>I got my foot into the loop of chain, grasped at a projection in the +gate-post, and found myself up.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span></p> + +<p>"There is a crossbar, on this side to stand on," said Smith.</p> + +<p>He climbed over and vanished in the darkness. I was still astride the +broken gate when the car turned the corner, slowly, for there was +scanty room; but I was standing upon the bar on the inside and had my +head below the gap ere the driver could possibly have seen me.</p> + +<p>"Stay where you are until he passes," hissed my companion, below. +"There is a row of kegs under you."</p> + +<p>The sound of the motor passing outside grew loud—louder—then began +to die away. I felt about with my left foot, discerned the top of a +keg, and dropped, panting, beside Smith.</p> + +<p>"Phew!" I said—"that was a close thing! Smith—how do we know—?"</p> + +<p>"That we have followed the right car?" he interrupted. "Ask yourself +the question: what would any ordinary man be doing motoring in a place +like this at two o'clock in the morning?"</p> + +<p>"You are right, Smith," I agreed. "Shall we get out again?"</p> + +<p>"Not yet. I have an idea. Look yonder."</p> + +<p>He grasped my arm, turning me in the desired direction.</p> + +<p>Beyond a great expanse of unbroken darkness a ray of moonlight slanted +into the place wherein we stood, spilling its cold radiance upon rows +of kegs.</p> + +<p>"That's another door," continued my friend. I now began dimly to +perceive him beside me. "If my calculations are not entirely wrong, it +opens on a wharf gate—"</p> + +<p>A steam siren hooted dismally, apparently from quite close at hand.</p> + +<p>"I'm right!" snapped Smith. "That turning leads down to the gate. Come +on, Petrie!"</p> + +<p>He directed the light of the electric torch upon a narrow path through +the ranks of casks, and led the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> way to the farther door. A good two +feet of moonlight showed along the top. I heard Smith straining; +then—</p> + +<p>"These kegs are all loaded with grease," he said, "and I want to +reconnoitre over that door."</p> + +<p>"I am leaning on a crate which seems easy to move," I reported. "Yes, +it's empty. Lend a hand."</p> + +<p>We grasped the empty crate, and, between us, set it up on a solid +pedestal of casks. Then Smith mounted to this observation platform and +I scrambled up beside him, and looked down upon the lane outside.</p> + +<p>It terminated as Smith had foreseen at a wharf gate some six feet to +the right of our post. Piled up in the lane beneath us, against the +warehouse door, was a stack of empty casks. Beyond, over the way, was +a kind of ramshackle building that had possibly been a dwelling-house +at some time. Bills were stuck in the ground-floor windows indicating +that the three floors were to let as offices; so much was discernible +in that reflected moonlight.</p> + +<p>I could hear the tide lapping upon the wharf, could feel the chill +from the near river and hear the vague noises which, night nor day, +never cease upon the great commercial waterway.</p> + +<p>"Down!" whispered Smith. "Make no noise! I suspected it. They heard +the car following!"</p> + +<p>I obeyed, clutching at him for support; for I was suddenly dizzy, and +my heart was leaping wildly—furiously.</p> + +<p>"You saw her?" he whispered.</p> + +<p>Saw her! Yes, I had seen her! And my poor dream-world was toppling +about me, its cities ashes and its fairness dust.</p> + +<p>Peering from the window, her great eyes wondrous in the moonlight and +her red lips parted, hair gleaming like burnished foam and her anxious +gaze set <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span>upon the corner of the lane—was Kâramanèh ... Kâramanèh +whom once we had rescued from the house of this fiendish Chinese +doctor; Kâramanèh who had been our ally, in fruitless quest of +whom,—when, too late, I realized how empty my life was become—I had +wasted what little of the world's goods I possessed:—Kâramanèh!</p> + +<p>"Poor old Petrie," murmured Smith. "I knew, but I hadn't the +heart—<i>He</i> has her again—God knows by what chains he holds her. But +she's only a woman, old boy, and women are very much alike—very much +alike from Charing Cross to Pagoda Road."</p> + +<p>He rested his hand on my shoulder for a moment; I am ashamed to +confess that I was trembling; then, clenching my teeth with that +mechanical physical effort which often accompanies a mental one, I +swallowed the bitter draught of Nayland Smith's philosophy. He was +raising himself, to peer, cautiously, over the top of the door. I did +likewise.</p> + +<p>The window from which the girl had looked was nearly on a level with +our eyes, and as I raised my head above the woodwork, I quite +distinctly saw her go out of the room. The door, as she opened it, +admitted a dull light, against which her figure showed silhouetted for +a moment. Then the door was reclosed.</p> + +<p>"We must risk the other windows," rapped Smith.</p> + +<p>Before I had grasped the nature of his plan, he was over and had +dropped almost noiselessly upon the casks outside. Again I followed +his lead.</p> + +<p>"You are not going to attempt anything, single-handed—against <i>him</i>?" +I asked.</p> + +<p>"Petrie—Eltham is in that house. He has been brought here to be put +to the question, in the mediæval, and Chinese, sense! Is there time to +summon assistance?"</p> + +<p>I shuddered. This had been in my mind, certainly, but so expressed it +was definitely horrible—revolting, yet stimulating.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You have the pistol," added Smith; "follow closely, and quietly."</p> + +<p>He walked across the tops of the casks and leapt down, pointing to +that nearest to the closed door of the house. I helped him place it +under the open window. A second we set beside it, and, not without +some noise, got a third on top.</p> + +<p>Smith mounted.</p> + +<p>His jaw muscles were very prominent and his eyes shone like steel; but +he was as cool as though he were about to enter a theatre and not the +den of the most stupendous genius who ever worked for evil. I would +forgive any man who, knowing Dr. Fu-Manchu, feared him; I feared him +myself—feared him as one fears a scorpion; but when Nayland Smith +hauled himself up on to the wooden ledge above the door and swung +thence into the darkened room, I followed and was in close upon his +heels. But I admired him, for he had every ampère of his +self-possession in hand; my own case was different.</p> + +<p>He spoke close to my ear.</p> + +<p>"Is your hand steady? We may have to shoot."</p> + +<p>I thought of Kâramanèh, of lovely dark-eyed Kâramanèh, whom this +wonderful, evil product of secret China had stolen from me—for so I +now adjudged it.</p> + +<p>"Rely upon me!" I said grimly. "I—"</p> + +<p>The words ceased—frozen on my tongue.</p> + +<p>There are things that one seeks to forget, but it is my lot often to +remember the sound which at that moment literally struck me rigid with +horror. Yet it was only a groan; but, merciful God! I pray that it may +never be my lot to listen to such a groan again.</p> + +<p>Smith drew a sibilant breath.</p> + +<p>"It's Eltham!" he whispered hoarsely, "they're torturing—"</p> + +<p>"No, no!" screamed a woman's voice—a voice<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> that thrilled me anew, +but with another emotion. "Not that, not—"</p> + +<p>I distinctly heard the sound of a blow. Followed a sort of vague +scuffling. A door somewhere at the back of the house opened—and shut +again. Some one was coming along the passage towards us!</p> + +<p>"Stand back!" Smith's voice was low, but perfectly steady. "Leave it +to me!"</p> + +<p>Nearer came the footsteps and nearer. I could hear suppressed sobs. +The door opened, admitting again the faint light—and Kâramanèh came +in. The place was quite unfurnished, offering no possibility of +hiding; but to hide was unnecessary.</p> + +<p>Her slim figure had not crossed the threshold ere Smith had his arm +about the girl's waist and one hand clapped to her mouth. A stifled +gasp she uttered, and he lifted her into the room.</p> + +<p>"Shut the door, Petrie," he directed.</p> + +<p>I stepped forward and closed the door. A faint perfume stole to my +nostrils—a vague, elusive breath of the East, reminiscent of strange +days that, now, seemed to belong to a remote past. Kâramanèh! that +faint, indefinable perfume was part of her dainty personality; it may +appear absurd—impossible—but many and many a time I had dreamt of +it.</p> + +<p>"In my breast pocket," rapped Smith; "the light."</p> + +<p>I bent over the girl as he held her. She was quite still, but I could +have wished that I had had more certain mastery of myself. I took the +torch from Smith's pocket and, mechanically, directed it upon the +captive.</p> + +<p>She was dressed very plainly, wearing a simple blue skirt, and white +blouse. It was easy to divine that it was she whom Eltham had mistaken +for a French maid. A brooch set with a ruby was pinned at the point +where the blouse opened—gleaming fierily and harshly against the soft +skin. Her face was pale and her eyes wide with fear.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span></p> + +<p>"There is some cord in my right-hand pocket," said Smith. "I came +provided. Tie her wrists."</p> + +<p>I obeyed him, silently. The girl offered no resistance, but I think I +never essayed a less congenial task than that of binding her white +wrists. The jewelled fingers lay quite listlessly in my own.</p> + +<p>"Make a good job of it!" rapped Smith significantly.</p> + +<p>A flush rose to my cheeks, for I knew well enough what he meant.</p> + +<p>"She is fastened," I said, and I turned the ray of the torch upon her +again.</p> + +<p>Smith removed his hand from her mouth but did not relax his grip of +her. She looked up at me with eyes in which I could have sworn there +was no recognition. But a flush momentarily swept over her face, and +left it pale again.</p> + +<p>"We shall have to—gag her—"</p> + +<p>"Smith, I can't do it!"</p> + +<p>The girl's eyes filled with tears and she looked up at my companion +pitifully.</p> + +<p>"Please don't be cruel to me," she whispered, with that soft accent +which always played havoc with my composure. "Every one—every one—is +cruel to me. I will promise—indeed I will swear, to be quiet. Oh, +believe me, if you can save him I will do nothing to hinder you." Her +beautiful head drooped. "Have some pity for me as well."</p> + +<p>"Kâramanèh," I said, "we would have believed you once. We cannot now."</p> + +<p>She started violently.</p> + +<p>"You know my name!" Her voice was barely audible. "Yet I have never +seen you in my life—"</p> + +<p>"See if the door locks," interrupted Smith harshly.</p> + +<p>Dazed by the apparent sincerity in the voice of our lovely +captive—vacant from wonder of it all—I opened the door, felt for, +and found, a key.</p> + +<p>We left Kâramanèh crouching against the wall; her great eyes were +turned towards me fascinatedly.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span> Smith locked the door with much care. +We began a tip-toed progress along the dimly-lighted passage.</p> + +<p>From beneath a door on the left, and near the end, a brighter light +shone. Beyond that again was another door. A voice was speaking in the +lighted room; yet I could have sworn that Kâramanèh had come, not from +there but from the room beyond—from the far end of the passage.</p> + +<p>But the voice!—who, having once heard it, could ever mistake that +singular voice, alternately guttural and sibilant.</p> + +<p>Dr. Fu-Manchu was speaking!</p> + +<p>"I have asked you," came with ever-increasing clearness (Smith had +begun to turn the knob), "to reveal to me the name of your +correspondent in Nan-Yang. I have suggested that he may be the +Mandarin Yen-Sun-Yat, but you have declined to confirm me. Yet I know" +(Smith had the door open a good three inches and was peering in) "that +some official, some high official, is a traitor. Am I to resort again +to <i>the question</i> to learn his name?"</p> + +<p>Ice seemed to enter my veins at the unseen inquisitor's intonation of +the words "<i>the question</i>." This was the twentieth century; yet there, +in that damnable room....</p> + +<p>Smith threw the door open.</p> + +<p>Through a sort of haze, born mostly of horror, but not entirely, I saw +Eltham, stripped to the waist and tied, with his arms upstretched, to +a rafter in the ancient ceiling. A Chinaman, who wore a slop-shop blue +suit and who held an open knife in his hand, stood beside him. Eltham +was ghastly white. The appearance of his chest puzzled me momentarily, +then I realized that a sort of <i>tourniquet</i> of wire-netting was +screwed so tightly about him that the flesh swelled out in knobs +through the mesh. There was blood—</p> + +<p>"God in heaven!" screamed Smith frenziedly, "<i>they have the +wire-jacket on him!</i> Shoot down that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span> damned Chinaman, Petrie! Shoot! +Shoot!"</p> + +<p>Lithely as a cat the man with the knife leapt around—but I raised the +Browning, and deliberately—with a cool deliberation that came to me +suddenly—shot him through the head. I saw his oblique eyes turn up to +the whites; I saw the mark squarely between his brows; and with no +word nor cry he sank to his knees and toppled forward with one yellow +hand beneath him and one outstretched, +clutching—clutching—convulsively. His pigtail came unfastened and +began to uncoil, slowly, like a snake.</p> + +<p>I handed the pistol to Smith; I was perfectly cool, now; and I leapt +forward, took up the bloody knife from the floor and cut Eltham's +lashings. He sank into my arms.</p> + +<p>"Praise God," he murmured weakly. "He is more merciful to me than +perhaps I deserve. Unscrew ... the jacket, Petrie ... I think ... I +was very near to ... weakening. Praise the good God, who ... gave me +... fortitude...."</p> + +<p>I got the screw of the accursed thing loosened, but the act of +removing the jacket was too agonizing for Eltham—man of iron though +he was. I laid him swooning on the floor.</p> + +<p>"Where is Fu-Manchu?"</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith, from just within the door, threw out the query in a +tone of stark amaze. I stood up—I could do nothing more for the poor +victim at the moment—and looked about me.</p> + +<p>The room was innocent of furniture, save for heaps of rubbish on the +floor, and a tin oil-lamp hung on the wall. The dead Chinaman lay +close beside Smith. There was no second door, the one window was +barred and from this room we had heard the voice, the unmistakable, +unforgettable voice, of Fu-Manchu.</p> + +<p><i>But Dr. Fu-Manchu was not there!</i></p> + +<p>Neither of us could accept the fact for a moment; we stood there, +looking from the dead man to the tortured man who had only swooned, +in a state of helpless incredulity.</p> + +<p>Then the explanation flashed upon us both, simultaneously, and with a +cry of baffled rage Smith leapt along the passage to the second door. +It was wide open. I stood at his elbow when he swept its emptiness +with the ray of his pocket-lamp.</p> + +<p>There was a speaking-tube fixed between the two rooms!</p> + +<p>Smith literally ground his teeth.</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span></p> +<p>"Yet, Petrie," he said, "we have learnt something. Fu-Manchu had +evidently promised Eltham his life if he would divulge the name of his +correspondent. He meant to keep his word; it is a sidelight on his +character."</p> + +<p>"How so?"</p> + +<p>"Eltham has never seen Dr. Fu-Manchu, but Eltham knows certain parts +of China better than you know the Strand. Probably, if he saw +Fu-Manchu, he would recognize him for whom he really is, and this, it +seems, the Doctor is anxious to avoid."</p> + +<p>We ran back to where we had left Kâramanèh.</p> + +<p>The room was empty!</p> + +<p>"Defeated, Petrie!" said Smith bitterly. "The Yellow Devil is loosed +on London again!"</p> + +<p>He leant from the window and the skirl of a police whistle split the +stillness of the night.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IV" id="CHAPTER_IV"></a>CHAPTER IV</h2> + +<h3>THE CRY OF A NIGHTHAWK</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">S </span></p> +<p>uch were the episodes that marked the coming of Dr. Fu-Manchu to +London, that awakened fears long dormant and reopened old wounds—nay, +poured poison into them. I strove desperately, by close<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span> attention to +my professional duties, to banish the very memory of Kâramanèh from my +mind; desperately, but how vainly! Peace was for me no more, joy was +gone from the world, and only mockery remained as my portion.</p> + +<p>Poor Eltham we had placed in a nursing establishment, where his +indescribable hurts could be properly tended; and his uncomplaining +fortitude not infrequently made me thoroughly ashamed of myself. +Needless to say, Smith had made such other arrangements as were +necessary to safeguard the injured man, and these proved so successful +that the malignant being whose plans they thwarted abandoned his +designs upon the heroic clergyman and directed his attention +elsewhere, as I must now proceed to relate.</p> + +<p>Dusk always brought with it a cloud of apprehension, for darkness must +ever be the ally of crime; and it was one night, long after the clocks +had struck the mystic hour, "when churchyards yawn," that the hand of +Dr. Fu-Manchu again stretched out to grasp a victim. I was dismissing +a chance patient.</p> + +<p>"Good night, Dr. Petrie," he said.</p> + +<p>"Good night, Mr. Forsyth," I replied; and having conducted my late +visitor to the door, I closed and bolted it, switched off the light, +and went upstairs.</p> + +<p>My patient was chief officer of one of the P. and O. boats. He had cut +his hand rather badly on the homeward run, and signs of poisoning +having developed, had called to have the wound treated, apologizing +for troubling me at so late an hour, but explaining that he had only +just come from the docks. The hall clock announced the hour of one as +I ascended the stairs. I found myself wondering what there was in Mr. +Forsyth's appearance which excited some vague and elusive memory. +Coming to the top floor, I opened the door of a front bedroom and was +surprised to find the interior in darkness.</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I called.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Come here and watch!" was the terse response.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith was sitting in the dark at the open window and peering +out across the common. Even as I saw him, a dim silhouette, I could +detect that tensity in his attitude which told of high-strung nerves.</p> + +<p>I joined him.</p> + +<p>"What is it?" I asked curiously.</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Watch that clump of elms."</p> + +<p>His masterful voice had the dry tone in it betokening excitement. I +leaned on the ledge beside him and looked out. The blaze of stars +almost compensated for the absence of the moon, and the night had a +quality of stillness that made for awe. This was a tropical summer, +and the common, with its dancing lights dotted irregularly about it, +had an unfamiliar look to-night. The clump of nine elms showed as a +dense and irregular mass, lacking detail.</p> + +<p>Such moods as that which now claimed my friend are magnetic. I had no +thought of the night's beauty, for it only served to remind me that +somewhere amid London's millions was lurking an uncanny being, whose +life was a mystery, whose very existence was a scientific miracle.</p> + +<p>"Where's your patient?" rapped Smith.</p> + +<p>His abrupt query diverted my thoughts into a new channel. No footstep +disturbed the silence of the high-road. Where <i>was</i> my patient?</p> + +<p>I craned from the window. Smith grabbed my arm.</p> + +<p>"Don't lean out," he said.</p> + +<p>I drew back, glancing at him surprisedly.</p> + +<p>"For Heaven's sake, why not?"</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you presently, Petrie. Did you see him?"</p> + +<p>"I did, and I can't make out what he is doing. He seems to have +remained standing at the gate for some reason."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He has seen it!" snapped Smith. "Watch those elms."</p> + +<p>His hand remained upon my arm, gripping it nervously. Shall I say that +I was surprised? I can say it with truth. But I shall add that I was +thrilled, eerily; for this subdued excitement and alert watching of +Smith's could only mean one thing:</p> + +<p>Fu-Manchu!</p> + +<p>And that was enough to set me watching as keenly as he; to set me +listening, not only for sounds outside the house but for sounds +within. Doubts, suspicions, dreads heaped themselves up in my mind. +Why was Forsyth standing there at the gate? I had never seen him +before, to my knowledge, yet there was something oddly reminiscent +about the man. Could it be that his visit formed part of a plot? Yet +his wound had been genuine enough. Thus my mind worked, feverishly; +such was the effect of an unspoken thought—Fu-Manchu.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith's grip tightened on my arm.</p> + +<p>"There it is again, Petrie!" he whispered. "Look, look!"</p> + +<p>His words were wholly unnecessary. I, too, had seen it; a wonderful +and uncanny sight. Out of the darkness under the elms, low down upon +the ground, grew a vaporous blue light. It flared up, elfinish, then +began to ascend. Like an igneous phantom, a witch flame, it rose, +higher, higher, higher, to what I adjudged to be some twelve feet or +more from the ground. Then, high in the air, it died away again as it +had come!</p> + +<p>"For God's sake, Smith, what was it?"</p> + +<p>"Don't ask me, Petrie. I have seen it twice. We—"</p> + +<p>He paused. Rapid footsteps sounded below. Over Smith's shoulder I saw +Forsyth cross the road, climb the low rail, and set out across the +common.</p> + +<p>Smith sprang impetuously to his feet.</p> + +<p>"We must stop him!" he said hoarsely; then,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span> clapping a hand to my +mouth as I was about to call out—"Not a sound, Petrie!"</p> + +<p>He ran out of the room and went blundering downstairs in the dark, +crying:</p> + +<p>"Out through the garden—the side entrance!"</p> + +<p>I overtook him as he threw wide the door of my dispensing room. +Through he ran and opened the door at the other end. I followed him +out, closing it behind me. The smell from some tobacco plants in a +neighbouring flower-bed was faintly perceptible; no breeze stirred; +and in the great silence I could hear Smith, in front of me, tugging +at the bolt of the gate.</p> + +<p>Then he had it open, and I stepped out, close on his heels, and left +the door ajar.</p> + +<p>"We must not appear to have come from your house," explained Smith +rapidly. "I will go along to the high-road and cross to the common a +hundred yards up, where there is a pathway, as though homeward bound +to the north side. Give me half a minute's start, then you proceed in +an opposite direction and cross from the corner of the next road. +Directly you are out of the light of the street lamps, get over the +rails and run for the elms!"</p> + +<p>He thrust a pistol into my hand and was off.</p> + +<p>While he had been with me, speaking in that incisive impetuous way of +his, his dark face close to mine, and his eyes gleaming like steel, I +had been at one with him in his feverish mood, but now, when I stood +alone in that staid and respectable by-way, holding a loaded pistol in +my hand, the whole thing became utterly unreal.</p> + +<p>It was in an odd frame of mind that I walked to the next corner, as +directed, for I was thinking, not of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the great and evil +man who dreamed of Europe and America under Chinese rule, not of +Nayland Smith, who alone stood between the Chinaman and the +realization of his monstrous schemes, not even of Kâramanèh, the slave +girl, whose<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span> glorious beauty was a weapon of might in Fu-Manchu's +hand, but of what impression I must have made upon a patient had I +encountered one then.</p> + +<p>Such were my ideas up to the moment that I crossed to the common and +vaulted into the field on my right. As I began to run toward the elms +I found myself wondering what it was all about, and for what we were +come. Fifty yards west of the trees it occurred to me that if Smith +had counted on cutting Forsyth off we were too late, for it appeared +to me that he must already be in the coppice.</p> + +<p>I was right. Twenty paces more I ran, and ahead of me, from the elms, +came a sound. Clearly it came through the still air—the eerie hoot of +a nighthawk. I could not recall ever to have heard the cry of that +bird on the common before, but oddly enough I attached little +significance to it until, in the ensuing instant, a most dreadful +scream—a scream in which fear and loathing and anger were hideously +blended—thrilled me with horror.</p> + +<p>After that I have no recollection of anything until I found myself +standing by the southernmost elm.</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried breathlessly. "Smith! my God! where are you?"</p> + +<p>As if in answer to my cry came an indescribable sound, a mingled +sobbing and choking. Out from the shadows staggered a ghastly +figure—that of a man whose face appeared to be <i>streaked</i>. His eyes +glared at me madly, and he moved the air with his hands like one blind +and insane with fear.</p> + +<p>I started back; words died upon my tongue. The figure reeled, and the +man fell babbling and sobbing at my very feet.</p> + +<p>Inert I stood, looking down at him. He writhed a moment—and was +still. The silence again became perfect. Then, from somewhere beyond +the elms, Nayland Smith appeared. I did not move. Even<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span> when he stood +beside me, I merely stared at him fatuously.</p> + +<p>"I let him walk to his death, Petrie," I heard dimly. "God forgive +me—God forgive me!"</p> + +<p>The words aroused me.</p> + +<p>"Smith"—my voice came as a whisper—"for one awful moment I +thought—"</p> + +<p>"So did some one else," he rapped. "Our poor sailor has met the end +designed for <i>me</i>, Petrie!"</p> + +<p>At that I realized two things: I knew why Forsyth's face had struck me +as being familiar in some puzzling way, and I knew why Forsyth now lay +dead upon the grass. Save that he was a fair man and wore a slight +moustache, he was, in features and build, the double of Nayland Smith!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_V" id="CHAPTER_V"></a>CHAPTER V</h2> + +<h3>THE NET</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">W </span></p> +<p>e raised the poor victim and turned him over on his back. I dropped +upon my knees, and with unsteady fingers began to strike a match. A +slight breeze was arising and sighing gently through the elms, but, +screened by my hands, the flame of the match took life. It illuminated +wanly the sun-baked face of Nayland Smith, his eyes gleaming with +unnatural brightness. I bent forward, and the dying light of the match +touched that other face.</p> + +<p>"Oh, God!" whispered Smith.</p> + +<p>A faint puff of wind extinguished the match.</p> + +<p>In all my surgical experience I had never met with anything quite so +horrible. Forsyth's livid face was streaked with tiny streams of +blood, which proceeded from a series of irregular wounds. One group of +these clustered upon his left temple, another beneath his right eye, +and others extended from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span> chin down to the throat. They were +black, almost like tattoo marks, and the entire injured surface was +bloated indescribably. His fists were clenched; he was quite rigid.</p> + +<p>Smith's piercing eyes were set upon me eloquently as I knelt on the +path and made my examination—an examination which that first glimpse +when Forsyth came staggering out from the trees had rendered +useless—a mere matter of form.</p> + +<p>"He's quite dead, Smith," I said huskily. "It's—unnatural—it—"</p> + +<p>Smith began beating his fist into his left palm and taking little, +short, nervous strides up and down beside the dead man. I could hear a +car skirling along the high-road, but I remained there on my knees +staring dully at the disfigured bloody face which but a matter of +minutes since had been that of a clean-looking British seaman. I found +myself contrasting his neat, squarely trimmed moustache with the +bloated face above it, and counting the little drops of blood which +trembled upon its edge. There were footsteps approaching. I arose. The +footsteps quickened, and I turned as a constable ran up.</p> + +<p>"What's this?" he demanded gruffly, and stood with his fists clenched, +looking from Smith to me and down at that which lay between us. Then +his hand flew to his breast; there was a silvern gleam and—</p> + +<p>"Drop that whistle!" snapped Smith, and struck it from the man's hand. +"Where's your lantern? Don't ask questions!"</p> + +<p>The constable started back and was evidently debating upon his chances +with the two of us, when my friend pulled a letter from his pocket and +thrust it under the man's nose.</p> + +<p>"Read that!" he directed harshly, "and then listen to my orders."</p> + +<p>There was something in his voice which changed the officer's opinion +of the situation. He directed<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span> the light of his lantern upon the open +letter, and seemed to be stricken with wonder.</p> + +<p>"If you have any doubt," continued Smith—"you may not be familiar +with the Commissioner's signature—you have only to ring up Scotland +Yard from Dr. Petrie's house, to which we shall now return to disperse +it." He pointed to Forsyth. "Help us to carry him there. We must not +be seen; this must be hushed up. You understand? It must not get into +the Press—"</p> + +<p>The man saluted respectfully, and the three of us addressed ourselves +to the mournful task. By slow stages we bore the dead man to the edge +of the common, carried him across the road and into my house, without +exciting attention even on the part of those vagrants who nightly +slept out in the neighbourhood.</p> + +<p>We laid our burden upon the surgery table.</p> + +<p>"You will want to make an examination, Petrie," said Smith in his +decisive way, "and the officer here might 'phone for the ambulance. I +have some investigations to make also. I must have the pocket lamp."</p> + +<p>He raced upstairs to his room, and an instant later came running down +again. The front door banged.</p> + +<p>"The telephone is in the hall," I said to the constable.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, sir."</p> + +<p>He went out of the surgery as I switched on the lamp over the table +and began to examine the marks upon Forsyth's skin. These, as I have +said, were in groups and nearly all in the form of elongated +punctures; a fairly deep incision with a pear-shaped and superficial +scratch beneath it. One of the tiny wounds had penetrated the right +eye.</p> + +<p>The symptoms, or those which I had been enabled to observe as Forsyth +had first staggered into view from among the elms, were most puzzling. +Clearly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span> enough the muscles of articulation and the respiratory +muscles had been affected; and now the livid face, dotted over with +tiny wounds (they were also on the throat), set me mentally groping +for a clue to the manner of his death.</p> + +<p>No clue presented itself; and my detailed examination of the body +availed me nothing. The grey herald of dawn was come when the police +arrived with the ambulance and took Forsyth away.</p> + +<p>I was just taking my cap from the rack when Nayland Smith returned.</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried, "have you found anything?"</p> + +<p>He stood there in the grey light of the hall-way tugging at the lobe +of his left ear.</p> + +<p>The bronzed face looked very gaunt, I thought, and his eyes were +bright with that febrile glitter which once I had disliked, but which +I had learned from experience to be due to tremendous nervous +excitement. At such times he could act with icy coolness, and his +mental faculties seemed temporarily to acquire an abnormal keenness. +He made no direct reply, but—</p> + +<p>"Have you any milk?" he jerked abruptly.</p> + +<p>So wholly unexpected was the question that for a moment I failed to +grasp it. Then—</p> + +<p>"Milk!" I began.</p> + +<p>"Exactly, Petrie! If you can find me some milk, I shall be obliged."</p> + +<p>I turned to descend to the kitchen, when—</p> + +<p>"The remains of the turbot from dinner, Petrie, would also be welcome, +and I think I should like a trowel."</p> + +<p>I stopped at the stairhead and faced him.</p> + +<p>"I cannot suppose that you are joking, Smith," I said, "but—"</p> + +<p>He laughed dryly.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me, old man," he replied. "I was so preoccupied with my own +train of thought that it never occurred to me how absurd my request +must<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span> have sounded. I will explain my singular tastes later; at the +moment, hustle is the watchword."</p> + +<p>Evidently he was in earnest, and I ran downstairs accordingly, +returning with a garden trowel, a plate of cold fish, and a glass of +milk.</p> + +<p>"Thanks, Petrie," said Smith. "If you would put the milk in a jug—"</p> + +<p>I was past wondering, so I simply went and fetched a jug, into which +he poured the milk. Then, with the trowel in his pocket, the plate of +cold turbot in one hand and the milk-jug in the other, he made for the +door. He had it open, when another idea evidently occurred to him.</p> + +<p>"I'll trouble you for the pistol, Petrie."</p> + +<p>I handed him the pistol without a word.</p> + +<p>"Don't assume that I want to mystify you," he added, "but the presence +of any one else might jeopardize my plan. I don't expect to be long."</p> + +<p>The cold light of dawn flooded the hall-way momentarily; then the door +closed again and I went upstairs to my study, watching Nayland Smith +as he strode across the common in the early morning mist. He was +making for the Nine Elms, but I lost sight of him before he reached +them.</p> + +<p>I sat there for some time, watching for the first glow of sunrise. A +policeman tramped past the house, and, a while later, a belated +reveller in evening clothes. That sense of unreality assailed me +again. Out there in the grey mist a man who was vested with powers +which rendered him a law unto himself, who had the British Government +behind him in all that he might choose to do, who had been summoned +from Rangoon to London on singular and dangerous business, was +employing himself with a plate of cold turbot, a jug of milk, and a +trowel!</p> + +<p>Away to the right, and just barely visible, a tramcar stopped by the +common, then proceeded on its way, coming in a westerly direction. Its +lights twinkled yellowly through the greyness, but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span> I was less +concerned with the approaching car than with the solitary traveller +who had descended from it.</p> + +<p>As the car went rocking by below me I strained my eyes in an endeavour +more clearly to discern the figure, which, leaving the high-road, had +struck-out across the common. It was that of a woman, who seemingly +carried a bulky bag or parcel.</p> + +<p>One must be a gross materialist to doubt that there are latent powers +in man which man, in modern times, neglects or knows not how to +develop. I became suddenly conscious of a burning curiosity respecting +this lonely traveller who travelled at an hour so strange. With no +definite plan in mind, I went downstairs, took a cap from the rack and +walked briskly out of the house and across the common in a direction +which I thought would enable me to head off the woman.</p> + +<p>I had slightly miscalculated the distance, as Fate would have it, and +with a patch of gorse effectually screening my approach, I came upon +her, kneeling on the damp grass and unfastening the bundle which had +attracted my attention. I stopped and watched her.</p> + +<p>She was dressed in bedraggled fashion in rusty black, wore a common +black straw hat and a thick veil; but it seemed to me that the +dexterous hands at work untying the bundle were slim and white, and I +perceived a pair of hideous cotton gloves lying on the turf beside +her. As she threw open the wrappings and lifted out something that +looked like a small shrimping-net, I stepped around the bush, crossed +silently the intervening patch of grass and stood beside her.</p> + +<p>A faint breath of perfume reached me—of a perfume which, like the +secret incense of Ancient Egypt, seemed to assail my soul. The glamour +of the Orient was in that subtle essence, and I only knew one woman +who used it. I bent over the kneeling figure.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Good morning," I said; "can I assist you in any way?"</p> + +<p>She came to her feet like a startled deer, and flung away from me with +the lithe movement of some Eastern dancing-girl.</p> + +<p>Now came the sun, and its heralding rays struck sparks from the jewels +upon the white fingers of this woman who wore the garments of a +mendicant. My heart gave a great leap. It was with difficulty that I +controlled my voice.</p> + +<p>"There is no cause for alarm," I added.</p> + +<p>She stood watching me; even through the coarse veil I could see how +her eyes glittered. I stooped and picked up the net.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" The whispered word was scarcely audible; but it was enough. I +doubted no longer.</p> + +<p>"This is a net for bird-snaring," I said. "What strange bird are you +seeking, <i>Kâramanèh</i>?"</p> + +<p>With a passionate gesture Kâramanèh snatched off the veil, and with it +the ugly black hat. The cloud of wonderful intractable hair came +rumpling about her face, and her glorious eyes blazed out upon me. How +beautiful they were, with the dark beauty of an Egyptian night; how +often had they looked into mine in dreams!</p> + +<p>To labour against a ceaseless yearning for a woman whom one knows, +upon evidence that none but a fool might reject, to be +worthless—evil; is there any torture to which the soul of man is +subject, more pitiless? Yet this was my lot, for what past sins +assigned to me I was unable to conjecture; and this was the woman, +this lovely slave of a monster, this creature of Dr. Fu-Manchu.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you will declare that you do not know me!" I said harshly.</p> + +<p>Her lips trembled, but she made no reply.</p> + +<p>"It is very convenient to forget, sometimes," I ran on bitterly, then +checked myself, for I knew that my words were prompted by a feckless +desire<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span> to hear her defence, by a fool's hope that it might be an +acceptable one. I looked again at the net contrivance in my hand; it +had a strong spring fitted to it and a line attached. Quite obviously +it was intended for snaring. "What were you about to do?" I demanded +sharply; but in my heart, poor fool that I was, I found admiration for +the exquisite arch of Kâramanèh's lips, and reproach because they were +so tremulous.</p> + +<p>She spoke then.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Petrie—"</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"You seem to be—angry with me, not so much because—of what I do, as +because I do not remember you. Yet—"</p> + +<p>"Kindly do not revert to the matter," I interrupted. "You have chosen, +very conveniently, to forget that once we were friends. Please +yourself; but answer my question."</p> + +<p>She clasped her hands with a sort of wild abandon.</p> + +<p>"Why do you treat me so?" she cried. She had the most fascinating +accent imaginable. "Throw me into prison, kill me if you like for what +I have done!" She stamped her foot. "For what I have done! But do not +torture me, try to drive me mad with your reproaches—that I forget +you! I tell you—again I tell you—that until you came one night, last +week, to rescue some one from"—(there was the old trick of hesitating +before the name of Fu-Manchu)—"from <i>him</i>, I had never, never seen +you!"</p> + +<p>The dark eyes looked into mine, afire with a positive hunger for +belief—or so I was sorely tempted to suppose. But the facts were +against her.</p> + +<p>"Such a declaration is worthless," I said, as coldly as I could. "You +are a traitress; you betray those who are mad enough to trust you—"</p> + +<p>"I am no traitress!" she blazed at me. Her eyes were magnificent.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span></p> + +<p>"This is mere nonsense. You think that it will pay you better to serve +Fu-Manchu than to remain true to your friends. Your 'slavery'—for I +take it you are posing as a slave again—is evidently not very harsh. +You serve Fu-Manchu, lure men to their destruction, and in return he +loads you with jewels, lavishes gifts—"</p> + +<p>"Ah! so!"</p> + +<p>She sprang forward, raising flaming eyes to mine; her lips were +slightly parted. With that wild abandon which betrayed the desert +blood in her veins, she wrenched open the neck of her bodice and +slipped a soft shoulder free of the garment. She twisted around, so +that the white skin was but inches removed from me.</p> + +<p>"These are some of the gifts that he lavishes upon me!"</p> + +<p>I clenched my teeth. Insane thoughts flooded my mind. For that creamy +skin was wealed with the marks of the lash!</p> + +<p>She turned, quickly rearranging her dress, and watching me the while. +I could not trust myself to speak for a moment, then—</p> + +<p>"If I am a stranger to you, as you claim, why do you give me your +confidence?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"I have known you long enough to trust you!" she said simply, and +turned her head aside.</p> + +<p>"Then why do you serve this inhuman monster?"</p> + +<p>She snapped her fingers oddly, and looked up at me from under her +lashes. "Why do you question me if you think that everything I say is +a lie?"</p> + +<p>It was a lesson in logic—from a woman! I changed the subject.</p> + +<p>"Tell me what you came here to do," I demanded.</p> + +<p>She pointed to the net in my hands.</p> + +<p>"To catch birds; you have said so yourself."</p> + +<p>"What bird?"</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders.</p> + +<p>And now a memory was born within my brain:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span> it was that of the cry of +the nighthawk which had harbingered the death of Forsyth! The net was +a large and strong one; could it be that some horrible fowl of the +air—some creature unknown to Western naturalists—had been released +upon the common last night? I thought of the marks upon Forsyth's face +and throat; I thought of the profound knowledge of obscure and +dreadful things possessed by the Chinaman.</p> + +<p>The wrapping in which the net had been lay at my feet. I stooped and +took out from it a wicker basket. Kâramanèh stood watching me and +biting her lip, but she made no move to check me. I opened the basket. +It contained a large phial, the contents of which possessed a pungent +and peculiar smell.</p> + +<p>I was utterly mystified.</p> + +<p>"You will have to accompany me to my house," I said sternly.</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh upturned her great eyes to mine. They were wide with fear. +She was on the point of speaking when I extended my hand to grasp her. +At that, the look of fear was gone and one of rebellion held its +place. Ere I had time to realize her purpose, she flung back from me +with that wild grace which I had met with in no other woman, +turned—and ran!</p> + +<p>Fatuously, net and basket in hand, I stood looking after her. The idea +of pursuit came to me certainly; but I doubted if I could outrun her. +For Kâramanèh ran, not like a girl used to town or even country life, +but with the lightness and swiftness of a gazelle; ran like the +daughter of the desert that she was.</p> + +<p>Some two hundred yards she went, stopped, and looked back. It would +seem that the sheer joy of physical effort had aroused the devil in +her, the devil that must lie latent in every woman with eyes like the +eyes of Kâramanèh.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span></p> + +<p>In the ever-brightening sunlight I could see the lithe figure swaying; +no rags imaginable could mask its beauty. I could see the red lips and +gleaming teeth. Then—and it was music good to hear, despite its +taunt—she laughed defiantly, turned, and ran again!</p> + +<p>I resigned myself to defeat; I blush to add, gladly! Some evidences of +a world awakening were perceptible about me now. Feathered choirs +hailed the new day joyously. Carrying the mysterious contrivance which +I had captured from the enemy, I set out in the direction of my house, +my mind very busy with conjectures respecting the link between this +bird-snare and the cry like that of a nighthawk which we had heard at +the moment of Forsyth's death.</p> + +<p>The path that I had chosen led me around the border of the Mound +Pond—a small pool having an islet in the centre. Lying at the margin +of the pond I was amazed to see the plate and jug which Nayland Smith +had borrowed recently.</p> + +<p>Dropping my burden, I walked down to the edge of the water. I was +filled with a sudden apprehension. Then, as I bent to pick up the now +empty jug, came a hail:</p> + +<p>"All right, Petrie! Shall join you in a moment!"</p> + +<p>I started up, looked to right and left; but, although the voice had +been that of Nayland Smith, no sign could I discern of his presence!</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried. "Smith!"</p> + +<p>"Coming!"</p> + +<p>Seriously doubting my senses, I looked in the direction from which the +voice had seemed to proceed—and there was Nayland Smith.</p> + +<p>He stood on the islet in the centre of the pond, and, as I perceived +him, he walked down into the shallow water and waded across to me!</p> + +<p>"Good heavens!" I began.</p> + +<p>One of his rare laughs interrupted me.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You must think me mad this morning, Petrie!" he said. "But I have +made several discoveries. Do you know what that islet in the pond +really is?"</p> + +<p>"Merely an islet, I suppose."</p> + +<p>"Nothing of the kind; it is a burial mound, Petrie! It marks the site +of one of the Plague Pits where victims were buried during the Great +Plague of London. You will observe that although you have seen it +every morning for some years, it remains for a British Commissioner +lately resident in Burma to acquaint you with its history! +Hullo!"—the laughter was gone from his eyes, and they were steely +hard again—"what the blazes have we here?"</p> + +<p>He picked up the net. "What! A bird-trap!"</p> + +<p>"Exactly!" I said.</p> + +<p>Smith turned his searching gaze upon me. "Where did you find it, +Petrie?"</p> + +<p>"I did not exactly find it," I replied; and I related to him the +circumstances of my meeting with Kâramanèh.</p> + +<p>He directed that cold stare upon me throughout the narrative, and +when, with some embarrassment, I had told him of the girl's escape—</p> + +<p>"Petrie," he said succinctly, "you are an imbecile!"</p> + +<p>I flushed with anger, for not even from Nayland Smith, whom I esteemed +above all other men, could I accept such words uttered as he had +uttered them. We glared at one another.</p> + +<p>"Kâramanèh," he continued coldly, "is a beautiful toy, I grant you; +but so is a cobra. Neither is suitable for playful purposes."</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried hotly, "drop that! Adopt another tone or I cannot +listen to you!"</p> + +<p>"You <i>must</i> listen," he said, squaring his lean jaw truculently. "You +are playing, not only with a pretty girl who is the favourite of a +Chinese Nero, but with <i>my life</i>! And I object, Petrie, on purely +personal grounds!"</p> + +<p>I felt my anger oozing from me; for this was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span> strictly just. I had +nothing to say and Smith continued:</p> + +<p>"You <i>know</i> that she is utterly false, yet a glance or two from those +dark eyes of hers can make a fool of you! A woman made a fool of me +once, but I learned my lesson; you have failed to learn yours. If you +are determined to go to pieces on the rock that broke up Adam, do so! +But don't involve me in the wreck, Petrie, for that might mean a +yellow emperor of the world, and you know it!"</p> + +<p>"Your words are unnecessarily brutal, Smith," I said, feeling very +crestfallen, "but there—perhaps I fully deserve them all."</p> + +<p>"You <i>do</i>!" he assured me, but he relaxed immediately. "A murderous +attempt is made upon my life, resulting in the death of a perfectly +innocent man in no way concerned. Along you come and let an +accomplice, perhaps a participant, escape, merely because she has a +red mouth, or black lashes, or whatever it is that fascinates you so +hopelessly!"</p> + +<p>He opened the wicker basket, sniffing at the contents.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" he snapped, "do you recognize this odour?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly."</p> + +<p>"Then you have some idea respecting Kâramanèh's quarry?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing of the kind!"</p> + +<p>Smith shrugged his shoulders.</p> + +<p>"Come along, Petrie," he said, linking his arm in mine.</p> + +<p>We proceeded. Many questions there were that I wanted to put to him, +but one above all.</p> + +<p>"Smith," I said, "what, in Heaven's name, were you doing on the mound? +Digging something up?"</p> + +<p>"No," he replied, smiling dryly, "burying something!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VI" id="CHAPTER_VI"></a>CHAPTER VI</h2> + +<h3>UNDER THE ELMS</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">D </span></p> +<p>usk found Nayland Smith and me at the top bedroom window. We knew, +now that poor Forsyth's body had been properly examined, that he had +died from poisoning. Smith, declaring that I did not deserve his +confidence, had refused to confide in me his theory of the origin of +the peculiar marks upon the body.</p> + +<p>"On the soft ground under the trees," he said, "I found his tracks +right up to the point where—something happened. There were no other +fresh tracks for several yards around. He was attacked as he stood +close to the trunk of one of the elms. Six or seven feet away I found +some other tracks, very much like this."</p> + +<p>He marked a series of dots upon the blotting-pad, for this +conversation took place during the afternoon.</p> + +<p>"Claws!" I cried. "That eerie call! like the call of a nighthawk—is +it some unknown species of—flying thing?"</p> + +<p>"We shall see, shortly; possibly to-night," was his reply. "Since, +probably owing to the absence of any moon, a mistake was made"—his +jaw hardened at the thought of poor Forsyth—"another attempt along +the same lines will almost certainly follow—you know Fu-Manchu's +system?"</p> + +<p>So in the darkness, expectant, we sat watching the group of nine elms. +To-night the moon was come, raising her Aladdin's lamp up to the star +world and summoning magic shadows into being. By midnight the +high-road showed deserted, the common was a place of mystery; and save +for the periodical passage of an electric car, in blazing modernity, +this was a fit enough stage for an eerie drama.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span></p> + +<p>No notice of the tragedy had appeared in print; Nayland Smith was +vested with powers to silence the Press. No detectives, no special +constables, were posted. My friend was of opinion that the publicity +which had been given to the deeds of Dr. Fu-Manchu in the past, +together with the sometimes clumsy co-operation of the police, had +contributed not a little to the Chinaman's success.</p> + +<p>"There is only one thing to fear," he jerked suddenly; "he may not be +ready for another attempt to-night."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Since he has only been in England for a short time, his menagerie of +venomous things may be a limited one at present."</p> + +<p>Earlier in the evening there had been a brief but violent +thunderstorm, with a tropical downpour of rain, and now clouds were +scudding across the blue of the sky. Through a temporary rift in the +veiling the crescent of the moon looked down upon us. It had a +greenish tint, and it set me thinking of the filmed, green eyes of +Fu-Manchu.</p> + +<p>The cloud passed and a lake of silver spread out to the edge of the +coppice; where it terminated at a shadow bank.</p> + +<p>"There it is, Petrie!" hissed Nayland Smith.</p> + +<p>A lambent light was born in the darkness; it rose slowly, unsteadily, +to a great height, and died.</p> + +<p>"It's under the trees, Smith!"</p> + +<p>But he was already making for the door. Over his shoulder:</p> + +<p>"Bring the pistol, Petrie!" he cried; "I have another. Give me at +least twenty yards' start or no attempt may be made. But the instant +I'm under the trees, join me."</p> + +<p>Out of the house we ran, and over on to the common, which latterly had +been a pageant-ground for phantom warring. The light did not appear +again; and as Smith plunged off toward the trees, I wondered if he<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span> +knew what uncanny thing was hidden there. I more than suspected that +he had solved the mystery.</p> + +<p>His instructions to keep well in the rear I understood. Fu-Manchu, or +the creature of Fu-Manchu, would attempt nothing in the presence of a +witness. But we knew full well that the instrument of death which was +hidden in the elm coppice could do its ghastly work and leave no clue, +could slay and vanish. For had not Forsyth come to a dreadful end +while Smith and I were within twenty yards of him?</p> + +<p>Not a breeze stirred, as Smith, ahead of me—for I had slowed my +pace—came up level with the first tree. The moon sailed clear of the +straggling cloud wisps which alone told of the recent storm; and I +noted that an irregular patch of light lay silvern on the moist ground +under the elms where otherwise lay shadow.</p> + +<p>He passed on, slowly. I began to run again. Black against the silvern +patch, I saw him emerge—and look up.</p> + +<p>"Be careful, Smith!" I cried—and I was racing under the trees to join +him.</p> + +<p>Uttering a loud cry, he leaped—away from the pool of light.</p> + +<p>"Stand back, Petrie!" he screamed. "Back! farther!"</p> + +<p>He charged into me, shoulder lowered, and sent me reeling!</p> + +<p>Mixed up with his excited cry I had heard a loud splintering and +sweeping of branches overhead; and now as we staggered into the +shadows it seemed that one of the elms was reaching down to touch us! +So, at least, the phenomenon presented itself to my mind in that +fleeting moment while Smith, uttering his warning cry, was hurling me +back.</p> + +<p>Then the truth became apparent.</p> + +<p>With an appalling crash, a huge bough fell from above. One piercing +awful shriek there was, a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span> crackling of broken branches, and a choking +groan....</p> + +<p>The crack of Smith's pistol close beside me completed my confusion of +mind.</p> + +<p>"Missed!" he yelled. "Shoot it, Petrie! On your left! For God's sake +don't miss it!"</p> + +<p>I turned. A lithe black shape was streaking past me. I +fired—once—twice. Another frightful cry made yet more hideous the +nocturne.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith was directing the ray of a pocket torch upon the fallen +bough.</p> + +<p>"Have you killed it, Petrie?" he cried.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes!"</p> + +<p>I stood beside him, looking down. From the tangle of leaves and twigs +an evil yellow face looked up at us. The features were contorted with +agony, but the malignant eyes, wherein light was dying, regarded us +with inflexible hatred. The man was pinned beneath the heavy bough; +his back was broken; and, as we watched, he expired, frothing slightly +at the mouth, and quitted his tenement of clay leaving those glassy +eyes set hideously upon us.</p> + +<p>"The pagan gods fight upon our side," said Smith strangely. "Elms have +a dangerous habit of shedding boughs in still weather—particularly +after a storm. Pan, god of the woods, with this one has performed +Justice's work of retribution."</p> + +<p>"I don't understand. Where was this man—?"</p> + +<p>"Up the tree, lying along the bough which fell, Petrie! That is why he +left no footmarks. Last night no doubt he made his escape by swinging +from bough to bough, ape-fashion, and descending to the ground +somewhere at the other side of the coppice."</p> + +<p>He glanced at me.</p> + +<p>"You are wondering, perhaps," he suggested, "what caused the +mysterious light? I could have told you this morning, but I fear I was +in a bad temper, Petrie. It's very simple; a length of tape soaked in +spirit or something of the kind, and shel<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span>tered from the view of any +one watching from your windows, behind the trunk of the tree; then, +the end ignited, lowered, still behind the tree, to the ground. The +operator swinging it around, the flame ascended, of course. I found +the unburned fragment of the tape used last night, a few yards from +here."</p> + +<p>I was peering down at Fu-Manchu's servant, the hideous yellow man who +lay dead in a bower of elm leaves.</p> + +<p>"He has some kind of leather bag beside him," I began.</p> + +<p>"Exactly!" rapped Smith. "In that he carried his dangerous instrument +of death; from that he released it!"</p> + +<p>"Released what?"</p> + +<p>"What your fascinating friend came to recapture this morning."</p> + +<p>"Don't taunt me, Smith!" I said bitterly. "Is it some species of +bird?"</p> + +<p>"You saw the marks on Forsyth's body, and I told you of those which I +had traced upon the ground here. They were caused by <i>claws</i>, Petrie!"</p> + +<p>"Claws! I thought so! But <i>what</i> claws?"</p> + +<p>"The claws of a poisonous thing. I recaptured the one used last night, +killed it—against my will—and buried it on the mound. I was afraid +to throw it in the pond, lest some juvenile fisherman should pull it +out and sustain a scratch. I don't know how long the claws would +remain venomous."</p> + +<p>"You are treating me like a child, Smith," I said, slowly. "No doubt I +am hopelessly obtuse, but perhaps you will tell me what this Chinaman +carried in a leather bag and released upon Forsyth. It was something +which you recaptured, apparently with the aid of a plate of cold +turbot and a jug of milk. It was something, also, which Kâramanèh had +been sent to recapture with the aid—"</p> + +<p>I stopped.</p> + +<p>"Go on," said Nayland Smith, turning the ray<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span> to the left; "what did +she have in the basket?"</p> + +<p>"Valerian," I replied mechanically.</p> + +<p>The ray rested upon the lithe creature that I had shot down.</p> + +<p>It was a black cat!</p> + +<p>"A cat will go through fire and water for valerian," said Smith; "but +I got first innings this morning with fish and milk! I had recognized +the imprints under the trees for those of a cat, and I knew that if a +cat had been released here it would still be hiding in the +neighbourhood, probably in the bushes. I finally located a cat, sure +enough, and came for bait! I laid my trap, for the animal was too +frightened to be approachable, and then shot it; I had to. That yellow +fiend used the light as a decoy. The branch which killed him jutted +out over the path at a spot where an opening in the foliage above +allowed some moon rays to penetrate. Directly the victim stood +beneath, the Chinaman uttered his bird-cry; the one below looked up, +and the cat, previously held silent and helpless in the leather sack, +was dropped accurately upon his head!"</p> + +<p>"But—" I was growing confused.</p> + +<p>Smith stooped lower.</p> + +<p>"The cat's claws are sheathed now," he said; "but if you could examine +them you would find that they are coated with a shining black +substance. Only Fu-Manchu knows what that substance is, Petrie; but +you and I know what it can do!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VII" id="CHAPTER_VII"></a>CHAPTER VII</h2> + +<h3>ENTER MR. ABEL SLATTIN</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> +<p> don't blame you!" rapped Nayland Smith. "Suppose we say, then, a +thousand pounds if you show us the present hiding-place of Fu-Manchu, +the payment to be in no way subject to whether we profit by your +information or not?"</p> + +<p>Abel Slattin shrugged his shoulders, racially, and returned to the +armchair which he had just quitted. He reseated himself, placing his +hat and cane upon my writing-table.</p> + +<p>"A little agreement in black and white?" he suggested smoothly.</p> + +<p>Smith raised himself up out of the white cane chair, and, bending +forward over a corner of the table, scribbled busily upon a sheet of +notepaper with my fountain-pen.</p> + +<p>The while he did so, I covertly studied our visitor. He lay back in +the armchair, his heavy eyelids lowered deceptively. He was a thought +overdressed—a big man, dark-haired and well-groomed, who toyed with a +monocle most unsuitable to his type. During the preceding +conversation, I had been vaguely surprised to note Mr. Abel Slattin's +marked American accent.</p> + +<p>Sometimes, when Slattin moved, a big diamond which he wore upon the +third finger of his right hand glittered magnificently. There was a +sort of bluish tint underlying the dusky skin, noticeable even in his +hands but proclaiming itself significantly in his puffy face and +especially under the eyes. I diagnosed a labouring valve somewhere in +the heart system.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith's pen scratched on. My glance strayed from our Semitic +caller to his cane, lying upon the red leather before me. It was of +most unusual workmanship, apparently Indian, being<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span> made of some kind +of dark brown, mottled wood, bearing a marked resemblance to a snake's +skin; and the top of the cane was carved in conformity, to represent +the head of what I took to be a puff-adder, fragments of stone, or +beads, being inserted to represent the eyes, and the whole thing being +finished with an artistic realism almost startling.</p> + +<p>When Smith had tossed the written page to Slattin, and he, having read +it with an appearance of carelessness, had folded it neatly and placed +it in his pocket, I said:</p> + +<p>"You have a curio here?"</p> + +<p>Our visitor, whose dark eyes revealed all the satisfaction which, by +his manner, he sought to conceal, nodded and took up the cane in his +hand.</p> + +<p>"It comes from Australia, doctor," he replied; "it's aboriginal work, +and was given to me by a client. You thought it was Indian? Everybody +does. It's my mascot."</p> + +<p>"Really?"</p> + +<p>"It is indeed. Its former owner ascribed magical powers to it! In +fact, I believe he thought that it was one of those staffs mentioned +in biblical history—"</p> + +<p>"Aaron's rod?" suggested Smith, glancing at the cane.</p> + +<p>"Something of the sort," said Slattin, standing up and again preparing +to depart.</p> + +<p>"You will 'phone us, then?" asked my friend.</p> + +<p>"You will hear from me to-morrow," was the reply.</p> + +<p>Smith returned to the cane armchair, and Slattin, bowing to both of +us, made his way to the door as I rang for the girl to show him out.</p> + +<p>"Considering the importance of his proposal," I began, as the door +closed, "you hardly received our visitor with cordiality."</p> + +<p>"I hate to have any relations with him," answered my friend; "but we +must not be squeamish respecting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span> our instruments in dealing with Dr. +Fu-Manchu. Slattin has a rotten reputation—even for a private inquiry +agent. He is little better than a blackmailer—"</p> + +<p>"How do you know?"</p> + +<p>"Because I called on our friend Weymouth at the Yard yesterday and +looked up the man's record."</p> + +<p>"Whatever for?"</p> + +<p>"I knew that he was concerning himself, for some reason, in the case. +Beyond doubt he has established some sort of communication with the +Chinese group; I am only wondering—"</p> + +<p>"You don't mean—"</p> + +<p>"Yes—I do, Petrie! I tell you he is unscrupulous enough to stoop even +to that."</p> + +<p>No doubt Slattin knew that this gaunt, eager-eyed Burmese commissioner +was vested with ultimate authority in his quest of the mighty Chinaman +who represented things unutterable, whose potentialities for evil were +boundless as his genius, who personified a secret danger, the extent +and nature of which none of us truly understood. And, learning of +these things, with unerring Semitic instinct he had sought an opening +in this glittering Rialto. But there were <i>two</i> bidders!</p> + +<p>"You think he may have sunk so low as to become a creature of +Fu-Manchu?" I asked, aghast.</p> + +<p>"Exactly! If it paid him well I do not doubt that he would serve that +master as readily as any other. His record is about as black as it +well could be. Slattin is, of course, an assumed name; he was known as +Lieutenant Pepley when he belonged to the New York Police, and he was +kicked out of the service for complicity in an unsavoury Chinatown +case."</p> + +<p>"Chinatown!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, Petrie, it made me wonder, too; and we must not forget that he +is undeniably a clever scoundrel."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Shall you keep any appointment which he may suggest?"</p> + +<p>"Undoubtedly. But I shall not wait until to-morrow."</p> + +<p>"What!"</p> + +<p>"I propose to pay a little informal visit to Mr. Abel Slattin +to-night."</p> + +<p>"At his office?"</p> + +<p>"No; at his private residence. If, as I more than suspect, his object +is to draw us into some trap, he will probably report his favourable +progress to his employer to-night!"</p> + +<p>"Then we should have followed him!"</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stood up and divested himself of the old +shooting-jacket.</p> + +<p>"He <i>has</i> been followed, Petrie," he replied, with one of his rare +smiles. "Two C.I.D. men have been watching the house all night!"</p> + +<p>This was entirely characteristic of my friend's farseeing methods.</p> + +<p>"By the way," I said, "you saw Eltham this morning. He will soon be +convalescent. Where, in Heaven's name, can he—"</p> + +<p>"Don't be alarmed on his behalf, Petrie," interrupted Smith. "His life +is no longer in danger."</p> + +<p>I stared, stupidly.</p> + +<p>"No longer in danger!"</p> + +<p>"He received, some time yesterday, a letter, written in Chinese, upon +Chinese paper, and enclosed in an ordinary business envelope, having a +typewritten address and bearing a London postmark."</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"As nearly as I can render the message in English it reads: 'Although, +because you are a brave man, you would not betray your correspondent +in China, he has been discovered. He was a mandarin, and as I cannot +write the name of a traitor, I may not name him. He was executed four +days ago. I salute you and pray for your speedy +recovery.—<span class="smcap">Fu-Manchu.</span>'"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Fu-Manchu! But it is almost certainly a trap."</p> + +<p>"On the contrary, Petrie, Fu-Manchu would not have written in Chinese +unless he were sincere; and, to clear all doubt, I received a cable +this morning reporting that the Mandarin Yen-Sun-Yat was assassinated +in his own garden, in Nan-Yang, one day last week."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_VIII" id="CHAPTER_VIII"></a>CHAPTER VIII</h2> + +<h3>DR. FU-MANCHU STRIKES</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">T </span></p> +<p>ogether we marched down the slope of the quiet, suburban avenue; to +take pause before a small, detached house displaying the hatchet +boards of the estate agent. Here we found unkempt laurel bushes, and +acacias run riot, from which arboreal tangle protruded the notice: "To +be Let or Sold."</p> + +<p>Smith, with an alert glance to right and left, pushed open the wooden +gate and drew me in upon the gravel path. Darkness mantled all; for +the nearest street lamp was fully twenty yards beyond.</p> + +<p>From the miniature jungle bordering the path, a soft whistle sounded.</p> + +<p>"Is that Carter?" called Smith sharply.</p> + +<p>A shadowy figure uprose, and vaguely I made it out for that of a man +in the unobtrusive blue serge which is the undress uniform of the +Force.</p> + +<p>"Well?" rapped my companion.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Slattin returned ten minutes ago, sir," reported the constable. +"He came in a cab which he dismissed—"</p> + +<p>"He has not left again?"</p> + +<p>"A few minutes after his return," the man continued, "another cab came +up, and a lady alighted."</p> + +<p>"A lady!"</p> + +<p>"The same, sir, that has called upon him before."</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I whispered, plucking at his arm—"is <span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span>it—?"</p> + +<p>He half turned, nodding his head; and my heart began to throb +foolishly. For now the manner of Slattin's campaign suddenly was +revealed to me. In our operations against the Chinese murder-group two +years before, we had had an ally in the enemy's camp—Kâramanèh, the +beautiful slave, whose presence in those happenings of the past had +coloured the sometimes sordid drama with the opulence of old Arabia; +who had seemed a fitting figure for the romances of Bagdad during the +Caliphate—Kâramanèh, whom I had thought sincere, whose inscrutable +Eastern soul I had presumed, fatuously, to have laid bare and +analysed.</p> + +<p>Now once again she was plying her old trade of go-between; professing +to reveal the secrets of Dr. Fu-Manchu, and all the time—I could not +doubt it—inveigling men into the net of this awful fisher.</p> + +<p>Yesterday, I had been her dupe; yesterday, I had rejoiced in my +captivity. To-day, I was not the favoured one; to-day I had not been +selected recipient of her confidences—confidences sweet, seductive, +deadly: but Abel Slattin, a plausible rogue, who, in justice, should +be immured in Sing Sing, was chosen out, was enslaved by those lovely +mysterious eyes, was taking to his soul the lies which fell from those +perfect lips, triumphant in a conquest that must end in his undoing; +deeming, poor fool, that for love of him this pearl of the Orient was +about to betray her master, to resign herself a prize to the victor!</p> + +<p>Companioned by these bitter reflections, I had lost the remainder of +the conversation between Nayland Smith and the police officer; now, +casting off the succubus memory which threatened to obsess me, I put +forth a giant mental effort to purge my mind of this uncleanness, and +became again an active participant in the campaign against the +Master—the director of all things noxious.</p> + +<p>Our plans being evidently complete, Smith seized<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span> my arm, and I found +myself again out upon the avenue. He led me across the road and into +the gate of a house almost opposite. From the fact that two upper +windows were illuminated, I adduced that the servants were retiring; +the other windows were in darkness, except for one on the ground floor +to the extreme left of the building, through the lowered venetian +blinds whereof streaks of light shone out.</p> + +<p>"Slattin's study!" whispered Smith. "He does not anticipate +surveillance, and you will note that the window is wide open!"</p> + +<p>With that my friend crossed the strip of lawn, and, careless of the +fact that his silhouette must have been visible to any one passing the +gate, climbed carefully up the artificial rockery intervening, and +crouched upon the window-ledge peering into the room.</p> + +<p>A moment I hesitated, fearful that if I followed I should stumble or +dislodge some of the lava blocks of which the rockery was composed.</p> + +<p>Then I heard that which summoned me to the attempt, whatever the cost.</p> + +<p>Through the open window came the sound of a musical voice—a voice +possessing a haunting accent, possessing a quality which struck upon +my heart and set it quivering as though it were a gong hung in my +bosom.</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh was speaking.</p> + +<p>Upon hands and knees, heedless of damage to my garments, I crawled up +beside Smith. One of the laths was slightly displaced and over this my +friend was peering in. Crouching close beside him, I peered in also.</p> + +<p>I saw the study of a business man, with its files, neatly arranged +works of reference, roll-top desk, and Milner safe. Before the desk, +in a revolving chair, sat Slattin. He sat half-turned towards the +window, leaning back and smiling; so that I could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span> note the gold crown +which preserved the lower left molar. In an armchair by the window, +close, very close, and sitting with her back to me, was Kâramanèh!</p> + +<p>She, who, in my dreams, I always saw, was ever seeing, in an Eastern +dress, with gold bands about her white ankles, with jewel-laden +fingers, with jewels in her hair, wore now a fashionable costume and a +hat that could only have been produced in Paris. Kâramanèh was the one +Oriental woman I had ever known who could wear European clothes; and +as I watched that exquisite profile, I thought that Delilah must have +been just such another as this; that, excepting the Empress Poppæ, +history has record of no woman who, looking so innocent, was yet so +utterly vile.</p> + +<p>"Yes, my dear," Slattin was saying, and through his monocle ogling his +beautiful visitor, "I shall be ready for you to-morrow night."</p> + +<p>I felt Smith start at the words.</p> + +<p>"There will be a sufficient number of men?"</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh put the question in a strangely listless way.</p> + +<p>"My dear little girl," replied Slattin, rising and standing looking +down at her, with his gold tooth twinkling in the lamplight, "there +will be a whole division, if a whole division is necessary."</p> + +<p>He sought to take her white gloved hand, which rested upon the chair +arm; but she evaded the attempt with seeming artlessness, and stood +up. Slattin fixed his bold gaze upon her.</p> + +<p>"So now, give me my orders," he said.</p> + +<p>"I am not prepared to do so, yet," replied the girl composedly; "but +now that I know you are ready, I can make my plans."</p> + +<p>She glided past him to the door, avoiding his outstretched arm with an +artless art which made me writhe; for once I had been the willing +victim of all these wiles.</p> + +<p>"But—" began Slattin.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I will ring you up in less than half an hour," said Kâramanèh; and +without further ceremony, she opened the door.</p> + +<p>I still had my eyes glued to the aperture in the blind, when Smith +began tugging at my arm.</p> + +<p>"Down! you fool!" he hissed sharply; "if she sees us, all is lost!"</p> + +<p>Realizing this, and none too soon, I turned, and rather clumsily +followed my friend. I dislodged a piece of granite in my descent; but, +fortunately Slattin had gone out into the hall and could not well have +heard it.</p> + +<p>We were crouching around an angle of the house, when a flood of light +poured down the steps, and Kâramanèh rapidly descended. I had a +glimpse of a dark-faced man who evidently had opened the door for her; +then all my thoughts were centred upon that graceful figure receding +from me in the direction of the avenue. She wore a loose cloak, and I +saw this fluttering for a moment against the white gate-posts; then +she was gone.</p> + +<p>Yet Smith did not move. Detaining me with his hand he crouched there +against a quick-set hedge; until, from a spot lower down the hill, we +heard the start of the cab, which had been waiting. Twenty seconds +elapsed, and from some other distant spot a second cab started.</p> + +<p>"That's Weymouth!" snapped Smith. "With decent luck, we should know +Fu-Manchu's hiding-place before Slattin tells us!"</p> + +<p>"But—"</p> + +<p>"Oh! as it happens he's apparently playing the game." In the +half-light, Smith stared at me significantly. "Which makes it all the +more important," he concluded, "that we should not rely upon his aid!"</p> + +<p>Those grim words were prophetic.</p> + +<p>My companion made no attempt to communicate with the detective (or +detectives) who shared our<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span> vigil; we took up a position close under +the lighted study window and waited—waited.</p> + +<p>Once, a taxi-cab laboured hideously up the steep gradient of the +avenue.... It was gone. The lights at the upper windows above us +became extinguished. A policeman tramped past the gateway, casually +flashing his lamp in at the opening. One by one the illuminated +windows in other houses visible to us became dull; then lived again as +mirrors for the pallid moon. In the silence, words spoken within the +study were clearly audible; and we heard some one—presumably the man +who had opened the door—inquire if his services would be wanted again +that night.</p> + +<p>Smith inclined his head and hung over me in a tense attitude, in order +to catch Slattin's reply.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Burke," it came, "I want you to sit up until I return; I shall +be going out shortly."</p> + +<p>Evidently the man withdrew at that; for a complete silence followed +which prevailed for fully half an hour. I sought cautiously to move my +cramped limbs, unlike Smith, who seeming to have sinews of piano-wire, +crouched beside me immovable, untiringly. Then loud upon the +stillness, broke the strident note of the telephone bell.</p> + +<p>I started, nervously, clutching at Smith's arm. It felt hard as iron +to my grip.</p> + +<p>"Hullo!" I heard Slattin call, "who is speaking?... Yes, yes! This is +Mr. A. S.... I am to come at once?... I know where—yes!... You will +meet me there?... Good!—I shall be with you in half an hour.... +Good-bye!"</p> + +<p>Distinctly I heard the creak of the revolving office-chair as Slattin +rose; then Smith had me by the arm, and we were flying swiftly away +from the door to take up our former post around the angle of the +building. This gained—</p> + +<p>"He's going to his death!" rapped Smith beside me; "but Carter has a +cab from the Yard waiting in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span> the nearest rank. We shall follow to see +where he goes—for it is possible that Weymouth may have been thrown +off the scent; then, when we are sure of his destination, we can take +a hand in the game! We—"</p> + +<p>The end of the sentence was lost to me—drowned in such a frightful +wave of sound as I despair to describe. It began with a high, thin +scream, which was choked off staccato fashion; upon it followed a loud +and dreadful cry uttered with all the strength of Slattin's lungs.</p> + +<p>"Oh, God!" he cried, and again—"Oh, God!"</p> + +<p>This in turn merged into a sort of hysterical sobbing.</p> + +<p>I was on my feet now, and automatically making for the door. I had a +vague impression of Nayland Smith's face beside me, the eyes glassy +with a fearful apprehension. Then the door was flung open, and, in the +bright light of the hall-way, I saw Slattin standing—swaying and +seemingly fighting with the empty air.</p> + +<p>"What is it? For God's sake, what has happened?" reached my ears +dimly—and the man Burke showed behind his master. White-faced I saw +him to be; for now Smith and I were racing up the steps.</p> + +<p>Ere we could reach him, Slattin, uttering another choking cry, pitched +forward and lay half across the threshold.</p> + +<p>We burst into the hall, where Burke stood with both his hands raised +dazedly to his head. I could hear the sound of running feet upon the +gravel, and knew that Carter was coming to join us.</p> + +<p>Burke, a heavy man with a lowering, bull-dog type of face, collapsed +on to his knees beside Slattin, and began softly to laugh in little +rising peals.</p> + +<p>"Drop that!" snapped Smith, and grasping him by the shoulders, he sent +him spinning along the hall-way, where he sank upon the bottom step of +the stairs, to sit with his outstretched fingers extended<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span> before his +face, and peering at us grotesquely through the crevices.</p> + +<p>There were rustlings and subdued cries from the upper part of the +house. Carter came in out of the darkness, carefully stepping over the +recumbent figure; and the three of us stood there in the lighted hall +looking down at Slattin.</p> + +<p>"Help me to move him back," directed Smith tensely; "far enough to +close the door."</p> + +<p>Between us we accomplished this, and Carter fastened the door. We were +alone with the shadow of Fu-Manchu's vengeance; for as I knelt beside +the body on the floor, a look and a touch sufficed to tell me that +this was but clay from which the spirit had fled!</p> + +<p>Smith met my glance as I raised my head, and his teeth came together +with a loud snap; the jaw muscles stood out prominently beneath the +dark skin; and his face was grimly set in that old, half-despairful +expression which I knew so well but which boded so ill for whomsoever +occasioned it.</p> + +<p>"Dead, Petrie—already?"</p> + +<p>"Lightning could have done the work no better. Can I turn him over?"</p> + +<p>Smith nodded.</p> + +<p>Together we stooped and rolled the heavy body on its back. A flood of +whispers came sibilantly from the stairway. Smith spun around rapidly, +and glared upon the group of half-dressed servants.</p> + +<p>"Return to your rooms!" he rapped imperiously: "let no one come into +the hall without my orders."</p> + +<p>The masterful voice had its usual result; there was a hurried retreat +to the upper landing. Burke, shaking like a man with an ague, sat on +the lower step, pathetically drumming his palms upon his uplifted +knees.</p> + +<p>"I warned him, I warned him!" he mumbled monotonously, "I warned him, +oh, I warned him!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Stand up!" shouted Smith, "stand up and come here!"</p> + +<p>The man, with his frightened eyes turning to right and left, and +seeming to search for something in the shadows about him, advanced +obediently.</p> + +<p>"Have you a flask?" demanded Smith of Carter.</p> + +<p>The detective silently administered to Burke a stiff restorative.</p> + +<p>"Now," continued Smith, "you, Petrie, will want to examine him, I +suppose?" He pointed to the body. "And in the meantime I have some +questions to put to you, my man."</p> + +<p>He clapped his hand upon Burke's shoulder.</p> + +<p>"My God!" Burke broke out, "I was ten yards from him when it +happened!"</p> + +<p>"No one is accusing you," said Smith less harshly; "but since you were +the only witness, it is by your aid that we hope to clear the matter +up."</p> + +<p>Exerting a gigantic effort to regain control of himself, Burke nodded, +watching my friend with a childlike eagerness. During the ensuing +conversation, I examined Slattin for marks of violence; and of what I +found, more anon.</p> + +<p>"In the first place," said Smith, "you say that you warned him. When +did you warn him, and of what?"</p> + +<p>"I warned him, sir, that it would come to this—"</p> + +<p>"That <i>what</i> would come to this?"</p> + +<p>"His dealings with the Chinamen!"</p> + +<p>"He had dealings with Chinamen?"</p> + +<p>"He accidentally met a Chinaman at an East End gaming-house, a man he +had known in 'Frisco—a man called Singapore Charlie—"</p> + +<p>"What! Singapore Charlie!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir, the same man that had a dope-shop, two years ago, down +Ratcliffe way—"</p> + +<p>"There was a fire—"</p> + +<p>"But Singapore Charlie escaped, sir."</p> + +<p>"And he is one of the gang?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He is one of what we used to call, in New York, the Seven Group."</p> + +<p>Smith began to tug at the lobe of his left ear, reflectively, as I saw +out of the corner of my eye.</p> + +<p>"The Seven Group!" he mused. "That is significant. I always suspected +that Dr. Fu-Manchu and the notorious Seven Group were one and the +same. Go on, Burke."</p> + +<p>"Well, sir," the man continued more calmly, "the lieutenant—"</p> + +<p>"The lieutenant!" began Smith; then: "Oh! of course; Slattin used to +be a police lieutenant!"</p> + +<p>"Well, sir, he—Mr. Slattin—had a sort of hold on this Singapore +Charlie, and two years ago, when he first met him, he thought that +with his aid he was going to pull off the biggest thing of his life—"</p> + +<p>"Forestall <i>me</i>, in fact?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir; but you got in first with the big raid—and spoiled it."</p> + +<p>Smith nodded grimly, glancing at the Scotland Yard man, who returned +his nod with equal grimness.</p> + +<p>"A couple of months ago," resumed Burke, "he met Charlie again down +East, and the Chinaman introduced him to a girl—some sort of an +Egyptian girl."</p> + +<p>"Go on!" snapped Smith. "I know her."</p> + +<p>"He saw her a good many times—and she came here once or twice. She +made out that she and Singapore Charlie were prepared to give away the +boss of the Yellow gang—"</p> + +<p>"For a price, of course?"</p> + +<p>"I suppose so," said Burke; "but I don't know. I only know that I +warned him."</p> + +<p>"H'm!" muttered Smith. "And now, what took place to-night?"</p> + +<p>"He had an appointment here with the girl," began Burke.</p> + +<p>"I know all that," interrupted Smith. "I merely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span> want to know what +took place after the telephone call."</p> + +<p>"Well, he told me to wait up, and I was dozing in the next room to the +study—the dining-room—when the 'phone bell aroused me. I heard the +lieutenant—Mr. Slattin—coming out, and I ran out too, but only in +time to see him taking his hat from the rack—"</p> + +<p>"But he wears no hat!"</p> + +<p>"He never got it off the peg! Just as he reached up to take it, he +gave a most frightful scream, and turned around like lightning as +though some one had attacked him from behind!"</p> + +<p>"There was no one else in the hall?"</p> + +<p>"No one at all. I was standing down there outside the dining-room just +by the stairs, but he didn't turn in my direction, he turned and +looked right behind him—where there was no one—nothing. His cries +were frightful." Burke's voice broke, and he shuddered feverishly. +"Then he made a rush for the front door. It seemed as though he had +not seen me. He stood there screaming; but, before I could reach him, +he fell...."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith fixed a piercing gaze upon Burke.</p> + +<p>"Is that all you know?" he demanded slowly.</p> + +<p>"As God is my judge, sir, that's all I know, and all I saw. There was +no living thing near him when he met his death."</p> + +<p>"We shall see," muttered Smith. He turned to me. "What killed him, +Petrie?" he asked shortly.</p> + +<p>"Apparently something which occasioned a minute wound on the left +wrist," I replied, and, stooping, I raised the already cold hand in +mine.</p> + +<p>A tiny, inflamed wound showed on the wrist; and a certain puffiness +was becoming observable in the injured hand and arm. Smith bent down +and drew a quick, sibilant breath.</p> + +<p>"You know what this is, Petrie?" he cried.</p> + +<p>"Certainly. It was too late to employ a ligature<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span> and useless to +inject ammonia. Death was practically instantaneous. His heart...."</p> + +<p>There came a loud knocking and ringing.</p> + +<p>"Carter!" cried Smith, turning to the detective, "open that door to no +one—no one. Explain who I am—"</p> + +<p>"But if it is the inspector—?"</p> + +<p>"I said, open the door to <i>no one</i>!" snapped Smith. "Burke, stand +exactly where you are! Carter, you can speak to whoever knocks through +the letter-box. Petrie, don't move for your life! It may be here, in +the hall way!..."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_IX" id="CHAPTER_IX"></a>CHAPTER IX</h2> + +<h3>THE CLIMBER</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">O </span></p> +<p>ur search of the house of Abel Slattin ceased only with the coming of +the dawn and yielded nothing but disappointment. Failure followed upon +failure; for, in the grey light of the morning, our own quest +concluded, Inspector Weymouth returned to report that the girl, +Kâramanèh, had thrown him off the scent.</p> + +<p>Again he stood before me, the big, burly friend of old and dreadful +days: a little greyer above the temples, which I set down for a record +of former horrors; but deliberate, stoical, thorough, as ever. His +blue eyes melted in the old generous way as he saw me, and he gripped +my hand in greeting.</p> + +<p>"Once again," he said, "your dark-eyed friend has been too clever for +me, doctor. But the track, as far as I could follow, leads to the old +spot. In fact"—he turned to Smith, who, grim-faced and haggard, +looked thoroughly ill in that grey light—"I believe Fu-Manchu's lair +is somewhere near the former opium-den of Shen-Yan—'Singapore +Charlie'!"</p> + +<p>Smith nodded.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span></p> + +<p>"We will turn our attention in that direction," he replied, "at a very +early date."</p> + +<p>Inspector Weymouth looked down at the body of Abel Slattin.</p> + +<p>"How was it done?" he asked softly.</p> + +<p>"Clumsily for Fu-Manchu," I replied. "A snake was introduced into the +house by some means—"</p> + +<p>"By Kâramanèh!" rapped Smith.</p> + +<p>"Very possibly by Kâramanèh," I continued firmly. "The thing has +escaped us."</p> + +<p>"My own idea," said Smith, "is that it was concealed about his +clothing. When he fell by the open door it glided out of the house. We +must have the garden searched thoroughly by daylight."</p> + +<p>"<i>He</i>"—Weymouth glanced at that which lay upon the floor—"must be +moved; but otherwise we can leave the place untouched, clear out the +servants, and lock the house up!"</p> + +<p>"I have already given orders to that effect," answered Smith. He spoke +wearily and with a note of conscious defeat in his voice. "Nothing has +been disturbed"—he swept his arm around comprehensively—"papers and +so forth you can examine at leisure."</p> + +<p>Presently we quitted that house upon which the fateful Chinaman had +set his seal, as the suburb was awakening to a new day. The clank of +milk-cans was my final impression of the avenue to which a dreadful +minister of death had come at the bidding of the death lord. We left +Inspector Weymouth in charge and returned to my rooms, scarcely +exchanging a word upon the way.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith, ignoring my entreaties, composed himself for slumber in +the white cane chair in my study. About noon he retired to the +bath-room and, returning, made a pretence to breakfast; then resumed +his seat in the cane armchair. Carter reported in the afternoon, but +his report was merely<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span> formal. Returning from my round of professional +visits at half-past five, I found Nayland Smith in the same position; +and so the day waned into evening, and dusk fell uneventfully.</p> + +<p>In the corner of the big room by the empty fireplace, Nayland Smith +lay, his long, lean frame extended in the white cane chair. A tumbler, +from which two straws protruded, stood by his right elbow, and a +perfect continent of tobacco smoke lay between us, wafted towards the +door by the draught from an open window. He had littered the hearth +with matches and tobacco ash, being the most untidy smoker I had ever +met; and save for his frequent rappings out of his pipe bowl and +perpetual striking of matches, he had shown no sign of activity for +the past hour. Collarless and wearing an old tweed jacket, he had +spent the evening, as he had spent the day, in the cane chair, only +quitting it for some ten minutes, or less, to toy with dinner.</p> + +<p>My several attempts at conversation had elicited nothing but growls; +therefore, as dusk descended, having dismissed my few patients, I +busied myself collating my notes upon the renewed activity of the +Yellow Doctor, and was thus engaged when the 'phone bell disturbed me. +It was Smith who was wanted, however; and he went out eagerly, leaving +me to my task.</p> + +<p>At the end of a lengthy conversation, he returned from the 'phone and +began, restlessly, to pace the room. I made a pretence of continuing +my labours, but covertly I was watching him. He was twitching at the +lobe of his left ear, and his face was a study in perplexity. Abruptly +he burst out:</p> + +<p>"I shall throw the thing up, Petrie! Either I am growing too old to +cope with such an adversary as Fu-Manchu, or else my intellect has +become dull. I cannot seem to think clearly or consistently. For the +Doctor, this crime, this removal of Slattin, is clumsy—unfinished. +There are two explanations.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span> Either he, too, is losing his old +cunning, or he has been interrupted!"</p> + +<p>"Interrupted!"</p> + +<p>"Take the facts, Petrie." Smith clapped his hands upon my table and +bent down, peering into my eyes. "Is it characteristic of Fu-Manchu to +kill a man by the direct agency of a snake and to implicate one of his +own damnable servants in this way?"</p> + +<p>"But we have found no snake!"</p> + +<p>"Kâramanèh introduced one in some way. Do you doubt it?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly Kâramanèh visited him on the evening of his death, but you +must be perfectly well aware that even if she had been arrested, no +jury could convict her."</p> + +<p>Smith resumed his restless pacings up and down.</p> + +<p>"You are very useful to me, Petrie," he rapped; "as a counsel for the +defence you constantly rectify my errors of prejudice. Yet I am +convinced that our presence at Slattin's house last night prevented +Fu-Manchu from finishing off this little matter as he had designed to +do."</p> + +<p>"What has given you this idea?"</p> + +<p>"Weymouth is responsible. He has rung me up from the Yard. The +constable on duty at the house where the murder was committed, reports +that some one, less than an hour ago, attempted to break in."</p> + +<p>"Break in!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! you are interested? <i>I</i> thought the circumstance illuminating, +also!"</p> + +<p>"Did the officer see this person?"</p> + +<p>"No; he only heard him. It was some one who endeavoured to enter by +the bath-room window, which, I am told, may be reached fairly easily +by an agile climber."</p> + +<p>"The attempt did not succeed?"</p> + +<p>"No; the constable interrupted, but failed to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span> make a capture or even +to secure a glimpse of the man."</p> + +<p>We were both silent for some moments; then—</p> + +<p>"What do you propose to do?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"We must not let Fu-Manchu's servants know," replied Smith, "but +to-night I shall conceal myself in Slattin's house and remain there +for a week or a day—it matters not how long—until that attempt is +repeated. Quite obviously, Petrie, we have overlooked something which +implicates the murderer with the murder! In short, either by accident, +by reason of our superior vigilance, or by the clumsiness of his +plans, Fu-Manchu for once in an otherwise blameless career has left a +<i>clue</i>!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_X" id="CHAPTER_X"></a>CHAPTER X</h2> + +<h3>THE CLIMBER RETURNS</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> +<p>n utter darkness we groped our way through into the hall of Slattin's +house, having entered, stealthily, from the rear; for Smith had +selected the study as a suitable base of operations. We reached it +without mishap, and presently I found myself seated in the very chair +which Kâramanèh had occupied; my companion took up a post just within +the widely opened door.</p> + +<p>So we commenced our ghostly business in the house of the murdered +man—a house from which, but a few hours since, his body had been +removed. This was such a vigil as I had endured once before, when, +with Nayland Smith and another, I had waited for the coming of one of +Fu-Manchu's death agents.</p> + +<p>Of all the sounds which one by one now began to detach themselves from +the silence, there was a particular sound, homely enough at another +time,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span> which spoke to me more dreadfully than the rest. It was the +ticking of the clock upon the mantelpiece; and I thought how this +sound must have been familiar to Abel Slattin, how it must have formed +part and parcel of his life, as it were, and how it went on +now—<i>tick</i>-<i>tick</i>-<i>tick</i>-<i>tick</i>—whilst he, for whom it had ticked, +lay unheeding—would never heed it more.</p> + +<p>As I grew more accustomed to the gloom, I found myself staring at the +office chair; once I found myself expecting Abel Slattin to enter the +room and occupy it. There was a little China Buddha upon a bureau in +one corner, with a gilded cap upon its head, and as some reflection of +the moonlight sought out this little cap, my thoughts grotesquely +turned upon the murdered man's gold tooth.</p> + +<p>Vague creakings from within the house, sounds as though of stealthy +footsteps upon the stairs, set my nerves tingling; but Nayland Smith +gave no sign, and I knew that my imagination was magnifying these +ordinary night sounds out of all proportion to their actual +significance. Leaves rustled faintly outside the window at my back: I +construed their sibilant whispers into the dreaded +name—<i>Fu-Manchu</i>—<i>Fu-Manchu</i>—<i>Fu-Manchu</i>!</p> + +<p>So wore on the night; and, when the ticking clock hollowly boomed the +hour of one, I almost leapt out of my chair, so highly strung were my +nerves, and so appallingly did the sudden clangour beat upon them. +Smith, like a man of stone, showed no sign. He was capable of so +subduing his constitutionally high-strung temperament, at times, that +temporarily he became immune from human dreads. On such occasion he +would be icily cool amid universal panic; but, his object +accomplished, I have seen him in such a state of collapse, that utter +nervous exhaustion is the only term by which I can describe it.</p> + +<p><i>Tick</i>-<i>tick</i>-<i>tick</i>-<i>tick</i> went the clock, and, my heart still +thumping noisily in my breast, I began to count the tickings; <i>one</i>, +<i>two</i>, <i>three</i>, <i>four</i>, <i>five</i>, and so<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span> on to a hundred, and from one +hundred to many hundreds.</p> + +<p>Then, out from the confusion of minor noises, a new, arresting sound +detached itself. I ceased my counting; no longer I noted the +<i>tick</i>-<i>tick</i> of the clock, nor the vague creakings, rustlings and +whispers. I saw Smith, shadowly, raise his hand in warning—in +needless warning; for I was almost holding my breath in an effort of +acute listening.</p> + +<p>From high up in the house this new sound came—from above the topmost +rooms, it seemed, up under the roof; a regular squeaking, oddly +familiar, yet elusive. Upon it followed a very soft and muffled thud; +then a metallic sound as of a rusty hinge in motion; then a new +silence, pregnant with a thousand possibilities more eerie than any +clamour.</p> + +<p>My mind was rapidly at work. Lighting the topmost landing of the house +was a sort of glazed trap, evidently set in the floor of a loft-like +place extending over the entire building. Somewhere in the red-tiled +roof above, there presumably existed a corresponding skylight or +lantern.</p> + +<p>So I argued; and, ere I had come to any proper decision, another +sound, more intimate, came to interrupt me.</p> + +<p>This time I could be in no doubt; some one was lifting the trap above +the stairhead—slowly, cautiously, and all but silently. Yet to my +ears, attuned to trifling disturbances, the trap creaked and groaned +noisily.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith waved to me to take a stand on the other side of the +opened door—behind it, in fact, where I should be concealed from the +view of any one descending the stair.</p> + +<p>I stood up and crossed the floor to my new post.</p> + +<p>A dull thud told of the trap fully raised and resting upon some +supporting joist. A faint rustling (of discarded garments, I told +myself) spoke to my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span> newly awakened, acute perceptions, of the visitor +preparing to lower himself to the landing. Followed a groan of +woodwork submitted to sudden strain—and the unmistakable pad of bare +feet upon the linoleum of the top corridor.</p> + +<p>I knew now that one of Dr. Fu-Manchu's uncanny servants had gained the +roof of the house by some means, had broken through the skylight and +had descended by means of the trap beneath on to the landing.</p> + +<p>In such a tensed-up state as I cannot describe, nor, at this hour +mentally reconstruct, I waited for the creaking of the stairs which +should tell of the creature's descent.</p> + +<p>I was disappointed. Removed scarce a yard from me as he was, I could +hear Nayland Smith's soft, subdued breathing; but my eyes were all for +the darkened hall-way, for the smudgy outline of the stair-rail with +the faint patterning in the background, which, alone, indicated the +wall.</p> + +<p>It was amid an utter silence, unheralded by even so slight a sound as +those which I had acquired the power of detecting—that I saw the +continuity of the smudgy line of stair-rail to be interrupted.</p> + +<p>A dark patch showed upon it, just within my line of sight, invisible +to Smith on the other side of the doorway, and some ten or twelve +stairs up.</p> + +<p>No sound reached me, but the dark patch vanished—and reappeared three +feet lower down.</p> + +<p>Still I knew that this phantom approach must be unknown to my +companion—and I knew that it was impossible for me to advise him of +it unseen by the dreaded visitor.</p> + +<p>A third time the dark patch—the hand of one who, ghostly, silent, was +creeping down into the hall-way—vanished and reappeared on a level +with my eyes. Then a vague shape became visible; no more than a blur +upon the dim design of the wall-paper ... and Nayland Smith got his +first sight of the stranger.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span></p> + +<p>The clock on the mantelpiece boomed out the half-hour.</p> + +<p>At that, such was my state (I blush to relate it), I uttered a faint +cry!</p> + +<p>It ended all secrecy—that hysterical weakness of mine. It might have +frustrated our hopes; that it did not do so was in no measure due to +me. But in a sort of passionate whirl, the ensuing events moved +swiftly.</p> + +<p>Smith hesitated not one instant. With a panther-like leap he hurled +himself into the hall.</p> + +<p>"The lights, Petrie!" he cried, "the lights! The switch is near the +street door!"</p> + +<p>I clenched my fists in a swift effort to regain control of my +treacherous nerves, and, bounding past Smith, and past the foot of the +stair, I reached out my hand to the switch, the situation of which, +fortunately, I knew.</p> + +<p>Around I came, in response to a shrill cry from behind me—an inhuman +cry, less a cry than the shriek of some enraged animal....</p> + +<p>With his left foot upon the first stair, Nayland Smith stood, his lean +body bent perilously backward, his arms rigidly thrust out, and his +sinewy fingers gripping the throat of an almost naked man—a man whose +brown body glistened unctuously, whose shaven head was apish low, +whose bloodshot eyes were the eyes of a mad dog! His teeth, upper and +lower, were bared; they glistened, they gnashed, and a froth was on +his lips. With both his hands, he clutched a heavy stick, and +once—twice, he brought it down upon Nayland Smith's head!</p> + +<p>I leapt forward to my friend's aid; but as though the blows had been +those of a feather, he stood like some figure of archaic statuary, nor +for an instant relaxed the death-grip which he had upon his +adversary's throat.</p> + +<p>Thrusting my way up the stairs, I wrenched the stick from the hand of +the dacoit—for in this glistening<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span> brown man I recognized one of that +deadly brotherhood who hailed Dr. Fu-Manchu their Lord and Master.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I cannot dwell upon the end of that encounter; I cannot hope to make +acceptable to my readers an account of how Nayland Smith, glassy-eyed, +and with consciousness ebbing from him instant by instant, stood +there, a realization of Leighton's "Athlete," his arms rigid as iron +bars even after Fu-Manchu's servant hung limply in that frightful +grip.</p> + +<p>In his last moment of consciousness, with the blood from his wounded +head trickling down into his eyes, he pointed to the stick which I had +torn from the grip of the dacoit, and which I still held in my hand.</p> + +<p>"Not Aaron's rod, Petrie!" he gasped hoarsely ... "the rod of +Moses!—Slattin's stick!"</p> + +<p>Even in upon my anxiety for my friend, amazement intruded.</p> + +<p>"But," I began—and turned to the rack in which Slattin's favourite +cane at that moment reposed—had reposed at the time of his death.</p> + +<p>Yes! There stood Slattin's cane; we had not moved it; we had disturbed +nothing in that stricken house; there it stood, in company with an +umbrella and a malacca.</p> + +<p>I glanced at the cane in my hand. Surely there could not be two such +in the world?</p> + +<p>Smith collapsed on the floor at my feet.</p> + +<p>"Examine the one in the rack, Petrie," he whispered, almost inaudibly, +"but do not touch it. It may not be yet...."</p> + +<p>I propped him up against the foot of the stairs, and as the constable +began knocking violently at the street door, crossed to the rack and +lifted out the replica of the cane which I held in my hand.</p> + +<p>A faint cry from Smith—and as if it had been a leprous thing, I +dropped the cane instantly.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Merciful God!" I groaned.</p> + +<p>Although, in every other particular, it corresponded with that which I +held—which I had taken from the dacoit—which he had come to +substitute for the cane now lying upon the floor—in one dreadful +particular it differed.</p> + +<p>Up to the snake's head it was an accurate copy; <i>but the head lived</i>!</p> + +<p>Either from pain, fear, or starvation, the thing confined in the +hollow tube of this awful duplicate was become torpid. Otherwise, no +power on earth could have saved me from the fate of Abel Slattin; for +the creature was an Australian death-adder.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XI" id="CHAPTER_XI"></a>CHAPTER XI</h2> + +<h3>THE WHITE PEACOCK</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">N </span></p> +<p>ayland Smith wasted no time in pursuing the plan of campaign which he +had mentioned to Inspector Weymouth. Less than forty-eight hours after +quitting the house of the murdered Slattin I found myself bound along +Whitechapel Road upon strange enough business.</p> + +<p>A very fine rain was falling, which rendered it difficult to see +clearly from the windows; but the weather apparently had little effect +upon the commercial activities of the district. The cab was threading +a hazardous way through the cosmopolitan throng crowding the street. +On either side of me extended a row of stalls, seemingly established +in opposition to the more legitimate shops upon the inner side of the +pavement.</p> + +<p>Jewish hawkers, many of them in their shirt-sleeves, acclaimed the +rarity of the bargains which they had to offer; and, allowing for the +difference of costume, these tireless Israelites, heedless of climatic +conditions, sweating at their mongery,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span> might well have stood, not in +a squalid London thoroughfare, but in an equally squalid market-street +of the Orient.</p> + +<p>They offered linen and fine raiment; from foot-gear to hair-oil their +wares ranged. They enlivened their auctioneering with conjuring tricks +and witty stories, selling watches by the aid of legerdemain, and +fancy vests by grace of a seasonable anecdote.</p> + +<p>Poles, Russians, Serbs, Roumanians, Jews of Hungary, and Italians of +Whitechapel mingled in the throng. Near East and Far East rubbed +shoulders. Pidgin English contested with Yiddish for the ownership of +some tawdry article offered by an auctioneer whose nationality defied +conjecture, save that always some branch of his ancestry had drawn +nourishment from the soil of Eternal Judæa.</p> + +<p>Some wearing men's caps, some with shawls thrown over their oily +locks, and some, more true to primitive instincts, defying, +bare-headed, the unkindly elements, bedraggled women—more often than +not burdened with muffled infants—crowded the pavements and the +roadway, thronged about the stalls like white ants about some choicer +carrion.</p> + +<p>And the fine drizzling rain fell upon all alike, pattering upon the +hood of the taxi-cab; trickling down the front windows; glistening +upon the unctuous hair of those in the street who were hatless; dewing +the bare arms of the auctioneers, and dripping, melancholy, from the +tarpaulin coverings of the stalls. Heedless of the rain above and of +the mud beneath, North, South, East and West mingled their cries, +their bids, their blandishments, their raillery, mingled their persons +in that joyless throng.</p> + +<p>Sometimes a yellow face showed close to one of the streaming windows; +sometimes a black-eyed, pallid face, but never a face wholly sane and +healthy. This was an underworld where squalor and vice went hand in +hand through the beautiless streets, a melting<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span>-pot of the world's +outcasts; this was the shadowland which last night had swallowed up +Nayland Smith.</p> + +<p>Ceaselessly I peered to right and left, searching amid that +rain-soaked company for any face known to me. Whom I expected to find +there, I know not, but I should have counted it no matter for surprise +had I detected amid that ungracious ugliness the beautiful face of +Kâramanèh, the Eastern slave-girl, the leering yellow face of a +Burmese dacoit, the gaunt, bronze features of Nayland Smith; a hundred +times I almost believed that I had seen the ruddy countenance of +Inspector Weymouth, and once (at what instant my heart seemed to stand +still) I suffered from the singular delusion that the oblique green +eyes of Dr. Fu-Manchu peered out from the shadows between two stalls.</p> + +<p>It was mere phantasy, of course, the sick imaginings of a mind +overwrought. I had not slept and had scarcely tasted food for more +than thirty hours; for, following up a faint clue supplied by Burke, +Slattin's man, and, like his master, an ex-officer of New York Police, +my friend, Nayland Smith, on the previous evening, had set out in +quest of some obscene den where the man called Shen-Yan—former keeper +of an opium shop—was now said to be in hiding. Shen-Yan we knew to be +a creature of the Chinese doctor, and only a most urgent call had +prevented me from joining Smith upon this promising, though hazardous +expedition.</p> + +<p>At any rate, Fate willing it so, he had gone without me; and +now—although Inspector Weymouth, assisted by a number of C.I.D. men, +was sweeping the district about me—to the time of my departure +nothing whatever had been heard of Smith. The ordeal of waiting +finally had proved too great to be borne. With no definite idea of +what I proposed to do, I had thrown myself into the search, filled +with such dreadful apprehensions as I hope never again to experience.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span></p> + +<p>I did not know the exact situation of the place to which Smith was +gone, for owing to the urgent case which I have mentioned, I had been +absent at the time of his departure; nor could Scotland Yard enlighten +me upon this point. Weymouth was in charge of the case—under Smith's +direction—and since the inspector had left the Yard, early that +morning, he had disappeared as completely as Smith, no report having +been received from him.</p> + +<p>As my driver turned into the black mouth of a narrow, ill-lighted +street, and the glare and clamour of the greater thoroughfare died +behind me, I sank into the corner of the cab burdened with such a +sense of desolation as mercifully comes but rarely.</p> + +<p>We were heading now for that strange settlement off the West India +Dock Road, which, bounded by Limehouse Causeway and Pennyfields, and +narrowly confined within four streets, composes an unique Chinatown, a +miniature of that at Liverpool, and of the greater one in San +Francisco. Inspired with an idea which promised hopefully, I raised +the speaking-tube:</p> + +<p>"Take me first to the River Police Station," I directed; "along +Ratcliffe Highway."</p> + +<p>The man turned and nodded comprehendingly, as I could see through the +wet pane.</p> + +<p>Presently we swerved to the right and into an even narrower street. +This inclined in an easterly direction, and proved to communicate with +a wide thoroughfare along which passed brilliantly lighted electric +trams. I had lost all sense of direction, and when, swinging to the +left and to the right again, I looked through the window and perceived +that we were before the door of the Police Station, I was dully +surprised.</p> + +<p>In quite mechanical fashion I entered the depôt. Inspector Ryman, our +associate in one of the darkest episodes of the campaign with the +Yellow Doctor two years before, received me in his office.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span></p> + +<p>By a negative shake of the head, he answered my unspoken question.</p> + +<p>"The ten o'clock boat is lying off the Stone Stairs, doctor," he said, +"and co-operating with some of the Scotland Yard men who are dragging +that district—"</p> + +<p>I shuddered at the word "dragging"; Ryman had not used it literally, +but nevertheless it had conjured up a dread possibility—a possibility +in accordance with the methods of Dr. Fu-Manchu. All within space of +an instant I saw the tide of Limehouse Reach, the Thames lapping about +the green-coated timbers of a dock pier; and +rising—falling—sometimes disclosing to the pallid light a rigid +hand, sometimes a horribly bloated face—I saw the body of Nayland +Smith at the mercy of those oily waters. Ryman continued:</p> + +<p>"There is a launch out, too, patrolling the riverside from here to +Tilbury. Another lies at the breakwater." He jerked his thumb over his +shoulder. "Should you care to take a run down and see for yourself?"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks," I replied, shaking my head. "You are doing all that can +be done. Can you give me the address of the place to which Mr. Smith +went last night?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said Ryman; "I thought you knew it. You remember +Shen-Yan's place—by Limehouse Basin? Well, farther east—east of the +Causeway, between Gill Street and Three Colt Street—is a block of +wooden buildings. You recall them?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," I replied. "Is the man established there again, then?"</p> + +<p>"It appears so, but although you have evidently not been informed of +the fact, Weymouth raided the establishment in the early hours of this +morning!"</p> + +<p>"Well?" I cried.</p> + +<p>"Unfortunately with no result," continued the inspector. "The +notorious Shen-Yan was missing,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span> and although there is no real doubt +that the place is used as a gaming-house, not a particle of evidence +to that effect could be obtained. Also—there was no sign of Mr. +Nayland Smith, and no sign of the American Burke, who had led him to +the place."</p> + +<p>"Is it certain that they went there?"</p> + +<p>"Two C.I.D. men, who were shadowing, actually saw the pair of them +enter. A signal had been arranged, but it was never given; and at +about half-past four the place was raided."</p> + +<p>"Surely some arrests were made?"</p> + +<p>"But there was no evidence!" cried Ryman. "Every inch of the +rat-burrow was searched. The Chinese gentleman who posed as the +proprietor of what he claimed to be a respectable lodging-house, +offered every facility to the police. What could we do?"</p> + +<p>"I take it that the place is being watched?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said Ryman. "Both from the river and from the shore. Oh! +they are not there! God knows where they are, but they are not +<i>there</i>!"</p> + +<p>I stood for a moment in silence, endeavouring to determine my course; +then, telling Ryman that I hoped to see him later, I walked out slowly +into the rain and mist, and nodding to the taxi-driver to proceed to +our original destination, I re-entered the cab.</p> + +<p>As we moved off, the lights of the River Police depôt were swallowed +up in the humid murk, and again I found myself being carried through +the darkness of those narrow streets, which, like a maze, hold secret +within their Labyrinth mysteries great, and at least as foul, as that +of Parsiphaë.</p> + +<p>The marketing centres I had left far behind me; to my right stretched +the broken range of riverside buildings, and beyond them flowed the +Thames, a stream heavily burdened with secrets as ever were Tiber or +Tigris. On my left, occasional flickering lights broke through the +mist, for the most part the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span> lights of taverns; and saving these rents +in the veil, the darkness was punctuated with nothing but the faint +and yellow luminance of the street lamps.</p> + +<p>Ahead was a black mouth, which promised to swallow me up as it had +swallowed up my friend.</p> + +<p>In short, what with my lowered condition, and consequent frame of +mind, and what with the traditions, for me inseparable from that +gloomy quarter of London, I was in the grip of a shadowy menace which +at any moment might become tangible—I perceived, in the most +commonplace objects, the yellow hand of Dr. Fu-Manchu.</p> + +<p>When the cab stopped in a place of utter darkness, I aroused myself +with an effort, opened the door, and stepped out into the mud of a +narrow lane. A high brick wall frowned upon me from one side, and, +dimly perceptible, there towered a smoke stack beyond. On my right +uprose the side of a wharf building, shadowly, and some distance +ahead, almost obscured by the drizzling rain, a solitary lamp +flickered.</p> + +<p>I turned up the collar of my raincoat, shivering, as much at the +prospect as from physical chill.</p> + +<p>"You will wait here," I said to the man; and, feeling in my +breast-pocket, I added: "If you hear the note of a whistle, drive on +and rejoin me."</p> + +<p>He listened attentively and with a certain eagerness. I had selected +him that night for the reason that he had driven Smith and myself on +previous occasions and had proved himself a man of intelligence. +Transferring a Browning pistol from my hip-pocket to that of my +raincoat, I trudged on into the mist.</p> + +<p>The headlights of the taxi were swallowed up behind me, and just +abreast of the street lamp I stood listening.</p> + +<p>Save for the dismal sound of rain, and the trickling of water along +the gutters, all about me was silent. Sometimes this silence would be +broken by the distant,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span> muffled note of a steam siren; and always, +forming a sort of background to the near stillness, was the remote din +of riverside activity.</p> + +<p>I walked on to the corner just beyond the lamp. This was the street in +which the wooden buildings were situated. I had expected to detect +some evidences of surveillance, but if any were indeed being observed, +it was effectively masked. Not a living creature was visible, peer as +I would.</p> + +<p>Plans I had none, and perceiving that the street was empty, and that +no lights showed in any of the windows, I passed on, only to find that +I had entered a cul-de-sac.</p> + +<p>A rickety gate gave access to a descending flight of stone steps, the +bottom invisible in the denser shadows of an archway, beyond which, I +doubted not, lay the river.</p> + +<p>Still uninspired by any definite design, I tried the gate and found +that it was unlocked. Like some wandering soul, as it has since seemed +to me, I descended. There was a lamp over the archway, but the glass +was broken, and the rain apparently had extinguished the light; as I +passed under it, I could hear the gas whistling from the burner.</p> + +<p>Continuing my way, I found myself upon a narrow wharf with the Thames +flowing gloomily beneath me. A sort of fog hung over the river, +shutting me in. Then came an incident.</p> + +<p>Suddenly, quite near, there arose a weird and mournful cry—a cry +indescribable, and inexpressibly uncanny!</p> + +<p>I started back so violently that how I escaped falling into the river +I do not know to this day. That cry, so eerie and so wholly +unexpected, had unnerved me; and realizing the nature of my +surroundings, and the folly of my presence alone in such a place, I +began to edge back towards the foot of the steps, away from the thing +that cried; when<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span> —a great white shape uprose like a phantom before +me!...</p> + +<p>There are few men, I suppose, whose lives have been crowded with so +many eerie happenings as mine, but this phantom thing which grew out +of the darkness, which seemed about to envelop me, takes rank in my +memory amongst the most fearsome apparitions which I have witnessed.</p> + +<p>I know that I was frozen with a sort of supernatural terror. I stood +there, my hands clenched, staring—staring—at that white shape, which +seemed to float.</p> + +<p>And as I stared, every nerve in my body thrilling, I distinguished the +outline of the phantom. With a subdued cry, I stepped forward. A new +sensation claimed me. In that one stride I passed from the horrible to +the bizarre.</p> + +<p>I found myself confronted with something tangible certainly, but +something whose presence in that place was utterly extravagant—could +only be reconcilable in the dreams of an opium slave.</p> + +<p>Was I awake? was I sane? Awake and sane beyond doubt, but surely +moving, not in the purlieus of Limehouse, but in the fantastic realms +of fairyland.</p> + +<p>Swooping, with open arms, I rounded up in an angle against the +building and gathered in this screaming thing which had inspired in me +so keen a terror.</p> + +<p>The great, ghostly fan was closed as I did so, and I stumbled back +towards the stair with my struggling captive tucked under my arm; I +mounted into one of London's darkest slums, carrying a beautiful white +peacock!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XII" id="CHAPTER_XII"></a>CHAPTER XII</h2> + +<h3>DARK EYES LOOK INTO MINE</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">M </span></p> +<p>y adventure had done nothing to relieve the feeling of unreality +which held me enthralled. Grasping the struggling bird firmly by the +body, and having the long white tail fluttering a yard or so behind +me, I returned to where the taxi waited.</p> + +<p>"Open the door!" I said to the man—who greeted me with such a stare +of amazement that I laughed outright, though my mirth was but hollow.</p> + +<p>He jumped into the road and did as I directed. Making sure that both +windows were closed, I thrust the peacock into the cab and shut the +door upon it.</p> + +<p>"For God's sake, sir—" began the driver.</p> + +<p>"It has probably escaped from some collector's place on the +riverside," I explained, "but one never knows. See that it does not +escape again, and if at the end of an hour, as arranged, you do not +hear from me, take it back with you to the River Police Station."</p> + +<p>"Right you are, sir," said the man, remounting his seat. "It's the +first time I ever saw a peacock in Limehouse!"</p> + +<p>It was the first time <i>I</i> had seen one, and the incident struck me as +being more than odd; it gave me an idea, and a new, faint hope. I +returned to the head of the steps, at the foot of which I had met with +this singular experience, and gazed up at the dark building beneath +which they led. Three windows were visible, but they were broken and +neglected. One, immediately above the arch, had been pasted up with +brown paper, and this was now peeling off in the rain, a little stream +of which trickled down from the detached corner to drop, drearily, +upon the stone stairs beneath.</p> + +<p>Where were the detectives? I could only assume that they had directed +their attention elsewhere, for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span> had the place not been utterly +deserted, surely I had been challenged.</p> + +<p>In pursuit of my new idea, I again descended the steps. The persuasion +(shortly to be verified) that I was close upon the secret hold of the +Chinaman, grew stronger, unaccountably. I had descended some eight +steps, and was at the darkest part of the archway or tunnel, when +confirmation of my theories came to me.</p> + +<p>A noose settled accurately upon my shoulders, was snatched tight about +my throat, and with a feeling of insupportable agony at the base of my +skull, and a sudden supreme knowledge that I was being +strangled—hanged—I lost consciousness!</p> + +<p>How long I remained unconscious, I was unable to determine at the +time, but I learned later that it was for no more than half an hour; +at any rate, recovery was slow.</p> + +<p>The first sensation to return to me was a sort of repetition of the +asphyxia. The blood seemed to be forcing itself into my eyes—I +choked—I felt that my end was come. And, raising my hands to my +throat, I found it to be swollen and inflamed. Then the floor upon +which I lay seemed to be rocking like the deck of a ship, and I glided +back again into a place of darkness and forgetfulness.</p> + +<p>My second awakening was heralded by a returning sense of smell; for I +became conscious of a faint, exquisite perfume.</p> + +<p>It brought me to my senses as nothing else could have done, and I sat +upright with a hoarse cry. I could have distinguished that perfume +amid a thousand others, could have marked it apart from the rest in a +scent bazaar. For me it had one meaning, and one meaning +only—Kâramanèh.</p> + +<p>She was near to me, or had been near to me!</p> + +<p>And in the first moments of my awakening I groped about in the +darkness blindly seeking her. Then my swollen throat and throbbing +head, together<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span> with my utter inability to move my neck even slightly, +reminded me of the facts as they were. I knew in that bitter moment +that Kâramanèh was no longer my friend; but, for all her beauty and +charm, was the most heartless, the most fiendish creature in the +service of Dr. Fu-Manchu. I groaned aloud in my despair and misery.</p> + +<p>Something stirred near to me in the room, and set my nerves creeping +with a new apprehension. I became fully alive to the possibilities of +the darkness.</p> + +<p>To my certain knowledge, Dr. Fu-Manchu at this time had been in +England for fully three months, which meant that by now he must be +equipped with all the instruments of destruction, animate and +inanimate, which dread experience had taught me to associate with him.</p> + +<p>Now, as I crouched there in that dark apartment, listening for a +repetition of the sound, I scarcely dared to conjecture what might +have occasioned it, but my imagination peopled the place with reptiles +which writhed upon the floor, with tarantulas and other deadly insects +which crept upon the walls, which might drop upon me from the ceiling +at any moment.</p> + +<p>Then, since nothing stirred about me, I ventured to move, turning my +shoulders, for I was unable to move my aching head; and I looked in +the direction from which a faint, very faint, light proceeded.</p> + +<p>A regular tapping sound now began to attract my attention, and, having +turned about, I perceived that behind me was a broken window, in +places patched with brown paper; the corner of one sheet of paper was +detached, and the rain trickled down upon it with a rhythmical sound.</p> + +<p>In a flash I realized that I lay in the room immediately above the +archway; and listening intently, I perceived above the other faint +sounds of the night, or thought that I perceived, the hissing of the +gas from the extinguished lamp-burner.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span></p> + +<p>Unsteadily I rose to my feet, but found myself swaying like a drunken +man. I reached out for support, stumbling in the direction of the +wall. My foot came in contact with something that lay there, and I +pitched forward and fell....</p> + +<p>I anticipated a crash which would put an end to my hopes of escape, +but my fall was comparatively noiseless—for I fell upon the body of a +man who lay bound up with rope close against the wall!</p> + +<p>A moment I stayed as I fell, the chest of my fellow captive rising and +falling beneath me as he breathed. Knowing that my life depended upon +retaining a firm hold upon myself, I succeeded in overcoming the +dizziness and nausea which threatened to drown my senses, and, moving +back so that I knelt upon the floor, I fumbled in my pocket for the +electric lamp which I had placed there. My raincoat had been removed +whilst I was unconscious, and with it my pistol, but the lamp was +untouched.</p> + +<p>I took it out, pressed the button, and directed the ray upon the face +of the man beside me.</p> + +<p>It was Nayland Smith!</p> + +<p>Trussed up and fastened to a ring in the wall he lay, having a cork +gag strapped so tightly between his teeth that I wondered how he had +escaped suffocation.</p> + +<p>But although a greyish pallor showed through the tan of his skin, his +eyes were feverishly bright, and there, as I knelt beside him, I +thanked Heaven silently, but fervently.</p> + +<p>Then, in furious haste, I set to work to remove the gag. It was most +ingeniously secured by means of leather straps buckled at the back of +his head, but I unfastened these without much difficulty, and he spat +out the gag, uttering an exclamation of disgust.</p> + +<p>"Thank God, old man!" he said huskily. "Thank God that you are alive! +I saw them drag you in, and I thought...."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I have been thinking the same about you for more than twenty-four +hours," I said reproachfully. "Why did you start without—?"</p> + +<p>"I did not want you to come, Petrie," he replied. "I had a sort of +premonition. You see it was realized; and instead of being as helpless +as I, Fate has made you the instrument of my release. Quick! You have +a knife? Good!" The old, feverish energy was by no means extinguished +in him. "Cut the ropes about my wrists and ankles, but don't otherwise +disturb them."</p> + +<p>I set to work eagerly.</p> + +<p>"Now," Smith continued, "put that filthy gag in place again—but you +need not strap it so tightly! Directly they find that you are alive, +they will treat you the same—you understand? She has been here three +times—"</p> + +<p>"Kâramanèh?..."</p> + +<p>"<i>Ssh</i>!"</p> + +<p>I heard a sound like the opening of a distant door.</p> + +<p>"Quick! the straps of the gag!" whispered Smith, "and pretend to +recover consciousness just as they enter—"</p> + +<p>Clumsily I followed his directions, for my fingers were none too +steady, replaced the lamp in my pocket, and threw myself upon the +floor.</p> + +<p>Through half-shut eyes, I saw the door open and obtained a glimpse of +a desolate, empty passage beyond. On the threshold stood Kâramanèh. +She held in her hand a common tin oil lamp which smoked and flickered +with every movement, filling the already none too cleanly air with an +odour of burning paraffin.</p> + +<p>She personified the <i>outré</i>; nothing so incongruous as her presence in +that place could well be imagined. She was dressed as I remembered +once to have seen her two years before, in the gauzy silks of the +harêm. There were pearls glittering like great tears amid the cloud of +her wonderful hair. She wore broad gold bangles upon her bare arms, +and her fingers were<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span> laden with jewellery. A heavy girdle swung from +her hips, defining the lines of her slim shape, and about one white +ankle was a gold band.</p> + +<p>As she appeared in the doorway I almost entirely closed my eyes, but +my gaze rested fascinatedly upon the little red slippers which she +wore.</p> + +<p>Again I detected the exquisite, elusive perfume which, like a breath +of musk, spoke of the Orient; and, as always, it played havoc with my +reason, seeming to intoxicate me as though it were the very essence of +her loveliness.</p> + +<p>But I had a part to play, and throwing out one clenched hand so that +my fist struck upon the floor, I uttered a loud groan, and made as if +to rise upon my knees.</p> + +<p>One quick glimpse I had of her wonderful eyes, widely opened and +turned upon me with such an enigmatical expression as set my heart +leaping wildly—then, stepping back, Kâramanèh placed the lamp upon +the boards of the passage and clapped her hands.</p> + +<p>As I sank upon the floor in assumed exhaustion, a Chinaman with a +perfectly impassive face, and a Burman whose pock-marked, evil +countenance was set in an apparently habitual leer, came running into +the room past the girl.</p> + +<p>With a hand which trembled violently, she held the lamp whilst the two +yellow ruffians tied me. I groaned and struggled feebly, fixing my +gaze upon the lamp bearer in a silent reproach which was by no means +without its effect.</p> + +<p>She lowered her eyes and I could see her biting her lip, whilst the +colour gradually faded from her cheeks. Then, glancing up again +quickly, and still meeting that reproachful stare, she turned her head +aside altogether, and rested one hand upon the wall, swaying slightly +as she did so.</p> + +<p>It was a singular ordeal for more than one of that incongruous group; +but in order that I may not be charged with hypocrisy or with seeking +to hide my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span> own folly, I confess, here, that when again I found myself +in darkness, my heart was leaping not because of the success of my +strategy, but because of the success of that reproachful glance which +I had directed toward the lovely, dark-eyed Kâramanèh, toward the +faithless evil Kâramanèh! So much for myself.</p> + +<p>The door had not been closed ten seconds, ere Smith again was spitting +out the gag, swearing under his breath, and stretching his cramped +limbs free from their binding. Within a minute from the time of my +trussing, I was a free man again; save that look where I would—to +right, to left, or inward, to my own conscience—two dark eyes met +mine, enigmatically.</p> + +<p>"What now?" I whispered.</p> + +<p>"Let me think," replied Smith. "A false move would destroy us."</p> + +<p>"How long have you been here?"</p> + +<p>"Since last night."</p> + +<p>"Is Fu-Manchu—"</p> + +<p>"Fu-Manchu is here!" replied Smith grimly, "and not only Fu-Manchu, +but—another."</p> + +<p>"Another!"</p> + +<p>"A higher than Fu-Manchu, apparently. I have an idea of the identity +of this person, but no more than an idea. Something unusual is going +on, Petrie; otherwise I should have been a dead man twenty four hours +ago. Something even more important than my death engages Fu-Manchu's +attention—and this can only be the presence of the mysterious +visitor. Your seductive friend, Kâramanèh, is arrayed in her very +becoming national costume in his honour, I presume." He stopped +abruptly; then added "I would give five hundred pounds for a glimpse +of that visitor's face!"</p> + +<p>"Is Burke—?"</p> + +<p>"God knows what has become of Burke, Petrie! We were both caught +napping in the establishment of the amiable Shen-Yan, where, amid a +very mixed company of poker players, we were losing our money like +gentlemen."</p> + +<p>"But Weymouth—"</p> + +<p>"Burke and I had both been neatly sand-bagged, my dear Petrie, and +removed elsewhere, some hours before Weymouth raided the gaming house. +Oh! I don't know how they smuggled us away with the police watching +the place; but my presence here is sufficient evidence of the fact. +Are you armed?"</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span></p> +<p>"No; my pistol was in my raincoat, which is missing."</p> + +<p>In the dim light from the broken window I could see Smith tugging +reflectively at the lobe of his left ear.</p> + +<p>"I am without arms, too," he mused. "We might escape from the +window—"</p> + +<p>"It's a long drop!"</p> + +<p>"Ah! I imagined so. If only I had a pistol, or a revolver—"</p> + +<p>"What should you do?"</p> + +<p>"I should present myself before the important meeting, which, I am +assured, is being held somewhere in this building; and to-night would +see the end of my struggle with the Fu-Manchu group—the end of the +whole Yellow menace! For not only is Fu-Manchu here, Petrie, with all +his gang of assassins, but he whom I believe to be the real head of +the group—a certain mandarin—is here also!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIII" id="CHAPTER_XIII"></a>CHAPTER XIII</h2> + +<h3>THE SACRED ORDER</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">S </span></p> +<p>mith stepped quietly across the room and tried the door. It proved to +be unlocked, and an instant later we were both outside in the passage. +Coincident with our arrival there, arose a sudden outcry from some +place at the westward end. A high-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span>pitched, grating voice, in which +guttural notes alternated with a serpent-like hissing, was raised in +anger.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Fu-Manchu!" whispered Smith, grasping my arm.</p> + +<p>Indeed it was the unmistakable voice of the Chinaman, raised +hysterically in one of those outbursts which in the past I had +diagnosed as symptomatic of dangerous mania.</p> + +<p>The voice rose to a scream, the scream of some angry animal rather +than anything human. Then, chokingly, it ceased. Another short sharp +cry followed—but not in the voice of Fu-Manchu—a dull groan, and the +sound of a fall.</p> + +<p>With Smith still grasping my wrist, I shrank back into the doorway, as +something that looked in the darkness like a great ball of fluff came +rapidly along the passage toward me. Just at my feet the thing +stopped, and I made it out for a small animal. The tiny, gleaming eyes +looked up at me, and, chattering wickedly, the creature bounded past +and was lost from view.</p> + +<p>It was Dr. Fu-Manchu's marmoset.</p> + +<p>Smith dragged me back into the room which we had just left. As he +partly reclosed the door, I heard the clapping of hands. In a +condition of most dreadful suspense, we waited; until a new, ominous +sound proclaimed itself. Some heavy body was being dragged into the +passage. I heard the opening of a trap. Exclamations in guttural +voices told of a heavy task in progress; there was a great straining +and creaking—whereupon the trap was softly reclosed.</p> + +<p>Smith bent to my ear.</p> + +<p>"Fu-Manchu has chastised one of his servants," he whispered. "There +will be food for the grappling-irons to-night!"</p> + +<p>I shuddered violently, for, without Smith's words, I knew that a +bloody deed had been done in that house within a few yards of where we +stood.</p> + +<p>In the new silence, I could hear the drip, drip,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span> drip of the rain +outside the window; then a steam siren hooted dismally upon the river, +and I thought how the screw of that very vessel, even as we listened, +might be tearing the body of Fu-Manchu's servant!</p> + +<p>"Have you some one waiting?" whispered Smith eagerly.</p> + +<p>"How long was I insensible?"</p> + +<p>"About half an hour."</p> + +<p>"Then the cabman will be waiting."</p> + +<p>"Have you a whistle with you?"</p> + +<p>I felt in my coat pocket.</p> + +<p>"Yes," I reported.</p> + +<p>"Good! Then we will take a chance."</p> + +<p>Again we slipped out into the passage and began a stealthy progress to +the west. Ten paces amid absolute darkness, and we found ourselves +abreast of a branch corridor. At the farther end, through a kind of +little window, a dim light shone.</p> + +<p>"See if you can find the trap," whispered Smith; "light your lamp."</p> + +<p>I directed the ray of the pocket lamp upon the floor, and there at my +feet was a square wooden trap. As I stooped to examine it, I glanced +back painfully, over my shoulder—and saw Nayland Smith tiptoeing away +from me along the passage toward the light!</p> + +<p>Inwardly I cursed his folly, but the temptation to peep in at that +little window proved too strong for me, as it had proved too strong +for him.</p> + +<p>Fearful that some board would creak beneath my tread, I followed; and +side by side we two crouched, looking into a small rectangular room. +It was a bare and cheerless apartment, with unpapered walls and +carpetless floor. A table and a chair constituted the sole furniture.</p> + +<p>Seated in the chair, with his back towards us, was a portly Chinaman +who wore a yellow, silken robe. His face it was impossible to see; but +he was beating his fists upon the table, and pouring out a torrent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span> of +words in a thin, piping voice. So much I perceived at a glance, then, +into view at the distant end of the room, paced a tall, +high-shouldered figure—a figure, unforgettable, at once imposing and +dreadful, stately and sinister.</p> + +<p>With the long, bony hands behind him, fingers twining and intertwining +serpentinely about the handle of a little fan, and with the pointed +chin resting on the breast of the yellow robe, so that the light from +the lamp swinging in the centre of the ceiling gleamed upon the great, +dome-like brow, this tall man paced sombrely from left to right.</p> + +<p>He cast a sidelong, venomous glance at the voluble speaker out of +half-shut eyes; in the act they seemed to light up as with an internal +luminance; momentarily, they sparkled like emeralds; then their +brilliance was filmed over as one sees in the eyes of a bird when the +membrane is lowered.</p> + +<p>My blood seemed to chill, and my heart to double its pulsations; +beside me Smith was breathing more rapidly than usual. I knew now the +explanation of the feeling which had claimed me when first I had +descended the stone stairs. I knew what it was that hung like a miasma +over that house. It was the aura, the glamour, which radiated from +this wonderful and evil man as light radiates from radium. It was the +<i>vril</i>, the <i>force</i>, of Dr. Fu-Manchu.</p> + +<p>I began to move away from the window. But Smith held my wrist as in a +vice. He was listening raptly to the torrential speech of the Chinaman +who sat in the chair; and I perceived in his eyes the light of a +sudden comprehension.</p> + +<p>As the tall figure of the Chinese doctor came pacing into view again, +Smith, his head below the level of the window, pushed me gently along +the passage.</p> + +<p>Regaining the site of the trap, he whispered to me:</p> + +<p>"We owe our lives, Petrie, to the national child<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span>ishness of the +Chinese! A race of ancestor worshippers is capable of anything, and +Dr. Fu-Manchu, the dreadful being who has rained terror upon Europe, +stands in imminent peril of disgrace for having lost a decoration."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean, Smith?"</p> + +<p>"I mean that this is no time for delay, Petrie! Here, unless I am +greatly mistaken, lies the rope by means of which you made your +entrance. It shall be the means of your exit. Open the trap!"</p> + +<p>Handing the lamp to Smith, I stooped and carefully raised the +trap-door. At which moment, a singular and a dramatic thing happened.</p> + +<p>A softly musical voice—the voice of my dreams!—spoke.</p> + +<p>"Not that way! Oh, God, not that way!"</p> + +<p>In my surprise and confusion I all but let the trap fall, but I +retained sufficient presence of mind to replace it gently. Standing +upright, I turned ... and there, with her little jewelled hand resting +upon Smith's arm, stood Kâramanèh!</p> + +<p>In all my experience of him, I had never seen Nayland Smith so utterly +perplexed. Between anger, distrust and dismay, he wavered; and each +passing emotion was written legibly upon the lean bronzed features. +Rigid with surprise, he stared at the beautiful face of the girl. She, +although her hand still rested upon Smith's arm, had her dark eyes +turned upon me with that same enigmatical expression. Her lips were +slightly parted, and her breast heaved tumultuously.</p> + +<p>This ten seconds of silence in which we three stood looking at one +another encompassed the whole gamut of human emotion. The silence was +broken by Kâramanèh.</p> + +<p>"They will be coming back that way!" she whispered, bending eagerly +toward me. (How, in the most desperate moments, I loved to listen to +that odd, musical accent!) "Please, if you would<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span> save your life, and +spare mine, trust me!" She suddenly clasped her hands together and +looked up into my face, passionately. "Trust me—just for once—and I +will show you the way!"</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith never removed his gaze from her for a moment, nor did he +stir.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" she whispered tremulously, and stamped one little red slipper +upon the floor. "<i>Won't</i> you heed me? <i>Come</i>, or it will be too late!"</p> + +<p>I glanced anxiously at my friend; the voice of Dr. Fu-Manchu, now +raised again in anger, was audible above the piping tones of the other +Chinaman. And as I caught Smith's eye, in silent query—the trap at my +feet began slowly to lift!</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh stifled a little sobbing cry; but the warning came too late. +A hideous yellow face, with oblique squinting eyes, appeared in the +aperture.</p> + +<p>I found myself inert, useless; I could neither think nor act. Nayland +Smith, however, as if instinctively, delivered a pitiless kick at the +head protruding above the trap.</p> + +<p>A sickening crushing sound, with a sort of muffled snap, spoke of a +broken jaw-bone; and with no word or cry, the Chinaman fell. As the +trap descended with a bang, I heard the thud of his body on the stone +stairs beneath.</p> + +<p>But we were lost. Kâramanèh fled along one of the passages lightly as +a bird, and disappeared—as Dr. Fu-Manchu, his top lip drawn up above +his teeth in the manner of an angry jackal, appeared from the other.</p> + +<p>"This way!" cried Smith, in a voice that rose almost to a +shriek—"this way!"—and he led toward the room overhanging the steps.</p> + +<p>Off we dashed with panic swiftness, only to find that this retreat +also was cut off. Dimly visible in the darkness was a group of yellow +men, and despite the gloom, the curved blades of the knives which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span> +they carried glittered menacingly. The passage was full of dacoits!</p> + +<p>Smith and I turned, together. The trap was raised again, and the +Burman, who had helped to tie me, was just scrambling up beside Dr. +Fu-Manchu, who stood there watching us, a shadowy, sinister figure.</p> + +<p>"The game's up, Petrie!" muttered Smith. "It has been a long fight, +but Fu-Manchu wins!"</p> + +<p>"Not entirely!" I cried.</p> + +<p>I whipped the police whistle from my pocket, and raised it to my lips; +but brief as the interval had been, the dacoits were upon me.</p> + +<p>A sinewy brown arm shot over my shoulder, and the whistle was dashed +from my grasp. Then came a riot of maëlstrom fighting, with Smith and +myself ever sinking lower amid a whirlpool, as it seemed, of +blood-lustful eyes, yellow fangs, and gleaming blades.</p> + +<p>I had some vague idea that the rasping voice of Fu-Manchu broke once +through the turmoil, and when, with my wrists tied behind me, I +emerged from the strife to find myself lying beside Smith in the +passage, I could only assume that the Chinaman had ordered his bloody +servants to take us alive; for saving numerous bruises and a few +superficial cuts, I was unwounded.</p> + +<p>The place was utterly deserted again, and we two panting captives +found ourselves alone with Dr. Fu-Manchu. The scene was unforgettable: +that dimly-lighted passage, its extremities masked in shadows, and the +tall, yellow-robed figure of the Satanic Chinaman towering over us +where we lay.</p> + +<p>He had recovered his habitual calm, and as I peered at him through the +gloom, I was impressed anew with the tremendous intellectual force of +the man. He had the brow of a genius, the features of a born ruler; +and even in that moment I could find time to search my memory, and to +discover that<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span> the face, saving the indescribable evil of its +expression, was identical with that of Seti I, the mighty Pharaoh who +lives in the Cairo Museum.</p> + +<p>Down the passage came leaping and gambolling the Doctor's marmoset. +Uttering its shrill, whistling cry, it leapt on to his shoulder, +clutched with its tiny fingers at the scanty, neutral-coloured hair +upon his crown, and bent forward, peering grotesquely into that still, +dreadful face.</p> + +<p>Dr. Fu-Manchu stroked the little creature and crooned to it, as a +mother to her infant. Only this crooning, and the laboured breathing +of Smith and myself, broke that impressive stillness.</p> + +<p>Suddenly the guttural voice began:</p> + +<p>"You come at an opportune time, Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith and Dr. +Petrie; at a time when the greatest man in China flatters me with a +visit. In my absence from home, a tremendous honour has been conferred +upon me, and, in the hour of this supreme honour, dishonour and +calamity have befallen! For my services to China—the New China, the +China of the future—I have been admitted by the Sublime Prince to the +Sacred Order of the White Peacock."</p> + +<p>Warming to his discourse, he threw wide his arms, hurling the +chattering marmoset fully five yards along the corridor.</p> + +<p>"Oh, god of Cathay!" he cried sibilantly, "in what have I sinned that +this catastrophe has been visited upon my head! Learn, my two dear +friends, that the sacred white peacock, brought to these misty shores +for my undying glory has been lost to me! Death is the penalty of such +a sacrilege; death shall be my lot, since death I deserve."</p> + +<p>Covertly Smith nudged me with his elbow. I knew what the nudge was +designed to convey; he would remind me of his words—anent the +childish trifles which sway the life of intellectual China.</p> + +<p>Personally, I was amazed. That Fu-Manchu's anger, grief, sorrow and +resignation were real, no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span> one watching him, and hearing his voice, +could doubt. He continued:</p> + +<p>"By one deed, and one deed alone, may I win a lighter punishment. By +one deed, and the resignation of all my titles, all my lands, and all +my honours, may I merit to be spared to my work—which has only +begun."</p> + +<p>I knew now that we were lost, indeed; these were confidences which our +graves should hold inviolate! He suddenly opened fully those blazing +green eyes and directed their baneful glare upon Nayland Smith.</p> + +<p>"The Director of the universe," he continued softly, "has relented +toward me. To-night, you die! To-night, the arch-enemy of our caste +shall be no more. This is my offering—the price of redemption...."</p> + +<p>My mind was working again, and actively. I managed to grasp the +stupendous truth—and the stupendous possibility.</p> + +<p>Dr. Fu-Manchu was in the act of clapping his hands, when I spoke.</p> + +<p>"Stop!" I cried.</p> + +<p>He paused, and the weird film, which sometimes became visible in his +eyes, now obscured their greenness, and lent him the appearance of a +blind man.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Petrie," he said softly, "I shall always listen to you with +respect."</p> + +<p>"I have an offer to make," I continued, seeking to steady my voice. +"Give us our freedom, and I will restore your shattered honour—I will +restore the sacred peacock!"</p> + +<p>Dr. Fu-Manchu bent forward until his face was so close to mine that I +could see the innumerable lines which, an intricate network, covered +his yellow skin.</p> + +<p>"Speak!" he hissed. "You lift up my heart from a dark pit!"</p> + +<p>"I can restore your white peacock," I said; "I, and I alone, know +where it is!"—and I strove not to shrink from the face so close to +mine.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span></p> + +<p>Upright shot the tall figure; high above his head Fu-Manchu threw his +arms—and a light of exaltation gleamed in the now widely-opened, +catlike eyes.</p> + +<p>"Oh, god!" he screamed frenziedly. "Oh, god of the Golden Age! like a +phœnix I arise from the ashes of myself!" He turned to me. "Quick! +Quick! make your bargain! End my suspense!"</p> + +<p>Smith stared at me like a man dazed; but, ignoring him, I went on:</p> + +<p>"You will release me, now, immediately. In another ten minutes it will +be too late; my friend will remain. One of your—servants—can +accompany me, and give the signal when I return with the peacock. Mr. +Nayland Smith and yourself, or another, will join me at the corner of +the street where the raid took place last night. We will then give you +ten minutes' grace, after which we shall take whatever steps we +choose."</p> + +<p>"Agreed!" cried Fu-Manchu. "I ask but one thing from an Englishman; +your word of honour?"</p> + +<p>"I give it."</p> + +<p>"I, also," said Smith hoarsely.</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>Ten minutes later, Nayland Smith and I, standing beside the cab, whose +lights gleamed yellowly through the mist, exchanged a struggling, +frightened bird for our lives—capitulated with the enemy of the white +race.</p> + +<p>With characteristic audacity—and characteristic trust in the British +sense of honour—Dr. Fu-Manchu came in person with Nayland Smith, in +response to the wailing signal of the dacoit who had accompanied me. +No word was spoken, save that the cabman suppressed a curse of +amazement; and the Chinaman, his sinister servant at his elbow, bowed +low—and left us, surely to the mocking laughter of the gods!</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIV" id="CHAPTER_XIV"></a>CHAPTER XIV</h2> + +<h3>THE COUGHING HORROR</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> +<p> leapt up in bed with a great start.</p> + +<p>My sleep was troubled often enough in those days which immediately +followed our almost miraculous escape from the den of Fu-Manchu; and +now, as I crouched there, nerves aquiver—listening—listening—I +could not be sure if this dank panic which possessed me had its origin +in nightmare or in something else.</p> + +<p>Surely a scream, a choking cry for help, had reached my ears; but now, +almost holding my breath in that sort of nervous tensity peculiar to +one aroused thus, I listened, and the silence seemed complete. Perhaps +I had been dreaming....</p> + +<p>"Help! Petrie! <i>Help</i>!..."</p> + +<p>It was Nayland Smith in the room above me!</p> + +<p>My doubts were resolved; this was no trick of an imagination +disordered. Some dreadful menace threatened my friend. Not delaying +even to snatch my dressing-gown, I rushed out on to the landing, up +the stairs, bare-footed as I was, threw open the door of Smith's room +and literally hurled myself in.</p> + +<p>Those cries had been the cries of one assailed, had been uttered, I +judged, in the brief interval of a life and death struggle; had been +choked off....</p> + +<p>A certain amount of moonlight found access to the room, without +spreading so far as the bed in which my friend lay. But at the moment +of my headlong entrance, and before I had switched on the light, my +gaze automatically was directed to the pale moonbeam streaming through +the window and down on to one corner of the sheep skin rug beside the +bed.</p> + +<p>There came a sound of faint and muffled coughing,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span></p> + +<p>What with my recent awakening and the panic at my heart, I could not +claim that my vision was true; but across this moonbeam passed a sort +of grey streak, for all the world as though some long thin shape had +been withdrawn, snakelike, from the room, through the open window.... +From somewhere outside the house, and below, I heard the cough again, +followed by a sharp cracking sound like the lashing of a whip.</p> + +<p>I depressed the switch, flooding the room with light, and as I leapt +forward to the bed a word picture of what I had seen formed in my +mind; and I found that I was thinking of a grey feather boa.</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried (my voice seemed to pitch itself, unwilled, in a very +high key), "Smith, old man!"</p> + +<p>He made no reply, and a sudden, sorrowful fear clutched at my +heart-strings. He was lying half out of bed flat upon his back, his +head at a dreadful angle with his body. As I bent over him and seized +him by the shoulders, I could see the whites of his eyes. His arms +hung limply, and his fingers touched the carpet.</p> + +<p>"My God!" I whispered, "what has happened?"</p> + +<p>I heaved him back on to the pillow, and looked anxiously into his +face. Habitually gaunt, the flesh so refined away by the consuming +nervous energy of the man as to reveal the cheekbones in sharp +prominence, he now looked truly ghastly. His skin was so sun-baked as +to have changed constitutionally; nothing could ever eradicate that +tan. But to-night a fearful greyness was mingled with the brown, his +lips were purple ... and there were marks of strangulation upon the +lean throat—ever darkening weals of clutching fingers.</p> + +<p>He began to breathe stertorously and convulsively, inhalation being +accompanied by a significant gurgle in the throat. But now my calm was +restored in<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span> face of a situation which called for professional +attention.</p> + +<p>I aided my friend's laboured respirations by the usual means, setting +to work vigorously; so that presently he began to clutch at his +inflamed throat which that murderous pressure had threatened to close.</p> + +<p>I could hear sounds of movements about the house, showing that not I +alone had been awakened by those hoarse screams.</p> + +<p>"It's all right, old man," I said, bending over him: "brace up!"</p> + +<p>He opened his eyes—they looked bleared and bloodshot—and gave me a +quick glance of recognition.</p> + +<p>"It's all right, Smith!" I said—"no! don't sit up; lie there for a +moment."</p> + +<p>I ran across to the dressing-table, whereon I perceived his flask to +lie, and mixed him a weak stimulant with which I returned to the bed.</p> + +<p>As I bent over him again, my housekeeper appeared in the doorway, pale +and wide-eyed.</p> + +<p>"There is no occasion for alarm," I said over my shoulder; "Mr. +Smith's nerves are overwrought and he was awakened by some disturbing +dream. You can return to bed, Mrs. Newsome."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith seemed to experience much difficulty in swallowing the +contents of the tumbler which I held to his lips; and, from the way in +which he fingered the swollen glands, I could see that his throat, +which I had vigorously massaged, was occasioning him great pain. But +the danger was past, and already that glassy look was disappearing +from his eyes, nor did they protrude so unnaturally.</p> + +<p>"God, Petrie!" he whispered, "that was a near shave! I haven't the +strength of a kitten!"</p> + +<p>"The weakness will pass off," I replied; "there will be no collapse, +now. A little more fresh air...."</p> + +<p>I stood up, glancing at the windows, then back<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span> at Smith, who forced a +wry smile in answer to my look.</p> + +<p>"Couldn't be done, Petrie," he said huskily.</p> + +<p>His words referred to the state of the windows. Although the night was +oppressively hot, these were only opened some four inches at top and +bottom. Farther opening was impossible because of iron brackets +screwed firmly into the casements, which prevented the windows being +raised or lowered farther.</p> + +<p>It was a precaution adopted after long experience of the servants of +Dr. Fu-Manchu.</p> + +<p>Now, as I stood looking from the half-strangled man upon the bed to +those screwed-up windows, the fact came home to my mind that this +precaution had proved futile. I thought of the thing which I had +likened to a feather boa; and I looked at the swollen weals made by +clutching fingers upon the throat of Nayland Smith.</p> + +<p>The bed stood fully four feet from the nearest window.</p> + +<p>I suppose the question was written in my face; for, as I turned again +to Smith, who, having struggled upright, was still fingering his +injured throat ruefully—"God only knows, Petrie!" he said; "no human +arm could have reached me...."</p> + +<p>For us, the night was ended so far as sleep was concerned. Arrayed in +his dressing-gown, Smith sat in the white cane chair in my study with +a glass of brandy and water beside him, and (despite my official +prohibition) with the cracked briar, which had sent up its incense in +many strange and dark places of the East and which yet survived to +perfume these prosy rooms in suburban London, between his teeth. I +stood with my elbow resting upon the mantelpiece looking down at him +where he sat.</p> + +<p>"By God! Petrie," he said, yet again, with his fingers straying gently +over the surface of his throat, "that was a narrow shave—a damned +narrow shave!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Narrower than perhaps you appreciate, old man," I replied. "You were +a most unusual shade of blue when I found you...."</p> + +<p>"I managed," said Smith evenly, "to tear those clutching fingers away +for a moment and to give a cry for help. It was only for a moment, +though. Petrie! they were fingers of steel—of steel!"</p> + +<p>"The bed...." I began.</p> + +<p>"I know that," rapped Smith. "I shouldn't have been sleeping in it, +had it been within reach of the window; but, knowing that the Doctor +avoids noisy methods, I had thought myself fairly safe so long as I +made it impossible for any one actually to enter the room...."</p> + +<p>"I have always insisted, Smith," I cried, "that there was danger! What +of poisoned darts? What of the damnable reptiles and insects which +form part of the armoury of Fu-Manchu?"</p> + +<p>"Familiarity breeds contempt, I suppose," he replied. "But as it +happened, none of those agents was employed. The very menace that I +sought to avoid reached me somehow. It would almost seem that Dr. +Fu-Manchu deliberately accepted the challenge of those screwed up +windows! Hang it all, Petrie! one cannot sleep in a room hermetically +sealed in weather like this! It's positively Burmese; and although I +can stand tropical heat, curiously enough the heat of London gets me +down almost immediately."</p> + +<p>"The humidity; that's easily understood. But you'll have to put up +with it in the future. After nightfall our windows must be closed +entirely, Smith."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith knocked out his pipe upon the side of the fireplace. The +bowl sizzled furiously, but without delay he stuffed broad-cut mixture +into the hot pipe, dropping a liberal quantity upon the carpet during +the process. He raised his eyes to me, and his face was very grim.</p> + +<p>"Petrie," he said, striking a match on the heel of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span> his slipper, "the +resources of Dr. Fu-Manchu are by no means exhausted. Before we quit +this room it is up to us to come to a decision upon a certain point." +He got his pipe well alight. "What kind of thing, what unnatural, +distorted creature, laid hands upon my throat to-night? I owe my life, +primarily, to you, old man, but secondarily, to the fact that I was +awakened, just before the attack, by the creature's <i>coughing</i>—by its +vile, high pitched <i>coughing</i>...."</p> + +<p>I glanced around at the books upon my shelves. Often enough, following +some outrage by the brilliant, Chinese doctor whose genius was +directed to the discovery of new and unique death agents, we had +obtained a clue in those works of a scientific nature which bulk +largely in the library of a medical man. There are creatures, there +are drugs, which, ordinarily innocuous, may be so employed as to +become inimical to human life; and in the distorting of nature, in the +disturbing of balances and the diverting of beneficent forces into +strange and dangerous channels, Dr. Fu-Manchu excelled. I had known +him to enlarge, by artificial culture, a minute species of fungus so +as to render it a powerful agent capable of attacking man; his +knowledge of venomous insects has probably never been paralleled in +the history of the world; whilst, in the sphere of pure toxicology, he +had, and has, no rival: the Borgias were children by comparison. But, +look where I would, think how I might, no adequate explanation of this +latest outrage seemed possible along normal lines.</p> + +<p>"There's the clue," said Nayland Smith, pointing to a little ash-tray +upon the table near by. "Follow it if you can."</p> + +<p>But I could not.</p> + +<p>"As I have explained," continued my friend, "I was awakened by a sound +of coughing; then came a death grip on my throat, and instinctively my +hands shot out in search of my attacker. I could not<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span> reach him; my +hands came in contact with nothing palpable. Therefore I clutched at +the fingers which were dug into my windpipe, and found them to be +small—as the marks show—and <i>hairy</i>. I managed to give that first +cry for help, and with all my strength I tried to unfasten the grip +that was throttling the life out of me. At last I contrived to move +one of the hands, and I called out again, though not so loudly. Then +both the hands were back again; I was weakening; but I clawed like a +madman at the thin, hairy arms of the strangling thing, and with a +blood-red mist dancing before my eyes, I seemed to be whirling madly +round and round until all became a blank. Evidently I used my nails +pretty freely—and there's the trophy."</p> + +<p>For the twentieth time, I should think, I raised the ash-tray in my +hand and held it immediately under the table lamp in order to examine +its contents. In the little brass bowl lay a blood-stained fragment of +greyish hair attached to a tatter of skin. This fragment of epidermis +had an odd bluish tinge, and the attached hair was much darker at the +roots than elsewhere. Saving its singular colour, it might have been +torn from the forearm of a very hirsute human; but although my +thoughts wandered, unfettered, north, south, east and west; although, +knowing the resources of Fu-Manchu, I considered all the recognized +Mongolian types, and, in quest of hirsute mankind, even roamed, far +north among the blubber-eating Esquimaux; although I glanced at +Australasia, at Central Africa, and passed in mental review the dark +places of the Congo, nowhere in the known world, nowhere in the +history of the human species, could I come upon a type of man +answering to the description suggested by our strange clue.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith was watching me curiously as I bent over the little +brass ash-tray.</p> + +<p>"You are puzzled," he rapped in his short way. "So am I—utterly +puzzled. Fu-Manchu's gallery<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span> of monstrosities clearly has become +reinforced; for even if we identified the type, we should not be in +sight of our explanation."</p> + +<p>"You mean—" I began.</p> + +<p>"Fully four feet from the window, Petrie, and that window but a few +inches open! Look"—he bent forward, resting his chest against the +table, and stretched out his hand towards me—"you have a rule there; +just measure."</p> + +<p>Setting down the ash-tray, I opened out the rule and measured the +distance from the farther edge of the table to the tips of Smith's +fingers.</p> + +<p>"Twenty-eight inches—and <i>I</i> have a long reach!" snapped Smith, +withdrawing his arm and striking a match to relight his pipe. "There's +one thing, Petrie, often proposed before, which now we must do without +delay. The ivy must be stripped from the walls at the back. It's a +pity, but we cannot afford to sacrifice our lives to our sense of the +æsthetic. What do you make of the sound like the cracking of a whip?"</p> + +<p>"I make nothing of it, Smith," I replied wearily. "It might have been +a thick branch of ivy breaking beneath the weight of a climber."</p> + +<p>"Did it sound like it?"</p> + +<p>"I must confess that the explanation does not convince me, but I have +no better one."</p> + +<p>Smith, permitting his pipe to go out, sat staring straightly before +him, and tugging at the lobe of his left ear.</p> + +<p>"The old bewilderment is seizing me," I continued. "At first, when I +realized that Dr. Fu-Manchu was back in England, when I realized that +an elaborate murder-machine was set up somewhere in London, it seemed +unreal, fantastical. Then I met—Kâramanèh! She, whom we thought to be +his victim, showed herself again to be his slave. Now, with Weymouth +and Scotland Yard at work, the old secret evil is established again in +our midst, unaccountably<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span> —our lives are menaced—sleep is a +danger—every shadow threatens death ... oh! it is awful."</p> + +<p>Smith remained silent; he did not seem to have heard my words. I knew +these moods and had learnt that it was useless to seek to interrupt +them. With his brows drawn down, and his deep-set eyes staring into +space, he sat there gripping his cold pipe so tightly that my own jaw +muscles ached sympathetically. No man was better equipped than this +gaunt British Commissioner to stand between society and the menace of +the Yellow Doctor; I respected his meditations, for, unlike my own, +they were informed by an intimate knowledge of the dark and secret +things of the East, of that mysterious East out of which Fu-Manchu +came, of that jungle of noxious things whose miasma had been wafted +Westward with the implacable Chinaman.</p> + +<p>I walked quietly from the room, occupied with my own bitter +reflections.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XV" id="CHAPTER_XV"></a>CHAPTER XV</h2> + +<h3>BEWITCHMENT</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">Y </span></p> +<p>ou say you have two pieces of news for me?" said Nayland Smith, +looking across the breakfast table to where Inspector Weymouth sat +sipping coffee.</p> + +<p>"There are two points—yes," replied the Scotland Yard man, whilst +Smith paused, egg-spoon in hand, and fixed his keen eyes upon the +speaker. "The first is this: the headquarters of the yellow group is +no longer in the East End."</p> + +<p>"How can you be sure of that?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span></p> + +<p>"For two reasons. In the first place, that district must now be too +hot to hold Dr. Fu-Manchu; in the second place, we have just completed +a house-to-house inquiry which has scarcely overlooked a rathole or a +rat. That place where you say Fu-Manchu was visited by some Chinese +mandarin; where you, Mr. Smith, and"—glancing in my direction—"you, +doctor, were confined for a time—"</p> + +<p>"Yes?" snapped Smith, attacking his egg.</p> + +<p>"Well," continued the Inspector, "it is all deserted now. There is not +the slightest doubt that the Chinaman has fled to some other abode. I +am certain of it. My second piece of news will interest you very much, +I am sure. You were taken to the establishment of the Chinaman, +Shen-Yan, by a certain ex-officer of New York Police—Burke...."</p> + +<p>"Good God!" cried Smith, looking up with a start; "I thought they had +him!"</p> + +<p>"So did I," replied Weymouth grimly; "but they haven't! He got away in +the confusion following the raid, and has been hiding ever since with +a cousin—a nurseryman out Upminster way...."</p> + +<p>"Hiding?" snapped Smith.</p> + +<p>"Exactly—hiding. He has been afraid to stir ever since, and has +scarcely shown his nose outside the door. He says he is watched night +and day."</p> + +<p>"Then how ...!"</p> + +<p>"He realized that something must be done," continued the Inspector, +"and made a break this morning. He is so convinced of this constant +surveillance that he came away secretly, hidden under the boxes of a +market-wagon. He landed at Covent Garden in the early hours of this +morning and came straight away to the Yard."</p> + +<p>"What is he afraid of exactly?"</p> + +<p>Inspector Weymouth put down his coffee cup and bent forward slightly.</p> + +<p>"He knows something," he said in a low voice, "and <i>they</i> are aware +that he knows it!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span></p> + +<p>"And what is this he knows?"</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stared eagerly at the detective.</p> + +<p>"Every man has his price," replied Weymouth, with a smile, "and Burke +seems to think that you are a more likely market than the police +authorities."</p> + +<p>"I see," snapped Smith. "He wants to see <i>me</i>?"</p> + +<p>"He wants you to go and see <i>him</i>," was the reply. "I think he +anticipates that you may make a capture of the person or persons +spying upon him."</p> + +<p>"Did he give you any particulars?"</p> + +<p>"Several. He spoke of a sort of gipsy girl with whom he had a short +conversation one day, over the fence which divides his cousin's flower +plantations from the lane adjoining."</p> + +<p>"Gipsy girl!" I whispered, glancing rapidly at Smith.</p> + +<p>"I think you are right, doctor," said Weymouth with his slow smile; +"it was Kâramanèh. She asked him the way to somewhere or other and got +him to write it upon a loose page of his notebook, so that she should +not forget it."</p> + +<p>"You hear that, Petrie?" rapped Smith.</p> + +<p>"I hear it," I replied, "but I don't see any special significance in +the fact."</p> + +<p>"I do!" rapped Smith. "I didn't sit up the greater part of last night +thrashing my weary brains for nothing! But I am going to the British +Museum to-day, to confirm a certain suspicion." He turned to Weymouth. +"Did Burke go back?" he demanded abruptly.</p> + +<p>"He returned hidden under the empty boxes," was the reply. "Oh! you +never saw a man in such a funk in all your life!"</p> + +<p>"He may have good reasons," I said.</p> + +<p>"He <i>has</i> good reasons!" replied Nayland Smith grimly; "if that man +really possesses information inimical to the safety of Fu-Manchu, he +can only escape doom by means of a miracle similar to that which +hitherto has protected you and me."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Burke insists," said Weymouth at this point, "that something comes +almost every night after dusk, slinking about the house—it's an old +farmhouse, I understand; and on two or three occasions he has been +awakened (fortunately for him he is a light sleeper) by sounds of +<i>coughing</i> immediately outside his window. He is a man who sleeps with +a pistol under his pillow, and more than once, on running to the +window, he has had a vague glimpse of some creature leaping down from +the tiles of the roof, which slopes up to his room, into the flower +beds below...."</p> + +<p>"Creature!" said Smith, his grey eyes ablaze now, "you said +<i>creature</i>!"</p> + +<p>"I used the word deliberately," replied Weymouth, "because Burke seems +to have the idea that it goes on all fours."</p> + +<p>There was a short and rather strained silence. Then:</p> + +<p>"In descending a sloping roof," I suggested, "a human being would +probably employ his hands as well as his feet."</p> + +<p>"Quite so," agreed the Inspector. "I am merely reporting the +impression of Burke."</p> + +<p>"Has he heard no other sound?" rapped Smith; "one like the cracking of +dry branches, for instance?"</p> + +<p>"He made no mention of it," replied Weymouth, staring.</p> + +<p>"And what is the plan?"</p> + +<p>"One of his cousin's vans," said Weymouth, with his slight smile, "has +remained behind at Covent Garden and will return late this afternoon. +I propose that you and I, Mr. Smith, imitate Burke and ride down to +Upminster under the empty boxes."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stood up, leaving his breakfast half finished, and began +to wander up and down the room, reflectively tugging at his ear. Then +he began to fumble in the pockets of his dressing-gown and finally +produced the inevitable pipe, dilapidated<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span> pouch, and box of safety +matches. He began to load the much-charred agent of reflection.</p> + +<p>"Do I understand that Burke is actually too afraid to go out openly +even in daylight?" he asked suddenly.</p> + +<p>"He has not hitherto left his cousin's plantations at all," replied +Weymouth. "He seems to think that openly to communicate with the +authorities, or with you, would be to seal his death warrant."</p> + +<p>"He's right," snapped Smith.</p> + +<p>"Therefore he came and returned secretly," continued the inspector; +"and if we are to do any good, obviously we must adopt similar +precautions. The market wagon, loaded in such a way as to leave ample +space in the interior for us, will be drawn up outside the office of +Messrs. Pike and Pike, in Covent Garden, until about five o'clock this +afternoon. At say, half-past four, I propose that we meet there and +embark upon the journey."</p> + +<p>The speaker glanced in my direction interrogatively.</p> + +<p>"Include me in the programme," I said. "Will there be room in the +wagon?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," was the reply; "it is most commodious, but I cannot +guarantee its comfort."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith promenaded the room unceasingly, and presently he walked +out altogether, only to return ere the Inspector and I had had time to +exchange more than a glance of surprise, carrying a brass ash-tray. He +placed this on a corner of the breakfast table before Weymouth.</p> + +<p>"Ever seen anything like that?" he inquired.</p> + +<p>The Inspector examined the gruesome relic with obvious curiosity, +turning it over with the tip of his little finger and manifesting +considerable repugnance in touching it at all. Smith and I watched him +in silence, and, finally, placing the tray again upon the table, he +looked up in a puzzled way.</p> + +<p>"It's something like the skin of a water-rat," he said.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span></p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stared at him fixedly.</p> + +<p>"A water-rat? Now that you come to mention it, I perceive a certain +resemblance—yes. But"—he had been wearing a silk scarf about his +throat and now he unwrapped it—"did you ever see a water-rat that +could make marks like these?"</p> + +<p>Weymouth started to his feet with some muttered exclamation.</p> + +<p>"What is this?" he cried. "When did it happen, and how?"</p> + +<p>In his own terse fashion, Nayland Smith related the happenings of the +night. At the conclusion of the story:</p> + +<p>"By heaven!" whispered Weymouth, "the thing on the roof—the coughing +thing that goes on all fours, seen by Burke...."</p> + +<p>"My own idea exactly!" cried Smith.</p> + +<p>"Fu-Manchu," I said excitedly, "has brought some new, some dreadful +creature, from Burma...."</p> + +<p>"No, Petrie," snapped Smith, turning upon me suddenly. "Not from +Burma—from Abyssinia."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>That day was destined to be an eventful one; a day never to be +forgotten by any of us concerned in those happenings which I have to +record. Early in the morning Nayland Smith set off for the British +Museum to pursue his mysterious investigations, and I, having +performed my brief professional round (for, as Nayland Smith had +remarked on one occasion, this was a beastly healthy district), I +found, having made the necessary arrangements, that, with over three +hours to spare, I had nothing to occupy my time until the appointment +in Covent Garden Market. My lonely lunch completed, a restless fit +seized me, and I felt unable to remain longer in the house. Inspired +by this restlessness, I attired myself for the adventure of the +evening, not neglecting to place a pistol in my pocket, and, walking +to the neighbouring<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span> Tube station, I booked to Charing Cross, and +presently found myself rambling aimlessly along the crowded streets. +Led on by what link of memory I know not, I presently drifted into New +Oxford Street, and looked up with a start—to learn that I stood +before the shop of a second-hand bookseller where once two years +before I had met Kâramanèh.</p> + +<p>The thoughts conjured up at that moment were almost too bitter to be +borne, and without so much as glancing at the books displayed for +sale, I crossed the roadway, entered Museum Street, and, rather in +order to distract my mind than because I contemplated any purchase, +began to examine the Oriental pottery, Egyptian statuettes, Indian +armour, and other curios, displayed in the window of an antique +dealer.</p> + +<p>But, strive as I would to concentrate my mind upon the objects in the +window, my memories persistently haunted me, and haunted me to the +exclusion even of the actualities. The crowds thronging the pavement, +the traffic in New Oxford Street, swept past unheeded; my eyes saw +nothing of pot nor statuette, but only met, in a misty imaginative +world, the glance of two other eyes—the dark and beautiful eyes of +Kâramanèh. In the exquisite tinting of a Chinese vase dimly +perceptible in the background of the shop, I perceived only the +blushing cheeks of Kâramanèh; her face rose up, a taunting phantom, +from out of the darkness between a hideous, gilded idol and an Indian +sandal-wood screen.</p> + +<p>I strove to dispel this obsessing thought, resolutely fixing my +attention upon a tall Etruscan vase in the corner of the window, near +to the shop door. Was I losing my senses indeed? A doubt of my own +sanity momentarily possessed me. For, struggle as I would to dispel +the illusion—there, looking out at me over that ancient piece of +pottery, was the bewitching face of the slave-girl!</p> + +<p>Probably I was glaring madly, and possibly I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span> attracted the notice of +the passers-by; but of this I cannot be certain, for all my attention +was centred upon that phantasmal face, with the cloudy hair, slightly +parted red lips, and the brilliant dark eyes which looked into mine +out of the shadows of the shop.</p> + +<p>It was bewildering—it was uncanny; for, delusion or verity, the +glamour prevailed. I exerted a great mental effort, stepped to the +door, turned the handle, and entered the shop with as great a show of +composure as I could muster.</p> + +<p>A curtain draped in a little door at the back of one counter swayed +slightly, with no greater violence than may have been occasioned by +the draught. But I fixed my eyes upon this swaying curtain almost +fiercely ... as an impassive half-caste of some kind who appeared to +be a strange cross between a Græco-Hebrew and a Japanese, entered and +quite unemotionally faced me, with a slight bow.</p> + +<p>So wholly unexpected was this apparition that I started back.</p> + +<p>"Can I show you anything, sir?" inquired the new arrival, with a +second slight inclination of the head.</p> + +<p>I looked at him for a moment in silence. Then:</p> + +<p>"I thought I saw a lady of my acquaintance here a moment ago," I said. +"Was I mistaken?"</p> + +<p>"Quite mistaken, sir," replied the shopman, raising his black eyebrows +ever so slightly; "a mistake possibly due to a reflection in the +window. Will you take a look around now that you are here?"</p> + +<p>"Thank you," I replied, staring him hard in the face; "at some other +time."</p> + +<p>I turned and quitted the shop abruptly. Either I was mad, or Kâramanèh +was concealed somewhere therein.</p> + +<p>However, realizing my helplessness in the matter, I contented myself +with making a mental note of the name which appeared above the +establishment<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span>—J. Salaman—and walked on, my mind in a chaotic +condition and my heart beating with unusual rapidity.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVI" id="CHAPTER_XVI"></a>CHAPTER XVI</h2> + +<h3>THE QUESTING HANDS</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">W </span></p> +<p>ithin my view, from the corner of the room where I sat in deepest +shadow, through the partly opened window (it was screwed, like our +own) were rows of glass-houses gleaming in the moonlight, and, beyond +them, orderly ranks of flower-beds extending into a blue haze of +distance. By reason of the moon's position, no light entered the room, +but my eyes, from long watching, were grown familiar with the +darkness, and I could see Burke quite clearly as he lay in the bed +between my post and the window. I seemed to be back again in those +days of the troubled past when first Nayland Smith and I had come to +grips with the servants of Dr. Fu-Manchu. A more peaceful scene than +this flower-planted corner of Essex it would be difficult to imagine; +but, either because of my knowledge that its peace was chimerical, or +because of that outflung consciousness of danger which actually, or in +my imagination, preceded the coming of the Chinaman's agents, to my +seeming the silence throbbed electrically and the night was laden with +stilly omens.</p> + +<p>Already cramped by my journey in the market-cart, I found it difficult +to remain very long in any one position. What information had Burke to +sell? He had refused, for some reason, to discuss the matter that +evening, and now, enacting the part allotted him by Nayland Smith, he +feigned sleep consistently, although at intervals he would whisper to +me his doubts and fears.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span></p> + +<p>All the chances were in our favour to-night; for whilst I could not +doubt that Dr. Fu-Manchu was set upon the removal of the ex-officer of +New York police, neither could I doubt that our presence in the farm +was unknown to the agents of the Chinaman. According to Burke, +constant attempts had been made to achieve Fu-Manchu's purpose, and +had only been frustrated by his (Burke's) wakefulness. There was every +probability that another attempt would be made to-night.</p> + +<p>Any one who has been forced by circumstance to undertake such a vigil +as this will be familiar with the marked changes (corresponding with +phases of the earth's movement) which take place in the atmosphere, at +midnight, at two o'clock, and again at four o'clock. During those four +hours falls a period wherein all life is at its lowest ebb, and every +physician is aware that there is a greater likelihood of a patient's +passing between midnight and 4 a.m., than at any other period during +the cycle of the hours.</p> + +<p>To-night I became specially aware of this lowering of vitality, and +now, with the night at that darkest phase which precedes the dawn, an +indescribable dread, such as I had known before in my dealings with +the Chinaman, assailed me, when I was least prepared to combat it. The +stillness was intense Then:</p> + +<p>"<i>Here it is!</i>" whispered Burke from the bed.</p> + +<p>The chill at the very centre of my being, which but corresponded with +the chill of all surrounding nature at that hour, became intensified, +keener, at the whispered words.</p> + +<p>I rose stealthily out of my chair, and from my nest of shadows +watched—watched intently, the bright oblong of the window....</p> + +<p>Without the slightest heralding sound—a black silhouette crept up +against the pane ... the silhouette of a small, malformed head, a +dog-like head,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span> deep-set in square shoulders. Malignant eyes peered +intently in. Higher it rose—that wicked head—against the window, +then crouched down on the sill and became less sharply defined as the +creature stooped to the opening below. There was a faint sound of +sniffing.</p> + +<p>Judging from the stark horror which I experienced myself, I doubted, +now, if Burke could sustain the rôle allotted him. In beneath the +slightly raised window came a hand, perceptible to me despite the +darkness of the room. It seemed to project from the black silhouette +outside the pane, to be thrust forward—and forward—and forward ... +that small hand with the outstretched fingers.</p> + +<p>The unknown possesses unique terrors; and since I was unable to +conceive what manner of thing this could be, which, extending its +incredibly long arms, now sought the throat of the man upon the bed, I +tasted of that sort of terror which ordinarily one knows only in +dreams.</p> + +<p>"Quick, sir—<i>quick</i>!" screamed Burke, starting up from the pillow.</p> + +<p>The questing hands had reached his throat!</p> + +<p>Choking down an urgent dread that I had of touching the thing which +had reached through the window to kill the sleeper, I sprang across +the room and grasped the rigid, hairy forearms.</p> + +<p>Heavens! Never have I felt such muscles, such tendons, as those +beneath the hirsute skin! They seemed to be of steel wire, and with a +sudden frightful sense of impotence, I realized that I was as +powerless as a child to relax that strangle-hold. Burke was making the +most frightful sounds and quite obviously was being asphyxiated before +my eyes!</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried, "Smith! Help! <i>help</i>! for God's sake!"</p> + +<p>Despite the confusion of my mind I became aware of sounds outside and +below me. Twice the thing at the window coughed; there was an +incessant,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span> lash-like cracking, then some shouted words which I was +unable to make out; and finally the sharp report of a pistol.</p> + +<p>Snarling like that of a wild beast came from the creature with the +hairy arms, together with renewed coughing. But the steel grip relaxed +not one iota. I realized two things: the first, that in my terror at +the suddenness of the attack I had omitted to act as prearranged: the +second, that I had discredited the strength of the visitant, whilst +Smith had foreseen it.</p> + +<p>Desisting in my vain endeavour to pit my strength against that of the +nameless thing, I sprang back across the room and took up the weapon +which had been left in my charge earlier in the night, but which I had +been unable to believe it would be necessary to employ. This was a +sharp and heavy axe which Nayland Smith, when I had met him in Covent +Garden, had brought with him, to the great amazement of Weymouth and +myself.</p> + +<p>As I leapt back to the window and uplifted this primitive weapon, a +second shot sounded from below, and more fierce snarling, coughing, +and guttural mutterings assailed my ears from beyond the pane.</p> + +<p>Lifting the heavy blade, I brought it down with all my strength upon +the nearer of those hairy arms where it crossed the window-ledge, +severing muscle, tendon and bone as easily as a knife might cut +cheese....</p> + +<p>A shriek—a shriek neither human nor animal, but gruesomely compound +of both—followed ... and merged into a choking cough. Like a flash +the other shaggy arm was withdrawn, and some vaguely seen body went +rolling down the sloping red tiles and crashed on to the ground +beneath.</p> + +<p>With a second piercing shriek, louder than that recently uttered by +Burke, wailing through the night from somewhere below, I turned +desperately to the man on the bed, who now was become significantly<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span> +silent. A candle with matches, stood upon a table hard by, and, my +fingers far from steady, I set about obtaining a light. This +accomplished, I stood the candle upon the little chest-of-drawers and +returned to Burke's side.</p> + +<p>"Merciful God!" I cried.</p> + +<p>Of all the pictures which remain in my memory, some of them dark +enough, I can find none more horrible than that which now confronted +me in the dim candle-light. Burke lay crosswise on the bed, his head +thrown back and sagging; one rigid hand he held in the air, and with +the other grasped the hairy forearm which I had severed with the axe; +for, in a death-like grip, the dead fingers were still fastened, +vice-like, at his throat.</p> + +<p>His face was nearly black, and his eyes projected from their sockets +horribly. Mastering my repugnance, I seized the hideous piece of +bleeding anatomy and strove to release it. It defied all my efforts; +in death it was as implacable as in life. I took a knife from my +pocket, and, tendon by tendon, cut away that uncanny grip from Burke's +throat....</p> + +<p>But my labour was in vain. Burke was dead!</p> + +<p>I think I failed to realize this for some time. My clothes were +sticking clammily to my body; I was bathed in perspiration, and, +shaking furiously, I clutched at the edge of the window, avoiding the +bloody patch upon the ledge, and looked out over the roofs to where, +in the more distant plantations, I could hear excited voices. What had +been the meaning of that scream which I had heard but to which in my +frantic state of mind I had paid comparatively little attention?</p> + +<p>There was a great stirring all about me.</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I cried from the window; "Smith, for mercy's sake where are +you?"</p> + +<p>Footsteps came racing up the stairs. Behind me the door burst open and +Nayland Smith stumbled into the room.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span></p> + +<p>"God!" he said, and started back in the doorway.</p> + +<p>"Have you got it, Smith?" I demanded hoarsely. "In sanity's name what +is it—<i>what is it?</i>"</p> + +<p>"Come downstairs," replied Smith quietly, "and see for yourself." He +turned his head aside from the bed.</p> + +<p>Very unsteadily I followed him down the stairs and through the +rambling old house out into the stone-paved courtyard. There were +figures moving at the end of a long alleyway between the glass houses, +and one, carrying a lantern, stooped over something which lay upon the +ground.</p> + +<p>"That's Burke's cousin with the lantern," whispered Smith, in my ear; +"don't tell him yet."</p> + +<p>I nodded, and we hurried up to join the group. I found myself looking +down at one of those thickset Burmans whom I always associated with +Fu-Manchu's activities. He lay quite flat, face downward; but the back +of his head was a shapeless blood-clotted mass, and a heavy +stock-whip, the butt end ghastly because of the blood and hair which +clung to it, lay beside him. I started back appalled as Smith caught +my arm.</p> + +<p>"<i>It</i> turned on its keeper!" he hissed in my ear. "I wounded it twice +from below, and you severed one arm; in its insensate fury, its +unreasoning malignity, it returned—and there lies its second +victim...."</p> + +<p>"Then...."</p> + +<p>"It's gone, Petrie! It has the strength of four men even now. Look!"</p> + +<p>He stooped, and from the clenched left hand of the dead Burman, +extracted a piece of paper and opened it.</p> + +<p>"Hold the lantern a moment," he said.</p> + +<p>In the yellow light he glanced at the scrap of paper.</p> + +<p>"As I expected—a leaf of Burke's notebook; it worked by <i>scent</i>." He +turned to me with an odd expression in his grey eyes. "I wonder what +piece of <i>my</i> personal property Fu-Manchu has pilfered," he said, "in +order to enable it to sleuth <i>me</i>?"</p> + +<p>He met the gaze of the man holding the lantern.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps you had better return to the house," he said, looking him +squarely in the eyes.</p> + +<p>The other's face blanched.</p> + +<p>"You don't mean, sir—you don't mean...."</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span></p> +<p>"Brace up!" said Smith, laying his hand upon his shoulder. +"Remember—he chose to play with fire!"</p> + +<p>One wild look the man cast from Smith to me, then went off, +staggering, toward the farm.</p> + +<p>"Smith—" I began.</p> + +<p>He turned to me with an impatient gesture.</p> + +<p>"Weymouth has driven into Upminster," he snapped; "and the whole +district will be scoured before morning. They probably motored here, +but the sounds of the shots will have enabled whoever was with the car +to make good his escape. And—exhausted from loss of blood, its +capture is only a matter of time, Petrie."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVII" id="CHAPTER_XVII"></a>CHAPTER XVII</h2> + +<h3>ONE DAY IN RANGOON</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">N </span></p> +<p>ayland Smith returned from the telephone. Nearly twenty-four hours +had elapsed since the awful death of Burke.</p> + +<p>"No news, Petrie," he said shortly. "It must have crept into some +inaccessible hole to die."</p> + +<p>I glanced up from my notes. Smith settled into the white cane +armchair, and began to surround himself with clouds of aromatic smoke. +I took up<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span> a half-sheet of foolscap covered with pencilled writing in +my friend's cramped characters, and transcribed the following, in +order to complete my account of the latest Fu-Manchu outrage:</p> + +<p>"The Amharûn, a Semitic tribe allied to the Falashas, who have been +settled for many generations in the southern province of Shoa +(Abyssinia), have been regarded as unclean and outcast, apparently +since the days of Menelek—son of Suleyman and the Queen of +Sheba—from whom they claim descent. Apart from their custom of eating +meat cut from living beasts, they are accursed because of their +alleged association with the <i>Cynocephalus hamadryas</i> (Sacred Baboon). +I, myself, was taken to a hut on the banks of the Hawash and shown a +creature ... whose predominant trait was an unreasoning malignity +toward ... and a ferocious tenderness for the society of its furry +brethren. Its powers of <i>scent</i> were fully equal to those of a +bloodhound, whilst its abnormally long forearms possessed incredible +strength ... a <i>Cynocephalyte</i> such as this, contracts phthisis even +in the more northern provinces of Abyssinia...."</p> + +<p>"You have not yet explained to me, Smith," I said, having completed +this note, "how you got in touch with Fu-Manchu; how you learnt that +he was not dead, as we had supposed, but living—active."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stood up and fixed his steely eyes upon me with an +indefinable expression in them. Then:</p> + +<p>"No," he replied; "I haven't. Do you wish to know?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," I said with surprise; "is there any reason why I should +not?"</p> + +<p>"There is no real reason," said Smith; "or"—staring at me very +hard—"I hope there is no real reason."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Well"—he grabbed up his pipe from the table and began furiously to +load it—"I blundered upon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span> the truth one day in Rangoon. I was +walking out of a house which I occupied there for a time, and as I +swung around the corner into the main street, I ran into—literally +ran into...."</p> + +<p>Again he hesitated oddly; then closed up his pouch and tossed it into +the cane chair. He struck a match.</p> + +<p>"I ran into Kâramanèh," he continued abruptly, and began to puff away +at his pipe, filling the air with clouds of tobacco smoke.</p> + +<p>I caught my breath. This was the reason why he had kept me so long in +ignorance of the story. He knew of my hopeless, uncrushable sentiments +towards the gloriously beautiful but utterly hypocritical and evil +Eastern girl who was perhaps the most dangerous of all Dr. Fu-Manchu's +servants; for the power of her loveliness was magical, as I knew to my +cost.</p> + +<p>"What did you do?" I asked quietly, my fingers drumming upon the +table.</p> + +<p>"Naturally enough," continued Smith, "with a cry of recognition I held +out both my hands to her gladly. I welcomed her as a dear friend +regained; I thought of the joy with which <i>you</i> would learn that I had +found the missing one; I thought how you would be in Rangoon just as +quickly as the fastest steamer would get you there...."</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"Kâramanèh started back and treated me to a glance of absolute +animosity! No recognition was there, and no friendliness—only a sort +of scornful anger."</p> + +<p>He shrugged his shoulders and began to walk up and down the room.</p> + +<p>"I do not know what <i>you</i> would have done in the circumstances, +Petrie, but I—"</p> + +<p>"Yes?"</p> + +<p>"I dealt with the situation rather promptly, I think. I simply picked +her up without another word, right there in the public street, and +raced<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span> back into the house, with her kicking and fighting like a +little demon! She did not shriek or do anything of that kind, but +fought silently like a vicious wild animal. Oh! I had some scars, I +assure you; but I carried her up into my office, which fortunately was +empty at the time, plumped her down in a chair, and stood looking at +her."</p> + +<p>"Go on" I said rather hollowly; "what next?"</p> + +<p>"She glared at me with those wonderful eyes, an expression of +implacable hatred in them! Remembering all that we had done for her; +remembering our former friendship; above all, remembering <i>you</i>—this +look of hers almost made me shiver. She was dressed very smartly in +European fashion, and the whole thing had been so sudden that as I +stood looking at her I half expected to wake up presently and find it +all a day-dream. But it was real—as real as her enmity. I felt the +need for reflection, and having vainly endeavoured to draw her into +conversation, and elicited no other answer than this glare of +hatred—I left her there, going out and locking the door behind me."</p> + +<p>"Very high-handed?"</p> + +<p>"A Commissioner has certain privileges, Petrie; and any action I might +choose to take was not likely to be questioned. There was only one +window to the office, and it was fully twenty feet above the level; it +overlooked a narrow street off the main thoroughfare (I think I have +explained that the house stood on a corner), so I did not fear her +escaping. I had an important engagement which I had been on my way to +fulfil when the encounter took place, and now, with a word to my +native servant—who chanced to be downstairs—I hurried off."</p> + +<p>Smith's pipe had gone out as usual, and he proceeded to relight it, +whilst, my eyes lowered, I continued to drum upon the table.</p> + +<p>"This boy took her some tea later in the afternoon," he continued, +"and apparently found her<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span> in a more placid frame of mind. I returned +immediately after dusk, and he reported that when last he had looked +in, about half an hour earlier, she had been seated in an armchair +reading a newspaper (I may mention that everything of value in the +office was securely locked up!). I was determined upon a certain +course by this time, and I went slowly upstairs, unlocked the door, +and walked into the darkened office. I turned up the light ... the +place was empty!"</p> + +<p>"Empty!"</p> + +<p>"The window was open, and the bird flown! Oh! it was not so simple a +flight—as you would realize if you knew the place. The street, which +the window overlooked, was bounded by a blank wall, on the opposite +side, for thirty or forty yards along; and as we had been having heavy +rains, it was full of glutinous mud. Furthermore, the boy whom I had +left in charge had been sitting in the doorway immediately below the +office window watching for my return ever since his last visit to the +room above...."</p> + +<p>"She must have bribed him," I said bitterly, "or corrupted him with +her infernal blandishments."</p> + +<p>"I'll swear she did not," rapped Smith decisively. "I know my man, and +I'll swear she did not. There were no marks in the mud of the road to +show that a ladder had been placed there; moreover, nothing of the +kind could have been attempted whilst the boy was sitting in the +doorway; that was evident. In short, she did not descend into the +roadway and did not come out by the door...."</p> + +<p>"Was there a gallery outside the window?"</p> + +<p>"No; it was impossible to climb to right or left of the window or up +on to the roof. I convinced myself of that."</p> + +<p>"But, my dear man!" I cried, "you are eliminating every natural mode +of egress! Nothing remains but flight."</p> + +<p>"I am aware, Petrie, that nothing remains but<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span> flight; in other words, +I have never to this day understood how she quitted the room. I only +know that she did."</p> + +<p>"And then?"</p> + +<p>"I saw in this incredible escape the cunning hand of Dr. +Fu-Manchu—saw it at once. Peace was ended; and I set to work along +certain channels without delay. In this manner I got on the track at +last, and learnt, beyond the possibility of doubt, that the Chinese +doctor lived—nay! was actually on his way to Europe again!"</p> + +<p>There followed a short silence. Then—</p> + +<p>"I suppose it's a mystery that will be cleared up some day," concluded +Smith; "but to date the riddle remains intact." He glanced at the +clock. "I have an appointment with Weymouth; therefore, leaving you to +the task of solving this problem which thus far has defied my own +efforts, I will get along."</p> + +<p>He read a query in my glance.</p> + +<p>"Oh! I shall not be late," he added; "I think I may venture out alone +on this occasion without personal danger."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith went upstairs to dress, leaving me seated at my +writing-table deep in thought. My notes upon the renewed activity of +Dr. Fu-Manchu were stacked on my left hand, and, opening a new +writing-block, I commenced to add to them particulars of this +surprising event in Rangoon which properly marked the opening of the +Chinaman's second campaign. Smith looked in at the door on his way +out, but seeing me thus engaged, did not disturb me.</p> + +<p>I think I have made it sufficiently evident in these records that my +practice was not an extensive one, and my hour for receiving patients +arrived and passed with only two professional interruptions.</p> + +<p>My task concluded, I glanced at the clock, and determined to devote +the remainder of the evening to a little private investigation of my +own. From Nayland Smith I had preserved the matter a secret,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span> largely +because I feared his ridicule; but I had by no means forgotten that I +had seen, or had strongly imagined that I had seen, Kâramanèh—that +beautiful anomaly who (in modern London) asserted herself to be a +slave—in the shop of an antique dealer not a hundred yards from the +British Museum!</p> + +<p>A theory was forming in my brain, which I was burningly anxious to put +to the test. I remembered how, two years before, I had met Kâramanèh +near to this same spot; and I had heard Inspector Weymouth assert +positively that Fu-Manchu's headquarters were no longer in the East +End, as of yore. There seemed to me to be a distinct probability that +a suitable centre had been established for his reception in this +place, so much less likely to be suspected by the authorities. Perhaps +I attached too great a value to what may have been a delusion; perhaps +my theory rested upon no more solid foundation than the belief that I +had seen Kâramanèh in the shop of the curio dealer. If her appearance +there should prove to have been imaginary, the structure of my theory +would be shattered at its base. To-night I should test my premises, +and upon the result of my investigations determine my future action.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XVIII" id="CHAPTER_XVIII"></a>CHAPTER XVIII</h2> + +<h3>THE SILVER BUDDHA</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">M </span></p> +<p>useum Street certainly did not seem a likely spot for Dr. Fu-Manchu +to establish himself, yet, unless my imagination had strangely +deceived me, from the window of the antique dealer who traded under +the name of J. Salaman, those<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span> wonderful eyes of Kâramanèh, like the +velvet midnight of the Orient, had looked out at me.</p> + +<p>As I paced slowly along the pavement toward that lighted window, my +heart was beating far from normally, and I cursed the folly which, +despite all, refused to die, but lingered on, poisoning my life. +Comparative quiet reigned in Museum Street, at no time a busy +thoroughfare, and, excepting another shop at the Museum end, +commercial activities had ceased there. The door of a block of +residential chambers almost immediately opposite to the shop which was +my objective, threw out a beam of light across the pavement; not more +than two or three people were visible upon either side of the street.</p> + +<p>I turned the knob of the door and entered the shop.</p> + +<p>The same dark and immobile individual whom I had seen before, and +whose nationality defied conjecture, came out from the curtained +doorway at the back to greet me.</p> + +<p>"Good evening, sir," he said monotonously, with a slight inclination +of the head; "is there anything which you desire to inspect?"</p> + +<p>"I merely wish to take a look round," I replied. "I have no particular +item in view."</p> + +<p>The shopman inclined his head again, swept a yellow hand +comprehensively about, as if to include the entire stock, and seated +himself on a chair behind the counter.</p> + +<p>I lighted a cigarette with such an air of nonchalance as I could +summon to the operation, and began casually to inspect the varied +articles of <i>virtu</i> loading the shelves and tables about me. I am +bound to confess that I retain no one definite impression of this +tour. Vases I handled, statuettes, Egyptian scarabs, bead necklaces, +illuminated missals, portfolios of old prints, jade ornaments, +bronzes, fragments of rare lace, early printed books, Assyrian +tablets, daggers, Roman rings, and a hundred other curiosities, +leisurely, and I trust with apparent<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span> interest, yet without forming +the slightest impression respecting any one of them.</p> + +<p>Probably I employed myself in this way for half an hour or more, and +whilst my hands busied themselves among the stock of J. Salaman, my +mind was occupied entirely elsewhere. Furtively I was studying the +shopman himself, a human presentment of a Chinese idol; I was +listening and watching: especially I was watching the curtained +doorway at the back of the shop.</p> + +<p>"We close at about this time, sir," the man interrupted me, speaking +in the emotionless, monotonous voice which I had noted before.</p> + +<p>I replaced upon the glass counter a little Sekhet boat, carved in wood +and highly coloured, and glanced up with a start. Truly my methods +were amateurish; I had learnt nothing; I was unlikely to learn +anything. I wondered how Nayland Smith would have conducted such an +inquiry, and I racked my brains for some means of penetrating into the +recesses of the establishment. Indeed I had been seeking such a plan +for the past half an hour, but my mind had proved incapable of +suggesting one.</p> + +<p>Why I did not admit failure I cannot imagine, but, instead, I began to +tax my brains anew for some means of gaining further time; and, as I +looked about the place, the shopman very patiently awaiting my +departure, I observed an open case at the back of the counter. The +three lower shelves were empty, but upon the fourth shelf squatted a +silver Buddha.</p> + +<p>"I should like to examine the silver image yonder," I said; "what +price are you asking for it?"</p> + +<p>"It is not for sale, sir," replied the man, with a greater show of +animation than he had yet exhibited.</p> + +<p>"Not for sale!" I said, my eyes ever seeking the curtained doorway; +"how's that?"</p> + +<p>"It is sold."</p> + +<p>"Well, even so, there can be no objection to my examining it?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It is not for sale, sir."</p> + +<p>Such a rebuff from a tradesman would have been more than sufficient to +call for a sharp retort at any other time, but now it excited the +strangest suspicions. The street outside looked comparatively +deserted, and prompted, primarily, by an emotion which I did not pause +to analyse, I adopted a singular measure; without doubt I relied upon +the unusual powers vested in Nayland Smith to absolve me in the event +of error. I made as if to go out into the street, then turned, leapt +past the shopman, ran behind the counter, and grasped at the silver +Buddha!</p> + +<p>That I was likely to be arrested for attempted larceny I cared not; +the idea that Kâramanèh was concealed somewhere in the building ruled +absolutely, and a theory respecting this silver image had taken +possession of my mind. Exactly what I expected to happen at that +moment I cannot say, but what actually happened was far more startling +than anything I could have imagined.</p> + +<p>At the instant that I grasped the figure I realized that it was +attached to the woodwork; in the next I knew that it was a handle ... +as I tried to pull it toward me I became aware that this handle was +the handle of a door. For that door swung open before me, and I found +myself at the foot of a flight of heavily carpeted stairs.</p> + +<p>Anxious as I had been to proceed a moment before, I was now trebly +anxious to retire, and for this reason: on the bottom step of the +stairs, facing me, <i>stood Dr. Fu-Manchu!</i></p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XIX" id="CHAPTER_XIX"></a>CHAPTER XIX</h2> + +<h3>DR. FU-MANCHU'S LABORATORY</h3> +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> + +<p> cannot conceive that any ordinary mortal ever attained to anything +like an intimacy with Dr. Fu-Manchu; I cannot believe that any man +could ever grow used to his presence, could ever cease to fear him. I +suppose I had set eyes upon Fu-Manchu some five or six times prior to +this occasion, and now he was dressed in the manner which I always +associated with him, probably because it was thus I first saw him. He +wore a plain yellow robe, and, his pointed chin resting upon his +bosom, he looked down at me, revealing a great expanse of the +marvellous brow with its sparse, neutral-coloured hair.</p> + +<p>Never in my experience have I known such <i>force</i> to dwell in the +glance of any human eye as dwelt in that of this uncanny being. His +singular affliction (if affliction it were), the film or slight +membrane which sometimes obscured the oblique eyes, was particularly +evident at the moment that I crossed the threshold, but now as I +looked up at Dr. Fu-Manchu, it lifted—revealing the eyes in all their +emerald greenness.</p> + +<p>The idea of physical attack upon this incredible being seemed +childish—inadequate. But, following that first instant of +stupefaction, I forced myself to advance upon him.</p> + +<p>A dull, crushing blow descended on the top of my skull, and I became +oblivious of all things.</p> + +<p>My return to consciousness was accompanied by tremendous pains in my +head, whereby, from previous experience, I knew that a sandbag had +been used against me by some one in the shop, presumably by the +immobile shopman. This awakening was accompanied by none of those hazy +doubts respecting previous events and present surroundings which are<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span> +the usual symptoms of revival from sudden unconsciousness; even before +I opened my eyes, before I had more than a partial command of my +senses, I knew that, with my wrists handcuffed behind me, I lay in a +room which was also occupied by Dr. Fu-Manchu. This absolute certainty +of the Chinaman's presence was evidenced, not by my senses, but only +by an inner consciousness, and the same that always awakened into life +at the approach not only of Fu-Manchu in person but of certain of his +uncanny servants.</p> + +<p>A faint perfume hung in the air about me; I do not mean that of any +essence or of any incense, but rather the smell which is suffused by +Oriental furniture, by Oriental draperies; the indefinable but +unmistakable perfume of the East.</p> + +<p>Thus, London has a distinct smell of its own, and so has Paris, whilst +the difference between Marseilles and Suez, for instance, is even more +marked. Now the atmosphere surrounding me was Eastern, but not of the +East that I knew; rather it was Far Eastern. Perhaps I do not make +myself very clear, but to me there was a mysterious significance in +that perfumed atmosphere. I opened my eyes.</p> + +<p>I lay upon a long low settee, in a fairly large room which was +furnished, as I had anticipated, in an absolutely Oriental fashion. +The two windows were so screened as to have lost, from the interior +point of view, all resemblance to European windows, and the whole +structure of the room had been altered in conformity, bearing out my +idea that the place had been prepared for Fu-Manchu's reception some +time before his actual return. I doubt if, East or West, a duplicate +of that singular apartment could be found.</p> + +<p>The end in which I lay was, as I have said, typical of an Eastern +house, and a large, ornate lantern hung from the ceiling almost +directly above me. The farther end of the room was occupied by tall +cases,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span> some of them containing books, but the majority filled with +scientific paraphernalia: rows of flasks and jars, frames of +test-tubes, retorts, scales, and other objects of the laboratory. At a +large and very finely carved table sat Dr. Fu-Manchu, a yellow and +faded volume open before him, and some dark red fluid, almost like +blood, bubbling in a test-tube which he held over the flame of a +Bunsen-burner.</p> + +<p>The enormously long nail of his right index finger rested upon the +opened page of the book, to which he seemed constantly to refer, +dividing his attention between the volume, the contents of the +test-tube, and the progress of a second experiment, or possibly a part +of the same, which was taking place upon another corner of the +littered table.</p> + +<p>A huge glass retort (the bulb was fully two feet in diameter), fitted +with a Liebig's Condenser, rested in a metal frame, and within the +bulb, floating in an oily substance, was a fungus some six inches +high, shaped like a toadstool, but of a brilliant and venomous orange +colour. Three flat tubes of light were so arranged as to cast violet +rays upward into the retort, and the receiver, wherein condensed the +product of this strange experiment, contained some drops of a red +fluid which may have been identical with that boiling in the +test-tube.</p> + +<p>These things I perceived at a glance; then the filmy eyes of Dr. +Fu-Manchu were raised from the book, turned in my direction, and all +else was forgotten.</p> + +<p>"I regret," came the sibilant voice, "that unpleasant measures were +necessary, but hesitation would have been fatal. I trust, Dr. Petrie, +that you suffer no inconvenience?"</p> + +<p>To this speech no reply was possible, and I attempted none.</p> + +<p>"You have long been aware of my esteem for your acquirements," +continued the Chinaman, his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span> voice occasionally touching deep guttural +notes, "and you will appreciate the pleasure which this visit affords +me. I kneel at the feet of my silver Buddha. I look to you, when you +shall have overcome your prejudices—due to ignorance of my true +motives—to assist me in establishing that intellectual control which +is destined to be the new World Force. I bear you no malice for your +ancient enmity, and even now"—he waved one yellow hand toward the +retort—"I am conducting an experiment designed to convert you from +your misunderstanding, and to adjust your perspective."</p> + +<p>Quite unemotionally he spoke, then turned again to his book, his +test-tube and retort, in the most matter-of-fact way imaginable. I do +not think the most frenzied outburst on his part, the most fiendish +threats, could have produced such effect upon me as those cold and +carefully calculated words, spoken in that unique voice. In its tones, +in the glance of the green eyes, in the very pose of the gaunt, +high-shouldered body, there was power—force.</p> + +<p>I counted myself lost, and in view of the Doctor's words, studied the +progress of the experiment with frightful interest. But a few moments +sufficed in which to realize that, for all my training, I knew as +little of Chemistry—of Chemistry as understood by this man's +genius—as a junior student in surgery knows of trephining. The +process in operation was a complete mystery to me; the means and the +end were alike incomprehensible.</p> + +<p>Thus, in the heavy silence of that room, a silence only broken by the +regular bubbling from the test-tube, I found my attention straying +from the table to the other objects surrounding it; and at one of them +my gaze stopped and remained chained with horror.</p> + +<p>It was a glass jar, some five feet in height and filled with viscous +fluid of a light amber colour. Out from this peered a hideous, +dog-like face, low-browed,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span> with pointed ears and a nose almost +hoggishly flat. By the death-grin of the face the gleaming fangs were +revealed; and the body, the long yellow-grey body, rested, or seemed +to rest, upon short, malformed legs, whilst one long limp arm, the +right, hung down straightly in the preservative. The left arm had been +severed above the elbow.</p> + +<p>Fu-Manchu, finding his experiment to be proceeding favourably, lifted +his eyes to me again.</p> + +<p>"You are interested in my poor <i>Cynocephalyte</i>?" he said; and his eyes +were filmed like the eyes of one afflicted with cataract. "He was a +devoted servant, Dr. Petrie, but the lower influences in his genealogy +sometimes conquered. Then he got out of hand; and at last he was so +ungrateful toward those who had educated him, that, in one of those +paroxysms of his, he attacked and killed a most faithful Burman, one +of my oldest followers."</p> + +<p>Fu-Manchu returned to his experiment.</p> + +<p>Not the slightest emotion had he exhibited thus far, but had chatted +with me as any other scientist might chat with a friend who casually +visits his laboratory. The horror of the thing was playing havoc with +my own composure, however. There I lay, fettered, in the same room +with this man whose existence was a menace to the entire white race, +whilst placidly he pursued an experiment designed, if his own words +were believable, to cut me off from my kind—to wreak some change, +psychological or physiological I knew not; to place me, it might be, +upon a level with such brute things as that which now hung, half +floating, in the glass jar!</p> + +<p>Something I know of the history of that ghastly specimen, that thing +neither man nor ape; for within my own knowledge had it not attempted +the life of Nayland Smith, and was it not <i>I</i> who, with an axe, had +maimed it in the instant of one of its last slayings?<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span></p> + +<p>Of these things Dr. Fu-Manchu was well aware, so that his placid +speech was doubly, trebly horrible to my ears. I sought, furtively, to +move my arms, only to realize that, as I had anticipated, the +handcuffs were chained to a ring in the wall behind me. The +establishments of Dr. Fu-Manchu were always well provided with such +contrivances as these.</p> + +<p>I uttered a short, harsh laugh. Fu-Manchu stood up slowly from the +table, and, placing the test-tube in a rack, deposited the latter +carefully upon a shelf at his side.</p> + +<p>"I am happy to find you in such good humour," he said softly. "Other +affairs call me; and, in my absence, that profound knowledge of +chemistry, of which I have had evidence in the past, will enable you +to follow with intelligent interest the action of these violet rays +upon this exceptionally fine specimen of Siberian <i>Amanita muscaria</i>. +At some future time, possibly when you are my guest in China—which +country I am now making arrangements for you to visit—I shall discuss +with you some lesser-known properties of this species; and I may say +that one of your first tasks when you commence your duties as +assistant in my laboratory in Kiangsu, will be to conduct a series of +twelve experiments, which I have outlined, into other potentialities +of this unique fungus."</p> + +<p>He walked quietly to a curtained doorway, with his catlike yet awkward +gait, lifted the drapery, and, bestowing upon me a slight bow of +farewell, went out of the room.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XX" id="CHAPTER_XX"></a>CHAPTER XX</h2> + +<h3>THE CROSSBAR</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">H </span></p> +<p>ow long I lay there alone I had no means of computing. My mind was +busy with many matters, but principally concerned with my fate in the +immediate future. That Dr. Fu-Manchu entertained for me a singular +kind of regard, I had had evidence before. He had formed the erroneous +opinion that I was an advanced scientist who could be of use to him in +his experiments, and I was aware that he cherished a project of +transporting me to some place in China where his principal laboratory +was situated. Respecting the means which he proposed to employ, I was +unlikely to forget that this man, who had penetrated further along +certain byways of science than seemed humanly possible, undoubtedly +was master of a process for producing artificial catalepsy. It was my +lot, then, to be packed in a chest (to all intents and purposes a dead +man for the time being) and dispatched to the interior of China!</p> + +<p>What a fool I had been. To think that I had learnt nothing from my +long and dreadful experience of the methods of Dr. Fu-Manchu; to think +that I had come <i>alone</i> in quest of him; that, leaving no trace behind +me, I had deliberately penetrated to his secret abode!</p> + +<p>I have said that my wrists were manacled behind me, the manacles being +attached to a chain fastened in the wall. I now contrived, with +extreme difficulty, to reverse the position of my hands; that is to +say, I climbed backward through the loop formed by my fettered arms, +so that instead of the gyves being behind me, they now were in front.</p> + +<p>Then I began to examine them, learning, as I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span> had anticipated, that +they fastened with a lock. I sat gazing at the steel bracelets in the +light of the lamp which swung over my head, and it became apparent to +me that I had gained little by my contortion.</p> + +<p>A slight noise disturbed these unpleasant reveries. It was nothing +less than the rattling of keys!</p> + +<p>For a moment I wondered if I had heard aright, or if the sound +portended the coming of some servant of the Doctor who was locking up +the establishment for the night. The jangling sound was repeated, and +in such a way that I could not suppose it to be accidental. Some one +was deliberately rattling a small bunch of keys in an adjoining room.</p> + +<p>And now my heart leapt wildly—then seemed to stand still.</p> + +<p>With a low whistling cry a little grey shape shot through the doorway +by which Fu-Manchu had retired, and rolled like a ball of fluff blown +by the wind, completely under the table which bore the weird +scientific appliances of the Chinaman; the advent of the grey object +was accompanied by a further rattling of keys.</p> + +<p>My fear left me, and a mighty anxiety took its place. This creature +which now crouched chattering at me from beneath the big table was +Fu-Manchu's marmoset, and in the intervals of its chatterings and +grimacing, it nibbled, speculatively, at the keys upon the ring which +it clutched in its tiny hands. Key after key it sampled in this +manner, evincing a growing dissatisfaction with the uncrackable nature +of its find.</p> + +<p>One of those keys might be that of the handcuffs!</p> + +<p>I could not believe that the tortures of Tantalus were greater than +were mine at this moment. In all my hopes of rescue or release, I had +included nothing so strange, so improbable as this. A sort of awe +possessed me; for if by this means the key which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span> should release me +should come into my possession, how ever again could I doubt a +beneficent Providence?</p> + +<p>But they were not yet in my possession; moreover, the key of the +handcuffs might not be amongst the bunch.</p> + +<p>Were there no means whereby I could induce the marmoset to approach +me?</p> + +<p>Whilst I racked my brains for some scheme, the little animal took the +matter out of my hands. Tossing the ring with its jangling contents a +yard or so across the carpet in my direction, it leapt in pursuit, +picked up the ring, whirled it over its head, and then threw a +complete somersault around it. Now it snatched up the keys again, and +holding them close to its ear, rattled them furiously. Finally, with +an incredible spring, it leapt on to the chain supporting the lamp +above my head, and with the garish shade swinging and spinning wildly, +clung there looking down at me like an acrobat on a trapeze. The tiny, +bluish face, completely framed in grotesque whiskers, enhanced the +illusion of an acrobatic comedian. Never for a moment did it release +its hold upon the key-ring.</p> + +<p>My suspense now was almost intolerable. I feared to move, lest, +alarming the marmoset, it should run off again, taking the keys with +it. So as I lay there, looking up at the little creature swinging +above me, the second wonder of the night came to pass.</p> + +<p>A voice that I could never forget, strive how I would, a voice that +haunted my dreams by night, and for which by day I was ever listening, +cried out from some adjoining room:</p> + +<p>"<i>Ta'ala hina!</i>" it called. "<i>Ta'ala hina, Peko!</i>"</p> + +<p>It was Kâramanèh!</p> + +<p>The effect upon the marmoset was instantaneous. Down came the bunch of +keys upon one side of the shade, almost falling on my head, and down +leapt the ape upon the other. In two leaps it had tra<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span>versed the room +and had vanished through the curtained doorway.</p> + +<p>If ever I had need of coolness it was now; the slightest mistake would +be fatal! The keys had slipped from the mattress of the divan, and now +lay just beyond reach of my fingers. Rapidly I changed my position, +and sought, without undue noise, to move the keys with my foot.</p> + +<p>I had actually succeeded in sliding them back on to the mattress, +when, unheralded by any audible footstep, Kâramanèh came through the +doorway, holding the marmoset in her arms. She wore a dress of fragile +muslin material, and out from its folds protruded one silk-stockinged +foot, resting in a high-heeled red shoe....</p> + +<p>For a moment she stood watching me, with a sort of enforced composure; +then her glance strayed to the keys lying upon the floor. Slowly, and +with her eyes fixed again upon my face, she crossed the room, stooped, +and took up the key-ring.</p> + +<p>It was one of the poignant moments of my life; for by that simple act +all my hopes had been shattered!</p> + +<p>Any poor lingering doubt that I may have had left me now. Had the +slightest spark of friendship animated the bosom of Kâramanèh, most +certainly she would have overlooked the presence of the keys—of the +keys which represented my one hope of escape from the clutches of the +fiendish Chinaman.</p> + +<p>There is a silence more eloquent than words. For half a minute or +more, Kâramanèh stood watching me—forcing herself to watch me—and I +looked up at her with a concentrated gaze in which rage and reproach +must have been strangely mingled.</p> + +<p>What eyes she had!—of that blackly lustrous sort nearly always +associated with unusually dark complexions; but Kâramanèh's complexion +was peachlike, or rather of an exquisite and delicate fairness which +reminded me of the petal of a rose. By some I have been accused of +romancing about this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span> girl's beauty, but only by those who had not met +her; for indeed she was astonishingly lovely.</p> + +<p>At last her eyes fell, the long lashes drooped upon her cheeks. She +turned and walked slowly to the chair wherein Fu-Manchu had sat. +Placing the keys upon the table amid the scientific litter, she rested +one dimpled elbow upon the yellow page of the book, and with her chin +in her palm, again directed upon me that enigmatical gaze.</p> + +<p>I dared not think of the past, of the past in which this beautiful, +treacherous girl had played a part; yet, watching her, I could not +believe, even now, that she was false! My state was truly a pitiable +one; I could have cried out in sheer anguish. With her long lashes +partly lowered, she watched me awhile, then spoke; and her voice was +music which seemed to mock me; every inflection of that elusive accent +reopened, lancet-like, the ancient wound.</p> + +<p>"Why do you look at me so?" she said, almost in a whisper. "By what +right do you reproach me?—Have you ever offered me friendship, that I +should repay you with friendship? When first you came to the house +where I was, by the river—came to save some one from" (there was the +familiar hesitation which always preceded the name of Fu-Manchu) +"from—<i>him</i>, you treated me as your enemy, although—I would have +been your friend...."</p> + +<p>There was appeal in the soft voice, but I laughed mockingly, and threw +myself back upon the divan. Kâramanèh stretched out her hands toward +me, and I shall never forget the expression which flashed into those +glorious eyes; but, seeing me intolerant of her appeal, she drew back +and quickly turned her head aside. Even in this hour of extremity, of +impotent wrath, I could find no contempt in my heart for her feeble +hypocrisy; with all the old wonder I watched that exquisite profile, +and Kâramanèh's very deceitfulness was a salve—for had she not cared +she would not have attempted it!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span></p> + +<p>Suddenly she stood up, taking the keys in her hands, and approached +me.</p> + +<p>"Not by word, nor by look," she said quietly, "have you asked for my +friendship, but because I cannot bear you to think of me as you do, I +will prove that I am not the hypocrite and the liar you think me. You +will not trust me, but I will trust you."</p> + +<p>I looked up into her eyes, and knew a pagan joy when they faltered +before my searching gaze. She threw herself upon her knees beside me, +and the faint exquisite perfume inseparable from my memories of her, +became perceptible, and seemed as of old to Intoxicate me. The lock +clicked ... and I was free.</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh rose swiftly to her feet as I stood up and outstretched my +cramped arms. For one delirious moment her bewitching face was close +to mine, and the dictates of madness almost ruled; but I clenched my +teeth and turned sharply aside. I could not trust myself to speak.</p> + +<p>With Fu-Manchu's marmoset again gambolling before us, we walked +through the curtained doorway into the room beyond. It was in +darkness, but I could see the slave-girl in front of me, a slim +silhouette, as she walked to a screened window, and, opening the +screen in the manner of a folding door, also threw up the window.</p> + +<p>"Look!" she whispered.</p> + +<p>I crept forward and stood beside her. I found myself looking down into +the Museum Street from a first-floor window! Belated traffic still +passed along New Oxford Street on the left, but not a solitary figure +was visible to the right, as far as I could see, and that was nearly +to the railings of the Museum. Immediately opposite, in one of the +flats which I had noticed earlier in the evening, another window was +opened. I turned, and in the reflected light saw that Kâramanèh held a +cord in her hand. Our glances met in the semi-darkness.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span></p> + +<p>She began to haul the cord into the window, and, looking upward, I +perceived that it was looped in some way over the telegraph cables +which crossed the street at that point. It was a slender cord, and it +appeared to be passed across a joint in the cables almost immediately +above the centre of the roadway. As it was hauled in, a second and +stronger line attached to it was pulled, in turn, over the cables, and +thence in by the window. Kâramanèh twisted a length of it around a +metal bracket fastened in the wall, and placed a light wooden crossbar +in my hand.</p> + +<p>"Make sure that there is no one in the street," she said, craning out +and looking to right and left, "then <i>swing across</i>. The length of the +rope is just sufficient to enable you to swing through the open window +opposite, and there is a mattress inside to drop upon. But release the +bar immediately, or you may be dragged back. The door of the room in +which you will find yourself is unlocked, and you have only to walk +down the stairs and out into the street."</p> + +<p>I peered at the crossbar in my hand, then looked hard at the girl +beside me. I missed something of the old fire of her nature; she was +very subdued, to-night.</p> + +<p>"Thank you, Kâramanèh," I said softly.</p> + +<p>She suppressed a little cry as I spoke her name, and drew back into +the shadows.</p> + +<p>"I believe you are my friend," I said, "but I cannot understand. Won't +you help me to understand?"</p> + +<p>I took her unresisting hand, and drew her toward me. My very soul +seemed to thrill at the contact of her lithe body....</p> + +<p>She was trembling wildly and seemed to be trying to speak, but +although her lips framed the words no sound followed. Suddenly +comprehension came to me. I looked down into the street, hitherto +deserted<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span> ... and into the upturned face of Fu-Manchu!</p> + +<p>Wearing a heavy fur-collared coat, and with his yellow, malignant +countenance grotesquely horrible beneath the shadow of a large tweed +motor cap, he stood motionless, looking up at me. That he had seen me, +I could not doubt; but had he seen my companion?</p> + +<p>In a choking whisper Kâramanèh answered my unspoken question.</p> + +<p>"He has not seen me! I have done much for you; do in return a small +thing for me! Save my life!"</p> + +<p>She dragged me back from the window and fled across the room to the +weird laboratory where I had lain captive. Throwing herself upon the +divan, she held out her white wrists and glanced significantly at the +manacles.</p> + +<p>"Lock them upon me!" she said rapidly. "Quick! quick!"</p> + +<p>Great as was my mental disturbance, I managed to grasp the purpose of +this device. The very extremity of my danger found me cool. I fastened +the manacles, which so recently had confined my own wrists, upon the +slim wrists of Kâramanèh. A faint and muffled disturbance, doubly +ominous because there was nothing to proclaim its nature, reached me +from some place below, on the ground floor.</p> + +<p>"Tie something around my mouth!" directed Kâramanèh with nervous +rapidity. As I began to look about me: "Tear a strip from my dress," +she said; "do not hesitate—be quick! be quick!"</p> + +<p>I seized the flimsy muslin and tore off half a yard or so from the hem +of the skirt. The voice of Dr. Fu-Manchu became audible. He was +speaking rapidly, sibilantly, and evidently was approaching—would be +upon me in a matter of moments. I fastened the strip of fabric over +the girl's mouth and tied it behind, experiencing a pang half +pleasur<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span>able and half fearful as I found my hands in contact with the +foamy luxuriance of her hair.</p> + +<p>Dr. Fu-Manchu was entering the room immediately beyond.</p> + +<p>Snatching up the bunch of keys, I turned and ran, for in another +instant my retreat would be cut off. As I burst once more into the +darkened room I became aware that a door on the farther side of it was +open; and framed in the opening was the tall high-shouldered figure of +the Chinaman, still enveloped in his fur coat and wearing the +grotesque cap. As I saw him, so he perceived me; and as I sprang to +the window, he advanced.</p> + +<p>I turned desperately and hurled the bunch of keys with all my force +into the dimly seen face....</p> + +<p>Either because they possessed a chatoyant quality of their own (as I +had often suspected), or by reason of the light reflected through the +open window, the green eyes gleamed upon me vividly like those of a +giant cat. One short guttural exclamation paid tribute to the accuracy +of my aim; then I had the crossbar in my hand.</p> + +<p>I threw one leg across the sill, and dire as was my extremity, +hesitated for an instant ere trusting myself to the flight....</p> + +<p>A vice-like grip fastened upon my left ankle.</p> + +<p>Hazily I became aware that the dark room was become flooded with +figures. The whole yellow gang were upon me—the entire murder-group +composed of units recruited from the darkest places of the East!</p> + +<p>I have never counted myself a man of resource, and have always envied +Nayland Smith his possession of that quality, in him extraordinarily +developed; but on this occasion the gods were kind to me, and I +resorted to the only device, perhaps, which could have saved me. +Without releasing my hold upon the crossbar, I clutched at the ledge +with the fingers of both hands and swung back, into<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span> the room, my +right leg, which was already across the sill. With all my strength I +kicked out. My heel came in contact, in sickening contact, with a +human head; beyond doubt I had split the skull of the man who held me.</p> + +<p>The grip upon my ankle was released automatically; and now consigning +all my weight to the rope, I slipped forward, as a diver, across the +broad ledge and found myself sweeping through the night like a winged +thing....</p> + +<p>The line, as Kâramanèh had assured me, was of well-judged length. Down +I swept to within six or seven feet of the street level, then up, up, +at ever-decreasing speed, toward the vague oblong of the open window +beyond.</p> + +<p>I hope I have been successful, in some measure, in portraying the +varied emotions which it was my lot to experience that night, and it +may well seem that nothing more exquisite could remain for me. Yet it +was written otherwise; for as I swept up to my goal, describing the +inevitable arc which I had no power to check, I saw that <i>one</i> awaited +me.</p> + +<p>Crouching forward half out of the open window was a Burmese dacoit, a +cross-eyed, leering being whom I well remembered to have encountered +two years before in my dealings with Dr. Fu-Manchu. One bare, sinewy +arm held rigidly at right angles before his breast, he clutched a long +curved knife and waited—waited—for the critical moment when my +throat should be at his mercy!</p> + +<p>I have said that a strange coolness had come to my aid; even now it +did not fail me, and so incalculably rapid are the workings of the +human mind that I remembered complimenting myself upon an achievement +which Smith himself could not have bettered, and this in the +immeasurable interval which intervened between the commencement of my +upward swing and my arrival on a level with the window.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span></p> + +<p>I threw my body back and thrust my feet forward. As my legs went +through the opening, an acute pain in one calf told me that I was not +to escape scathless from the night's mêlée. But the dacoit went +rolling over in the darkness of the room, as helpless in face of that +ramrod stroke as the veriest infant....</p> + +<p>Back I swept upon my trapeze, a sight to have induced any passing +citizen to question his sanity. With might and main I sought to check +the swing of the pendulum, for if I should come within reach of the +window behind I doubted not that other knives awaited me. It was no +difficult feat, and I succeeded in checking my flight. Swinging there +above Museum Street I could even appreciate, so lucid was my mind, the +ludicrous element of the situation.</p> + +<p>I dropped. My wounded leg almost failed me; and greatly shaken, but +with no other serious damage, I picked myself up from the dust of the +roadway—to see the bar vanishing into the darkness above. It was a +mockery of Fate that the problem which Nayland Smith had set me to +solve should have been solved thus: for I could not doubt that by +means of the branch of a tall tree or some other suitable object +situated opposite to Smith's house in Rangoon, Kâramanèh had made her +escape as to-night I had made mine.</p> + +<p>Apart from the acute pain in my calf I knew that the dacoit's knife +had bitten deeply by reason of the fact that a warm liquid was +trickling down into my boot. Like any drunkard I stood there in the +middle of the road looking up at the vacant window where the dacoit +had been, and up at the window above the shop of J. Salaman where I +knew Fu-Manchu to be. But for some reason the latter window had been +closed or almost closed, and as I stood there this reason became +apparent to me.</p> + +<p>The sound of running footsteps came from the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span> direction of New Oxford +Street. I turned—to see two policemen bearing down upon me!</p> + +<p>This was a time for quick decisions and prompt action. I weighed all +the circumstances in the balance, and made the last vital choice of +the night; I turned and ran toward the British Museum as though the +worst of Fu-Manchu's creatures, and not my allies the police, were at +my heels!</p> + +<p>No one else was in sight, but, as I whirled into the Square, the red +lamp of a slowly retreating taxi became visible some hundred yards to +the left. My leg was paining me greatly, but the nature of the wound +did not interfere with my progress; therefore I continued my headlong +career, and ere the police had reached the end of Museum Street I had +my hand upon the door handle of the cab—for, the Fates being +persistently kind to me, the vehicle was for hire.</p> + +<p>"Dr. Cleeve's, Harley Street!" I shouted at the man. "Drive like hell! +It's an urgent case."</p> + +<p>I leapt into the cab.</p> + +<p>Within five seconds from the time that I slammed the door and dropped +back panting upon the cushions, we were speeding westward toward the +house of the famous pathologist, thereby throwing the police +hopelessly off the track.</p> + +<p>Faintly to my ears came the purr of a police whistle. The taxi-man +evidently did not hear the significant sound. Merciful Providence had +rung down the curtain; for to-night my rôle in the yellow drama was +finished.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXI" id="CHAPTER_XXI"></a>CHAPTER XXI</h2> + +<h3>CRAGMIRE TOWER</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">L </span></p> +<p>ess than two hours later, Inspector Weymouth and a party from New +Scotland Yard raided the house in Museum Street. They found the stock +of J. Salaman practically intact, and, in the strangely appointed +rooms above, every evidence of a hasty outgoing. But of the +instruments, drugs and other laboratory paraphernalia not one item +remained. I would gladly have given my income for a year, to have +gained possession of the books, alone; for beyond all shadow of doubt, +I knew them to contain formulæ calculated to revolutionize the science +of medicine.</p> + +<p>Exhausted, physically and mentally, and with my mind a +whispering-gallery of conjectures (it were needless for me to mention +<i>whom</i> respecting), I turned in, gratefully, having patched up the +slight wound in my calf.</p> + +<p>I seemed scarcely to have closed my eyes, when Nayland Smith was +shaking me into wakefulness.</p> + +<p>"You are probably tired out," he said; "but your crazy expedition of +last night entitles you to no sympathy. Read this. There is a train in +an hour. We will reserve a compartment and you can resume your +interrupted slumbers in a corner seat."</p> + +<p>As I struggled upright in bed, rubbing my eyes sleepily, Smith handed +me the <i>Daily Telegraph</i>, pointing to the following paragraph upon the +literary page:</p> + +<p>"Messrs. M—— announce that they will publish shortly the +long-delayed work of Kegan Van Roon, the celebrated American +traveller, Orientalist and psychic investigator, dealing with his +recent inquiries in China. It will be remembered that Mr. Van Roon<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span> +undertook to motor from Canton to Siberia last winter, but met with +unforeseen difficulties in the province of Ho-Nan. He fell into the +hands of a body of fanatics and was fortunate to escape with his life. +His book will deal in particular with his experiences in Ho-Nan, and +some sensational revelations regarding the awakening of that most +mysterious race, the Chinese, are promised. For reasons of his own he +has decided to remain in England until the completion of his book +(which will be published simultaneously in New York and London), and +has leased Cragmire Tower, Somersetshire, in which romantic and +historical residence he will collate his notes and prepare for the +world a work ear-marked as a classic even before it is published."</p> + +<p>I glanced up from the paper, to find Smith's eyes fixed upon me +inquiringly.</p> + +<p>"From what I have been able to learn," he said evenly, "we should +reach Saul, with decent luck, just before dusk."</p> + +<p>As he turned and quitted the room without another word, I realized, in +a flash, the purport of our mission; I understood my friend's ominous +calm, betokening suppressed excitement.</p> + +<p>Fortune was with us (or so it seemed); and whereas we had not hoped to +gain Saul before sunset, as a matter of fact the autumn afternoon was +in its most glorious phase as we left the little village with its +old-time hostelry behind us and set out in an easterly direction, with +the Bristol Channel far away on our left and a gently sloping upland +on our right.</p> + +<p>The crooked high-street practically constituted the entire hamlet of +Saul, and the inn, The Wagoners, was the last house in the street. +Now, as we followed the ribbon of moor-path to the top of the rise, we +could stand and look back upon the way we had come; and although we +had covered fully a mile of ground, it was possible to detect the +sunlight gleaming now and then upon the gilt lettering of the inn<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span> +sign as it swayed in the breeze. The day had been unpleasantly warm, +but relieved by this same sea breeze, which, although but slight, had +in it the tang of the broad Atlantic. Behind us, then, the footpath +sloped down to Saul, unpeopled by any living thing; east and +north-east swelled the monotony of the moor right out to the hazy +distance where the sky began and the sea remotely lay hidden; west +fell the gentle gradient from the top of the slope which we had +mounted, and here, as far as the eye could reach, the country had an +appearance suggestive of a huge and dried-up lake. This idea was borne +out by an odd blotchiness, for sometimes there would be half a mile or +more of seeming moorland, then a sharply defined change (or it seemed +sharply defined from that bird's-eye point of view). A vivid greenness +marked these changes, which merged into a dun coloured smudge and +again into the brilliant green; then the moor would begin once more.</p> + +<p>"That will be the Tor of Glastonbury, I suppose," said Smith, suddenly +peering through his field-glasses in an easterly direction; "and +yonder, unless I am greatly mistaken, is Cragmire Tower."</p> + +<p>Shading my eyes with my hand, I also looked ahead, and saw the place +for which we were bound; one of those round towers, more common in +Ireland, which some authorities have declared to be of Phœnician +origin. Ramshackle buildings clustered untidily about its base, and to +it a sort of tongue of that oddly venomous green which patched the +lowlands shot out and seemed almost to reach the tower-base. The land +for miles around was as flat as the palm of my hand, saving certain +hummocks, lesser tors, and irregular piles of boulders which dotted +its expanse. Hills and uplands there were in the hazy distance, +forming a sort of mighty inland bay which I doubted not in some past +age had been covered by the sea. Even in the brilliant sunlight the +place had something of a mournful aspect, look<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span>ing like a great +dried-up pool into which the children of giants had carelessly cast +stones.</p> + +<p>We met no living soul upon the moor. With Cragmire Tower but a quarter +of a mile off, Smith paused again, and raising his powerful glasses +swept the visible landscape.</p> + +<p>"Not a sign, Petrie," he said softly; "yet...."</p> + +<p>Dropping the glasses back into their case, my companion began to tug +at his left ear.</p> + +<p>"Have we been over-confident?" he said, narrowing his eyes in +speculative fashion. "No less than three times I have had the idea +that something, or some one, has just dropped out of sight, <i>behind</i> +us, as I focussed...."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean, Smith?"</p> + +<p>"Are we"—he glanced about him as though the vastness were peopled +with listening Chinamen—"<i>followed</i>?"</p> + +<p>Silently we looked into one another's eyes, each seeking for the dread +which neither had named. Then:</p> + +<p>"Come on, Petrie!" said Smith, grasping my arm: and at quick march we +were off again.</p> + +<p>Cragmire Tower stood upon a very slight eminence, and what had looked +like a green tongue, from the moorland slopes above, was in fact a +creek, flanked by lush land, which here found its way to the sea. The +house which we were come to visit consisted in a low, two-storey +building, joining the ancient tower on the east, with two smaller +out-buildings. There was a miniature kitchen-garden, and a few stunted +fruit trees in the north-west corner; the whole being surrounded by a +grey stone wall.</p> + +<p>The shadow of the tower fell sharply across the path, which ran up +almost alongside of it. We were both extremely warm by reason of our +long and rapid walk on that hot day, and this shade should have been +grateful to us. In short, I find it difficult to account for the +unwelcome chill which I experi<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span>enced at the moment that I found myself +at the foot of the time-worn monument. I know that we both pulled up +sharply and looked at one another as though acted upon by some mutual +disturbance.</p> + +<p>But not a sound broke the stillness save the remote murmuring, until a +solitary sea-gull rose in the air and circled directly over the tower, +uttering its mournful and unmusical cry. Automatically to my mind +sprang the lines of the poem:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Far from all brother-men, in the weird of the fen,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With God's creatures I bide, 'mid the birds that I ken;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where the winds ever dree, where the hymn of the sea<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Brings a message of peace from the ocean to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>Not a soul was visible about the premises; there was no sound of human +activity and no dog barked. Nayland Smith drew a long breath, glanced +back along the way we had come, then went on, following the wall, I +beside him, until we came to the gate. It was unfastened, and we +walked up the stone path through a wilderness of weeds. Four windows +of the house were visible, two on the ground floor and two above. +Those on the ground floor were heavily boarded up, those above, though +glazed, boasted neither blinds nor curtains. Cragmire Tower showed not +the slightest evidence of tenancy.</p> + +<p>We mounted three steps and stood before a tremendously massive oaken +door. An iron bell-pull, ancient and rusty, hung on the right of the +door, and Smith, giving me an odd glance, seized the ring and tugged +it.</p> + +<p>From somewhere within the building answered a mournful clangour, a +cracked and toneless jangle, which, seeming to echo through empty +apartments, sought and found an exit apparently by way of one of the +openings in the round tower; for it was from above our heads that the +noise came to us.</p> + +<p>It died away, that eerie ringing—that clanging so dismal that it +could chill my heart even then with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span> the bright sunlight streaming +down out of the blue; it awoke no other response than the mournful cry +of the sea-gull circling over our heads. Silence fell. We looked at +one another, and we were both about to express a mutual doubt, when, +unheralded by any unfastening of bolts or bars, the door was opened, +and a huge mulatto, dressed in white, stood there regarding us.</p> + +<p>I started nervously, for the apparition was so unexpected, but Nayland +Smith, without evidence of surprise, thrust a card into the man's +hand.</p> + +<p>"Take my card to Mr. Van Roon, and say that I wish to see him on +important business," he directed authoritatively.</p> + +<p>The mulatto bowed and retired. His white figure seemed to be swallowed +up by the darkness within, for beyond the patch of uncarpeted floor +revealed by the peeping sunlight, was a barn-like place of densest +shadow. I was about to speak, but Smith laid his hand upon my arm +warningly, as, out from the shadows, the mulatto returned. He stood on +the right of the door and bowed again.</p> + +<p>"Be pleased to enter," he said, in his harsh, negro voice. "Mr. Van +Roon will see you."</p> + +<p>The gladness of the sun could no longer stir me; a chill and sense of +foreboding bore me company as beside Nayland Smith I entered Cragmire +Tower.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXII" id="CHAPTER_XXII"></a>CHAPTER XXII</h2> + +<h3>THE MULATTO</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">T </span></p> +<p>he room in which Van Roon received us was roughly of the shape of an +old-fashioned key-hole; one end if it occupied the base of the tower, +upon which the remainder had evidently been built. In many respects it +was a singular room, but the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span> feature which caused me the greatest +amazement was this—it had no windows!</p> + +<p>In the deep alcove formed by the tower sat Van Roon at a littered +table, upon which stood an oil reading-lamp, green-shaded, of the +"Victoria" pattern, to furnish the entire illumination of the +apartment. That book-shelves lined the rectangular portion of this +strange study I divined, although that end of the place was dark as a +catacomb. The walls were wood-panelled, and the ceiling was +oaken-beamed. A small book shelf and tumble-down cabinet stood upon +either side of the table, and the celebrated American author and +traveller lay propped up in a long split-cane chair. He wore smoke +glasses, and had a clean-shaven, olive face, with a profusion of +jet-black hair. He was garbed in a dirty red dressing-gown, and a +perfect fog of cigar smoke hung in the room. He did not rise to greet +us, but merely extended his right hand, between two fingers whereof he +held Smith's card.</p> + +<p>"You will excuse the seeming discourtesy of an invalid, gentlemen?" he +said; "but I am suffering from undue temerity in the interior of +China!"</p> + +<p>He waved his hand vaguely, and I saw that two rough deal chairs stood +near the table. Smith and I seated ourselves, and my friend, leaning +his elbow upon the table, looked fixedly at the face of the man whom +we were come from London to visit. Although comparatively unfamiliar +to the British public, the name of Van Roon was well known in American +literary circles; for he enjoyed in the United States a reputation +somewhat similar to that which had rendered the name of our mutual +friend, Sir Lionel Barton, a household word in England. It was Van +Roon who, following in the footsteps of Madame Blavatsky, had sought +out the haunts of the fabled mahatmas in the Himalayas, and Van Roon +who had essayed to explore the fever swamps of Yucatan in quest of the +secret of lost Atlantis; lastly, it was<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span> Van Roon, who, with an +overland car specially built for him by a celebrated American firm, +had undertaken the journey across China.</p> + +<p>I studied the olive face with curiosity. Its natural impassivity was +so greatly increased by the presence of the coloured spectacles that +my study was as profitless as if I had scrutinized the face of a +carven Buddha. The mulatto had withdrawn, and in an atmosphere of +gloom and tobacco smoke Smith and I sat staring, perhaps rather +rudely, at the object of our visit to the West Country.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Van Roon," began my friend abruptly, "you will no doubt have seen +this paragraph. It appeared in this morning's <i>Daily Telegraph</i>."</p> + +<p>He stood up, and taking out the cutting from his notebook, placed it +on the table.</p> + +<p>"I have seen this—yes," said Van Roon, revealing a row of even white +teeth in a rapid smile. "Is it to this paragraph that I owe the +pleasure of seeing you here?"</p> + +<p>"The paragraph appeared in this morning's issue," replied Smith. "An +hour from the time of seeing it, my friend, Dr. Petrie, and I were +entrained for Bridgwater."</p> + +<p>"Your visit delights me, gentlemen, and I should be ungrateful to +question its cause; but frankly I am at a loss to understand why you +should have honoured me thus. I am a poor host, God knows; for what +with my tortured limb, a legacy from the Chinese devils whose secrets +I surprised, and my semi-blindness, due to the same cause, I am but +sorry company."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith held up his right hand deprecatingly. Van Roon tendered +a box of cigars and clapped his hands, whereupon the mulatto entered.</p> + +<p>"I see that you have a story to tell me, Mr. Smith," he said; +"therefore I suggest whisky-and-soda—or you might prefer tea, as it +is nearly tea-time?"</p> + +<p>Smith and I chose the former refreshment, and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span> the soft-footed +half-breed having departed upon his errand, my companion, leaning +forward earnestly across the littered table, outlined for Van Roon the +story of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the great and malign being whose mission in +England at that moment was none other than the stoppage of just such +information as our host was preparing to give to the world.</p> + +<p>"There is a giant conspiracy, Mr. Van Roon," he said, "which had its +birth in this very province of Ho-Nan, from which you were so +fortunate to escape alive; whatever its scope or limitations, a great +secret society is established among the yellow races. It means that +China, which has slumbered for so many generations, now stirs in that +age-long sleep. I need not tell <i>you</i> how much more it means, this +seething in the pot...."</p> + +<p>"In a word," interrupted Van Roon, pushing Smith's glass across the +table, "you would say—"</p> + +<p>"That your life is not worth that!" replied Smith, snapping his +fingers before the other's face.</p> + +<p>A very impressive silence fell. I watched Van Roon curiously as he sat +propped up among his cushions, his smooth face ghastly in the green +light from the lamp-shade. He held the stump of a cigar between his +teeth, but, apparently unnoticed by him, it had long since gone out. +Smith, out of the shadows, was watching him, too. Then—</p> + +<p>"Your information is very disturbing," said the American. "I am the +more disposed to credit your statement because I am all too painfully +aware of the existence of such a group as you mention, in China, but +that they had an agent here in England is something I had never +conjectured. In seeking out this solitary residence I have unwittingly +done much to assist their designs.... But—my dear Mr. Smith, I am +very remiss! Of course you will remain to-night, and I trust for some +days to come?"</p> + +<p>Smith glanced rapidly across at me, then turned again to our host.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It seems like forcing our company upon you," he said, "but in your +own interests I think it will be best to do as you are good enough to +suggest. I hope and believe that our arrival here has not been noticed +by the enemy; therefore it will be well if we remain concealed as much +as possible for the present, until we have settled upon some plan."</p> + +<p>"Hagar shall go to the station for your baggage," said the American +rapidly, and clapped his hands, his usual signal to the mulatto.</p> + +<p>Whilst the latter was receiving his orders I noticed Nayland Smith +watching him closely; and when he had departed:</p> + +<p>"How long has that man been in your service?" snapped my friend.</p> + +<p>Van Roon peered blindly through his smoked glasses.</p> + +<p>"For some years," he replied; "he was with me in India—and in China."</p> + +<p>"Where did you engage him?"</p> + +<p>"Actually, in St. Kitts."</p> + +<p>"H'm," muttered Smith, and automatically he took out and began to fill +his pipe.</p> + +<p>"I can offer you no company but my own, gentlemen," continued Van +Roon, "but unless it interfere, with your plans, you may find the +surrounding district of interest and worthy of inspection, between now +and dinner-time. By the way, I think I can promise you quite a +satisfactory meal, for Hagar is a model chef."</p> + +<p>"A walk would be enjoyable," said Smith, "but dangerous."</p> + +<p>"Ah! perhaps you are right. Evidently you apprehend some attempt upon +me?"</p> + +<p>"At any moment!"</p> + +<p>"To one in my crippled condition, an alarming outlook! However, I +place myself unreservedly in your hands. But really, you must not +leave this interesting district before you have made the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span> acquaintance +of some of its historical spots. To me, steeped as I am in what I may +term the lore of the odd, it is a veritable wonderland, almost as +interesting, in its way, as the caves and jungles of Hindustan +depicted by Madame Blavatsky."</p> + +<p>His high-pitched voice, with a certain laboured intonation, not quite +so characteristically American as was his accent, rose even higher; he +spoke with the fire of the enthusiast.</p> + +<p>"When I learnt that Cragmire Tower was vacant," he continued, "I leapt +at the chance (excuse the metaphor, from a lame man!). This is a +ghost-hunter's paradise. The tower itself is of unknown origin, though +probably Phœnician, and the house traditionally sheltered Dr. +Macleod, the necromancer, after his flight from the persecution of +James of Scotland. Then, to add to its interest, it borders on +Sedgemoor, the scene of the bloody battle during the Monmouth rising, +whereat a thousand were slain on the field. It is a local legend that +the unhappy Duke and his staff may be seen, on stormy nights, crossing +the path which skirts the mire, after which this building is named, +with flaming torches held aloft."</p> + +<p>"Merely marsh-lights, I take it?" interjected Smith, gripping his pipe +hard between his teeth.</p> + +<p>"Your practical mind naturally seeks a practical explanation," smiled +Van Roon, "but I myself have other theories. Then in addition to the +charms of Sedgemoor—haunted Sedgemoor—on a fine day it is quite +possible to see the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey from here; and +Glastonbury Abbey, as you may know, is closely bound up with the +history of Alchemy. It was in the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey that the +adept Kelly, companion of Dr. Dee, discovered, in the reign of +Elizabeth, the famous caskets of St. Dunstan, containing the two +tinctures...."</p> + +<p>So he ran on, enumerating the odd charms of his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span> residence, charms +which for my part I did not find appealing. Finally—</p> + +<p>"We cannot presume further upon your kindness," said Nayland Smith, +standing up. "No doubt we can amuse ourselves in the neighbourhood of +the house until the return of your servant."</p> + +<p>"Look upon Cragmire Tower as your own, gentlemen!" cried Van Roon. +"Most of the rooms are unfurnished, and the garden is a wilderness, +but the structure of the brickwork in the tower may interest you +archæologically, and the view across the moor is at least as fine as +any in the neighbourhood."</p> + +<p>So, with his brilliant smile and a gesture of one thin yellow hand, +the crippled traveller made us free of his odd dwelling. As I passed +out from the room close at Smith's heels, I glanced back, I cannot say +why. Van Roon already was bending over his papers, in his +green-shadowed sanctuary, and the light shining down upon his smoked +glasses created the odd illusion that he was looking over the tops of +the lenses and not down at the table as his attitude suggested. +However, it was probably ascribable to the weird chiaroscuro of the +scene, although it gave the seated figure an oddly malignant +appearance, and I passed through the utter darkness of the outer room +to the front door. Smith opening it, I was conscious of surprise to +find dusk come—to meet darkness where I had looked for sunlight.</p> + +<p>The silver wisps which had raced along the horizon, as we came to +Cragmire Tower, had been harbingers of other and heavier banks. A +stormy sunset smeared crimson streaks across the skyline, where a +great range of clouds, like the oily smoke of a city burning, was +banked, mountain topping mountain, and lighted from below by this +angry red. As we came down the steps and out by the gate, I turned and +looked across the moor behind us. A sort of reflection from this +distant blaze encrimsoned the whole landscape. The inland bay glowed +sullenly,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span> as if internal fires and not reflected light were at work; +a scene both wild and majestic.</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith was staring up at the cone-like top of the ancient tower +in a curious, speculative fashion. Under the influence of our host's +conversation I had forgotten the reasonless dread which had touched me +at the moment of our arrival, but now, with the red light blazing over +Sedgemoor, as if in memory of the blood which had been shed there, and +with the tower of unknown origin looming above me, I became very +uncomfortable again, nor did I envy Van Roon his eerie residence. The +proximity of a tower of any kind, at night, makes in some inexplicable +way for awe, and to-night there were other agents, too.</p> + +<p>"What's that?" snapped Smith suddenly, grasping my arm.</p> + +<p>He was peering southward, toward the distant hamlet, and, starting +violently at his words and the sudden grasp of his hand, I, too, +stared in that direction.</p> + +<p>"We were followed, Petrie," he almost whispered. "I never got a sight +of our follower, but I'll swear we were followed. Look! there's +something moving over yonder!"</p> + +<p>Together we stood staring into the dusk; then Smith burst abruptly +into one of his rare laughs, and clapped me upon the shoulder.</p> + +<p>"It's Hagar, the mulatto!" he cried, "and our grips. That +extraordinary American with his tales of witch-lights and haunted +abbeys has been playing the devil with our nerves." He glanced up at +the tower. "What a place to live in! Frankly, I don't think I could +stand it."</p> + +<p>Together we waited by the gate until the half-caste appeared on the +bend of the path with a grip in either hand. He was a great, muscular +fellow with a stoic face, and, for the purpose of visiting Saul, +presumably, he had doffed his white raiment<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span> and now wore a sort of +livery, with a peaked cap.</p> + +<p>Smith watched him enter the house. Then—</p> + +<p>"I wonder where Van Roon obtains his provisions and so forth," he +muttered. "It's odd they knew nothing about the new tenant of Cragmire +Tower at 'The Wagoners.'"</p> + +<p>There came a sort of sudden expectancy into his manner for which I +found myself at a loss to account. He turned his gaze inland and stood +there tugging at his left ear and clicking his teeth together. He +stared at me, and his eyes looked very bright in the dusk, for a sort +of red glow from the sunset touched them; but he spoke no word, merely +taking my arm and leading me off on a rambling walk around and about +the house. Neither of us spoke a word until we stood at the gate of +Cragmire Tower again; then—</p> + +<p>"I'll swear, now, that we were followed here to-day!" muttered Smith.</p> + +<p>The lofty place immediately within the doorway proved, in the light of +a lamp now fixed in an iron bracket, to be a square entrance hall +meagrely furnished. The closed study door faced the entrance, and on +the left of it ascended an open staircase up which the mulatto led the +way. We found ourselves on the floor above, in a corridor traversing +the house from back to front. An apartment on the immediate left was +indicated by the mulatto as that allotted to Smith. It was a room of +fair size, furnished quite simply but boasting a wardrobe cupboard, +and Smith's grip stood beside the white-enamelled bed. I glanced +around, and then prepared to follow the man, who had awaited me in the +doorway.</p> + +<p>He still wore his dark livery, and as I followed the lithe yet brawny +figure along the corridor, I found myself considering critically his +breadth of shoulder and the extraordinary thickness of his neck.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span></p> + +<p>I have repeatedly spoken of a sort of foreboding, an elusive stirring +in the depths of my being, of which I became conscious at certain +times in my dealings with Dr. Fu-Manchu and his murderous servants. +This sensation, or something akin to it, claimed me now, +unaccountably, as I stood looking into the neat bedroom, on the same +side of the corridor but at the extreme end, wherein I was to sleep. A +voiceless warning urged me to return; a kind of childish panic came +fluttering about my heart, a dread of entering the room, of allowing +the mulatto to come <i>behind me</i>.</p> + +<p>Doubtless this was no more than a subconscious product of my +observations respecting his abnormal breadth of shoulder. But whatever +the origin of the impulse, I found myself unable to disobey it. +Therefore, I merely nodded, turned on my heel and went back to Smith's +room.</p> + +<p>I closed the door, then turned to face Smith, who stood regarding me.</p> + +<p>"Smith," I said, "that man sends cold water trickling down my spine!"</p> + +<p>Still regarding me fixedly, my friend nodded his head.</p> + +<p>"You are curiously sensitive to this sort of thing," he replied +slowly; "I have noticed it before as a useful capacity. I don't like +the look of the man myself. The fact that he has been in Van Roon's +employ for some years goes for nothing. We are neither of us likely to +forget Kwee, the Chinese servant of Sir Lionel Barton, and it is quite +possible that Fu-Manchu has corrupted this man as he corrupted the +other. It is quite possible...."</p> + +<p>His voice trailed off into silence, and he stood looking across the +room with unseeing eyes, meditating deeply. It was quite dark, now, +outside, as I could see through the uncurtained window, which opened +upon the dreary expanse stretching out to haunted Sedgemoor. Two +candles were burning upon the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span> dressing-table; they were but recently +lighted, and so intense was the stillness that I could distinctly hear +the spluttering of one of the wicks, which was damp. Without giving +the slightest warning of his intention, Smith suddenly made two +strides forward, stretched out his long arms, and snuffed the pair of +candles in a twinkling!</p> + +<p>The room became plunged in impenetrable darkness.</p> + +<p>"Not a word, Petrie!" whispered my companion.</p> + +<p>I moved cautiously to join him, but as I did so, perceived that he was +moving, too. Vaguely, against the window I perceived him silhouetted. +He was looking out across the moor, and—</p> + +<p>"See! see!" he hissed.</p> + +<p>My heart thumping furiously in my breast, I bent over him; and for the +second time since our coming to Cragmire Tower, my thoughts flew to +"The Fenman."</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">There are shades in the fen; ghosts of women and men<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who have sinned and have died, but are living again.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O'er the waters they tread, with their lanterns of dread,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And they peer in the pools—in the pools of the dead....<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>A light was dancing out upon the moor, a witch-light that came and +went unaccountably, up and down, in and out, now clearly visible, now +masked in the darkness!</p> + +<p>"Lock the door!" snapped my companion—"if there's a key."</p> + +<p>I crept across the room and fumbled for a moment; then—</p> + +<p>"There is no key," I reported.</p> + +<p>"Then wedge the chair under the knob and let no one enter until I +return!" he said amazingly.</p> + +<p>With that he opened the window to its fullest extent, threw his leg +over the sill, and went creeping along a wide concrete ledge, in which +ran a leaded gutter, in the direction of the tower on the right!<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span></p> + +<p>Not pausing to follow his instructions respecting the chair, I craned +out of the window, watching his progress, and wondering with what +sudden madness he was bitten. Indeed, I could not credit my senses, +could not believe that I heard and saw aright. Yet there out in the +darkness on the moor moved the will-o'-the-wisp, and ten yards along +the gutter crept my friend, like a great gaunt cat. Unknown to me he +must have prospected the route by daylight, for now I saw his design. +The ledge terminated only where it met the ancient wall of the tower, +and it was possible for an agile climber to step from it to the edge +of the unglazed window some four feet below, and to scramble from that +point to the stone fence and thence on to the path by which we had +come from Saul.</p> + +<p>This difficult operation Nayland Smith successfully performed, and, to +my unbounded amazement, went racing into the darkness toward the +dancing light, headlong, like a madman! The night swallowed him up, +and between my wonder and my fear my hands trembled so violently that +I could scarce support myself where I rested, with my full weight upon +the sill.</p> + +<p>I seemed now to be moving through the fevered phases of a nightmare. +Around and below me Cragmire Tower was profoundly silent, but a faint +odour of cookery was now perceptible. Outside, from the night, came a +faint whispering as of the distant sea, but no moon and no stars +relieved the impenetrable blackness. Only out over the moor the +mysterious light still danced and moved.</p> + +<p>One—two—three—four—five minutes passed. The light vanished and did +not appear again. Five more age-long minutes elapsed in absolute +silence, whilst I peered into the darkness of the night and listened, +muscles tensed, for the return of Nayland Smith. Yet two more minutes, +which embraced an agony of suspense, passed in the same fashion; then +a shadowy form grew, phantomesque, out of the gloom; a moment more, +and I distinctly heard the heavy breathing of a man nearly spent, and +saw my friend scrambling up toward the black embrasure in the tower. +His voice came huskily, pantingly:</p> + +<p>"Creep along and lend me a hand, Petrie! I am nearly winded."</p> + +<p>I crept through the window, steadied my quivering nerves by an effort +of the will, and reached the end of the ledge in time to take Smith's +extended hand and to draw him up beside me against the wall of the +tower. He was shaking with his exertions, and must have fallen, I +think, without my assistance. Inside the room again—</p> + +<p>"Quick! light the candles!" he breathed hoarsely. "Did any one come?"</p> + +<p>"No one—nothing."</p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span></p> +<p>Having expended several matches in vain, for my fingers twitched +nervously, I ultimately succeeded in relighting the candles.</p> + +<p>"Get along to your room!" directed Smith. "Your apprehensions are +unfounded at the moment, but you may as well leave both doors wide +open!"</p> + +<p>I looked into his face—it was very drawn and grim, and his brow was +wet with perspiration, but his eyes had the fighting glint, and I knew +that we were upon the eve of strange happenings.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXIII"></a>CHAPTER XXIII</h2> + +<h3>A CRY ON THE MOOR</h3> +<p><span class="f2">O </span></p> + +<p>f the events intervening between this moment and that when death +called to us out of the night, I have the haziest recollections. An +excellent dinner was served in the bleak and gloomy dining-room by<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span> +the mulatto, and the crippled author was carried to the head of the +table by this same herculean attendant, as lightly as though he had +had but the weight of a child.</p> + +<p>Van Roon talked continuously, revealing a deep knowledge of all sorts +of obscure matters; and in the brief intervals, Nayland Smith talked +also, with almost feverish rapidity. Plans for the future were +discussed. I can recall no one of them.</p> + +<p>I could not stifle my queer sentiments in regard to the mulatto, and +every time I found him behind my chair I was hard put to it to repress +a shudder. In this fashion the strange evening passed; and to the +accompaniment of distant, muttering thunder, we two guests retired to +our chambers in Cragmire Tower. Smith had contrived to give me my +instructions in a whisper, and five minutes after entering my own +room, I had snuffed the candles, slipped a wedge, which he had given +me, under the door, crept out through the window on to the guttered +ledge, and joined Smith in his room. He, too, had extinguished his +candles, and the place was in darkness. As I climbed in, he grasped my +wrist to silence me, and turned me forcibly toward the window again.</p> + +<p>"Listen!" he said.</p> + +<p>I turned and looked out upon a prospect which had been a fit setting +for the witch scene in <i>Macbeth</i>. Thunderclouds hung low over the +moor, but through them ran a sort of chasm, or rift, allowing a bar of +lurid light to stretch across the drear, from east to west—a sort of +lane walled by darkness. There came a remote murmuring, as of a +troubled sea—a hushed and distant chorus; and sometimes in upon it +broke the drums of heaven. In the west lightning flickered, though but +faintly, intermittently.</p> + +<p>Then came the <i>call</i>.</p> + +<p>Out of the blackness of the moor it came, wild and distant—"<i>Help! +help!</i>"</p> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span></p><p>"Smith!" I whispered—"what is it? What...."</p> + +<p>"Mr. Smith!" came the agonized cry ... "Nayland Smith, help! for God's +sake...."</p> + +<p>"Quick, Smith!" I cried, "quick, man! It's Van Roon—he's been dragged +out ... they are murdering him...."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith held me in a vice-like grip, silent, unmoved!</p> + +<p>Louder and more agonized came the cry for aid, and I felt more than +ever certain that it was poor Van Roon who uttered it.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Smith! Dr. Petrie! for God's sake come ... or ... it will be ... +too ... late...."</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I said, turning furiously upon my friend, "if you are going +to remain here whilst murder is done, <i>I</i> am not!"</p> + +<p>My blood boiled now with hot resentment. It was incredible, inhuman, +that we should remain there inert whilst a fellow-man, and our host to +boot, was being done to death out there in the darkness. I exerted all +my strength to break away; but although my efforts told upon him, as +his loud breathing revealed, Nayland Smith clung to me tenaciously. +Had my hands been free, in my fury I could have struck him; for the +pitiable cries, growing fainter now, told their own tale. Then Smith +spoke—shortly and angrily—breathing hard between the words.</p> + +<p>"Be quiet, you fool!" he snapped. "It's little less than an insult, +Petrie, to think me capable of refusing help where help is needed!"</p> + +<p>Like, a cold douche his words acted; in that instant I knew myself a +fool.</p> + +<p>"You remember the Call of Siva?" he said, thrusting me away +irritably, "—two years ago—and what it meant to those who obeyed it?"</p> + +<p>"You might have told me...."</p> + +<p>"<i>Told</i> you! You would have been through the window before I had +uttered two words!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span></p> + +<p>I realized the truth of his assertion, and the justness of his anger.</p> + +<p>"Forgive me, old man," I said, very crestfallen, "but my impulse was a +natural one, you'll admit. You must remember that I have been trained +never to refuse aid when aid is asked."</p> + +<p>"Shut up, Petrie!" he growled; "forget it."</p> + +<p>The cries had ceased, now, entirely, and a peal of thunder, louder +than any yet, echoed over distant Sedgemoor. The chasm of light +splitting the heavens closed in, leaving the night wholly black.</p> + +<p>"Don't talk!" rapped Smith; "act! You wedged your door?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Good. Get into that cupboard, have your Browning ready, and keep the +door very slightly ajar."</p> + +<p>He was in that mood of repressed fever which I knew and which always +communicated itself to me. I spoke no further word, but stepped into +the wardrobe indicated and drew the door nearly shut. The recess just +accommodated me, and through the aperture I could see the bed, +vaguely, the open window, and part of the opposite wall. I saw Smith +cross the floor, as a mighty clap of thunder boomed over the house.</p> + +<p>A gleam of lightning flickered through the gloom.</p> + +<p>I saw the bed for a moment, distinctly, and it appeared to me that +Smith lay therein, with the sheets pulled up over his head. The light +was gone and I could hear big drops of rain pattering upon the leaden +gutter below the open window.</p> + +<p>My mood was strange, detached, and characterized by vagueness. That +Van Roon lay dead upon the moor I was convinced; and—although I +recognized that it must be a sufficient one—I could not even dimly +divine the reason why we had refrained from lending him aid. To have +failed to save him, knowing his peril, would have been bad enough;<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span> to +have <i>refused</i>, I thought, was shameful. Better to have shared his +fate—yet....</p> + +<p>The downpour was increasing, and beating now a regular tattoo upon the +gutter-way. Then, splitting the oblong of greater blackness which +marked the casement, quivered dazzlingly another flash of lightning in +which I saw the bed again, with that impression of Smith curled up in +it. The blinding light died out; came the crash of thunder, harsh and +fearsome, more imminently above the tower than ever. The building +seemed to shake.</p> + +<p>Coming as they did, horror and the wrath of heaven together, suddenly, +crashingly, black and angry after the fairness of the day, these +happenings and their setting must have terrorized the stoutest heart; +but somehow I seemed detached, as I have said, and set apart from the +whirl of events; a spectator. Even when a vague yellow light crept +across the room from the direction of the door, and flickered +unsteadily on the bed, I remained unmoved to a certain degree, +although passively alive to the significance of the incident. I +realised that the ultimate issue was at hand, but either because I was +emotionally exhausted, or from some other cause, the pending climax +failed to disturb me.</p> + +<p>Going on tiptoe, in stockinged feet, across my field of vision, passed +Kegan Van Roon! He was in his shirt-sleeves and held a lighted candle +in one hand whilst with the other he shaded it against the draught +from the window. He was a cripple no longer, and the smoked glasses +were discarded; most of the light, at the moment when first I saw him, +shone upon his thin, olive face, and at sight of his eyes much of the +mystery of Cragmire Tower was resolved. For they were oblique, very +slightly, but nevertheless unmistakably oblique. Though highly +educated, and possibly an American citizen, <i>Van Roon was a Chinaman!</i></p> + +<p>Upon the picture of his face as I saw it then, I do<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span> not care to +dwell. It lacked the unique horror of Dr. Fu-Manchu's unforgettable +countenance, but possessed a sort of animal malignancy which the +latter lacked.... He approached within three or four feet of the bed, +peering—peering. Then, with a timidity which spoke well for Nayland +Smith's reputation, he paused and beckoned to some one who evidently +stood in the doorway behind him. As he did so I saw that the legs of +his trousers were caked with greenish-brown mud nearly up to the +knees.</p> + +<p>The huge mulatto, silent-footed, crossed to the bed in three strides. +He was stripped to the waist, and excepting some few professional +athletes, I had never seen a torso to compare with that which, brown +and glistening, now bent over Nayland Smith. The muscular development +was simply enormous; the man had a neck like a column, and the thews +around his back and shoulders were like ivy tentacles wreathing some +gnarled oak.</p> + +<p>Whilst Van Roon, his evil gaze upon the bed, held the candle aloft, +the mulatto, with a curious preparatory writhing movement of the +mighty shoulders, lowered his outstretched fingers to the disordered +bed linen....</p> + +<p>I pushed open the cupboard door and thrust out the Browning. As I did +so a dramatic thing happened. A tall, gaunt figure shot suddenly +upright from <i>beyond</i> the bed. It was Nayland Smith!</p> + +<p>Upraised in his hand he held a heavy walking cane. I knew the handle +to be leaded, and I could judge of the force with which he wielded it +by the fact that it cut the air with a keen <i>swishing</i> sound. It +descended upon the back of the mulatto's skull with a sickening thud, +and the great brown body dropped inert upon the padded bed—in which +not Smith, but his grip, reposed. There was no word, no cry. Then—</p> + +<p>"Shoot, Petrie! Shoot the fiend! <i>Shoot</i>!..."</p> + +<p>Van Roon, dropping the candle, in the falling<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span> gleam of which I saw +the whites of the oblique eyes, turned and leapt from the room with +the agility of a wild cat. The ensuing darkness was split by a streak +of lightning ... and there was Nayland Smith scrambling around the +foot of the bed and making for the door in hot pursuit.</p> + +<p>We gained it almost together. Smith had dropped the cane, and now held +his pistol in his hand. Together we fired into the chasm of the +corridor, and in the flash, saw Van Roon hurling himself down the +stairs. He went silently in his stockinged feet, and our own clatter +was drowned by the awful booming of the thunder which now burst over +us again.</p> + +<p>Crack!—crack!—crack! Three times our pistols spat venomously after +the flying figure ... then we had crossed the hall below and were in +the wilderness of the night with the rain descending upon us in +sheets. Vaguely I saw the white shirt-sleeves of the fugitive near the +corner of the stone fence. A moment he hesitated, then darted away +inland, not toward Saul, but toward the moor and the cup of the inland +bay.</p> + +<p>"Steady, Petrie! steady!" cried Nayland Smith. He ran, panting, beside +me. "It is the path to the mire." He breathed sibilantly between every +few words. "It was out there ... that he hoped to lure us ... with the +cry for help."</p> + +<p>A great blaze of lightning illuminated the landscape as far as the eye +could see. Ahead of us a flying shape, hair lank and glistening in the +downpour, followed a faint path skirting that green tongue of morass +which we had noted from the upland.</p> + +<p>It was Kegan Van Roon. He glanced over his shoulder, showing a yellow, +terror-stricken face. We were gaining upon him. Darkness fell, and the +thunder cracked and boomed as though the very moor were splitting +about us.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Another fifty yards, Petrie," breathed Nayland Smith, "and after that +it's uncharted ground."</p> + +<p>On we went through the rain and the darkness; then—</p> + +<p>"Slow up! slow up!" cried Smith. "It feels soft!"</p> + +<p>Indeed, already I had made one false step—and the hungry mire had +fastened upon my foot, almost tripping me.</p> + +<p>"Lost the path!"</p> + +<p>We stopped dead. The falling rain walled us in. I dared not move, for +I knew that the mire, the devouring mire, stretched, eager, close +about my feet. We were both waiting for the next flash of lightning, I +think, but, before it came, out of the darkness ahead of us rose a cry +that sometimes rings in my ears to this hour. Yet it was no more than +a repetition of that which had called to us, deathfully, awhile +before.</p> + +<p>"Help! help! for God's sake help! Quick! I am sinking...."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith grasped my arm furiously.</p> + +<p>"We dare not move, Petrie—we dare not move!" he breathed. "It's God's +justice—visible for once."</p> + +<p>Then came the lightning; and—ignoring a splitting crash behind us—we +both looked ahead, over the mire.</p> + +<p>Just on the edge of the venomous green patch, not thirty yards away, I +saw the head and shoulders and upstretched, appealing arms of Van +Roon. Even as the lightning flickered and we saw him, he was gone; +with one last, long, drawn-out cry, horribly like the mournful wail of +a sea-gull, he was gone!</p> + +<p>The eerie light died, and in the instant before the sound of the +thunder came shatteringly, we turned about ... in time to see Cragmire +Tower, a blacker silhouette against the night, topple and fall! A red +glow began to be perceptible above the building.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span> The thunder came +booming through the caverns of space. Nayland Smith lowered his wet +face close to mine and shouted in my ear:</p> + +<p>"Kegan Van Roon never returned from China. It was a trap. Those were +two creatures of Dr. Fu-Manchu...."</p> + +<p>The thunder died away, hollowly, echoing over the distant sea....</p> + +<p>"That light on the moor to-night?"</p> + +<p>"You have not learnt the Morse Code, Petrie. It was a signal, and it +read: S M I T H ... S O S."</p> + +<p>"Well?"</p> + +<p>"I took the chance, as you know. And it was Kâramanèh! She knew of the +plot to bury us in the mire. She had followed from London, but could +do nothing until dusk. God forgive me if I've mis-judged her—for we +owe her our lives to-night."</p> + +<p>Flames were bursting up from the building beside the ruin of the +ancient tower which had faced the storms of countless ages only to +succumb at last. The lightning literally had cloven it in twain.</p> + +<p>"The mulatto?..."</p> + +<p>Again the lightning flashed, and we saw the path and began to retrace +our steps. Nayland Smith turned to me; his face was very grim in that +unearthly light, and his eyes shone like steel.</p> + +<p>"I killed him, Petrie ... as I meant to do."</p> + +<p>From out over Sedgemoor it came, cracking and rolling and booming +towards us, swelling in volume to a stupendous climax, that awful +laughter of Jove the destroyer of Cragmire Tower.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIV" id="CHAPTER_XXIV"></a>CHAPTER XXIV</h2> + +<h3>STORY OF THE GABLES</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> +<p>n looking over my notes dealing with the second phase of Dr. +Fu-Manchu's activities in England, I find that one of the worst hours +of my life was associated with the singular and seemingly inconsequent +adventure of the fiery hand. I shall deal with it in this place, +begging you to bear with me if I seem to digress.</p> + +<p>Inspector Weymouth called one morning, shortly after the Van Roon +episode, and entered upon a surprising account of a visit to a house +at Hampstead which enjoyed the sinister reputation of being +uninhabitable.</p> + +<p>"But in what way does the case enter into your province?" inquired +Nayland Smith, idly tapping out his pipe on a bar of the grate.</p> + +<p>We had not long finished breakfast, but from an early hour Smith had +been at his eternal smoking, which only the advent of the meal had +interrupted.</p> + +<p>"Well," replied the Inspector, who occupied a big armchair near the +window, "I was sent to look into it, I suppose, because I had nothing +better to do at the moment."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" jerked Smith, glancing over his shoulder.</p> + +<p>The ejaculation had a veiled significance; for our quest of Dr. +Fu-Manchu had come to an abrupt termination by reason of the fact that +all trace of that malignant genius, and of the group surrounding him, +had vanished with the destruction of Cragmire Tower.</p> + +<p>"The house is called The Gables," continued the Scotland Yard man, +"and I knew I was on a wild-goose chase from the first—"</p> + +<p>"Why?" snapped Smith.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Because I was there before, six months ago or so—just before your +present return to England—and I knew what to expect."</p> + +<p>Smith looked up with some faint dawning of interest perceptible in his +manner.</p> + +<p>"I was unaware," he said with a slight smile, "that the cleaning-up of +haunted houses came within the province of New Scotland Yard. I am +learning something."</p> + +<p>"In the ordinary way," replied the big man good-humouredly, "it +doesn't. But a sudden death always excites suspicion, and—"</p> + +<p>"A sudden death?" I said, glancing up; "you didn't explain that the +ghost had killed any one!"</p> + +<p>"I'm afraid I'm a poor hand at yarn-spinning, doctor," said Weymouth, +turning his blue, twinkling eyes in my direction. "Two people have +died at The Gables within the last six months."</p> + +<p>"You begin to interest me," declared Smith, and there came something +of the old, eager look into his gaunt face, as, having lighted his +pipe, he tossed the match-end into the hearth.</p> + +<p>"I had hoped for some little excitement, myself," confessed the +Inspector. "This dead-end, with not a shadow of a clue to the +whereabouts of the Yellow fiend, has been getting on my nerves—"</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith grunted sympathetically.</p> + +<p>"Although Dr. Fu-Manchu had been in England for some months, now," +continued Weymouth, "I have never set eyes upon him; the house we +raided in Museum Street proved to be empty; in a word, I am wasting my +time. So that I volunteered to run up to Hampstead and look into the +matter of The Gables, principally as a distraction. It's a queer +business, but more in the Psychical Research Society's line than mine, +I'm afraid. Still, if there were no Dr. Fu-Manchu it might be of +interest to you—and to you, Dr. Petrie—because it illustrates the +fact that, given the right sort of subject, death<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span> can be brought +about without any elaborate mechanism—such as our Chinese friends +employ."</p> + +<p>"You interest me more and more," declared Smith, stretching himself in +the long, white cane rest-chair.</p> + +<p>"Two men, both fairly sound, except that the first one had an +asthmatic heart, have died at The Gables without any one laying a +little finger upon them. Oh! there was no jugglery! They weren't +poisoned, or bitten by venomous insects, or suffocated, or anything +like that. They just died of fear—stark fear."</p> + +<p>With my elbows resting upon the table cover, and my chin in my hands, +I was listening attentively, now, and Nayland Smith, a big cushion +behind his head, was watching the speaker with a keen and speculative +look in those steely eyes of his.</p> + +<p>"You imply that Dr. Fu-Manchu has something to learn from The Gables?" +he jerked.</p> + +<p>Weymouth nodded stolidly.</p> + +<p>"I can't work up anything like amazement in these days," continued the +latter; "every other case seems stale and hackneyed alongside <i>the</i> +case. But I must confess that when The Gables came on the books of the +Yard the second time, I began to wonder. I thought there might be some +tangible clue, some link connecting the two victims; perhaps some +evidence of robbery or of revenge—of some sort of motive. In short, I +hoped to find evidence of human agency at work, but, as before, I was +disappointed."</p> + +<p>"It's a legitimate case of a haunted house, then?" said Smith.</p> + +<p>"Yes; we find them occasionally, these uninhabitable places, where +there is <i>something</i>, something malignant and harmful to human life, +but something that you cannot arrest, that you cannot hope to bring +into court."</p> + +<p>"Ah," replied Smith slowly; "I suppose you are right. There are +historic instances, of course:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span> Glamys Castle and Spedlins Tower in +Scotland, Peel Castle, Isle of Man, with its <i>Maudhe Dhug</i>, the grey +lady of Rainham Hall, the headless horses of Caistor, the Wesley ghost +of Epworth Rectory and others. But I have never come in personal +contact with such a case, and if I did I should feel very humiliated +to have to confess that there was <i>any</i> agency which could produce a +<i>physical</i> result—death,—but which was immune from physical +retaliation."</p> + +<p>Weymouth nodded his head again.</p> + +<p>"<i>I</i> might feel a bit sour about it, too," he replied, "if it were not +that I haven't much pride left in these days, considering the show of +physical retaliation I have made against Dr. Fu-Manchu."</p> + +<p>"A home-thrust, Weymouth!" snapped Nayland Smith, with one of those +rare boyish laughs of his. "We're children to that Chinese doctor, +Inspector, to that weird product of a weird people who are as old in +evil as the Pyramids are old in mystery. But about The Gables?"</p> + +<p>"Well, it's an uncanny place. You mentioned Glamys Castle a moment +ago, and it's possible to understand an old stronghold like that being +haunted, but The Gables was only built about 1870; it's quite a modern +house. It was built for a wealthy Quaker family, and they occupied it, +uninterruptedly and apparently without anything unusual occurring for +over forty years. Then it was sold to a Mr. Maddison—and Mr. Maddison +died there six months ago."</p> + +<p>"Maddison?" said Smith sharply, staring across at Weymouth. "What was +he? Where did he come from?"</p> + +<p>"He was a retired tea-planter from Colombo," replied the Inspector.</p> + +<p>"Colombo?"</p> + +<p>"There was a link with the East, certainly, if that's what you are +thinking; and it was this fact which interested me at the time, and +which led me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span> to waste precious days and nights on the case. But there +was no mortal connection between this liverish individual and the +schemes of Dr. Fu-Manchu. I'm certain of that."</p> + +<p>"And how did he die?" I asked interestedly.</p> + +<p>"He just died in his chair one evening, in the room which he used as a +library. It was his custom to sit there every night, when there were +no visitors, reading, until twelve o'clock or later. He was a +bachelor, and his household consisted of a cook, a housemaid, and a +man who had been with him for thirty years, I believe. At the time of +Mr. Maddison's death, his household had recently been deprived of two +of its members. The cook and housemaid both resigned one morning, +giving as their reason the fact that the place was haunted."</p> + +<p>"In what way?"</p> + +<p>"I interviewed the precious pair at the time, and they told me absurd +and various tales about dark figures wandering along the corridors and +bending over them in bed at night, whispering; but their chief trouble +was a continuous ringing of bells about the house."</p> + +<p>"Bells?"</p> + +<p>"They said that it became unbearable. Night and day there were bells +ringing all over the house. At any rate, they went, and for three or +four days The Gables was occupied only by Mr. Maddison and his man, +whose name was Stevens. I interviewed the latter also, and he was an +altogether more reliable witness; a decent, steady sort of man whose +story impressed me very much at the time."</p> + +<p>"Did he confirm the ringing?"</p> + +<p>"He swore to it—a sort of jangle, sometimes up in the air, near the +ceilings, and sometimes under the floor, like the shaking of silver +bells."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stood up abruptly and began to pace the room, leaving +great trails of blue-grey smoke behind him.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Your story is sufficiently interesting, Inspector," he declared, +"even to divert my mind from the eternal contemplation of the +Fu-Manchu problem. This would appear to be distinctly a case of an +'astral bell' such as we sometimes hear of in India."</p> + +<p>"It was Stevens," continued Weymouth, "who found Mr. Maddison. He +(Stevens) had been out on business connected with the household +arrangements, and at about eleven o'clock he returned, letting himself +in with a key. There was a light in the library, and getting no +response to his knocking, Stevens entered. He found his master sitting +bolt upright in a chair, clutching the arms with rigid fingers and +staring straight before him with a look of such frightful horror on +his face, that Stevens positively ran from the room and out of the +house. Mr. Maddison was stone dead. When a doctor, who lives at no +great distance away, came and examined him, he could find no trace of +violence whatever; he had apparently died of fright, to judge from the +expression on his face."</p> + +<p>"Anything else?"</p> + +<p>"Only this: I learnt, indirectly, that the last member of the Quaker +family to occupy the house had apparently witnessed the apparition, +which had led to his vacating the place. I got the story from the wife +of a man who had been employed as gardener there at that time. The +apparition—which he witnessed in the hall-way, if I remember +rightly—took the form of a sort of luminous hand clutching a long, +curved knife."</p> + +<p>"Oh, heavens!" cried Smith, and laughed shortly; "that's quite in +order!"</p> + +<p>"This gentleman told no one of the occurrence until after he had left +the house, no doubt in order that the place should not acquire an evil +reputation. Most of the original furniture remained, and Mr. Maddison +took the house furnished. I don't think<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span> there can be any doubt that +what killed him was fear at seeing a repetition—"</p> + +<p>"Of the fiery hand?" concluded Smith.</p> + +<p>"Quite so. Well, I examined The Gables pretty closely, and, with +another Scotland Yard man, spent a night in the empty house. We saw +nothing; but once, very faintly, we heard the ringing of bells."</p> + +<p>Smith spun around upon him rapidly.</p> + +<p>"You can swear to that?" he snapped.</p> + +<p>"I can swear to it," declared Weymouth stolidly. "It seemed to be over +our heads. We were sitting in the dining-room. Then it was gone, and +we heard nothing more whatever of an unusual nature. Following the +death of Mr. Maddison, The Gables remained empty until a while ago, +when a French gentleman, named Lejay, leased it—"</p> + +<p>"Furnished?"</p> + +<p>"Yes; nothing was removed—"</p> + +<p>"Who kept the place in order?"</p> + +<p>"A married couple living in the neighbourhood undertook to do so. The +man attended to the lawn and so forth, and the woman came once a week, +I believe, to clean up the house."</p> + +<p>"And Lejay?"</p> + +<p>"He came in only last week, having leased the house for six months. +His family were to have joined him in a day or two, and he, with the +aid of the pair I have just mentioned, and assisted by a French +servant he brought over with him, was putting the place in order. At +about twelve o'clock on the Friday night this servant ran into a +neighbouring house screaming 'the fiery hand!' and when at last a +constable arrived and a frightened group went up the avenue of The +Gables, they found M. Lejay, dead in the avenue, near the steps just +outside the hall door! He had the same face of horror...."</p> + +<p>"What a tale for the Press!" snapped Smith.</p> + +<p>"The owner has managed to keep it quiet so far,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span> but this time I think +it will leak into the Press—yes."</p> + +<p>There was a short silence; then—</p> + +<p>"And you have been down to The Gables again?"</p> + +<p>"I was there on Saturday, but there's not a scrap of evidence. The man +undoubtedly died of fright in the same way as Maddison. The place +ought to be pulled down; it's unholy."</p> + +<p>"Unholy is the word," I said. "I never heard anything like it. This M. +Lejay had no enemies?—there could be no possible motive?"</p> + +<p>"None whatever. He was a business man from Marseilles, and his affairs +necessitated his remaining in or near to London for some considerable +time; therefore, he decided to make his headquarters here, +temporarily, and leased The Gables with that intention."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith was pacing the floor with increasing rapidity; he was +tugging at the lobe of his left ear and his pipe had long since gone +out.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXV" id="CHAPTER_XXV"></a>CHAPTER XXV</h2> + +<h3>THE BELLS</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> +<p> started to my feet as a tall, bearded man swung open the door and +hurled himself impetuously into the room. He wore a silk hat, which +fitted him very ill, and a black frock-coat which did not fit him at +all.</p> + +<p>"It's all right, Petrie!" cried the apparition; "I've leased The +Gables!"</p> + +<p>It was Nayland Smith! I stared at him in amazement.</p> + +<p>"The first time I have employed a disguise," continued my friend +rapidly, "since the memorable<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span> episode of the false pigtail." He threw +a small brown leather grip upon the floor. "In case you should care to +visit the house, Petrie, I have brought these things. My tenancy +commences to-night!"</p> + +<p>Two days had elapsed, and I had entirely forgotten the strange story +of The Gables which Inspector Weymouth had related to us; evidently it +was otherwise with my friend, and utterly at a loss for an explanation +of his singular behaviour, I stooped mechanically and opened the grip. +It contained an odd assortment of garments, and amongst other things +several grey wigs and a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles.</p> + +<p>Kneeling there with this strange litter about me, I looked up +amazedly. Nayland Smith, the unsuitable silk hat set right upon the +back of his head, was pacing the room excitedly, his fuming pipe +protruding from the tangle of factitious beard.</p> + +<p>"You see, Petrie," he began again, rapidly, "I did not entirely trust +the agent. I've leased the house in the name of Professor Maxton...."</p> + +<p>"But, Smith," I cried, "what possible reason can there be for +disguise?"</p> + +<p>"There's every reason," he snapped.</p> + +<p>"Why should you interest yourself in The Gables?"</p> + +<p>"Does no explanation occur to you?"</p> + +<p>"None whatever; to me the whole thing smacks of stark lunacy."</p> + +<p>"Then you won't come?"</p> + +<p>"I've never stuck at anything, Smith," I replied, "however +undignified, when it has seemed that my presence could be of the +slightest use."</p> + +<p>As I rose to my feet, Smith stepped in front of me, and the steely +grey eyes shone out strangely from the altered face. He clapped his +hands upon my shoulders.</p> + +<p>"If I assure you that your presence is necessary to my safety," he +said, "that if you fail me I must seek another companion—will you +come?"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span></p> + +<p>Intuitively, I knew that he was keeping something back, and I was +conscious of some resentment, but, nevertheless, my reply was a +foregone conclusion, and—with the borrowed appearance of an extremely +untidy old man—I crept guiltily out of my house that evening and into +the cab which Smith had waiting.</p> + +<p>The Gables was a roomy and rambling place lying back a considerable +distance from the road. A semi-circular drive gave access to the door, +and so densely wooded was the ground, that for the most part the drive +was practically a tunnel—a verdant tunnel. A high brick wall +concealed the building from the point of view of any one on the +roadway, but either horn of the crescent drive terminated at a heavy, +wrought-iron gateway.</p> + +<p>Smith discharged the cab at the corner of the narrow and winding road +upon which The Gables fronted. It was walled in on both sides; on the +left the wall being broken by tradesmen's entrances to the houses +fronting upon another street, and on the right following, +uninterruptedly, the grounds of The Gables. As we came to the gate—</p> + +<p>"Nothing now," said Smith, pointing into the darkness of the road +before us, "except a couple of studios, until one comes to the Heath."</p> + +<p>He inserted the key in the lock of the gate and swung it creakingly +open. I looked into the black arch of the avenue, thought of the +haunted residence that lay hidden somewhere beyond, of those who had +died in it—especially of the one who had died there under the trees +... and found myself out of love with the business of the night.</p> + +<p>"Come on!" said Nayland Smith briskly, holding the gate open; "there +should be a fire in the library, and refreshments, if the charwoman +has followed instructions."</p> + +<p>I heard the great gate clang to behind us. Even had there been any +moon (and there was none) I doubted if more than a patch or two of +light could<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span> have penetrated there. The darkness was extraordinary. +Nothing broke it, and I think Smith must have found his way by the aid +of some sixth sense. At any rate, I saw nothing of the house until I +stood some five paces from the steps leading up to the porch. A light +was burning in the hall-way, but dimly and inhospitably; of the façade +of the building I could perceive little.</p> + +<p>When we entered the hall and the door was closed behind us, I began +wondering anew what purpose my friend hoped to serve by a vigil in +this haunted place. There was a light in the library, the door of +which was ajar, and on the large table were decanters, a siphon, and +some biscuits and sandwiches. A large grip stood upon the floor also. +For some reason which was a mystery to me, Smith had decided that we +must assume false names whilst under the roof of The Gables; and—</p> + +<p>"Now, Pearce," he said, "a whisky-and-soda before we look around?"</p> + +<p>The proposal was welcome enough, for I felt strangely dispirited, and, +to tell the truth, in my strange disguise not a little ridiculous.</p> + +<p>All my nerves, no doubt, were highly strung, and my sense of hearing +unusually acute, for I went in momentary expectation of some uncanny +happening. I had not long to wait. As I raised the glass to my lips +and glanced across the table at my friend, I heard the first faint +sound heralding the coming of the bells.</p> + +<p>It did not seem to proceed from anywhere within the library, but from +some distant room, far away overhead. A musical sound it was, but +breaking in upon the silence of that ill-omened house, its music was +the music of terror. In a faint and very sweet cascade it rippled; a +ringing as of tiny silver bells.</p> + +<p>I set down my glass upon the table, and rising slowly from the chair +in which I had been seated,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span> stared fixedly at my companion, who was +staring with equal fixity at me. I could see that I had not been +deluded; Nayland Smith had heard the ringing, too.</p> + +<p>"The ghosts waste no time!" he said softly. "This is not new to me; I +spent an hour here last night—and heard the same sound...."</p> + +<p>I glanced hastily around the room. It was furnished as a library, and +contained a considerable collection of works, principally novels. I +was unable to judge of the outlook, for the two lofty windows were +draped with heavy purple curtains which were drawn close. A +silk-shaded lamp swung from the centre of the ceiling, and immediately +over the table by which I stood. There was much shadow about the room; +and now I glanced apprehensively about me, but specially toward the +open door.</p> + +<p>In that breathless suspense of listening we stood awhile; then—</p> + +<p>"There it is again!" whispered Smith tensely.</p> + +<p>The ringing of bells was repeated, and seemingly much nearer to us; in +fact it appeared to come from somewhere above, up near the ceiling of +the room in which we stood. Simultaneously we looked up, then Smith +laughed shortly.</p> + +<p>"Instinctive, I suppose," he snapped; "but what do we expect to see in +the air?"</p> + +<p>The musical sound now grew in volume; the first tiny peal seemed to be +reinforced by others and by others again, until the air around about +us was filled with the pealings of these invisible bell-ringers.</p> + +<p>Although, as I have said, the sound was rather musical than horrible, +it was, on the other hand, so utterly unaccountable as to touch the +supreme heights of the uncanny. I could not doubt that our presence +had attracted these unseen ringers to the room in which we stood, and +I knew quite well that I was growing pale. This was the room in which +at<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span> least one unhappy occupant of The Gables had died of fear. I +recognized the fact that if this mere overture were going to affect my +nerves to such an extent, I could not hope to survive the ordeal of +the night; a great effort was called for. I emptied my glass at a +draught, and stared across the table at Nayland Smith with a sort of +defiance. He was standing very upright and motionless, but his eyes +were turning right and left, searching every visible corner of the big +room.</p> + +<p>"Good!" he said in a very low voice. "The terrorizing power of the +Unknown is boundless, but we must not get in the grip of panic, or we +could not hope to remain in this house ten minutes."</p> + +<p>I nodded without speaking. Then Smith, to my amazement, suddenly began +to speak in a loud voice, a marked contrast to that, almost a whisper, +in which he had spoken formerly.</p> + +<p>"My dear Pearce," he cried, "do you hear the ringing of bells?"</p> + +<p>Clearly the latter words were spoken for the benefit of the unseen +intelligence controlling these manifestations; and although I regarded +such finesse as somewhat wasted, I followed my friend's lead and +replied in a voice as loud as his own:</p> + +<p>"Distinctly, Professor!"</p> + +<p>Silence followed my words, a silence in which both stood watchful and +listening. Then, very faintly, I seemed to detect the silvern ringing +receding away through distant rooms. Finally it became inaudible, and +in the stillness of The Gables I could distinctly hear my companion +breathing. For fully ten minutes we two remained thus, each +momentarily expecting a repetition of the ringing, or the coming of +some new and more sinister manifestation. But we heard nothing and saw +nothing.</p> + +<p>"Hand me that grip, and don't stir until I come back!" hissed Smith in +my ear.</p> + +<p>He turned and walked out of the library, his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span> boots creaking very +loudly in that awe-inspiring silence.</p> + +<p>Standing beside the table, I watched the open door for his return, +crushing down a dread that <i>another</i> form than his might suddenly +appear there.</p> + +<p>I could hear him moving from room to room, and presently, as I waited +in hushed, tense watchfulness, he came in, depositing the grip upon +the table. His eyes were gleaming feverishly.</p> + +<p>"The house is haunted, Pearce!" he cried. "But no ghost ever +frightened <i>me</i>! Come, I will show you your room."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVI" id="CHAPTER_XXVI"></a>CHAPTER XXVI</h2> + +<h3>THE FIERY HAND</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">S </span></p> +<p>mith walked ahead of me upstairs; he had snapped up the light in the +hall-way, and now he turned and cried back loudly:</p> + +<p>"I fear we should never get servants to stay here."</p> + +<p>Again I detected the appeal to a hidden Audience; and there was +something very uncanny in the idea. The house now was deathly still; +the ringing had entirely subsided. In the upper corridor my companion, +who seemed to be well acquainted with the position of the switches, +again turned up all the lights, and in pursuit of the strange comedy +which he saw fit to enact, addressed me continuously in the loud and +unnatural voice which he had adopted as part of his disguise.</p> + +<p>We looked into a number of rooms all well and comfortably furnished, +but although my imagination may have been responsible for the idea, +they all seemed to possess a chilly and repellent atmo<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span>sphere. I felt +that to essay sleep in any one of them would be the merest farce, that +the place to all intents and purposes was uninhabitable, that +something incalculably evil presided over the house.</p> + +<p>And through it all, so obtuse was I that no glimmer of the truth +entered my mind. Outside again in the long, brightly lighted corridor, +we stood for a moment as if a mutual anticipation of some new event +pending had come to us. It was curious—that sudden pulling up and +silent questioning of one another; because, although we acted thus, no +sound had reached us. A few seconds later our anticipation was +realized. From the direction of the stairs it came—a low wailing in a +woman's voice; and the sweetness of the tones added to the terror of +the sound. I clutched at Smith's arm convulsively whilst that uncanny +cry rose and fell—rose and fell—and died away.</p> + +<p>Neither of us moved immediately. My mind was working with feverish +rapidity and seeking to run down a memory which the sound had stirred +into faint quickness. My heart was still leaping wildly when the +wailing began again, rising and falling in regular cadence. At that +instant I identified it.</p> + +<p>During the time Smith and I had spent together in Egypt, two years +before, searching for Kâramanèh, I had found myself on one occasion in +the neighbourhood of a native cemetery near to Bedrasheen. Now, the +scene which I had witnessed there rose up again vividly before me, and +I seemed to see a little group of black-robed women clustered together +about a native grave; for the wailing which now was dying away again +in The Gables was the same, or almost the same, as the wailing of +those Egyptian mourners.</p> + +<p>The house was very silent, now. My forehead was damp with +perspiration, and I became more and more convinced that the uncanny +ordeal must prove too much for my nerves. Hitherto, I had<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span> accorded +little credence to tales of the supernatural, but face to face with +such manifestations as these, I realized that I would have faced +rather a group of armed dacoits, nay! Dr. Fu-Manchu himself, than have +remained another hour in that ill-omened house.</p> + +<p>My companion must have read as much in my face. But he kept up the +strange and, to me, purposeless comedy when presently he spoke.</p> + +<p>"I feel it to be incumbent upon me to suggest," he said, "that we +spend the night at an hotel after all."</p> + +<p>He walked rapidly downstairs and into the library and began to strap +up the grip.</p> + +<p>"Yet," he said, "there may be a natural explanation of what we've +heard; for it is noteworthy that we have actually <i>seen</i> nothing. It +might even be possible to get used to the ringing and the wailing +after a time. Frankly, I am loath to go back on my bargain!"</p> + +<p>Whilst I stared at him in amazement, he stood there indeterminate as +it seemed. Then—</p> + +<p>"Come, Pearce!" he cried loudly, "I can see that you do not share my +views; but for my own part I shall return to-morrow and devote further +attention to the phenomena."</p> + +<p>Extinguishing the light, he walked out into the hall-way, carrying the +grip in his hand. I was not far behind him. We walked toward the door +together, and—</p> + +<p>"Turn the light out, Pearce," directed Smith; "the switch is at your +elbow. We can see our way to the door well enough, now."</p> + +<p>In order to carry out these instructions, it became necessary for me +to remain a few paces in the rear of my companion, and I think I have +never experienced such a pang of nameless terror as pierced me at the +moment of extinguishing the light; for Smith had not yet opened the +door, and the utter darkness of The Gables was horrible beyond +expression.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span> Surely darkness is the most potent weapon of the Unknown. +I know that at the moment my hand left the switch I made for the door +as though the hosts of hell pursued me. I collided violently with +Smith. He was evidently facing toward me in the darkness, for at the +moment of our collision he grasped my shoulder as in a vice.</p> + +<p>"My God, Petrie! look behind you!" he whispered.</p> + +<p>I was enabled to judge of the extent and reality of his fear by the +fact that the strange subterfuge of addressing me always as Pearce was +forgotten. I turned in a flash....</p> + +<p>Never can I forget what I saw. Many strange and terrible memories are +mine, memories stranger and more terrible than those of the average +man; but this <i>thing</i> which now moved slowly down upon us through the +impenetrable gloom of that haunted place was (if the term be +understood) almost absurdly horrible. It was a mediæval legend come to +life in modern London; it was as though some horrible chimera of the +black and ignorant past was become create and potent in the present.</p> + +<p>A luminous hand—a hand in the veins of which fire seemed to run so +that the texture of the skin and the shape of the bones within were +perceptible—in short a hand of glowing, fiery flesh, clutching a +short knife or dagger which also glowed with the same hellish, +infernal luminance, was advancing upon us where we stood—was not +three paces removed!</p> + +<p>What I did or how I came to do it, I can never recall. In all my years +I have experienced nothing to equal the stark panic which seized upon +me then. I know that I uttered a loud and frenzied cry: I know that I +tore myself like a madman from Smith's restraining grip....</p> + +<p>"Don't touch it! Keep away, for your life!" I heard....</p> + +<p>But, dimly I recollect that, finding the thing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span> approaching yet +nearer, I lashed out with my fists—madly, blindly—and struck +something palpable....</p> + +<p>What was the result, I cannot say. At that point my recollections +merge into confusion. Something or some one (Smith, as I afterwards +discovered) was hauling me by main force through the darkness; I fell +a considerable distance on to gravel which lacerated my hands and +gashed my knees. Then, with the cool night air fanning my brow, I was +running—running—my breath coming in hysterical sobs. Beside me fled +another figure.... And my definite recollections commence again at +that point. For this companion of my flight from The Gables threw +himself roughly against me to alter my course.</p> + +<p>"Not that way! not that way!" came pantingly. "Not on to the Heath ... +we must keep to the roads...."</p> + +<p>It was Nayland Smith. That healing realization came to me, bringing +such a gladness as no word of mine can express nor convey. Still we +ran on.</p> + +<p>"There's a policeman's lantern," panted my companion. "They'll attempt +nothing, now!"</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I gulped down the stiff brandy-and-soda, then glanced across to where +Nayland Smith lay extended in the long cane chair.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps you will explain," I said, "for what purpose you submitted me +to that ordeal. If you proposed to correct my scepticism concerning +supernatural manifestations, you have succeeded."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said my companion musingly, "they are devilishly clever; but we +knew that already."</p> + +<p>I stared at him, fatuously.</p> + +<p>"Have you ever known me to waste my time when there was important work +to do?" he continued. "Do you seriously believe that my ghost-hunting +was undertaken for amusement? Really, Petrie, although you are very +fond of assuring me<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span> that I need a holiday, I think the shoe is on the +other foot!"</p> + +<p>From the pocket of his dressing-gown he took out a piece of silk +fringe which had apparently been torn from a scarf, and rolling it +into a ball, tossed it across to me.</p> + +<p>"Smell!" he snapped.</p> + +<p>I did as he directed—and gave a great start. The silk exhaled a faint +perfume, but its effect upon me was as though someone had cried aloud: +"<i>Kâramanèh!</i>"</p> + +<p>Beyond doubt the silken fragment had belonged to the beautiful servant +of Dr. Fu-Manchu, to the dark-eyed, seductive Kâramanèh. Nayland Smith +was watching me keenly.</p> + +<p>"You recognize it—yes?"</p> + +<p>I placed the piece of silk upon the table, slightly shrugging my +shoulders.</p> + +<p>"It was sufficient evidence in itself," continued my friend, "but I +thought it better to seek confirmation, and the obvious way was to +pose as a new lessee of The Gables...."</p> + +<p>"But, Smith—" I began.</p> + +<p>"Let me explain, Petrie. The history of The Gables seemed to be +susceptible of only one explanation; in short it was fairly evident to +me that the object of the manifestations was to ensure the place being +kept empty. This idea suggested another, and with them both in mind, I +set out to make my inquiries, first taking the precaution to disguise +my identity, to which end Weymouth gave me the freedom of Scotland +Yard's fancy wardrobe. I did not take the agent into my confidence, +but posed as a stranger who had heard that the house was to let +furnished and thought it might suit his purpose. My inquiries were +directed to a particular end, but I failed to achieve it at the time. +I had theories, as I have said, and when, having paid the deposit and +secured possession of the keys, I was enabled to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span> visit the place +alone, I was fortunate enough to obtain evidence to show that my +imagination had not misled me.</p> + +<p>"You were very curious the other morning, I recall, respecting my +object in borrowing a large brace-and-bit. My object, Petrie, was to +bore a series of holes in the wainscoting of various rooms at The +Gables—in inconspicuous positions, of course...."</p> + +<p>"But, my dear Smith!" I cried, "you are merely adding to my +mystification."</p> + +<p>He stood up and began to pace the room in his restless fashion.</p> + +<p>"I had cross-examined Weymouth closely regarding the phenomenon of the +bell-ringing, and an exhaustive search of the premises led to the +discovery that the house was in such excellent condition that, from +ground-floor to attic, there was not a solitary crevice large enough +to admit of the passage of a mouse."</p> + +<p>I suppose I must have been staring very foolishly indeed, for Nayland +Smith burst into one of his sudden laughs.</p> + +<p>"A mouse, I said, Petrie!" he cried. "With the brace-and-bit I +rectified that matter. I made the holes I have mentioned, and before +each I set a trap baited with a piece of succulent, toasted cheese. +Just open that grip!"</p> + +<p>The light at last was dawning upon my mental darkness, and I pounced +upon the grip, which stood upon a chair near the window, and opened +it. A sickly smell of cooked cheese assailed my nostrils.</p> + +<p>"Mind your fingers!" cried Smith; "some of them are still set, +possibly."</p> + +<p>Out from the grip I began to take <i>mouse-traps</i>! Two or three of them +were still set, but in the case of the greater number the catches had +slipped. Nine I took out and placed upon the table, and all were +empty. In the tenth there crouched, panting, its<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span> soft furry body dank +with perspiration, a little white mouse!</p> + +<p>"Only one capture!" cried my companion, "showing how well fed the +creatures were. Examine his tail!"</p> + +<p>But already I had perceived that to which Smith would draw my +attention, and the mystery of the "astral bells" was a mystery no +longer. Bound to the little creature's tail, close to the root, with +fine soft wire such as is used for making up bouquets, were three tiny +silver bells. I looked across at my companion in speechless surprise.</p> + +<p>"Almost childish, is it not?" he said; "yet by means of this simple +device The Gables had been emptied of occupant after occupant. There +was small chance of the trick being detected, for, as I have said, +there was absolutely no aperture from roof to basement by means of +which one of them could have escaped into the building."</p> + +<p>"Then—"</p> + +<p>"They were admitted into the wall cavities and the rafters, from some +cellar underneath, Petrie, to which, after a brief scamper under the +floors and over the ceilings, they instinctively returned for the food +they were accustomed to receive, and for which, even had it been +possible (which it was not), they had no occasion to forage."</p> + +<p>I, too, stood up; for excitement was growing within me. I took up the +piece of silk from the table.</p> + +<p>"Where did you find this?" I asked, my eyes upon Smith's keen face.</p> + +<p>"In a sort of wine cellar, Petrie," he replied, "under the stair. +There is no cellar proper to The Gables—at least no such cellar +appears in the plans."</p> + +<p>"But—"</p> + +<p>"But there <i>is</i> one beyond doubt—yes! It must be part of some older +building which occupied the site before The Gables was built. One can +only<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span> surmise that it exists, although such a surmise is a fairly safe +one, and the entrance to the subterranean portion of the building is +situated beyond doubt in the wine cellar. Of this we have at least two +evidences: the finding of the fragment of silk there, and the fact +that in one case at least—as I learnt—the light was extinguished in +the library unaccountably. This could only have been done in one way: +by manipulating the main switch, which is also in the wine cellar."</p> + +<p>"But, Smith!" I cried, "do you mean that <i>Fu-Manchu</i> ...?"</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith turned in his promenade of the floor, and stared into my +eyes.</p> + +<p>"I mean that Dr. Fu-Manchu has had a hiding-place under The Gables for +an indefinite period!" he replied. "I always suspected that a man of +his genius would have a second retreat prepared for him, anticipating +the event of the first being discovered. Oh! I don't doubt it! The +place probably is extensive, and I am almost certain—though the point +has to be confirmed—that there is another entrance from the studio +further along the road. We know, now, why our recent searchings in the +East End have proved futile; why the house in Museum Street was +deserted: he has been lying low in this burrow at Hampstead!"</p> + +<p>"But the hand, Smith, the luminous hand...."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith laughed shortly.</p> + +<p>"Your superstitious fears overcame you to such an extent, Petrie—and +I don't wonder at it; the sight was a ghastly one—that probably you +don't remember what occurred when you struck out at that same ghostly +hand?"</p> + +<p>"I seemed to hit something."</p> + +<p>"That was why we ran. But I think our retreat had all the appearance +of a rout, as I intended that it should. Pardon my playing upon your +very natural fears, old man, but you could not have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span> <i>simulated</i> panic +half so naturally! And if they had suspected that the device was +discovered, we might never have quitted The Gables alive. It was +touch-and-go for a moment."</p> + +<p>"But—"</p> + +<p>"Turn out the light!" snapped my companion.</p> + +<p>Wondering greatly, I did as he desired. I turned out the light ... and +in the darkness of my study I saw a fiery fist being shaken at me +threateningly!... The bones were distinctly visible, and the +luminosity of the flesh was truly ghastly.</p> + +<p>"Turn on the light again!" cried Smith.</p> + +<p>Deeply mystified, I did so ... and my friend tossed a little electric +pocket-lamp on to the writing table.</p> + +<p>"They used merely a small electric lamp fitted into the handle of a +glass dagger," he said with a sort of contempt. "It was very +effective, but the luminous hand is a phenomenon producible by anyone +who possesses an electric torch."</p> + +<p>"The Gables will be watched?"</p> + +<p>"At last, Petrie, I think we have Fu-Manchu—in his own trap!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVII" id="CHAPTER_XXVII"></a>CHAPTER XXVII</h2> + +<h3>THE NIGHT OF THE RAID</h3> +<p><span class="f2">D </span></p> + +<p>ash it all, Petrie!" cried Smith, "this is most annoying!"</p> + +<p>The bell was ringing furiously, although midnight was long past. Whom +could my late visitor be? Almost certainly this ringing portended an +urgent case. In other words, I was not fated to take part<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span> in what I +anticipated would prove to be the closing scene of the Fu-Manchu +drama.</p> + +<p>"Every one is in bed," I said ruefully; "and how can I possibly see a +patient—in this costume?"</p> + +<p>Smith and I were both arrayed in rough tweeds, and anticipating the +labours before us, had dispensed with collars and wore soft mufflers. +It was hard to be called upon to face a professional interview dressed +thus, and having a big tweed cap pulled down over my eyes.</p> + +<p>Across the writing-table we confronted one another, in dismayed +silence, whilst, below, the bell sent up its ceaseless clangour.</p> + +<p>"It has to be done, Smith," I said regretfully. "Almost certainly it +means a journey and probably an absence of some hours."</p> + +<p>I threw my cap upon the table, turned up my coat to hide the absence +of collar, and started for the door. My last sight of Smith showed him +standing looking after me, tugging at the lobe of his ear and clicking +his teeth together with suppressed irritability. I stumbled down the +dark stairs, along the hall, and opened the front door. Vaguely +visible in the light of a street lamp which stood at no great distance +away, I saw a slender man of medium height confronting me. From the +shadowed face two large and luminous eyes looked out into mine. My +visitor, who, despite the warmth of the evening, wore a heavy +greatcoat, was an Oriental!</p> + +<p>I drew back, apprehensively; then:—</p> + +<p>"Ah! Dr. Petrie!" he said in a softly musical voice which made me +start again, "to God be all praise that I have found you!"</p> + +<p>Some emotion, which at present I could not define, was stirring within +me. Where had I seen this graceful Eastern youth before? Where had I +heard that soft voice?</p> + +<p>"Do you wish to see me professionally?" I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span> asked—yet even as I put +the question, I seemed to know it unnecessary.</p> + +<p>"So you know me no more?" said the stranger—and his teeth gleamed in +a slight smile.</p> + +<p>Heavens! I knew now what had struck that vibrant chord within me! The +voice, though infinitely deeper, yet had an unmistakable resemblance +to the dulcet tones of Kâramanèh—of Kâramanèh, whose eyes haunted my +dreams, whose beauty had done much to embitter my years.</p> + +<p>The Oriental youth stepped forward, with outstretched hand.</p> + +<p>"So you know me no more?" he repeated; "but I know <i>you</i>, and give +praise to Allah that I have found you!"</p> + +<p>I stepped back, pressed the electric switch, and turned, with leaping +heart, to look into the face of my visitor. It was a face of the +purest Greek beauty, a face that might have served as a model for +Praxiteles; the skin had a golden pallor, which, with the crisp black +hair and magnetic yet velvety eyes, suggested to my fancy that this +was the young Antinoüs risen from the Nile, whose wraith now appeared +to me out of the night. I stifled a cry of surprise, not unmingled +with gladness.</p> + +<p>It was Azîz—the brother of Kâramanèh!</p> + +<p>Never could the entrance of a figure upon the stage of a drama have +been more dramatic than the coming of Azîz upon this night of all +nights. I seized the outstretched hand and drew him forward, then +reclosed the door and stood before him a moment in doubt.</p> + +<p>A vaguely troubled look momentarily crossed the handsome face; with +the Oriental's unerring instinct, he had detected the reserve of my +greeting. Yet, when I thought of the treachery of Kâramanèh, when I +remembered how she, whom we had befriended, whom we had rescued from +the house of Fu-Manchu, now had turned like the beautiful viper<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span> that +she was to strike at the hand that caressed her; when I thought how +to-night we were set upon raiding the place where the evil Chinese +doctor lurked in hiding, were set upon the arrest of that malignant +genius and of all his creatures, Kâramanèh amongst them, is it strange +that I hesitated? Yet, again, when I thought of my last meeting with +her, and of how, twice, she had risked her life to save me....</p> + +<p>So, avoiding the gaze of the lad, I took his arm, and in silence we +two ascended the stairs and entered my study ... where Nayland Smith +stood bolt upright beside the table, his steely eyes fixed upon the +face of the new arrival.</p> + +<p>No look of recognition crossed the bronzed features, and Azîz, who had +started forward with outstretched hands, fell back a step and looked +pathetically from me to Nayland Smith, and from the grim Commissioner +back again to me. The appeal in the velvet eyes was more than I could +tolerate, unmoved.</p> + +<p>"Smith," I said shortly, "you remember Azîz?"</p> + +<p>Not a muscle visibly moved in Smith's face, as he snapped back:</p> + +<p>"I remember him perfectly."</p> + +<p>"He has come, I think, to seek our assistance."</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes!" cried Azîz, laying his hand upon my arm with a gesture +painfully reminiscent of Kâramanèh—"I came only to-night to London. +Oh, my gentlemen! I have searched, and searched, and searched, until I +am weary. Often I have wished to die. And then at last I come to +Rangoon...."</p> + +<p>"To Rangoon!" snapped Smith, still with the grey eyes fixed almost +fiercely upon the lad's face.</p> + +<p>"To Rangoon—yes; and there I hear news at last. I hear that you have +seen her—have seen Kâramanèh—that you are back in London." He was +not entirely at home with his English. "I know then that she must be +here, too. I ask them everywhere, and they answer 'yes.' Oh, Smith +Pasha!"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span> —he stepped forward and impulsively seized both Smith's +hands—"You know where she is—take me to her!"</p> + +<p>Smith's face was a study in perplexity now. In the past we had +befriended the young Azîz, and it was hard to look upon him in the +light of an enemy. Yet had we not equally befriended his sister?—and +she....</p> + +<p>At last Smith glanced across at me where I stood just within the +doorway.</p> + +<p>"What do you make of it, Petrie?" he said harshly. "Personally I take +it to mean that our plans have leaked out." He sprang suddenly back +from Azîz, and I saw his glance travelling rapidly over the slight +figure as if in quest of concealed arms. "I take it to be a trap!"</p> + +<p>A moment he stood so, regarding him, and despite my well-grounded +distrust of the Oriental character, I could have sworn that the +expression of pained surprise upon the youth's face was not simulated +but real. Even Smith, I think, began to share my view; for suddenly he +threw himself into the white cane rest-chair, and, still fixedly +regarding Azîz:</p> + +<p>"Perhaps I have wronged you," he said. "If I have, you shall know the +reason presently. Tell your own story!"</p> + +<p>There was a pathetic humidity in the velvet eyes of Azîz—eyes so like +those others that were ever looking into mine in dreams—as glancing +from Smith to me he began, hands outstretched, characteristically, +palms upward and fingers curling, to tell in broken English the story +of his search for Kâramanèh....</p> + +<p>"It was Fu-Manchu, my kind gentlemen—it was the <i>hâkîm</i> who is really +not a man at all, but an <i>efreet</i>. He found us again less than four +days after you had left us, Smith Pasha!... He found us in Cairo, and +to Kâramanèh he made the forgetting of all things—even of me—even of +me...."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span></p> + +<p>Nayland Smith snapped his teeth together sharply; then:</p> + +<p>"What do you mean by that?" he demanded.</p> + +<p>For my own part I understood well enough, remembering how the +brilliant Chinese doctor once had performed such an operation as this +upon poor Inspector Weymouth; how, by means of an injection of some +serum, prepared (as Kâramanèh afterwards told us) from the venom of a +swamp adder or similar reptile, he had induced <i>amnesia</i>, or complete +loss of memory. I felt every drop of blood recede from my cheeks.</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I began....</p> + +<p>"Let him speak for himself," interrupted my friend sharply.</p> + +<p>"They tried to take us both," continued Azîz, still speaking in that +soft, melodious manner, but with deep seriousness. "I escaped, I, who +am swift of foot, hoping to bring help."—He shook his head +sadly—"But, except the All Powerful, who is so powerful as the +<i>Hâkîm</i> Fu-Manchu? I hid, my gentlemen, and watched and waited, +one—two—three weeks. At last I saw her again, my sister Kâramanèh; +but ah! she did not know me, did not know <i>me</i>, Azîz, her brother! She +was in an <i>arabeeyeh</i>, and passed me quickly along the <i>Sharia +en-Nahhâsin</i>. I ran, and ran, and ran, crying her name, but although +she looked back, she did not know me—she did not know me! I felt that +I was dying, and presently I fell—upon the steps of the Mosque of +Abu."</p> + +<p>He dropped the expressive hands wearily to his sides and sank his chin +upon his breast.</p> + +<p>"And then?" I said huskily—for my heart was fluttering like a captive +bird.</p> + +<p>"Alas! from that day to this I see her no more, my gentlemen. I travel +not only in Egypt but near and far, and still I see her no more until +in Rangoon I hear that which brings me to England again"<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span>—he extended +his palms naïvely—"and here I am—Smith Pasha."</p> + +<p>Smith sprang upright again and turned to me.</p> + +<p>"Either I am growing over-credulous," he said, "or Azîz speaks the +truth. But"—he held up his hand—"you can tell me all that at some +other time, Petrie! We must take no chances. Sergeant Carter is +downstairs with the cab; you might ask him to step up. He and Azîz can +remain here until our return."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXVIII" id="CHAPTER_XXVIII"></a>CHAPTER XXVIII</h2> + +<h3>THE SAMURAI'S SWORD</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">T </span></p> +<p>he muffled drumming of sleepless London seemed very remote from us, +as side by side we crept up the narrow path to the studio. This was a +starry but moonless night, and the little dingy white building with a +solitary tree peeping, in silhouette above its glazed roof, bore an +odd resemblance to one of those tombs which form a city of the dead so +near to the city of feverish life, on the slopes of the Mokattam +Hills. This line of reflection proved unpleasant, and I dismissed it +sternly from my mind.</p> + +<p>The shriek of a train-whistle reached me, a sound which breaks the +stillness of the most silent London night, telling of the ceaseless, +febrile life of the great world-capital whose activity ceases not with +the coming of darkness. Around and about us a very great stillness +reigned, however, and the velvet dusk—which, with the star-jewelled +sky, was strongly suggestive of an Eastern night—gave up no sign to +show that it masked the presence of more than twenty men. Some +distance away on our right was The Gables, that sinister and deserted +mansion which we assumed, and with good reason, to be nothing<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span> less +than the gateway to the subterranean abode of Dr. Fu Manchu; before us +was the studio, which, if Nayland Smith's deductions were accurate, +concealed a second entrance to the same mysterious dwelling.</p> + +<p>As my friend, glancing cautiously all about him, inserted the key in +the lock, an owl hooted dismally almost immediately above our heads. I +caught my breath sharply, for it might be a signal; but, looking +upward, I saw a great black shape float slantingly from the tree +beyond the studio into the coppice on the right which hemmed in The +Gables. Silently the owl winged its uncanny flight into the greater +darkness of the trees, and was gone. Smith opened the door and we +stepped into the studio. Our plans had been well considered, and in +accordance with these, I now moved up beside my friend, who was dimly +perceptible to me in the starlight which found access through the +glass roof, and pressed the catch of my electric pocket-lamp....</p> + +<p>I suppose that by virtue of my self-imposed duty as chronicler of the +deeds of Dr. Fu Manchu—the greatest and most evil genius whom the +later centuries have produced, the man who dreamt of a universal +Yellow Empire—I should have acquired a certain facility in describing +bizarre happenings. But I confess that it fails me now as I attempt in +cold English to portray my emotions when the white beam from the +little lamp cut through the darkness of the studio, and shone fully +upon the beautiful face of <i>Kâramanèh</i>!</p> + +<p>Less than six feet away from me she stood, arrayed in the gauzy dress +of the harêm, her fingers and slim white arms laden with barbaric +jewelry! The light wavered in my suddenly nerveless hand, gleaming +momentarily upon bare ankles and golden anklets, upon little +red-leather shoes.</p> + +<p>I spoke no word, and Smith was as silent as I; both of us, I think, +were speechless rather from<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span> amazement than in obedience to the +evident wishes of Fu-Manchu's slave-girl. Yet I have only to close my +eyes at this moment to see her as she stood, one finger raised to her +lips, enjoining us to silence. She looked ghastly pale in the light of +the lamp, but so lovely that my rebellious heart threatened already to +make a fool of me.</p> + +<p>So we stood in that untidy studio, with canvases and easels heaped +against the wall and with all sorts of litter about us, a trio +strangely met, and one to have amused the high gods watching through +the windows of the stars.</p> + +<p>"Go back!" came in a whisper from Kâramanèh.</p> + +<p>I saw the red lips moving and read a dreadful horror in the widely +opened eyes, in those eyes like pools of mystery to taunt the thirsty +soul. The world of realities was slipping past me; I seemed to be +losing my hold on things actual; I had built up an Eastern palace +about myself and Kâramanèh, wherein, the world shut out, I might pass +the hours in reading the mystery of those dark eyes. Nayland Smith +brought me sharply to my senses.</p> + +<p>"Steady with the light, Petrie!" he hissed in my ear. "My scepticism +has been shaken to-night, but I am taking no chances."</p> + +<p>He moved from my side and forward toward that lovely, unreal figure +which stood immediately before the model's throne and its background +of plush curtains. Kâramanèh started forward to meet him, suppressing +a little cry, whose real anguish could not have been simulated.</p> + +<p>"Go back! go back!" she whispered urgently, and thrust out her hands +against Smith's breast. "For God's sake, go back! I have risked my +life to come here to-night. <i>He knows</i>, and is ready...."</p> + +<p>The words were spoken with passionate intensity, and Nayland Smith +hesitated. To my nostrils was wafted that faint, delightful perfume +which, since one night, two years ago, it had come to disturb my<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span> +senses, had taunted me many times as the mirage taunts the parched +Sahara traveller. I took a step forward.</p> + +<p>"Don't move!" snapped Smith.</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh clutched frenziedly at the lapels of his coat.</p> + +<p>"Listen to me!" she said beseechingly, and stamped one little foot +upon the floor—"listen to me! You are a clever man, but you know +nothing of a woman's heart—nothing—<i>nothing</i>—if seeing me, hearing +me, knowing, as you do know, what I risk, you can doubt that I speak +the truth. And I tell you that it is death to go behind those +curtains—that <i>he</i>...."</p> + +<p>"That's what I wanted to know!" snapped Smith. His voice quivered with +excitement.</p> + +<p>Suddenly grasping Kâramanèh by the waist, he lifted her and set her +aside; then in three bounds he was on to the model's throne and had +torn the plush curtains bodily from their fastenings.</p> + +<p>How it occurred I cannot hope to make clear, for here my recollections +merge into a chaos. I know that Smith seemed to topple forward amid +the purple billows of velvet, and his muffled cry came to me:</p> + +<p>"Petrie! My God, Petrie!..."</p> + +<p>The pale face of Kâramanèh looked up into mine and her hands were +clutching me, but the glamour of her personality had lost its hold, +for I knew—heavens how poignantly it struck home to me!—that Nayland +Smith was gone to his death. What I hoped to achieve, I know not, but +hurling the trembling girl aside, I snatched the Browning pistol from +my coat pocket, and with the ray of the lamp directed upon the purple +mound of velvet, I leaped forward.</p> + +<p>I think I realized that the curtains had masked a collapsible trap, a +sheer pit of blackness, an instant before I was precipitated into it, +but certainly the knowledge came too late. With the sound of a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span> soft, +shuddering cry in my ears, I fell, dropping lamp and pistol, and +clutching at the fallen hangings. But they offered me no support. My +head seemed to be bursting; I could utter only a hoarse groan, as I +fell—fell—fell....</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>When my mind began to work again, in returning consciousness, I found +it to be laden with reproach. How often in the past had we blindly +hurled ourselves into just such a trap as this? Should we never learn +that, where Fu-Manchu was, impetuosity must prove fatal? On two +distinct occasions in the past we had been made the victims of this +device, yet although we had had practically conclusive evidence that +this studio was used by Dr. Fu-Manchu, we had relied upon its floor +being as secure as that of any other studio, we had failed to sound +every foot of it ere trusting our weight to its support....</p> + +<p>"There is such a divine simplicity in the English mind that one may +lay one's plans with mathematical precision, and rely upon the Nayland +Smiths and Dr. Petries to play their allotted parts. Excepting two +faithful followers, my friends are long since departed. But here, in +these vaults which time has overlooked and which are as secret and as +serviceable to-day as they were two hundred years ago, I wait +patiently, with my trap set, like the spider for the fly!..."</p> + +<p>To the sound of that taunting voice, I opened my eyes. As I did so I +strove to spring upright—only to realize that I was tied fast to a +heavy ebony chair inlaid with ivory, and attached by means of two iron +brackets to the floor.</p> + +<p>"Even children learn from experience," continued the unforgettable +voice, alternately guttural and sibilant, but always as deliberate as +though the speaker were choosing with care words which should +perfectly clothe his thoughts. "For 'a burnt child<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span> fears the fire,' +says your English adage. But Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith, who +enjoys the confidence of the India Office, and who is empowered to +control the movements of the Criminal Investigation Department, learns +nothing from experience. He is less than a child, since he has twice +rashly precipitated himself into a chamber charged with an anæsthetic +prepared, by a process of my own, from the <i>lycoperdon</i> or Common +Puffball."</p> + +<p>I became fully master of my senses, and I became fully alive to a +stupendous fact. At last it was ended; we were utterly in the power of +Dr. Fu Manchu; our race was run.</p> + +<p>I sat in a low vaulted room. The roof was of ancient brickwork, but +the walls were draped with exquisite Chinese fabric having a green +ground whereon was a design representing a grotesque procession of +white peacocks. A green carpet covered the floor, and the whole of the +furniture was of the same material as the chair to which I was +strapped, viz. ebony inlaid with ivory. This furniture was scanty. +There was a heavy table in one corner of the dungeonesque place, on +which were a number of books and papers. Before this table was a +high-backed, heavily carven chair. A smaller table stood upon the +right of the only visible opening, a low door partially draped with +bead-work curtains, above which hung a silver lamp. On this smaller +table, a stick of incense, in a silver holder, sent up a pencil of +vapour into the air, and the chamber was loaded with the sickly sweet +fumes. A faint haze from the incense-stick hovered up under the roof.</p> + +<p>In the high-backed chair sat Dr. Fu Manchu, wearing a green robe upon +which was embroidered a design, the subject of which at first glance +was not perceptible, but which presently I made out to be a huge white +peacock. He wore a little cap perched upon the dome of his amazing +skull, and one clawish hand resting upon the ebony of the table, he +sat<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span> slightly turned toward me, his emotionless face a mask of +incredible evil. In spite of, or because of, the high intellect +written upon it, the face of Dr. Fu-Manchu was more utterly repellent +than any I have ever known, and the green eyes, eyes green as those of +a cat in the darkness, which sometimes burnt like witch-lamps, and +sometimes were horribly filmed like nothing human or imaginable, might +have mirrored not a soul, but an emanation of Hell, incarnate in this +gaunt, high-shouldered body.</p> + +<p>Stretched flat upon the floor lay Nayland Smith, partially stripped, +his arms thrown back over his head and his wrists chained to a stout +iron staple attached to the wall; he was fully conscious and staring +intently at the Chinese doctor. His bare ankles also were manacled, +and fixed to a second chain, which quivered tautly across the green +carpet and passed out through the doorway, being attached to something +beyond the curtain, and invisible to me from where I sat.</p> + +<p>Fu-Manchu was now silent. I could hear Smith's heavy breathing and +hear my watch ticking in my pocket. I suddenly realized that although +my body was lashed to the ebony chair, my hands and arms were free. +Next, looking dazedly about me, my attention was drawn to a heavy +sword which stood hilt upward against the wall within reach of my +hand. It was a magnificent piece, of Japanese workmanship; a long, +curved Damascened blade having a double-handed hilt of steel, inlaid +with gold, and resembling fine Kuft work. A host of possibilities +swept through my mind. Then I perceived that the sword was attached to +the wall by a thin steel chain some five feet in length.</p> + +<p>"Even if you had the dexterity of a Mexican knife-thrower," came the +guttural voice of Fu-Manchu, "you would be unable to reach me, dear +Dr. Petrie."</p> + +<p>The Chinaman had read my thoughts.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span></p> + +<p>Smith turned his eyes upon me momentarily, only to look away again in +the direction of Fu Manchu. My friend's face was slightly pale beneath +the tan, and his jaw muscles stood out with unusual prominence. By +this fact alone did he reveal the knowledge that he lay at the mercy +of this enemy of the white race, of this inhuman being who himself +knew no mercy, of this man whose very genius was inspired by the cool, +calculated cruelty of his race, of that race which to this day +disposes of hundreds, nay, thousands, of its unwanted girl-children by +the simple measure of throwing them down a well specially dedicated to +the purpose.</p> + +<p>"The weapon near your hand," continued the Chinaman imperturbably, "is +a product of the civilization of our near neighbours the Japanese, a +race to whose courage I prostrate myself in meekness. It is the sword +of a <i>samurai</i>, Dr. Petrie. It is of very great age, and was, until an +unfortunate misunderstanding with myself led to the extinction of the +family, a treasured possession of a noble Japanese house...."</p> + +<p>The soft voice, into which an occasional sibilance crept, but which +never rose above a cool monotone, gradually was lashing me into fury, +and I could see the muscles moving in Smith's jaws as he convulsively +clenched his teeth; whereby I knew that, impotent, he burned with a +rage at least as great as mine. But I did not speak, and did not move.</p> + +<p>"The ancient tradition of <i>seppuku</i>," continued the Chinaman, "or +<i>hara-kira</i>, still rules, as you know, in the great families of Japan. +There is a sacred ritual, and the <i>samurai</i> who dedicates himself to +this honourable end, must follow strictly the ritual. As a physician, +the exact nature of the ceremony might possibly interest you, Dr. +Petrie, but a technical account of the two incisions which the +sacrificant employs in his self-dismissal, might, on the other hand, +bore Mr. Nayland Smith. Therefore I will<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span> merely enlighten you upon +one little point, a minor one, but interesting to the student of human +nature. In short, even a <i>samurai</i>—and no braver race has ever +honoured the world—sometimes hesitates to complete the operation. The +weapon near to your hand, my dear Dr. Petrie, is known as the Friend's +Sword. On such occasions as we are discussing, a trusty friend is +given the post—an honoured one—of standing behind the brave man who +offers himself to his gods, and should the latter's courage +momentarily fail him, the friend with the trusty blade (to which now I +especially direct your attention) diverts the hierophant's mind from +his digression, and rectifies his temporary breach of etiquette by +severing the cervical vertebræ of the spinal column with the friendly +blade—which you can reach quite easily, Dr. Petrie, if you care to +extend your hand."</p> + +<p>Some dim perception of the truth was beginning to creep into my mind. +When I say a perception of the truth, I mean rather of some part of +the purpose of Dr. Fu-Manchu; of the whole horrible truth, of the +scheme which had been conceived by that mighty, evil man, I had no +glimmering, but I foresaw that a frightful ordeal was before us both.</p> + +<p>"That I hold you in high esteem," continued Fu-Manchu, "is a fact +which must be apparent to you by this time, but in regard to your +companion, I entertain very different sentiments...."</p> + +<p>Always underlying the deliberate calm of the speaker, sometimes +showing itself in an unusually deep guttural, sometimes in an +unusually serpentine sibilant, lurked the frenzy of hatred which in +the past had revealed itself occasionally in wild outbursts. +Momentarily I expected such an outburst now, but it did not come.</p> + +<p>"One quality possessed by Mr. Nayland Smith," resumed the Chinaman, "I +admire; I refer to his courage. I would wish that so courageous a man +should seek his own end, should voluntarily efface<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span> himself from the +path of that world-movement which he is powerless to check. In short, +I would have him show himself a <i>samurai</i>. Always his friend, you +shall remain so to the end, Dr. Petrie. I have arranged for this."</p> + +<p>He struck lightly a little silver gong, dependent from the corner of +the table, whereupon, from the curtained doorway, there entered a +short, thickly built Burman whom I recognized for a dacoit. He wore a +shoddy blue suit, which had been made for a much larger man; but these +things claimed little of my attention, which automatically was +directed to the load beneath which the Burman laboured.</p> + +<p>Upon his back he carried a sort of wire box rather less than six feet +long, some two feet high, and about two feet wide. In short, it was a +stout framework covered with fine wire-netting on the tops, sides and +ends, but open at the bottom. It seemed to be made in five sections, +or to contain four sliding partitions which could be raised or lowered +at will. These were of wood, and in the bottom of each was cut a +little arch. The arches in the four partitions varied in size, so that +whereas the first was not more than five inches high, the fourth +opened almost to the wire roof of the box or cage; and a fifth, which +was but little higher than the first, was cut in the actual end of the +contrivance.</p> + +<p>So intent was I upon this device, the purpose of which I was wholly +unable to divine, that I directed the whole of my attention upon it. +Then, as the Burman paused in the doorway, resting a corner of the +cage upon the brilliant carpet, I glanced toward Dr. Fu-Manchu. He was +watching Nayland Smith, and revealing his irregular yellow teeth—the +teeth of an opium smoker—in the awful mirthless smile which I knew.</p> + +<p>"God!" whispered Smith, "the Six Gates!"</p> + +<p>"Your knowledge of my beautiful country serves you well," replied +Fu-Manchu gently.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span></p> + +<p>Instantly I looked to my friend ... and every drop of blood seemed to +recede from my heart, leaving it cold in my breast. If <i>I</i> did not +know the purpose of the cage, obviously Smith knew it all too well. +His pallor had grown more marked, and although his grey eyes stared +defiantly at the Chinaman, I, who knew him, could read a deathly +horror in their depths.</p> + +<p>The dacoit, in obedience to a guttural order from Dr. Fu Manchu, +placed the cage upon the carpet, completely covering Smith's body, but +leaving his neck and head exposed. The seared and pock-marked face set +in a sort of placid leer, the dacoit adjusted the sliding partitions +to Smith's recumbent form, and I saw the purpose of the graduated +arches. They were intended to divide a human body in just such +fashion, and, as I realized, were most cunningly shaped to that end. +The whole of Smith's body lay now in the wire cage, each of the five +compartments whereof was shut off from its neighbour.</p> + +<p>The Burman stepped back and stood waiting in the doorway. Dr. Fu +Manchu, removing his gaze from the face of my friend, directed it now +upon me.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith shall have the honour of acting as +hierophant, admitting himself to the Mysteries," said Fu Manchu +softly, "and you, Dr. Petrie, shall be the Friend."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXIX" id="CHAPTER_XXIX"></a>CHAPTER XXIX</h2> + +<h3>THE SIX GATES</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">H </span></p> +<p>e glanced toward the Burman, who retired immediately, to re-enter a +moment later carrying a curious leather sack, in shape not unlike that +of<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span> a <i>sakká</i> or Arab water-carrier. Opening a little trap in the top +of the first compartment of the cage (that is, the compartment which +covered Smith's bare feet and ankles), he inserted the neck of the +sack, then suddenly seized it by the bottom and shook it vigorously. +Before my horrified gaze, four huge rats came tumbling out from the +bag into the cage!</p> + +<p>The dacoit snatched away the sack and snapped the shutter fast. A +moving mist obscured my sight, a mist through which I saw the green +eyes of Dr. Fu-Manchu fixed upon me, and through which, as from a +great distance, his voice, sunk to a snakelike hiss, came to my ears.</p> + +<p>"Cantonese rats, Dr. Petrie ... the most ravenous in the world ... +they have eaten nothing for nearly a week!"</p> + +<p>Then all became blurred as though a painter with a brush steeped in +red had smudged out the details of the picture. For an indefinite +period, which seemed like many minutes yet probably was only a few +seconds, I saw nothing and heard nothing; my sensory nerves were +dulled entirely. From this state I was awakened and brought back to +the realities by a sound which ever afterward I was doomed to +associate with that ghastly scene.</p> + +<p>This was the squealing of the rats.</p> + +<p>The red mist seemed to disperse at that, and with frightfully intense +interest, I began to study the awful torture to which Nayland Smith +was being subjected. The dacoit had disappeared, and Fu-Manchu +placidly was watching the four lean and hideous animals in the cage. +As I also turned my eyes in that direction, the rats overcame their +temporary fear, and began....</p> + +<p>"You have been good enough to notice," said the Chinaman, his voice +still sunk in that sibilant whisper, "my partiality for dumb allies. +You have met my scorpions, my death-adders, my baboon-man. The uses of +such a playful little animal as a marmoset<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span> have never been fully +appreciated before, I think, but to an indiscretion of this last-named +pet of mine I seem to remember that you owed something in the past, +Dr. Petrie...."</p> + +<p>Nayland Smith stifled a deep groan. One rapid glance I ventured at his +face. It was a greyish hue now, and dank with perspiration. His gaze +met mine.</p> + +<p>The rats had almost ceased squealing.</p> + +<p>"Much depends upon yourself, doctor," continued Fu-Manchu, slightly +raising his voice. "I credit Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith with +courage high enough to sustain the raising of all the gates; but I +estimate the strength of your friendship highly, also, and predict +that you will use the sword of the <i>samurai</i> certainly not later than +the time when I shall raise the third gate...."</p> + +<p>A low shuddering sound, which I cannot hope to describe, but alas! can +never forget, broke from the lips of the tortured man.</p> + +<p>"In China," resumed Fu-Manchu, "we call this quaint fancy the Six +Gates of Joyful Wisdom. The first gate, by which the rats are +admitted, is called the Gate of Joyous Hope; the second, the Gate of +Mirthful Doubt. The third gate is poetically named the Gate of True +Rapture, and the fourth, the Gate of Gentle Sorrow. I once was +honoured in the friendship of an exalted mandarin who sustained the +course of Joyful Wisdom to the raising of the fifth gate (called the +Gate of Sweet Desires) and the admission of the twentieth rat. I +esteem him almost equally with my ancestors. The sixth, or Gate +Celestial—whereby a man enters into the Joy of Complete +Understanding—I have dispensed with, here, substituting a Japanese +fancy of an antiquity nearly as great and honourable. The introduction +of this element of speculation I count a happy thought, and +accordingly take pride to myself."</p> + +<p>"The sword, Petrie!" whispered Smith. I should not have recognized his +voice, but he spoke quite<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span> evenly and steadily. "I rely upon you, old +man, to spare me the humiliation of asking mercy from that yellow +fiend!"</p> + +<p>My mind throughout this time had been gaining a sort of dreadful +clarity. I had avoided looking at the sword of <i>kara-kiri</i>, but my +thoughts had been leading me mercilessly up to the point at which we +were now arrived. No vestige of anger, of condemnation of the inhuman +being seated in the ebony chair, remained; that was past. Of all that +had gone before, and of what was to come in the future, I thought +nothing, knew nothing. Our long fight against the yellow group, our +encounters with the numberless creatures of Fu Manchu, the +dacoits—even Kâramanèh—were forgotten, blotted out. I saw nothing of +the strange appointments of that subterranean chamber; but face to +face with the supreme moment of a lifetime, I was alone with my poor +friend—and God.</p> + +<p>The rats began squealing again. They were fighting....</p> + +<p>"Quick, Petrie! Quick, man! I am weakening...."</p> + +<p>I turned and took up the <i>samurai</i> sword. My hands were very hot and +dry, but perfectly steady, and I tested the edge of the heavy weapon +upon my left thumb-nail as quietly as one might test a razor blade. It +was keen, this blade of ghastly history, as any razor ever wrought in +Sheffield. I seized the graven hilt, bent forward in my chair, and +raised the Friend's Sword high above my head. With the heavy weapon +poised there, I looked into my friend's eyes. They were feverishly +bright, but never in all my days, nor upon the many beds of suffering +which it had been my lot to visit, had I seen an expression like that +within them.</p> + +<p>"The raising of the First Gate is always a crucial moment," came the +guttural voice of the Chinaman.</p> + +<p>Although I did not see him, and barely heard his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span> words, I was aware +that he had stood up and was bending forward over the lower end of the +cage.</p> + +<p>"Now, Petrie! now! God bless you ... and good-bye...."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>From somewhere—somewhere remote—I heard a hoarse and animal-like +cry, followed by the sound of a heavy fall. I can scarcely bear to +write of that moment, for I had actually begun the downward sweep of +the great sword when that sound came—a faint Hope, speaking of aid +where I had thought no aid possible.</p> + +<p>How I contrived to divert the blade, I do not know to this day; but I +do know that its mighty sweep sheared a lock from Smith's head and +laid open the scalp. With the hilt in my quivering hands I saw the +blade bite deeply through the carpet and floor above Nayland Smith's +skull. There, buried fully two inches in the woodwork, it stuck, and +still clutching the hilt, I looked to the right and across the room—I +looked to the curtained doorway.</p> + +<p>Fu-Manchu, with one long, claw-like hand upon the top of the first +gate, was bending over the trap, but his brilliant green eyes were +turned in the same direction as my own—upon the curtained doorway.</p> + +<p>Upright within it, her beautiful face as pale as death, but her great +eyes blazing with a sort of splendid madness, stood Kâramanèh!</p> + +<p>She looked, not at the tortured man, not at me, but fully at Dr. +Fu-Manchu. One hand clutched the trembling draperies; now she suddenly +raised the other, so that the jewels on her white arm glittered in the +light of the lamp above the door. She held my Browning pistol! +Fu-Manchu sprang upright, inhaling sibilantly, as Kâramanèh pointed +the pistol point-blank at his high skull and fired....</p> + +<p>I saw a little red streak appear, up by the neutral-coloured hair, +under the black cap. I became as a<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span> detached intelligence, unlinked +with the corporeal, looking down upon a thing which for some reason I +had never thought to witness.</p> + +<p>Fu-Manchu threw up both arms, so that the sleeves of the green robe +fell back to the elbows. He clutched at his head and the black cap +fell behind him. He began to utter short, guttural cries; he swayed +backward—to the right—to the left—then lurched forward right across +the cage. There he lay, writhing, for a moment, his baneful eyes +turned up, revealing the whites; and the great grey rats, released, +began leaping about the room. Two shot like grey streaks past the slim +figure in the doorway, one darted behind the chair to which I was +lashed, and the fourth ran all around against the wall.... Fu-Manchu, +prostrate across the overturned cage, lay still, his massive head +sagging downward.</p> + +<p>I experienced a mental repetition of my adventure in the earlier +evening—I was dropping, dropping, dropping into some bottomless pit +... warm arms were about my neck; and burning kisses upon my lips.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXX" id="CHAPTER_XXX"></a>CHAPTER XXX</h2> + +<h3>THE CALL OF THE EAST</h3> +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> + +<p> seemed to haul myself back out of the pit of unconsciousness by the +aid of two little hands which clasped my own. I uttered a sigh that +was almost a sob, and opened my eyes.</p> + +<p>I was sitting in the big red-leathern armchair in my own study ... and +a lovely but truly bizarre figure, in a harêm dress, was kneeling on +the carpet<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span> at my feet; so that my first sight of the world was the +sweetest sight that the world had to offer me, the dark eyes of +Kâramanèh, with tears trembling like jewels upon her lashes!</p> + +<p>I looked no further than that, heeded not if there were others in the +room beside we two, but, gripping the jewel-laden fingers in what must +have been a cruel clasp, I searched the depths of the glorious eyes in +ever-growing wonder. What change had taken place in those limpid, +mysterious pools? Why was a wild madness growing up within me like a +flame? Why was the old longing returned, ten-thousandfold, to snatch +that pliant, exquisite shape to my breast?</p> + +<p>No word was spoken, but the spoken words of a thousand ages could not +have expressed one tithe what was held in that silent communion. A +hand was laid hesitatingly on my shoulder. I tore my gaze away from +the lovely face so near to mine, and glanced up.</p> + +<p>Azîz stood at the back of my chair!</p> + +<p>"God is all merciful," he said. "My sister is restored to us" (I loved +him for the plural) "and she <i>remembers</i>."</p> + +<p>Those few words were enough; I understood now that this lovely girl, +who half knelt, half lay at my feet, was not the evil, perverted +creature of Fu-Manchu whom we had gone out to arrest with the other +vile servants of the Chinese doctor, but was the old, beloved +companion of two years ago, the Kâramanèh for whom I had sought long +and wearily in Egypt, who had been swallowed up and lost to me in that +land of mystery.</p> + +<p>The loss of memory which Fu-Manchu had artificially induced was +subject to the same inexplicable laws which ordinarily rule in cases +of <i>amnesia</i>. The shock of her brave action that night had begun to +effect a cure; the sight of Azîz had completed it.</p> + +<p>Inspector Weymouth was standing by the writing-<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span>table. My mind cleared +rapidly now, and standing up, but without releasing the girl's hands, +so that I drew her up beside me, I said:</p> + +<p>"Weymouth—where is—?</p> + +<p>"He's waiting to see you, doctor," replied the Inspector.</p> + +<p>A pang, almost physical, struck at my heart.</p> + +<p>"Poor, dear old Smith!" I cried, with a break in my voice.</p> + +<p>Dr. Gray, a neighbouring practitioner, appeared in the doorway at the +moment that I spoke the words.</p> + +<p>"It's all right, Petrie," he said, reassuringly; "I think we took it +in time. I have thoroughly cauterised the wounds, and granted that no +complication sets in, he'll be on his feet again in a week or two."</p> + +<p>I suppose I was in a condition closely bordering upon the hysterical. +At any rate, my behaviour was extraordinary. I raised both my hands +above my head.</p> + +<p>"Thank God!" I cried at the top of my voice, "thank God!—thank God!"</p> + +<p>"Thank Him, indeed," responded the musical voice of Azîz. He spoke +with all the passionate devoutness of the true Moslem.</p> + +<p>Everything, even Kâramanèh, was forgotten, and I started for the door +as though my life depended upon my speed. With one foot upon the +landing, I turned, looked back, and met the glance of Inspector +Weymouth.</p> + +<p>"What have you done with the—body?" I asked.</p> + +<p>"We haven't been able to get to it. That end of the vault collapsed +two minutes after we hauled you out!"</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>As I write, now, of these strange days, already they seem remote and +unreal. But, where other<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span> and more dreadful memories already are grown +misty, the memory of that evening in my rooms remains clear-cut and +intimate. It marked a crisis in my life.</p> + +<p>During the days that immediately followed, whilst Smith was slowly +recovering from his hurts, I made my plans, deliberately; I prepared +to cut myself off from old associations—prepared to exile myself, +gladly; how gladly I cannot hope to express in mere cold words.</p> + +<p>That my friend approved of my projects I cannot truthfully state, but +his disapproval at least was not openly expressed. To Kâramanèh I said +nothing of my plans, but her complete reliance in my powers to protect +her, now, from all harm, was at once pathetic and exquisite.</p> + +<p>Since, always, I have sought in these chronicles, to confine myself to +the facts directly relating to the malignant activity of Dr. +Fu-Manchu, I shall abstain from burdening you with details of my +private affairs. As an instrument of the Chinese doctor, it has +sometimes been my duty to write of the beautiful Eastern girl; I +cannot suppose that my readers have any further curiosity respecting +her from the moment that Fate freed her from that awful servitude. +Therefore, when I shall have dealt with the episodes which marked our +voyage to Egypt—I had opened negotiations in regard to a practice in +Cairo—I may honourably lay down my pen.</p> + +<p>These episodes opened, dramatically upon the second night of the +voyage from Marseilles.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXI" id="CHAPTER_XXXI"></a>CHAPTER XXXI</h2> + +<h3>"MY SHADOW LIES UPON YOU"</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">I </span></p> +<p> suppose I did not awake very readily. Following the nervous +vigilance of the past six months, my tired nerves, in the enjoyment of +this relaxation, were rapidly recuperating. I no longer feared to +awaken to find a knife at my throat, no longer dreaded the darkness as +a foe.</p> + +<p>So that the voice may have been calling (indeed, <i>had</i> been calling) +for some time, and of this I had been hazily conscious before finally +I awoke. Then, ere the new sense of security came to reassure me, the +old sense of impending harm set my heart leaping nervously. There is +always a certain physical panic attendant upon such awakenings in the +still of night, especially in novel surroundings. Now I sat up +abruptly, clutching at the rail of my berth and listening.</p> + +<p>There was a soft thudding on my cabin door, and a voice, low and +urgent, was crying my name.</p> + +<p>Through the port-hole the moonlight streamed into my room, and save +for a remote and soothing throb, inseparable from the progress of a +great steamship, nothing else disturbed the stillness; I might have +floated lonely upon the bosom of the Mediterranean. But there was the +drumming on the door again, and the urgent appeal:</p> + +<p>"Dr. Petrie! Dr. Petrie!"</p> + +<p>I threw off the bedclothes and stepped on to the floor of the cabin, +fumbling hastily for my slippers. A fear that something was amiss, +that some aftermath, some wraith of the dread Chinaman, was yet to +come to disturb our premature peace, began to haunt me. I threw open +the door.</p> + +<p>Upon the gleaming deck, blackly outlined against<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span> a wondrous sky, +stood a man who wore a blue greatcoat over his pyjamas, and whose +unstockinged feet were thrust into red slippers. It was Platts, the +Marconi operator.</p> + +<p>"I'm awfully sorry to disturb you, Dr. Petrie," he said, "and I was +even less anxious to arouse your neighbour; but somebody seems to be +trying to get a message, presumably urgent, through to you."</p> + +<p>"To me!" I cried.</p> + +<p>"I cannot make it out," admitted Platts, running his fingers through +dishevelled hair, "but I thought it better to arouse you. Will you +come up?"</p> + +<p>I turned without a word, slipped into my dressing-gown, and with +Platts passed aft along the deserted deck. The sea was as calm as a +great lake. Ahead, on the port bow, an angry flambeau burnt redly +beneath the peaceful vault of the heavens. Platts nodded absently in +the direction of the weird flames.</p> + +<p>"Stromboli," he said; "we shall be nearly through the Straits by +breakfast-time."</p> + +<p>We mounted the narrow stair to the Marconi deck. At the table sat +Platts' assistant with the Marconi attachment upon his head—an +apparatus which always set me thinking of the electric chair.</p> + +<p>"Have you got it?" demanded my companion as we entered the room.</p> + +<p>"It's still coming through," replied the other without moving, "but in +the same jerky fashion. Every time I get it, it seems to have gone +back to the beginning—just <i>Dr. Petrie</i>—<i>Dr. Petrie</i>."</p> + +<p>He began to listen again for the elusive message. I turned to Platts.</p> + +<p>"Where is it being sent from?" I asked.</p> + +<p>Platts shook his head.</p> + +<p>"That's the mystery," he declared. "Look!"—he pointed to the table; +"according to the Marconi chart, there's a Messageries boat due west +between us and Marseilles, and the homeward-bound P. & O. which we +passed this morning must be getting on<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span> that way also, by now. The +<i>Isis</i> is somewhere ahead, but I've spoken all these, and the message +comes from none of them."</p> + +<p>"Then it may come from Messina."</p> + +<p>"It doesn't come from Messina," replied the man at the table, +beginning to write rapidly.</p> + +<p>Platts stepped forward and bent over the message which the other was +writing.</p> + +<p>"Here it is!" he cried excitedly; "we're getting it."</p> + +<p>Stepping in turn to the table, I leant over between the two and read +these words as the operator wrote them down: <i>Dr. Petrie</i>—<i>my +shadow</i>....</p> + +<p>I drew a quick breath and gripped Platt's shoulder harshly. His +assistant began fingering the instrument with irritation.</p> + +<p>"Lost it again!" he muttered.</p> + +<p>"This message...." I began.</p> + +<p>But again the pencil was travelling over the paper:—<i>lies upon you +all</i> ... <i>end of message</i>.</p> + +<p>The operator stood up and unclasped the receivers from his ears. +There, high above the sleeping ship's company, with the blue carpet of +the Mediterranean stretched indefinitely about us, we three stood +looking at one another. By virtue of a miracle of modern science, some +one, divided from me by mile upon mile of boundless ocean, had +spoken—and had been heard.</p> + +<p>"Is there no means of learning," I said, "from whence this message +emanated?"</p> + +<p>Platts shook his head, perplexedly.</p> + +<p>"They gave no code word," he said. "God knows who they were. It's a +strange business and a strange message. Have you any sort of idea, Dr. +Petrie, respecting the identity of the sender?"</p> + +<p>I stared him hard in the face; an idea had mechanically entered my +mind, but one of which I did not choose to speak, since it was opposed +to human possibility.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span></p> + +<p>But had I not seen with my own eyes the bloody streak across his +forehead as the shot fired by Kâramanèh entered his high skull, had I +not known, so certainly as it is given to men to know, that the giant +intellect was no more, the mighty will impotent, I should have +replied:</p> + +<p>"The message is from Dr. Fu Manchu!"</p> + +<p>My reflections were rudely terminated and my sinister thoughts given +new stimulus, by a loud though muffled cry which reached me from +somewhere in the ship below. Both my companions started as violently +as I, whereby I knew that the mystery of the wireless message had not +been without its effect upon their minds also. But whereas they paused +in doubt, I leapt from the room and almost threw myself down the +ladder.</p> + +<p>It was Kâramanèh who had uttered that cry of fear and horror!</p> + +<p>Although I could perceive no connection betwixt the strange message +and the cry in the night, intuitively I linked them, intuitively I +knew that my fears had been well grounded; that the shadow of Fu +Manchu still lay upon us.</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh occupied a large stateroom aft on the main deck; so that I +had to descend from the upper deck on which my own room was situated +to the promenade deck, again to the main deck, and thence proceed +nearly the whole length of the alleyway.</p> + +<p>Kâramanèh and her brother, Azîz, who occupied a neighbouring room, met +me, near the library. Kâramanèh's eyes were wide with fear; her +peerless colouring had fled, and she was white to the lips. Azîz, who +wore a dressing-gown thrown hastily over his night attire, had his arm +protectively about the girl's shoulders.</p> + +<p>"The mummy!" she whispered tremulously, "the mummy!"</p> + +<p>There came a sound of opening doors, and several passengers, whom +Kâramanèh's cries had alarmed,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span> appeared in various stages of undress. +A stewardess came running from the far end of the alleyway, and I +found time to wonder at my own speed; for, starting from the distant +Marconi deck, yet I had been the first to arrive upon the scene.</p> + +<p>Stacey, the ship's doctor, was quartered at no great distance from the +spot, and he now joined the group. Anticipating the question which +trembled upon the lips of several of those about me—</p> + +<p>"Come to Dr. Stacey's room," I said, taking Kâramanèh's arm; "we will +give you something to enable you to sleep." I turned to the group. "My +patient has had severe nerve trouble," I explained, "and has developed +somnambulistic tendencies."</p> + +<p>I declined the stewardess's offer of assistance, with a slight shake +of the head, and shortly the four of us entered the doctor's cabin, on +the deck above. Stacey carefully closed the door. He was an old +fellow-student of mine, and already he knew much of the history of the +beautiful Eastern girl and her brother Azîz.</p> + +<p>"I fear there's mischief afoot, Petrie," he said. "Thanks to your +presence of mind, the ship's gossips need know nothing of it."</p> + +<p>I glanced at Kâramanèh, who, since the moment of my arrival, had never +once removed her gaze from me; she remained in that state of passive +fear in which I had found her, the lovely face pallid; and she stared +at me fixedly in a childish, expressionless way which made me dread +that the shock to which she had been subjected, whatever its nature, +had caused a relapse into that strange condition of forgetfulness from +which a previous shock had aroused her. I could see that Stacey shared +my view, for—</p> + +<p>"Something has frightened you," he said gently, seating himself on the +arm of Kâramanèh's chair and patting her hand as if to reassure her. +"Tell us all about it."</p> + +<p>For the first time since our meeting that night,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span> the girl turned her +eyes from me and glanced up at Stacey, a sudden warm blush stealing +over her face and throat and as quickly departing, to leave her even +more pale than before. She grasped Stacey's hand in both her own—and +looked again at me.</p> + +<p>"Send for Mr. Nayland Smith without delay!" she said, and her sweet +voice was slightly tremulous. "He must be put on his guard!"</p> + +<p>I started up.</p> + +<p>"Why?" I said. "For God's sake tell us what has happened!"</p> + +<p>Azîz, who evidently was as anxious as myself for information, and who +now knelt at his sister's feet looking up at her with that strange +love, which was almost adoration, in his eyes, glanced back at me and +nodded his head rapidly.</p> + +<p>"Something "—Kâramanèh paused, shuddering violently—"some dreadful +thing, like a mummy escaped from its tomb, came into my room to-night +through the port-hole...."</p> + +<p>"Through the port-hole?" echoed Dr. Stacey amazedly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, yes, through the port-hole! A creature tall and very, very thin. +He wore wrappings—yellow wrappings, swathed about his head, so that +only his eyes, his evil gleaming eyes, were visible.... From waist to +knees he was covered, also, but his body, his feet, and his legs were +bare...."</p> + +<p>"Was he—?" I began.</p> + +<p>"He was a brown man, yes." Kâramanèh, divining my question, nodded, +and the shimmering cloud of her wonderful hair, hastily confined, +burst free and rippled about her shoulders. "A gaunt, fleshless brown +man, who bent, and writhed bony fingers—so!"</p> + +<p>"A thug!" I cried.</p> + +<p>"He—it—the mummy thing—would have strangled me if I had slept, for +he crouched over the berth—seeking—seeking...."<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span></p> + +<p>I clenched my teeth convulsively.</p> + +<p>"But I was sitting up—"</p> + +<p>"With the light on?" interrupted Stacey in surprise.</p> + +<p>"No," added Kâramanèh; "the light was out." She turned her eyes toward +me, as the wonderful blush overspread her face once more. "I was +sitting thinking. It all happened within a few seconds, and quite +silently. As the mummy crouched over the berth, I unlocked the door +and leapt out into the passage. I think I screamed; I did not mean to. +Oh, Dr. Stacey, there is not a moment to spare! Mr. Nayland Smith must +be warned immediately. Some horrible servant of Dr. Fu-Manchu is on +the ship!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXII" id="CHAPTER_XXXII"></a>CHAPTER XXXII</h2> + +<h3>THE TRAGEDY</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">N </span></p> +<p>ayland Smith leant against the edge of the dressing-table, attired in +pyjamas. The little stateroom was hazy with smoke, and my friend +gripped the charred briar between his teeth and watched the blue-grey +clouds arising from the bowl, in an abstracted way. I knew that he was +thinking hard, and from the fact that he had exhibited no surprise +when I had related to him the particulars of the attack upon +Kâramanèh, I judged that he had half anticipated something of the +kind. Suddenly he stood up, staring at me fixedly.</p> + +<p>"Your tact has saved the situation, Petrie," he snapped. "It failed +you momentarily, though, when you proposed to me just now that we +should muster<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span> the lascars for inspection. Our game is to pretend that +we know nothing—that we believe Kâramanèh to have had a bad dream."</p> + +<p>"But, Smith—" I began.</p> + +<p>"It would be useless, Petrie," he interrupted me. "You cannot suppose +that I overlooked the possibility of some creature of the Doctor's +being among the lascars. I can assure you that not one of them answers +to the description of the midnight assailant. From the girl's account +we have to look (discarding the idea of a revivified mummy) for a man +of unusual height—and there's no lascar of unusual height on board; +and from the visible evidence, that he entered the stateroom through +the port-hole, we have to look for a man more than normally thin. In a +word, the servant of Dr. Fu-Manchu who attempted the life of Kâramanèh +is either in hiding in the ship, or if visible, is disguised."</p> + +<p>With his usual clarity, Nayland Smith had visualized the facts of the +case; I passed in mental survey each one of the passengers, and those +of the crew whose appearances were familiar to me, with the result +that I had to admit the justice of my friend's conclusions. Smith +began to pace the narrow strip of carpet between the dressing-table +and the door. Suddenly he began again.</p> + +<p>"From our knowledge of Fu-Manchu—and of the group surrounding him +(and, don't forget, <i>surviving</i> him)—we may further assume that the +wireless message was no gratuitous piece of melodrama, but that it was +directed to a definite end. Let us endeavour to link up the chain a +little. You occupy an upper-berth; so do I. Experience of the Chinaman +has formed a habit in both of us: that of sleeping with closed +windows. Your port was fastened and so was my own. Kâramanèh is +quartered on the main deck, and her brother's stateroom opens into the +same alleyway. Since the ship is in the Straits of Messina, and the +glass set fair, the stewards have<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span> not closed the port-holes nightly +at present. We know that that of Kâramanèh's stateroom was open. +Therefore, in any attempt upon our quarter, Kâramanèh would +automatically be selected for the victim, since failing you or myself +she may be regarded as being the most obnoxious to Dr. Fu-Manchu."</p> + +<p>I nodded comprehendingly. Smith's capacity for throwing the white +light of reason into the darkest places often amazed me.</p> + +<p>"You may have noticed," he continued, "that Kâramanèh's room is +directly below your own. In the event of any outcry, you would be +sooner upon the scene than I should, for instance, because I sleep on +the opposite side of the ship. This circumstance I take to be the +explanation of the wireless message, which, because of its hesitancy +(a piece of ingenuity very characteristic of the group), led to your +being awakened and invited up to the Marconi deck; in short, it gave +the would-be assassin a better chance of escaping before your +arrival."</p> + +<p>I watched my friend in growing wonder. The strange events, seemingly +having no link, took their place in the drama, and became well-ordered +episodes in a plot that only a criminal genius could have devised. As +I studied the keen, bronzed face, I realized to the full the +stupendous mental power of Dr. Fu-Manchu, measuring it by the +criterion of Nayland Smith's. For the cunning Chinaman, in a sense, +had foiled this brilliant man before me, whereby if by naught else I +might know him a master of his evil art.</p> + +<p>"I regard the episode," continued Smith, "as a posthumous attempt of +the Doctor's; a legacy of hate which may prove more disastrous than +any attempt made upon us by Fu-Manchu in life. Some fiendish member of +the murder group is on board the ship. We must, as always, meet guile +with guile. There must be no appeal to the Captain, no<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span> public +examination of passengers and crew. One attempt has failed; I do not +doubt that others will be made. At present, you will enact the rôle of +physician-in-attendance upon Kâramanèh, and will put it about for whom +it may interest that a slight return of her nervous trouble is causing +her to pass uneasy nights. I can safely leave this part of the case to +you, I think?"</p> + +<p>I nodded rapidly.</p> + +<p>"I haven't troubled to make inquiries," added Smith, "but I think it +probable that the regulation respecting closed ports will come into +operation immediately we have passed the Straits, or at any rate +immediately there is any likelihood of bad weather."</p> + +<p>"You mean—"</p> + +<p>"I mean that no alteration should be made in our habits. A second +attempt along similar lines is to be apprehended—to-night. After that +we may begin to look out for a new danger."</p> + +<p>"I pray we may avoid it," I said fervently.</p> + +<p>As I entered the saloon for breakfast in the morning, I was subjected +to solicitous inquiries from Mrs. Prior, the gossip of the ship. Her +room adjoined Kâramanèh's, and she had been one of the passengers +aroused by the girl's cries in the night. Strictly adhering to my +rôle, I explained that my patient was threatened with a second nervous +breakdown, and was subject to vivid and disturbing dreams. One or two +other inquiries I met in the same way, ere escaping to the corner +table reserved to us.</p> + +<p>That iron-bound code of conduct which rules the Anglo-Indian, in the +first days of the voyage had threatened to ostracise Kâramanèh and +Azîz, by reason of the Eastern blood to which their brilliant but +peculiar type of beauty bore witness. Smith's attitude, however—and, +in a Burmese Commissioner, it constituted something of a law—had done +much to break down the barriers; the extraordinary<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span> beauty of the girl +had done the rest. So that now, far from finding themselves shunned, +the society of Kâramanèh and her romantic-looking brother was +universally courted. The last inquiry that morning, respecting my +interesting patient, came from the Bishop of Damascus, a benevolent +old gentleman whose ancestry was not wholly innocent of Oriental +strains, and who sat at a table immediately behind me. As I settled +down to my porridge, he turned his chair slightly and bent to my ear.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Prior tells me that your charming friend was disturbed last +night," he whispered. "She seems rather pale this morning; I sincerely +trust that she is suffering no ill effect."</p> + +<p>I swung around, with a smile. Owing to my carelessness, there was a +slight collision, and the poor bishop, who had been invalided to +England after typhoid, in order to undergo special treatment, +suppressed an exclamation of pain, although his fine dark eyes gleamed +kindly upon me through the pebbles of his gold-rimmed pince-nez.</p> + +<p>Indeed, despite his Eastern blood, he might have posed for a Sadler +picture, his small and refined features seeming out of place above the +bulky body.</p> + +<p>"Can you forgive my clumsiness?" I began.</p> + +<p>But the bishop raised his small, slim-fingered hand of old-ivory hue +deprecatingly.</p> + +<p>His system was supercharged with typhoid bacilli, and, as sometimes +occurs, the superfluous "bugs" had sought exit. He could only walk +with the aid of two stout sticks, and bent very much at that. His left +leg had been surgically scraped to the bone, and I appreciated the +exquisite torture to which my awkwardness had subjected him. But he +would entertain no apologies, pressing his inquiry respecting +Kâramanèh, in the kindly manner which had made him so deservedly +popular on board.</p> + +<p>"Many thanks for your solicitude," I said; "I have promised her sound +repose to-night, and since<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span> my professional reputation is at stake, I +shall see that she secures it."</p> + +<p>In short, we were in pleasant company, and the day passed happily +enough and without notable event. Smith spent some considerable time +with the chief officer, wandering about unfrequented parts of the +ship. I learnt later that he had explored the lascars' quarters, the +forecastle, the engine-room, and had even descended to the stoke-hold; +but this was done so unostentatiously that it occasioned no comment.</p> + +<p>With the approach of evening, in place of that physical contentment +which usually heralds the dinner-hour, at sea, I experienced a fit of +the seemingly causeless apprehension which too often in the past had +harbingered the coming of grim events; which I had learnt to associate +with the nearing presence of one of Fu-Manchu's death-agents. In view +of the facts, as I afterwards knew them to be, I cannot account for +this.</p> + +<p>Yet, in an unexpected manner, my forebodings were realized. That night +I was destined to meet a sorrow surpassing any which my troubled life +had known. Even now I experience great difficulty in relating the +matters which befell, in speaking of the sense of irrevocable loss +which came to me. Briefly, then, at about ten minutes before the +dining hour, whilst all the passengers, myself included, were below, +dressing, a faint cry arose from somewhere aft on the upper deck—a +cry which was swiftly taken up by other voices, so that presently a +deck-steward echoed it immediately outside my own stateroom:</p> + +<p>"Man overboard! Man overboard!"</p> + +<p>All my premonitions rallying in that one sickening moment, I sprang +out on the deck, half dressed as I was, and leaping past the boat +which swung nearly opposite my door, craned over the rail, looking +astern.</p> + +<p>For a long time I could detect nothing unusual.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span> The engine-room +telegraph was ringing—and the motion of the screws momentarily +ceased; then, in response to further ringing, recommenced, but so as +to jar the whole structure of the vessel; whereby I knew that the +engines were reversed. Peering intently into the wake of the ship, I +was but dimly aware of the ever-growing turmoil around me, of the +swift mustering of a boat's crew, of the shouted orders of the third +officer. Suddenly I saw it—the sight which was to haunt me for +succeeding days and nights.</p> + +<p>Half in the streak of the wake and half out of it, I perceived the +sleeve of a white jacket, and, near to it, a soft felt hat. The sleeve +rose up once into clear view, seemed to describe a half-circle in the +air, then sank back again into the glassy swell of the water. Only the +hat remained floating upon the surface.</p> + +<p>By the evidence of the white sleeve alone I might have remained +unconvinced, although upon the voyage I had become familiar enough +with the drill shooting-jacket, but the presence of the grey felt hat +was almost conclusive.</p> + +<p>The man overboard was Nayland Smith!</p> + +<p>I cannot hope, writing now, to convey in any words at my command, a +sense, even remote, of the utter loneliness which in that dreadful +moment closed coldly down upon me.</p> + +<p>To spring overboard to the rescue was a natural impulse, but to have +obeyed it would have been worse than quixotic. In the first place, the +drowning man was close upon half a mile astern; in the second place, +others had seen the hat and the white coat as clearly as I; among them +the third officer, standing upright in the stern of the boat—which, +with commendable promptitude, had already been swung into the water. +The steamer was being put about, describing a wide arc around the +little boat dancing on the deep blue rollers....<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span></p> + +<p>Of the next hour, I cannot bear to write at all. Long as I had known +him, I was ignorant of my friend's powers as a swimmer, but I judged +that he must have been a poor one from the fact that he had sunk so +rapidly in a calm sea. Except the hat, no trace of Nayland Smith +remained when the boat got to the spot.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="CHAPTER_XXXIII" id="CHAPTER_XXXIII"></a>CHAPTER XXXIII</h2> + +<h3>THE MUMMY</h3> + +<p><span class="f2">D </span></p> +<p>inner was out of the question that night for all of us. Kâramanèh, +who had spoken no word, but, grasping my hands, had looked into my +eyes—her own glassy with unshed tears—and then stolen away to her +cabin, had not since reappeared. Seated upon my berth, I stared +unseeingly before me, upon a changed ship, a changed sea and sky—upon +another world. The poor old Bishop, my neighbour, had glanced in +several times, as he hobbled by, and his spectacles were unmistakably +humid; but even he had vouchsafed no word, realizing that my sorrow +was too deep for such consolation.</p> + +<p>When at last I became capable of connected thought, I found myself +faced by a big problem. Should I place the facts of the matter, as I +knew them to be, before the Captain? or could I hope to apprehend +Fu-Manchu's servant by the methods suggested by my poor friend? That +Smith's death was an accident, I did not believe for a moment; it was +impossible not to link it with the attempt upon Kâramanèh. In my +misery and doubt, I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span> determined to take counsel with Dr. Stacey. I +stood up, and passed out on to the deck.</p> + +<p>Those passengers whom I met on my way to his room regarded me in +respectful silence. By contrast, Stacey's attitude surprised and even +annoyed me.</p> + +<p>"I'd be prepared to stake all I possess—although it's not much," he +said, "that this was not the work of your hidden enemy."</p> + +<p>He blankly refused to give me his reasons for the statement and +strongly advised me to watch and wait but to make no communication to +the Captain.</p> + +<p>At this hour I can look back and savour again something of the +profound dejection of that time. I could not face the passengers; I +even avoided Kâramanèh and Azîz. I shut myself in my cabin and sat +staring aimlessly into the growing darkness. The steward knocked, +once, inquiring if I needed anything, but I dismissed him abruptly. So +I passed the evening and the greater part of the night.</p> + +<p>Those groups of promenaders who passed my door invariably were +discussing my poor friend's tragic end; but as the night wore on, the +deck grew empty, and I sat amid a silence that in my miserable state I +welcomed more than the presence of any friend, saving only the one +whom I should never welcome again.</p> + +<p>Since I had not counted the bells, to this day I have only the vaguest +idea respecting the time whereat the next incident occurred which it +is my duty to chronicle. Perhaps I was on the verge of falling asleep, +seated there as I was; at any rate, I could scarcely believe myself +awake, when, unheralded by any footsteps to indicate his coming, some +one who seemed to be crouching outside my stateroom, slightly raised +himself and peered in through the port-hole—which I had not troubled +to close.</p> + +<p>He must have been a fairly tall man to have looked in at all, and +although his features were indistinguishable in the darkness, his +outline, which<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span> was clearly perceptible against the white boat beyond, +was unfamiliar to me. He seemed to have a small and oddly swathed +head, and what I could make out of the gaunt neck and square shoulders +in some way suggested an unnatural thinness; in short, the smudgy +silhouette in the port-hole was weirdly like that of a <i>mummy</i>!</p> + +<p>For some moments I stared at the apparition; then, rousing myself from +the apathy into which I had sunk, I stood up very quickly and stepped +across the room. As I did so the figure vanished, and when I threw +open the door and looked out upon the deck ... the deck was wholly +untenanted!</p> + +<p>I realized at once that it would be useless, even had I chosen the +course, to seek confirmation of what I had seen from the officer on +the bridge: my own cabin, together with the one adjoining—that of the +Bishop—was not visible from the bridge.</p> + +<p>For some time I stood in my doorway, wondering in a disinterested +fashion which now I cannot explain, if the hidden enemy had revealed +himself to me, or if disordered imagination had played me a trick. +Later, I was destined to know the truth of the matter, but when at +last I fell into a troubled sleep, that night, I was still in some +doubt upon the point.</p> + +<p>My state of mind when I awakened on the following day was +indescribable; I found it difficult to doubt that Nayland Smith would +meet me on the way to the bath-room as usual, with the cracked briar +fuming between his teeth. I felt myself almost compelled to pass +around to his stateroom in order to convince myself that he was not +really there. The catastrophe was still unreal to me, and the world a +dream-world. Indeed, I retain scarcely any recollections of the +traffic of that day, or of the days that followed it until we reached +Port Said.</p> + +<p>Two things only made any striking appeal to my dulled intelligence at +that time. These were: the aloof attitude of Dr. Stacey, who seemed +carefully<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span> to avoid me; and a curious circumstance which the second +officer mentioned in conversation one evening as we strolled up and +down the main deck together.</p> + +<p>"Either I was fast asleep at my post, Dr. Petrie," he said, "or last +night, in the middle watch, someone or something came over the side of +the ship just aft the bridge, slipped across the deck, and +disappeared."</p> + +<p>I stared at him wonderingly.</p> + +<p>"Do you mean something that came up out of the sea?" I said.</p> + +<p>"Nothing could very well have come up out of the sea," he replied, +smiling slightly, "so that it must have come up from the deck below."</p> + +<p>"Was it a man?"</p> + +<p>"It looked like a man, and a fairly tall one, but he came and was gone +like a fish, and I saw no more of him up to the time I was relieved. +To tell you the truth, I did not report it because I thought I must +have been dozing; it's a dead slow watch, and the navigation on this +part of the run is child's play."</p> + +<p>I was on the point of telling him what I had seen myself, two evenings +before, but for some reason I refrained from doing so, although I +think, had I confided in him, he would have abandoned the idea that +what he had seen was phantasmal; for the pair of us could not very +well have been dreaming. Some malignant presence haunted the ship; I +could not doubt this; yet I remained passive, sunk in a lethargy of +sorrow.</p> + +<p>We were scheduled to reach Port Said at about eight o'clock in the +evening, but by reason of the delay occasioned so tragically, I learnt +that in all probability we should not arrive earlier than midnight, +whilst passengers would not go ashore until the following morning. +Kâramanèh, who had been staring ahead all day, seeking a first glimpse +of her native land, was determined to remain up until the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span> hour of our +arrival, but after dinner a notice was posted up stating that we +should not be in before two a.m. Even those passengers who were the +most enthusiastic thereupon determined to postpone, for a few hours, +their first glimpse of the land of the Pharaohs and even to forgo the +sight—one of the strangest and most interesting in the world—of Port +Said by night.</p> + +<p>For my own part, I confess that all the interest and hope with which I +had looked forward to our arrival had left me, and often I detected +tears in the eyes of Kâramanèh; whereby I knew that the coldness in my +heart had manifested itself even to her. I had sustained the greatest +blow of my life, and not even the presence of so lovely a companion +could entirely recompense me for the loss of my dearest friend.</p> + +<p>The lights on the Egyptian shore were faintly visible when the last +group of stragglers on deck broke up. I had long since prevailed upon +Kâramanèh to retire, and now, utterly sick at heart, I sought my own +stateroom, mechanically undressed, and turned in.</p> + +<p>It may, or may not be singular that I had neglected all precautions +since the night of the tragedy; I was not even conscious of a desire +to visit retribution upon our hidden enemy; in some strange fashion I +took it for granted that there would be no further attempts upon +Kâramanèh, Azîz, or myself. I had not troubled to confirm Smith's +surmise respecting the closing of the port-holes; but I know now for a +fact that, whereas they had been closed from the time of our leaving +the Straits of Messina, to-night, in sight of the Egyptian coasts, the +regulation was relaxed again. I cannot say if this is usual, but that +it occurred on this ship is a fact to which I can testify—a fact to +which my attention was to be drawn dramatically.</p> + +<p>The night was steamingly hot, and because I<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span> welcomed the circumstance +that my own port was widely opened, I reflected that those on the +lower decks might be open also. A faint sense of danger stirred within +me; indeed, I sat upright and was about to spring out of my berth when +that occurred which induced me to change my mind.</p> + +<p>All passengers had long since retired, and a midnight silence +descended upon the ship, for we were not yet close enough to port for +any unusual activities to have commenced.</p> + +<p>Clearly outlined in the open port-hole there suddenly arose that same +grotesque silhouette which I had seen once before.</p> + +<p>Prompted by I know not what, I lay still and simulated heavy +breathing; for it was evident to me that I must be partly visible to +the watcher, so bright was the night. For ten—twenty—thirty seconds +he studied me in absolute silence, that gaunt thing so like a mummy; +and, my eyes partly closed, I watched him, breathing heavily all the +time. Then making no more noise than a cat, he moved away across the +deck, and I could judge of his height by the fact that his small +swathed head remained visible almost to the time that he passed to the +end of the white boat which swung opposite my stateroom.</p> + +<p>In a moment I slipped quietly to the floor, crossed and peered out of +the port-hole; so that at last I had a clear view of the sinister +mummy-man. He was crouching under the bow of the boat, and attaching +to the white rails, below, a contrivance of a kind with which I was +not entirely unfamiliar. This was a thin ladder of silken rope, having +bamboo rungs, with two metal hooks for attaching it to any suitable +object.</p> + +<p>The one thus engaged was, as Kâramanèh had declared, almost +superhumanly thin. His loins were swathed in a sort of linen garment, +and his head so bound about, turban fashion, that only his gleaming +eyes remained visible. The bare limbs and body<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span> were of a dusky yellow +colour, and, at sight of him, I experienced a sudden nausea.</p> + +<p>My pistol was in my cabin-trunk, and to have found it in the dark, +without making a good deal of noise, would have been impossible. +Doubting how I should act, I stood watching the man with the swathed +head whilst he threw the end of the ladder over the side, crept past +the bow of the boat, and swung his gaunt body over the rail, +exhibiting the agility of an ape. One quick glance fore and aft he +gave, then began to swarm down the ladder; in which instant I knew his +mission.</p> + +<p>With a choking cry, which forced itself unwilled from my lips, I tore +at the door, threw it open, and sprang across the deck. Plans, I had +none, and since I carried no instrument wherewith to sever the ladder, +the murderer might indeed have carried out his design for all that I +could have done to prevent him, were it not that another took a hand +in the game....</p> + +<p>At the moment that the mummy-man—his head now on a level with the +deck—perceived me, he stopped dead. Coincident with his stopping, the +crack of a pistol sounded—from immediately beyond the boat.</p> + +<p>Uttering a sort of sobbing sound, the creature fell—then clutched, +with straining yellow fingers, at the rails, and, seemingly by dint of +a great effort, swarmed along aft some twenty feet, with incredible +swiftness and agility, and clambered on to the deck.</p> + +<p>A second shot cracked sharply; and a voice (God, was I mad?) cried: +"Hold him, Petrie!"</p> + +<p>Rigid with fearful astonishment I stood, as out from the boat above me +leapt a figure attired solely in shirt and trousers. The new-comer +leapt away in the wake of the mummy-man—who had vanished around the +corner by the smokeroom. Over his shoulder he cried back at me:<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span></p> + +<p>"The Bishop's stateroom! See that no one enters!"</p> + +<p>I clutched at my head—which seemed to be fiery hot; I realized, in my +own person, the sensations of one who knows himself mad.</p> + +<p>For the man who pursued the mummy was <i>Nayland Smith</i>!</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;' /> + +<p>I stood in the Bishop's stateroom, Nayland Smith, his gaunt face wet +with perspiration, beside me, handling certain odd-looking objects +which littered the place, and lay about amid the discarded garments of +the absent cleric.</p> + +<p>"Pneumatic pads!" he snapped. "The man was a walking air-cushion!" He +gingerly fingered two strange rubber appliances. "For distending the +cheeks," he muttered, dropping them disgustedly on the floor. "His +hands and wrists betrayed him, Petrie. He wore his cuffs unusually +long but could not entirely hide his bony wrists. To have watched him, +whilst remaining myself unseen, was next to impossible; hence my +device of tossing a dummy overboard, calculated to float for less than +ten minutes! It actually floated nearly fifteen, as a matter of fact, +and I had some horrible moments!"</p> + +<p>"Smith!" I said, "how could you submit me ...?"</p> + +<p>He clapped his hands on my shoulders.</p> + +<p>"My dear old chap—there was no other way, believe me. From that boat +I could see right into his stateroom, but, once in, I dare not leave +it—except late at night, stealthily! The second spotted me one night +and I thought the game was up, but evidently he didn't report it."</p> + +<p>"But you might have confided...."</p> + +<p>"Impossible! I'll admit I nearly fell to the temptation that first +night; for I could see into your room as well as into his!" He slapped +me boister<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span>ously on the back, but his grey eyes were suspiciously +moist. "Dear old Petrie! Thank God for our friends! But you'd be the +first to admit, old man, that you're a dead poor actor! Your portrayal +of grief for the loss of a valued chum would not have convinced a soul +on board!</p> + +<p>"Therefore I made use of Stacey, whose callous attitude was less +remarkable. Gad, Petrie! I nearly bagged our man the first night! The +elaborate plan—Marconi message to get you out of the way, and so +forth—had miscarried, and he knew the port-hole trick would be +useless once we got into the open sea. He took a big chance. He +discarded his clerical guise and peeped into your room—you +remember?—but you were awake, and I made no move when he slipped back +to his own cabin; I wanted to take him red-handed."</p> + +<p>"Have you any idea ...?"</p> + +<p>"Who he is? No more than <i>where</i> he is! Probably some creature of Dr. +Fu-Manchu specially chosen for the purpose; obviously a man of +culture, and probably of thug ancestry. I hit him—in the shoulder; +but even then he ran like a hare. We've searched the ship, without +result. He may have gone overboard and chanced the swim to shore...."</p> + +<p>We stepped out on to the deck. Around us was that unforgettable +scene—Port Said by night. The ship was barely moving through the +glassy water, now. Smith took my arm and we walked forward. Above us +was the mighty peace of Egypt's sky ablaze with splendour; around and +about us moved the unique turmoil of the clearing-house of the Near +East.</p> + +<p>"I would give much to know the real identity of the Bishop of +Damascus," muttered Smith.</p> + +<p>He stopped abruptly, snapping his teeth together and grasping my arm +as in a vice. Hard upon his words had followed the rattling clangour +as the great anchor was let go; but horribly intermingled<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span> with the +metallic roar there came to us such a fearful inarticulate shrieking +as to chill one's heart.</p> + +<p>The anchor plunged into the water of the harbour; the shrieking +ceased. Smith turned to me, and his face was tragic in the light of +the arc lamp swung hard by.</p> + +<p>"We shall never know," he whispered. "God forgive him—he must be in +bloody tatters now. Petrie, the poor fool was hiding in the +<i>chain-locker!</i>"</p> + +<p>A little hand stole into mine. I turned quickly. Kâramanèh stood +beside me. I placed my arm about her shoulders, drawing her close; and +I blush to relate that all else was forgotten.</p> + +<p>For a moment, heedless of the fearful turmoil forward, Nayland Smith +stood looking at us. Then he turned, with his rare smile, and walked +aft.</p> + +<p>"Perhaps you're right, Petrie!" he said.</p> + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + +<h2>Uniform with this Volume</h2> +<table class="tb1" summary="List of Books"> +<tr><td class="tocch">36</td> + <td> </td> + <td>De Profundis</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">37</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Lord Arthur Savile's Crime</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">38</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Selected Poems</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">39</td> + <td> </td> + <td>An Ideal Husband</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">40</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Intentions</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">41</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Lady Windermere's Fan</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">77</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Selected Prose</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">85</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Importance of Being Earnest</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">146</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Woman of No Importance</td><td>Oscar Wilde</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">43</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Harvest Home</td><td>E. V. Lucas</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">44</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Little of Everything</td><td>E. V. Lucas</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">78</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Best of Lamb</td><td>E. V. Lucas</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">141</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Variety Lane</td><td>E. V. Lucas</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">292</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Mixed Vintages</td><td>E. V. Lucas</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">45</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Vailima Letters</td><td>Robert Louis Stevenson</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">80</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Selected Letters</td><td>Robert Louis Stevenson</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">46</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Hills and the Sea</td><td>Hilaire Belloc</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">96</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Picked Company</td><td>Hilaire Belloc</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">193</td> + <td> </td> + <td>On Nothing</td><td>Hilaire Belloc</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">226</td> + <td> </td> + <td>On Everything</td><td>Hilaire Belloc</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">254</td> + <td> </td> + <td>On Something</td><td>Hilaire Belloc</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">47</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Blue Bird</td><td>Maurice Maeterlinck</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">214</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Select Essays</td><td>Maurice Maeterlinck</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">50</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Charles Dickens</td><td>G. K. Chesterton</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">94</td> + <td> </td> + <td>All Things Considered</td><td>G. K. Chesterton</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">346</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Tremendous Trifles</td><td>G. K. Chesterton</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">54</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Life of John Ruskin</td><td>W. G. Collingwood</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">57</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Sevastopol and other Stories</td><td>Leo Tolstoy</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">91</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Social Evils and their Remedy</td><td>Leo Tolstoy</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">223</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Two Generations</td><td>Leo Tolstoy</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">253</td> + <td> </td> + <td>My Childhood and Boyhood</td><td>Leo Tolstoy</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">286</td> + <td> </td> + <td>My Youth</td><td>Leo Tolstoy</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">58</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Lore of the Honey-Bee</td><td>Tickner Edwardes</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">63</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Oscar Wilde</td><td>Arthur Ransome</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">64</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Vicar of Morwenstow</td><td>S. Baring-Gould</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">76</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Home Life in France</td><td>M. Betham-Edwards</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">83</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Reason and Belief</td><td>Sir Oliver Lodge</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">93</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Substance of Faith</td><td>Sir Oliver Lodge</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">116</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Survival of Man</td><td>Sir Oliver Lodge</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">284</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Modern Problems</td><td>Sir Oliver Lodge</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">95</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Mirror of the Sea</td><td>Joseph Conrad</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">126</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Science from an Easy Chair</td><td>Sir Ray Lankester</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">326</td> + <td> </td> + <td>More Science from an Easy Chair</td><td>Sir Ray Lankester</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">149</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Shepherd's Life</td><td>W. H. Hudson</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">200</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Jane Austen and her Times</td><td>G. E. Mitton</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">218</td> + <td> </td> + <td>R. L. S.</td><td>Francis Watt</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">285</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Old Time Parson</td><td>P. H. Ditchfield</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">287</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Customs of Old England</td><td>F. J. Snell</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">71</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Gates of Wrath</td><td>Arnold Bennett</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">81</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Card</td><td>Arnold Bennett</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">125</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Regent</td><td>Arnold Bennett</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">288</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Great Man</td><td>Arnold Bennett</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">316</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Whom God Hath Joined</td><td>Arnold Bennett</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">355</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Man from the North</td><td>Arnold Bennett</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">4</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Spanish Gold</td><td>G. A. Birmingham</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">87</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Lalage's Lovers</td><td>G. A. Birmingham</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">108</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Adventures of Dr. Whitty</td><td>G. A. Birmingham</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">349</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Island Mystery</td><td>G. A. Birmingham</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">296</td> + <td> </td> + <td>William, by the Grace of God</td><td>Marjorie Bowen</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">342</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Jean of the Lazy A</td><td>B. M. Bower</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">261</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Tarzan of the Apes</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">304</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Return of Tarzan</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">368</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Beasts of Tarzan</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">382</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Son of Tarzan</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">383</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">384</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Jungle Tales of Tarzan</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">385</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Princess of Mars</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">392</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Gods of Mars</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">393</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Warlord of Mars</td><td>Edgar Rice Burroughs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">315</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Flying Inn</td><td>G. K. Chesterton</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">212</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Under Western Eyes</td><td>Joseph Conrad</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">325</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Set of Six</td><td>Joseph Conrad</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">143</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Sandy Married</td><td>Dorothea Conyers</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">1</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Mighty Atom</td><td>Marie Corelli</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">2</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Jane</td><td>Marie Corelli</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">3</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Boy</td><td>Marie Corelli</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">231</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Cameos</td><td>Marie Corelli</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">336</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The O'Ruddy</td><td>Stephen Crane and Robert Barr</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">18</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Round the Red Lamp</td><td>Sir A. Conan Doyle</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">332</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Rachel</td><td>Jane H. Findlater</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">396</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Tongues of Conscience</td><td>Robert Hichens</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">20</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Light Freights</td><td>W. W. Jacobs</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">92</td> + <td> </td> + <td>White Fang</td><td>Jack London</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">374</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Ninety-six Hours' Leave</td><td>Stephen McKenna</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">389</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Sixth Sense</td><td>Stephen McKenna</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">330</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Fortune of Christina McNab</td><td>S. Macnaughtan</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">303</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Carissima</td><td>Lucas Malet</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">391</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Clementina</td><td>A. E. W. Mason</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">289</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Rest Cure</td><td>W. B. Maxwell</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">334</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Bellamy</td><td>Elinor Mordaunt</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">215</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo</td><td>E. Phillips Oppenheim</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">295</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Hillman</td><td>E. Phillips Oppenheim</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">276</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Mary All-alone</td><td>John Oxenham</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">329</td> + <td> </td> + <td>'1914'</td><td>John Oxenham</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">399</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Closed Book</td><td>Wm. Le Queux</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">113</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Lavender and Old Lace</td><td>Myrtle Reed</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">135</td> + <td> </td> + <td>A Spinner in the Sun</td><td>Myrtle Reed</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">343</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Shadow of Victory</td><td>Myrtle Reed</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">137</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu</td><td>Sax Rohmer</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">290</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Devil Doctor</td><td>Sax Rohmer</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">293</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Si-Fan Mysteries</td><td>Sax Rohmer</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">352</td> + <td> </td> + <td>Tales of Secret Egypt</td><td>Sax Rohmer</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">388</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Orchard of Tears</td><td>Sax Rohmer</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">395</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Golden Scorpion</td><td>Sax Rohmer</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">229</td> + <td> </td> + <td>My Friend the Chauffeur</td><td>C. N. and A. M. Williamson</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">279</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The War Wedding</td><td>C. N. and A. M. Williamson</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">344</td> + <td> </td> + <td>This Woman to this Man</td><td>C. N. and A. M. Williamson</td></tr> +<tr><td class="tocch">9</td> + <td> </td> + <td>The Unofficial Honeymoon</td><td>Dolf Wyllarde</td></tr> +</table> + +<h3>A short Selection only.</h3> + +<hr style='width: 65%;' /> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil Doctor, by Sax Rohmer + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL DOCTOR *** + +***** This file should be named 19142-h.htm or 19142-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/4/19142/ + +Produced by David Clarke, Sankar Viswanathan, and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. + + +</pre> + +</body> +</html> diff --git a/19142.txt b/19142.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6e2928d --- /dev/null +++ b/19142.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10058 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil Doctor, by Sax Rohmer + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Devil Doctor + +Author: Sax Rohmer + +Release Date: August 29, 2006 [EBook #19142] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL DOCTOR *** + + + + +Produced by David Clarke, Sankar Viswanathan, and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + THE + DEVIL DOCTOR + + + + HITHERTO UNPUBLISHED ADVENTURES IN + THE CAREER OF THE MYSTERIOUS + DR. FU-MANCHU + + + BY + + + SAX ROHMER + + + + SIXTH EDITION + + + + METHUEN & CO. LTD. + 36 ESSEX STREET W.C. + LONDON + + + + _First Published (Crown 8vo) March 2nd, 1916_ + + * * * * * + + + + +CONTENTS + + +CHAP. + +I A MIDNIGHT SUMMONS + +II ELTHAM VANISHES + +III THE WIRE JACKET + +IV THE CRY OF A NIGHTHAWK + +V THE NET + +VI UNDER THE ELMS + +VII ENTER MR. ABEL SLATTIN + +VIII DR. FU-MANCHU STRIKES + +IX THE CLIMBER + +X THE CLIMBER RETURNS + +XI THE WHITE PEACOCK + +XII DARK EYES LOOK INTO MINE + +XIII THE SACRED ORDER + +XIV THE COUGHING HORROR + +XV BEWITCHMENT + +XVI THE QUESTING HANDS + +XVII ONE DAY IN RANGOON + +XVIII THE SILVER BUDDHA + +XIX DR. FU-MANCHU'S LABORATORY + +XX THE CROSSBAR + +XXI CRAGMIRE TOWER + +XXII THE MULATTO + +XXIII A CRY ON THE MOOR + +XXIV STORY OF THE GABLES + +XXV THE BELLS + +XXVI THE FIERY HAND + +XXVII THE NIGHT OF THE RAID + +XXVIII THE SAMURAI'S SWORD + +XXIX THE SIX GATES + +XXX THE CALL OF THE EAST + +XXXI "MY SHADOW LIES UPON YOU" + +XXXII THE TRAGEDY + +XXXIII THE MUMMY + + * * * * * + + + + +THE DEVIL DOCTOR + +CHAPTER I + +A MIDNIGHT SUMMONS + + +"When did you last hear from Nayland Smith?" asked my visitor. + +I paused, my hand on the siphon, reflecting for a moment. + +"Two months ago," I said: "he's a poor correspondent and rather +soured, I fancy." + +"What--a woman or something?" + +"Some affair of that sort. He's such a reticent beggar, I really know +very little about it." + +I placed a whisky and soda before the Rev. J. D. Eltham, also sliding +the tobacco jar nearer to his hand. The refined and sensitive face of +the clergyman offered no indication to the truculent character of the +man. His scanty fair hair, already grey over the temples, was silken +and soft-looking: in appearance he was indeed a typical English +churchman; but in China he had been known as "the fighting +missionary," and had fully deserved the title. In fact, this +peaceful-looking gentleman had directly brought about the Boxer +Risings! + +"You know," he said in his clerical voice, but meanwhile stuffing +tobacco into an old pipe with fierce energy, "I have often wondered, +Petrie--I have never left off wondering--" + +"What?" + +"That accursed Chinaman! Since the cellar place beneath the site of +the burnt-out cottage in Dulwich Village--I have wondered more than +ever." + +He lighted his pipe and walked to the hearth to throw the match in the +grate. + +"You see," he continued, peering across at me in his oddly nervous +way--"one never knows, does one? If I thought that Dr. Fu-Manchu lived; +if I seriously suspected that that stupendous intellect, that wonderful +genius, Petrie, er"--he hesitated characteristically--"survived, I +should feel it my duty--" + +"Well?" I said, leaning my elbows on the table and smiling slightly. + +"If that Satanic genius were not indeed destroyed, then the peace of +the world might be threatened anew at any moment!" + +He was becoming excited, shooting out his jaw in the truculent manner +I knew, and snapping his fingers to emphasize his words; a man +composed of the oddest complexities that ever dwelt beneath a clerical +frock. + +"He may have got back to China, doctor!" he cried, and his eyes had +the fighting glint in them. "Could you rest in peace if you thought +that he lived? Should you not fear for your life every time that a +night-call took you out alone? Why, man alive, it is only two years +since he was here amongst us, since we were searching every shadow for +those awful green eyes! What became of his band of assassins--his +stranglers, his dacoits, his damnable poisons and insects and +what-not--the army of creatures--" + +He paused, taking a drink. + +"You"--he hesitated diffidently--"searched in Egypt with Nayland +Smith, did you not?" + +I nodded. + +"Contradict me if I am wrong," he continued; "but my impression is +that you were searching for the girl--the girl--Karamaneh, I think +she was called?" + +"Yes," I replied shortly; "but we could find no trace--no trace." + +"You--er--were interested?" + +"More than I knew," I replied, "until I realized that I had--lost +her." + +"I never met Karamaneh, but from your account, and from others, she +was quite unusually--" + +"She was very beautiful," I said, and stood up, for I was anxious to +terminate that phase of the conversation. + +Eltham regarded me sympathetically; he knew something of my search +with Nayland Smith for the dark-eyed Eastern girl who had brought +romance into my drab life; he knew that I treasured my memories of her +as I loathed and abhorred those of the fiendish, brilliant Chinese +doctor who had been her master. + +Eltham began to pace up and down the rug, his pipe bubbling furiously; +and something in the way he carried his head reminded me momentarily +of Nayland Smith. Certainly, between this pink-faced clergyman, with +his deceptively mild appearance, and the gaunt, bronzed and +steely-eyed Burmese commissioner, there was externally little in +common; but it was some little nervous trick in his carriage that +conjured up through the smoke-haze one distant summer evening when +Smith had paced that very room as Eltham paced it now, when before my +startled eyes he had rung up the curtain upon the savage drama in +which, though I little suspected it then, Fate had cast me for a +leading role. + +I wondered if Eltham's thoughts ran parallel with mine. My own were +centred upon the unforgettable figure of the murderous Chinaman. These +words, exactly as Smith had used them, seemed once again to sound in +my ears: "Imagine a person, tall, lean and feline, high-shouldered, +with a brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven +skull and long magnetic eyes of the true cat green. Invest him with +all the cruel cunning of an entire Eastern race accumulated in one +giant intellect, with all the resources of science, past and present, +and you have a mental picture of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the 'Yellow Peril' +incarnate in one man." + +This visit of Eltham's no doubt was responsible for my mood; for this +singular clergyman had played his part in the drama of two years ago. + +"I should like to see Smith again," he said suddenly; "it seems a pity +that a man like that should be buried in Burma. Burma makes a mess of +the best of men, doctor. You said he was not married?" + +"No," I replied shortly, "and is never likely to be, now." + +"Ah, you hinted at something of the kind." + +"I know very little of it. Nayland Smith is not the kind of man to +talk much." + +"Quite so--quite so! And, you know, doctor, neither am I; but"--he was +growing painfully embarrassed--"it may be your due--I--er--I have a +correspondent, in the interior of China--" + +"Well?" I said, watching him in sudden eagerness. + +"Well, I would not desire to raise--vain hopes--nor to occasion, shall +I say, empty fears; but--er ... no, doctor!" He flushed like a girl. +"It was wrong of me to open this conversation. Perhaps, when I know +more--will you forget my words, for the time?" + +The 'phone bell rang. + +"Hullo!" cried Eltham--"hard luck, doctor!"--but I could see that he +welcomed the interruption. "Why!" he added, "it is one o'clock!" + +I went to the telephone. + +"Is that Dr. Petrie?" inquired a woman's voice. + +"Yes; who is speaking?" + +"Mrs. Hewett has been taken more seriously ill. Could you come at +once?" + +"Certainly," I replied, for Mrs. Hewett was not only a profitable +patient but an estimable lady. "I shall be with you in a quarter of an +hour." + +I hung up the receiver. + +"Something urgent?" asked Eltham, emptying his pipe. + +"Sounds like it. You had better turn in." + +"I should much prefer to walk over with you, if it would not be +intruding. Our conversation has ill prepared me for sleep." + +"Right!" I said, for I welcomed his company; and three minutes later +we were striding across the deserted common. + +A sort of mist floated amongst the trees, seeming in the moonlight +like a veil draped from trunk to trunk, as in silence we passed the +Mound Pond, and struck out for the north side of the common. + +I suppose the presence of Eltham and the irritating recollection of +his half-confidence were the responsible factors, but my mind +persistently dwelt upon the subject of Fu-Manchu and the atrocities +which he had committed during his sojourn in England. So actively was +my imagination at work that I felt again the menace which so long had +hung over me; I felt as though that murderous yellow cloud still cast +its shadow upon England. And I found myself longing for the company of +Nayland Smith. I cannot state what was the nature of Eltham's +reflections, but I can guess; for he was as silent as I. + +It was with a conscious effort that I shook myself out of this +morbidly reflective mood, on finding that we had crossed the common +and were come to the abode of my patient. + +"I shall take a little walk," announced Eltham; "for I gather that you +don't expect to be detained long? I shall never be out of sight of the +door, of course." + +"Very well," I replied, and ran up the steps. + +There were no lights to be seen in any of the windows, which +circumstance rather surprised me, as my patient occupied, or had +occupied when last I had visited her, a first-floor bedroom in the +front of the house. My knocking and ringing produced no response for +three or four minutes; then, as I persisted, a scantily clothed and +half-awake maid-servant unbarred the door and stared at me stupidly in +the moonlight. + +"Mrs. Hewett requires me?" I asked abruptly. + +The girl stared more stupidly than ever. + +"No, sir," she said: "she don't, sir; she's fast asleep!" + +"But some one 'phoned me!" I insisted, rather irritably, I fear. + +"Not from here, sir," declared the now wide-eyed girl. "We haven't got +a telephone, sir." + +For a few moments I stood there, staring as foolishly as she; then +abruptly I turned and descended the steps. At the gate I stood looking +up and down the road. The houses were all in darkness. What could be +the meaning of the mysterious summons? I had made no mistake +respecting the name of my patient; it had been twice repeated over the +telephone; yet that the call had not emanated from Mrs. Hewett's house +was now palpably evident. Days had been when I should have regarded +the episode as preluding some outrage, but to-night I felt more +disposed to ascribe it to a silly practical joke. + +Eltham walked up briskly. + +"You're in demand to-night, doctor," he said. "A young person called +for you almost directly you had left your house, and, learning where +you were gone, followed you." + +"Indeed!" I said, a trifle incredulously. "There are plenty of other +doctors if the case is an urgent one." + +"She may have thought it would save time as you were actually up and +dressed," explained Eltham; "and the house is quite near to here, I +understand." + +I looked at him a little blankly. Was this another effort of the +unknown jester? + +"I have been fooled once," I said. "That 'phone call was a hoax--" + +"But I feel certain," declared Eltham earnestly, "that this is +genuine! The poor girl was dreadfully agitated; her master has broken +his leg and is lying helpless: number 280 Rectory Grove." + +"Where is the girl?" I asked sharply. + +"She ran back directly she had given me her message." + +"Was she a servant?" + +"I should imagine so: French, I think. But she was so wrapped up I had +little more than a glimpse of her. I am sorry to hear that some one +has played a silly joke on you, but believe me"--he was very +earnest--"this is no jest. The poor girl could scarcely speak for +sobs. She mistook me for you, of course." + +"Oh!" said I grimly; "well, I suppose I must go. Broken leg, you +said?--and my surgical bag, splints and so forth, are at home!" + +"My dear Petrie!" cried Eltham, in his enthusiastic way, "you no doubt +can do something to alleviate the poor man's suffering immediately. I +will run back to your rooms for the bag and rejoin you at 280 Rectory +Grove." + +"It's awfully good of you, Eltham--" + +He held up his hand. + +"The call of suffering humanity, Petrie, is one which I may no more +refuse to hear than you." + +I made no further protest after that, for his point of view was +evident and his determination adamantine, but told him where he would +find the bag and once more set out across the moon-bright common, he +pursuing a westerly direction and I going east. + +Some three hundred yards I had gone, I suppose, and my brain had been +very active the while, when something occurred to me which placed a +new complexion upon this second summons. I thought of the falsity of +the first, of the improbability of even the most hardened practical +joker practising his wiles at one o'clock in the morning. I thought of +our recent conversation; above all I thought of the girl who had +delivered the message to Eltham, the girl whom he had described as a +French maid--whose personal charm had so completely enlisted his +sympathies. Now, to this train of thought came a new one, and, adding +it, my suspicion became almost a certainty. + +I remembered (as, knowing the district, I should have remembered +before) that there was no number 280 Rectory Grove. + +Pulling up sharply, I stood looking about me. Not a living soul was in +sight; not even a policeman. Where the lamps marked the main paths +across the common nothing moved; in the shadows about me nothing +stirred. But something stirred within me--a warning voice which for +long had lain dormant. + +What was afoot? + +A breeze caressed the leaves overhead, breaking the silence with +mysterious whisperings. Some portentous truth was seeking for +admittance to my brain. I strove to reassure myself, but the sense of +impending evil and of mystery became heavier. At last I could combat +my strange fears no longer. I turned and began to run towards the +south side of the common--towards my rooms--and after Eltham. + +I had hoped to head him off, but came upon no sign of him. An +all-night tramcar passed at the moment that I reached the high-road, +and as I ran around behind it I saw that my windows were lighted and +that there was a light in the hall. + +My key was yet in the lock when my housekeeper opened the door. + +"There's a gentleman just come, doctor," she began. + +I thrust past her and raced up the stairs to my study. + +Standing by the writing-table was a tall thin man, his gaunt face +brown as a coffee-berry and his steely grey eyes fixed upon me. My +heart gave a great leap--and seemed to stand still. + +It was Nayland Smith! + +"Smith!" I cried. "Smith, old man, by God, I'm glad to see you!" + +He wrung my hand hard, looking at me with his searching eyes; but +there was little enough of gladness in his face. He was altogether +greyer than when last I had seen him--greyer and sterner. + +"Where is Eltham?" I asked. + +Smith started back as though I had struck him. + +"Eltham!" he whispered--"_Eltham_! is Eltham here?" + +"I left him ten minutes ago on the common." + +Smith dashed his right fist into the palm of his left hand, and his +eyes gleamed almost wildly. + +"My God, Petrie!" he said, "am I fated _always_ to come too late?" + +My dreadful fears in that instant were confirmed. I seemed to feel my +legs totter beneath me. + +"Smith, you don't mean--" + +"I do, Petrie!" His voice sounded very far away. "Fu-Manchu is here; +and Eltham, God help him ... is his first victim!" + + + + +CHAPTER II + +ELTHAM VANISHES + + +Smith went racing down the stairs like a man possessed. Heavy with +such a foreboding of calamity as I had not known for two years, I +followed him--along the hall and out into the road. The very peace and +beauty of the night in some way increased my mental agitation. The sky +was lighted almost tropically with such a blaze of stars as I could +not recall to have seen since, my futile search concluded, I had left +Egypt. The glory of the moonlight yellowed the lamps speckled across +the expanse of the common. The night was as still as night can ever be +in London. The dimming pulse of a cab or car alone disturbed the +quietude. + +With a quick glance to right and left, Smith ran across on to the +common, and, leaving the door wide open behind me, I followed. The +path which Eltham had pursued terminated almost opposite to my house. +One's gaze might follow it, white and empty, for several hundred yards +past the pond, and farther, until it became overshadowed and was lost +amid a clump of trees. + +I came up with Smith, and side by side we ran on, whilst pantingly I +told my tale. + +"It was a trick to get you away from him!" cried Smith. "They meant no +doubt to make some attempt at your house, but, as he came out with +you, an alternative plan--" + +Abreast of the pond, my companion slowed down, and finally stopped. + +"Where did you last see Eltham?" he asked, rapidly. + +I took his arm, turning him slightly to the right, and pointed across +the moon-bathed common. + +"You see that clump of bushes on the other side of the road?" I said. +"There's a path to the left of it. I took that path and he took this. +We parted at the point where they meet--" + +Smith walked right down to the edge of the water and peered about over +the surface. + +What he hoped to find there I could not imagine. Whatever it had been +he was disappointed, and he turned to me again, frowning perplexedly, +and tugging at the lobe of his left ear, an old trick which reminded +me of gruesome things we had lived through in the past. + +"Come on," he jerked. "It may be amongst the trees." + +From the tone of his voice I knew that he was tensed up nervously, and +his mood but added to the apprehension of my own. + +"_What_ may be amongst the trees, Smith?" I asked. + +He walked on. + +"God knows, Petrie; but I fear--" + +Behind us, along the high-road, a tramcar went rocking by, doubtless +bearing a few belated workers homeward. The stark incongruity of the +thing was appalling. How little those weary toilers, hemmed about with +the commonplace, suspected that almost within sight from the car +windows, amid prosy benches, iron railings, and unromantic, flickering +lamps, two fellow-men moved upon the border of a horror-land! + +Beneath the trees a shadow carpet lay, its edges tropically sharp; and +fully ten yards from the first of the group, we two, hatless both, and +sharing a common dread, paused for a moment and listened. + +The car had stopped at the farther extremity of the common, and now +with a moan that grew to a shriek was rolling on its way again. We +stood and listened until silence reclaimed the night. Not a footstep +could be heard. Then slowly we walked on. At the edge of the little +coppice we stopped again abruptly. + +Smith turned and thrust his pistol into my hand. A white ray of light +pierced the shadows; my companion carried an electric torch. But no +trace of Eltham was discoverable. + +There had been a heavy shower of rain during the evening, just before +sunset, and although the open paths were dry again, under the trees +the ground was still moist. Ten yards within the coppice we came upon +tracks--the tracks of one running, as the deep imprints of the toes +indicated. + +Abruptly the tracks terminated; others, softer, joined them, two sets +converging from left and right. There was a confused patch, trailing +off to the west; then this became indistinct, and was finally lost, +upon the hard ground outside the group. + +For perhaps a minute, or more, we ran about from tree to tree, and +from bush to bush, searching like hounds for a scent, and fearful of +what we might find. We found nothing; and fully in the moonlight we +stood facing one another. The night was profoundly still. + +Nayland Smith stepped back into the shadows, and began slowly to turn +his head from left to right, taking in the entire visible expanse of +the common. Towards a point where the road bisected it he stared +intently. Then, with a bound, he set off! + +"Come on, Petrie!" he cried. "There they are!" + +Vaulting a railing he went away over a field like a madman. Recovering +from the shock of surprise, I followed him, but he was well ahead of +me, and making for some vaguely seen objects moving against the lights +of the roadway. + +Another railing was vaulted, and the corner of a second, triangular +grass patch crossed at a hot sprint. We were twenty yards from the +road when the sound of a starting motor broke the silence. We gained +the gravelled footpath only to see the tail-light of the car dwindling +to the north! + +Smith leant dizzily against a tree. + +"Eltham is in that car!" he gasped. "Just God! are we to stand here +and see him taken away to--?" + +He beat his fist upon the tree, in a sort of tragic despair. The +nearest cab-rank was no great distance away, but, excluding the +possibility of no cab being there, it might, for all practicable +purposes, as well have been a mile off. + +The beat of the retreating motor was scarcely audible; the lights +might but just be distinguished. Then, coming in an opposite +direction, appeared the headlamp of another car, of a car that raced +nearer and nearer to us, so that, within a few seconds of its first +appearance, we found ourselves bathed in the beam of its headlights. + +Smith bounded out into the road, and stood, a weird silhouette, with +upraised arms, fully in its course! + +The brakes were applied hurriedly. It was a big limousine, and its +driver swerved perilously in avoiding Smith and nearly ran into me. +But, the breathless moment past, the car was pulled up, head on to the +railings; and a man in evening clothes was demanding excitedly what +had happened. Smith, a hatless, dishevelled figure, stepped up to the +door. + +"My name is Nayland Smith," he said rapidly--"Burmese Commissioner." +He snatched a letter from his pocket and thrust it into the hands of +the bewildered man. "Read that. It is signed by another +Commissioner--the Commissioner of Police." + +With amazement written all over him, the other obeyed. + +"You see," continued my friend tersely, "it is _carte blanche_. I wish +to commandeer your car, sir, on a matter of life and death!" + +The other returned the letter. + +"Allow me to offer it!" he said, descending. "My man will take your +orders. I can finish my journey by cab. I am--" + +But Smith did not wait to learn whom he might be. + +"Quick!" he cried to the stupefied chauffeur. "You passed a car a +minute ago--yonder. Can you overtake it?" + +"I can try, sir, if I don't lose her track." + +Smith leapt in, pulling me after him. + +"Do it!" he snapped. "There are no speed limits for me. Thanks! Good +night, sir!" + +We were off! The car swung around and the chase commenced. + +One last glimpse I had of the man we had dispossessed, standing alone +by the roadside, and at ever-increasing speed, we leapt away in the +track of Eltham's captors. + +Smith was too highly excited for ordinary conversation, but he threw +out short, staccato remarks. + +"I have followed Fu-Manchu from Hong-Kong," he jerked. "Lost him at +Suez. He got here a boat ahead of me. Eltham has been corresponding +with some mandarin up-country. Knew that. Came straight to you. Only +got in this evening. He--Fu-Manchu--has been sent here to get Eltham. +My God! and he has him! He will question him! The interior of China--a +seething pot, Petrie! They had to stop the leakage of information. +_He_ is here for that." + +The car pulled up with a jerk that pitched me out of my seat, and the +chauffeur leapt to the road and ran ahead. Smith was out in a trice, +as the man, who had run up to a constable, came racing back. + +"Jump in, sir--jump in!" he cried, his eyes bright with the lust of +the chase; "they are making for Battersea!" + +And we were off again. + +Through the empty streets we roared on. A place of gasometers and +desolate waste lots slipped behind and we were in a narrow way where +gates of yards and a few lowly houses faced upon a prospect of high +blank wall. + +"Thames on our right," said Smith, peering ahead. "His rathole is by +the river as usual. _Hi_!"--he grabbed up the speaking-tube--"Stop! +Stop!" + +The limousine swung into the narrow sidewalk, and pulled up close by a +yard gate. I, too, had seen our quarry--a long, low-bodied car, +showing no inside lights. It had turned the next corner, where a +street lamp shone greenly not a hundred yards ahead. + +Smith leapt out, and I followed him. + +"That must be a cul-de-sac," he said, and turned to the eager-eyed +chauffeur. "Run back to that last turning," he ordered, "and wait +there, out of sight. Bring the car up when you hear a police-whistle." + +The man looked disappointed, but did not question the order. As he +began to back away, Smith grasped me by the arm and drew me forward. + +"We must get to that corner," he said, "and see where the car stands, +without showing ourselves." + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE WIRE JACKET + + +I suppose we were not more than a dozen paces from the lamp when we +heard the thudding of the motor. The car was backing out! + +It was a desperate moment, for it seemed that we could not fail to be +discovered. Nayland Smith began to look about him, feverishly, for a +hiding place, a quest which I seconded with equal anxiety. And Fate +was kind to us--doubly kind as after events revealed. A wooden gate +broke the expanse of wall hard by upon the right, and, as the result +of some recent accident, a ragged gap had been torn in the panels +close to the top. + +The chain of the padlock hung loosely; and in a second Smith was up, +with his foot in this as in a stirrup. He threw his arm over the top +and drew himself upright. A second later he was astride the broken +gate. + +"Up you come, Petrie!" he said, and reached down his hand to aid me. + +I got my foot into the loop of chain, grasped at a projection in the +gate-post, and found myself up. + +"There is a crossbar, on this side to stand on," said Smith. + +He climbed over and vanished in the darkness. I was still astride the +broken gate when the car turned the corner, slowly, for there was +scanty room; but I was standing upon the bar on the inside and had my +head below the gap ere the driver could possibly have seen me. + +"Stay where you are until he passes," hissed my companion, below. +"There is a row of kegs under you." + +The sound of the motor passing outside grew loud--louder--then began +to die away. I felt about with my left foot, discerned the top of a +keg, and dropped, panting, beside Smith. + +"Phew!" I said--"that was a close thing! Smith--how do we know--?" + +"That we have followed the right car?" he interrupted. "Ask yourself +the question: what would any ordinary man be doing motoring in a place +like this at two o'clock in the morning?" + +"You are right, Smith," I agreed. "Shall we get out again?" + +"Not yet. I have an idea. Look yonder." + +He grasped my arm, turning me in the desired direction. + +Beyond a great expanse of unbroken darkness a ray of moonlight slanted +into the place wherein we stood, spilling its cold radiance upon rows +of kegs. + +"That's another door," continued my friend. I now began dimly to +perceive him beside me. "If my calculations are not entirely wrong, it +opens on a wharf gate--" + +A steam siren hooted dismally, apparently from quite close at hand. + +"I'm right!" snapped Smith. "That turning leads down to the gate. Come +on, Petrie!" + +He directed the light of the electric torch upon a narrow path through +the ranks of casks, and led the way to the farther door. A good two +feet of moonlight showed along the top. I heard Smith straining; +then-- + +"These kegs are all loaded with grease," he said, "and I want to +reconnoitre over that door." + +"I am leaning on a crate which seems easy to move," I reported. "Yes, +it's empty. Lend a hand." + +We grasped the empty crate, and, between us, set it up on a solid +pedestal of casks. Then Smith mounted to this observation platform and +I scrambled up beside him, and looked down upon the lane outside. + +It terminated as Smith had foreseen at a wharf gate some six feet to +the right of our post. Piled up in the lane beneath us, against the +warehouse door, was a stack of empty casks. Beyond, over the way, was +a kind of ramshackle building that had possibly been a dwelling-house +at some time. Bills were stuck in the ground-floor windows indicating +that the three floors were to let as offices; so much was discernible +in that reflected moonlight. + +I could hear the tide lapping upon the wharf, could feel the chill +from the near river and hear the vague noises which, night nor day, +never cease upon the great commercial waterway. + +"Down!" whispered Smith. "Make no noise! I suspected it. They heard +the car following!" + +I obeyed, clutching at him for support; for I was suddenly dizzy, and +my heart was leaping wildly--furiously. + +"You saw her?" he whispered. + +Saw her! Yes, I had seen her! And my poor dream-world was toppling +about me, its cities ashes and its fairness dust. + +Peering from the window, her great eyes wondrous in the moonlight and +her red lips parted, hair gleaming like burnished foam and her anxious +gaze set upon the corner of the lane--was Karamaneh ... Karamaneh +whom once we had rescued from the house of this fiendish Chinese +doctor; Karamaneh who had been our ally, in fruitless quest of +whom,--when, too late, I realized how empty my life was become--I had +wasted what little of the world's goods I possessed:--Karamaneh! + +"Poor old Petrie," murmured Smith. "I knew, but I hadn't the +heart--_He_ has her again--God knows by what chains he holds her. But +she's only a woman, old boy, and women are very much alike--very much +alike from Charing Cross to Pagoda Road." + +He rested his hand on my shoulder for a moment; I am ashamed to +confess that I was trembling; then, clenching my teeth with that +mechanical physical effort which often accompanies a mental one, I +swallowed the bitter draught of Nayland Smith's philosophy. He was +raising himself, to peer, cautiously, over the top of the door. I did +likewise. + +The window from which the girl had looked was nearly on a level with +our eyes, and as I raised my head above the woodwork, I quite +distinctly saw her go out of the room. The door, as she opened it, +admitted a dull light, against which her figure showed silhouetted for +a moment. Then the door was reclosed. + +"We must risk the other windows," rapped Smith. + +Before I had grasped the nature of his plan, he was over and had +dropped almost noiselessly upon the casks outside. Again I followed +his lead. + +"You are not going to attempt anything, single-handed--against _him_?" +I asked. + +"Petrie--Eltham is in that house. He has been brought here to be put +to the question, in the mediaeval, and Chinese, sense! Is there time to +summon assistance?" + +I shuddered. This had been in my mind, certainly, but so expressed it +was definitely horrible--revolting, yet stimulating. + +"You have the pistol," added Smith; "follow closely, and quietly." + +He walked across the tops of the casks and leapt down, pointing to +that nearest to the closed door of the house. I helped him place it +under the open window. A second we set beside it, and, not without +some noise, got a third on top. + +Smith mounted. + +His jaw muscles were very prominent and his eyes shone like steel; but +he was as cool as though he were about to enter a theatre and not the +den of the most stupendous genius who ever worked for evil. I would +forgive any man who, knowing Dr. Fu-Manchu, feared him; I feared him +myself--feared him as one fears a scorpion; but when Nayland Smith +hauled himself up on to the wooden ledge above the door and swung +thence into the darkened room, I followed and was in close upon his +heels. But I admired him, for he had every ampere of his +self-possession in hand; my own case was different. + +He spoke close to my ear. + +"Is your hand steady? We may have to shoot." + +I thought of Karamaneh, of lovely dark-eyed Karamaneh, whom this +wonderful, evil product of secret China had stolen from me--for so I +now adjudged it. + +"Rely upon me!" I said grimly. "I--" + +The words ceased--frozen on my tongue. + +There are things that one seeks to forget, but it is my lot often to +remember the sound which at that moment literally struck me rigid with +horror. Yet it was only a groan; but, merciful God! I pray that it may +never be my lot to listen to such a groan again. + +Smith drew a sibilant breath. + +"It's Eltham!" he whispered hoarsely, "they're torturing--" + +"No, no!" screamed a woman's voice--a voice that thrilled me anew, +but with another emotion. "Not that, not--" + +I distinctly heard the sound of a blow. Followed a sort of vague +scuffling. A door somewhere at the back of the house opened--and shut +again. Some one was coming along the passage towards us! + +"Stand back!" Smith's voice was low, but perfectly steady. "Leave it +to me!" + +Nearer came the footsteps and nearer. I could hear suppressed sobs. +The door opened, admitting again the faint light--and Karamaneh came +in. The place was quite unfurnished, offering no possibility of +hiding; but to hide was unnecessary. + +Her slim figure had not crossed the threshold ere Smith had his arm +about the girl's waist and one hand clapped to her mouth. A stifled +gasp she uttered, and he lifted her into the room. + +"Shut the door, Petrie," he directed. + +I stepped forward and closed the door. A faint perfume stole to my +nostrils--a vague, elusive breath of the East, reminiscent of strange +days that, now, seemed to belong to a remote past. Karamaneh! that +faint, indefinable perfume was part of her dainty personality; it may +appear absurd--impossible--but many and many a time I had dreamt of +it. + +"In my breast pocket," rapped Smith; "the light." + +I bent over the girl as he held her. She was quite still, but I could +have wished that I had had more certain mastery of myself. I took the +torch from Smith's pocket and, mechanically, directed it upon the +captive. + +She was dressed very plainly, wearing a simple blue skirt, and white +blouse. It was easy to divine that it was she whom Eltham had mistaken +for a French maid. A brooch set with a ruby was pinned at the point +where the blouse opened--gleaming fierily and harshly against the soft +skin. Her face was pale and her eyes wide with fear. + +"There is some cord in my right-hand pocket," said Smith. "I came +provided. Tie her wrists." + +I obeyed him, silently. The girl offered no resistance, but I think I +never essayed a less congenial task than that of binding her white +wrists. The jewelled fingers lay quite listlessly in my own. + +"Make a good job of it!" rapped Smith significantly. + +A flush rose to my cheeks, for I knew well enough what he meant. + +"She is fastened," I said, and I turned the ray of the torch upon her +again. + +Smith removed his hand from her mouth but did not relax his grip of +her. She looked up at me with eyes in which I could have sworn there +was no recognition. But a flush momentarily swept over her face, and +left it pale again. + +"We shall have to--gag her--" + +"Smith, I can't do it!" + +The girl's eyes filled with tears and she looked up at my companion +pitifully. + +"Please don't be cruel to me," she whispered, with that soft accent +which always played havoc with my composure. "Every one--every one--is +cruel to me. I will promise--indeed I will swear, to be quiet. Oh, +believe me, if you can save him I will do nothing to hinder you." Her +beautiful head drooped. "Have some pity for me as well." + +"Karamaneh," I said, "we would have believed you once. We cannot now." + +She started violently. + +"You know my name!" Her voice was barely audible. "Yet I have never +seen you in my life--" + +"See if the door locks," interrupted Smith harshly. + +Dazed by the apparent sincerity in the voice of our lovely +captive--vacant from wonder of it all--I opened the door, felt for, +and found, a key. + +We left Karamaneh crouching against the wall; her great eyes were +turned towards me fascinatedly. Smith locked the door with much care. +We began a tip-toed progress along the dimly-lighted passage. + +From beneath a door on the left, and near the end, a brighter light +shone. Beyond that again was another door. A voice was speaking in the +lighted room; yet I could have sworn that Karamaneh had come, not from +there but from the room beyond--from the far end of the passage. + +But the voice!--who, having once heard it, could ever mistake that +singular voice, alternately guttural and sibilant. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu was speaking! + +"I have asked you," came with ever-increasing clearness (Smith had +begun to turn the knob), "to reveal to me the name of your +correspondent in Nan-Yang. I have suggested that he may be the +Mandarin Yen-Sun-Yat, but you have declined to confirm me. Yet I know" +(Smith had the door open a good three inches and was peering in) "that +some official, some high official, is a traitor. Am I to resort again +to _the question_ to learn his name?" + +Ice seemed to enter my veins at the unseen inquisitor's intonation of +the words "_the question_." This was the twentieth century; yet there, +in that damnable room.... + +Smith threw the door open. + +Through a sort of haze, born mostly of horror, but not entirely, I saw +Eltham, stripped to the waist and tied, with his arms upstretched, to +a rafter in the ancient ceiling. A Chinaman, who wore a slop-shop blue +suit and who held an open knife in his hand, stood beside him. Eltham +was ghastly white. The appearance of his chest puzzled me momentarily, +then I realized that a sort of _tourniquet_ of wire-netting was +screwed so tightly about him that the flesh swelled out in knobs +through the mesh. There was blood-- + +"God in heaven!" screamed Smith frenziedly, "_they have the +wire-jacket on him!_ Shoot down that damned Chinaman, Petrie! Shoot! +Shoot!" + +Lithely as a cat the man with the knife leapt around--but I raised the +Browning, and deliberately--with a cool deliberation that came to me +suddenly--shot him through the head. I saw his oblique eyes turn up to +the whites; I saw the mark squarely between his brows; and with no word +nor cry he sank to his knees and toppled forward with one yellow hand +beneath him and one outstretched, clutching--clutching--convulsively. +His pigtail came unfastened and began to uncoil, slowly, like a snake. + +I handed the pistol to Smith; I was perfectly cool, now; and I leapt +forward, took up the bloody knife from the floor and cut Eltham's +lashings. He sank into my arms. + +"Praise God," he murmured weakly. "He is more merciful to me than +perhaps I deserve. Unscrew ... the jacket, Petrie ... I think ... I was +very near to ... weakening. Praise the good God, who ... gave me ... +fortitude...." + +I got the screw of the accursed thing loosened, but the act of +removing the jacket was too agonizing for Eltham--man of iron though +he was. I laid him swooning on the floor. + +"Where is Fu-Manchu?" + +Nayland Smith, from just within the door, threw out the query in a +tone of stark amaze. I stood up--I could do nothing more for the poor +victim at the moment--and looked about me. + +The room was innocent of furniture, save for heaps of rubbish on the +floor, and a tin oil-lamp hung on the wall. The dead Chinaman lay +close beside Smith. There was no second door, the one window was +barred and from this room we had heard the voice, the unmistakable, +unforgettable voice, of Fu-Manchu. + +_But Dr. Fu-Manchu was not there!_ + +Neither of us could accept the fact for a moment; we stood there, +looking from the dead man to the tortured man who had only swooned, +in a state of helpless incredulity. + +Then the explanation flashed upon us both, simultaneously, and with a +cry of baffled rage Smith leapt along the passage to the second door. +It was wide open. I stood at his elbow when he swept its emptiness +with the ray of his pocket-lamp. + +There was a speaking-tube fixed between the two rooms! + +Smith literally ground his teeth. + +"Yet, Petrie," he said, "we have learnt something. Fu-Manchu had +evidently promised Eltham his life if he would divulge the name of his +correspondent. He meant to keep his word; it is a sidelight on his +character." + +"How so?" + +"Eltham has never seen Dr. Fu-Manchu, but Eltham knows certain parts +of China better than you know the Strand. Probably, if he saw +Fu-Manchu, he would recognize him for whom he really is, and this, it +seems, the Doctor is anxious to avoid." + +We ran back to where we had left Karamaneh. + +The room was empty! + +"Defeated, Petrie!" said Smith bitterly. "The Yellow Devil is loosed +on London again!" + +He leant from the window and the skirl of a police whistle split the +stillness of the night. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +THE CRY OF A NIGHTHAWK + + +Such were the episodes that marked the coming of Dr. Fu-Manchu to +London, that awakened fears long dormant and reopened old wounds--nay, +poured poison into them. I strove desperately, by close attention to +my professional duties, to banish the very memory of Karamaneh from my +mind; desperately, but how vainly! Peace was for me no more, joy was +gone from the world, and only mockery remained as my portion. + +Poor Eltham we had placed in a nursing establishment, where his +indescribable hurts could be properly tended; and his uncomplaining +fortitude not infrequently made me thoroughly ashamed of myself. +Needless to say, Smith had made such other arrangements as were +necessary to safeguard the injured man, and these proved so successful +that the malignant being whose plans they thwarted abandoned his +designs upon the heroic clergyman and directed his attention +elsewhere, as I must now proceed to relate. + +Dusk always brought with it a cloud of apprehension, for darkness must +ever be the ally of crime; and it was one night, long after the clocks +had struck the mystic hour, "when churchyards yawn," that the hand of +Dr. Fu-Manchu again stretched out to grasp a victim. I was dismissing +a chance patient. + +"Good night, Dr. Petrie," he said. + +"Good night, Mr. Forsyth," I replied; and having conducted my late +visitor to the door, I closed and bolted it, switched off the light, +and went upstairs. + +My patient was chief officer of one of the P. and O. boats. He had cut +his hand rather badly on the homeward run, and signs of poisoning +having developed, had called to have the wound treated, apologizing +for troubling me at so late an hour, but explaining that he had only +just come from the docks. The hall clock announced the hour of one as +I ascended the stairs. I found myself wondering what there was in Mr. +Forsyth's appearance which excited some vague and elusive memory. +Coming to the top floor, I opened the door of a front bedroom and was +surprised to find the interior in darkness. + +"Smith!" I called. + +"Come here and watch!" was the terse response. + +Nayland Smith was sitting in the dark at the open window and peering +out across the common. Even as I saw him, a dim silhouette, I could +detect that tensity in his attitude which told of high-strung nerves. + +I joined him. + +"What is it?" I asked curiously. + +"I don't know. Watch that clump of elms." + +His masterful voice had the dry tone in it betokening excitement. I +leaned on the ledge beside him and looked out. The blaze of stars +almost compensated for the absence of the moon, and the night had a +quality of stillness that made for awe. This was a tropical summer, +and the common, with its dancing lights dotted irregularly about it, +had an unfamiliar look to-night. The clump of nine elms showed as a +dense and irregular mass, lacking detail. + +Such moods as that which now claimed my friend are magnetic. I had no +thought of the night's beauty, for it only served to remind me that +somewhere amid London's millions was lurking an uncanny being, whose +life was a mystery, whose very existence was a scientific miracle. + +"Where's your patient?" rapped Smith. + +His abrupt query diverted my thoughts into a new channel. No footstep +disturbed the silence of the high-road. Where _was_ my patient? + +I craned from the window. Smith grabbed my arm. + +"Don't lean out," he said. + +I drew back, glancing at him surprisedly. + +"For Heaven's sake, why not?" + +"I'll tell you presently, Petrie. Did you see him?" + +"I did, and I can't make out what he is doing. He seems to have +remained standing at the gate for some reason." + +"He has seen it!" snapped Smith. "Watch those elms." + +His hand remained upon my arm, gripping it nervously. Shall I say that +I was surprised? I can say it with truth. But I shall add that I was +thrilled, eerily; for this subdued excitement and alert watching of +Smith's could only mean one thing: + +Fu-Manchu! + +And that was enough to set me watching as keenly as he; to set me +listening, not only for sounds outside the house but for sounds +within. Doubts, suspicions, dreads heaped themselves up in my mind. +Why was Forsyth standing there at the gate? I had never seen him +before, to my knowledge, yet there was something oddly reminiscent +about the man. Could it be that his visit formed part of a plot? Yet +his wound had been genuine enough. Thus my mind worked, feverishly; +such was the effect of an unspoken thought--Fu-Manchu. + +Nayland Smith's grip tightened on my arm. + +"There it is again, Petrie!" he whispered. "Look, look!" + +His words were wholly unnecessary. I, too, had seen it; a wonderful +and uncanny sight. Out of the darkness under the elms, low down upon +the ground, grew a vaporous blue light. It flared up, elfinish, then +began to ascend. Like an igneous phantom, a witch flame, it rose, +higher, higher, higher, to what I adjudged to be some twelve feet or +more from the ground. Then, high in the air, it died away again as it +had come! + +"For God's sake, Smith, what was it?" + +"Don't ask me, Petrie. I have seen it twice. We--" + +He paused. Rapid footsteps sounded below. Over Smith's shoulder I saw +Forsyth cross the road, climb the low rail, and set out across the +common. + +Smith sprang impetuously to his feet. + +"We must stop him!" he said hoarsely; then, clapping a hand to my +mouth as I was about to call out--"Not a sound, Petrie!" + +He ran out of the room and went blundering downstairs in the dark, +crying: + +"Out through the garden--the side entrance!" + +I overtook him as he threw wide the door of my dispensing room. +Through he ran and opened the door at the other end. I followed him +out, closing it behind me. The smell from some tobacco plants in a +neighbouring flower-bed was faintly perceptible; no breeze stirred; +and in the great silence I could hear Smith, in front of me, tugging +at the bolt of the gate. + +Then he had it open, and I stepped out, close on his heels, and left +the door ajar. + +"We must not appear to have come from your house," explained Smith +rapidly. "I will go along to the high-road and cross to the common a +hundred yards up, where there is a pathway, as though homeward bound +to the north side. Give me half a minute's start, then you proceed in +an opposite direction and cross from the corner of the next road. +Directly you are out of the light of the street lamps, get over the +rails and run for the elms!" + +He thrust a pistol into my hand and was off. + +While he had been with me, speaking in that incisive impetuous way of +his, his dark face close to mine, and his eyes gleaming like steel, I +had been at one with him in his feverish mood, but now, when I stood +alone in that staid and respectable by-way, holding a loaded pistol in +my hand, the whole thing became utterly unreal. + +It was in an odd frame of mind that I walked to the next corner, as +directed, for I was thinking, not of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the great and evil +man who dreamed of Europe and America under Chinese rule, not of +Nayland Smith, who alone stood between the Chinaman and the +realization of his monstrous schemes, not even of Karamaneh, the slave +girl, whose glorious beauty was a weapon of might in Fu-Manchu's +hand, but of what impression I must have made upon a patient had I +encountered one then. + +Such were my ideas up to the moment that I crossed to the common and +vaulted into the field on my right. As I began to run toward the elms +I found myself wondering what it was all about, and for what we were +come. Fifty yards west of the trees it occurred to me that if Smith +had counted on cutting Forsyth off we were too late, for it appeared +to me that he must already be in the coppice. + +I was right. Twenty paces more I ran, and ahead of me, from the elms, +came a sound. Clearly it came through the still air--the eerie hoot of +a nighthawk. I could not recall ever to have heard the cry of that +bird on the common before, but oddly enough I attached little +significance to it until, in the ensuing instant, a most dreadful +scream--a scream in which fear and loathing and anger were hideously +blended--thrilled me with horror. + +After that I have no recollection of anything until I found myself +standing by the southernmost elm. + +"Smith!" I cried breathlessly. "Smith! my God! where are you?" + +As if in answer to my cry came an indescribable sound, a mingled +sobbing and choking. Out from the shadows staggered a ghastly +figure--that of a man whose face appeared to be _streaked_. His eyes +glared at me madly, and he moved the air with his hands like one blind +and insane with fear. + +I started back; words died upon my tongue. The figure reeled, and the +man fell babbling and sobbing at my very feet. + +Inert I stood, looking down at him. He writhed a moment--and was +still. The silence again became perfect. Then, from somewhere beyond +the elms, Nayland Smith appeared. I did not move. Even when he stood +beside me, I merely stared at him fatuously. + +"I let him walk to his death, Petrie," I heard dimly. "God forgive +me--God forgive me!" + +The words aroused me. + +"Smith"--my voice came as a whisper--"for one awful moment I +thought--" + +"So did some one else," he rapped. "Our poor sailor has met the end +designed for _me_, Petrie!" + +At that I realized two things: I knew why Forsyth's face had struck me +as being familiar in some puzzling way, and I knew why Forsyth now lay +dead upon the grass. Save that he was a fair man and wore a slight +moustache, he was, in features and build, the double of Nayland Smith! + + + + +CHAPTER V + +THE NET + + +We raised the poor victim and turned him over on his back. I dropped +upon my knees, and with unsteady fingers began to strike a match. A +slight breeze was arising and sighing gently through the elms, but, +screened by my hands, the flame of the match took life. It illuminated +wanly the sun-baked face of Nayland Smith, his eyes gleaming with +unnatural brightness. I bent forward, and the dying light of the match +touched that other face. + +"Oh, God!" whispered Smith. + +A faint puff of wind extinguished the match. + +In all my surgical experience I had never met with anything quite so +horrible. Forsyth's livid face was streaked with tiny streams of +blood, which proceeded from a series of irregular wounds. One group of +these clustered upon his left temple, another beneath his right eye, +and others extended from the chin down to the throat. They were +black, almost like tattoo marks, and the entire injured surface was +bloated indescribably. His fists were clenched; he was quite rigid. + +Smith's piercing eyes were set upon me eloquently as I knelt on the +path and made my examination--an examination which that first glimpse +when Forsyth came staggering out from the trees had rendered +useless--a mere matter of form. + +"He's quite dead, Smith," I said huskily. "It's--unnatural--it--" + +Smith began beating his fist into his left palm and taking little, +short, nervous strides up and down beside the dead man. I could hear a +car skirling along the high-road, but I remained there on my knees +staring dully at the disfigured bloody face which but a matter of +minutes since had been that of a clean-looking British seaman. I found +myself contrasting his neat, squarely trimmed moustache with the +bloated face above it, and counting the little drops of blood which +trembled upon its edge. There were footsteps approaching. I arose. The +footsteps quickened, and I turned as a constable ran up. + +"What's this?" he demanded gruffly, and stood with his fists clenched, +looking from Smith to me and down at that which lay between us. Then +his hand flew to his breast; there was a silvern gleam and-- + +"Drop that whistle!" snapped Smith, and struck it from the man's hand. +"Where's your lantern? Don't ask questions!" + +The constable started back and was evidently debating upon his chances +with the two of us, when my friend pulled a letter from his pocket and +thrust it under the man's nose. + +"Read that!" he directed harshly, "and then listen to my orders." + +There was something in his voice which changed the officer's opinion +of the situation. He directed the light of his lantern upon the open +letter, and seemed to be stricken with wonder. + +"If you have any doubt," continued Smith--"you may not be familiar +with the Commissioner's signature--you have only to ring up Scotland +Yard from Dr. Petrie's house, to which we shall now return to disperse +it." He pointed to Forsyth. "Help us to carry him there. We must not +be seen; this must be hushed up. You understand? It must not get into +the Press--" + +The man saluted respectfully, and the three of us addressed ourselves +to the mournful task. By slow stages we bore the dead man to the edge +of the common, carried him across the road and into my house, without +exciting attention even on the part of those vagrants who nightly +slept out in the neighbourhood. + +We laid our burden upon the surgery table. + +"You will want to make an examination, Petrie," said Smith in his +decisive way, "and the officer here might 'phone for the ambulance. I +have some investigations to make also. I must have the pocket lamp." + +He raced upstairs to his room, and an instant later came running down +again. The front door banged. + +"The telephone is in the hall," I said to the constable. + +"Thank you, sir." + +He went out of the surgery as I switched on the lamp over the table +and began to examine the marks upon Forsyth's skin. These, as I have +said, were in groups and nearly all in the form of elongated +punctures; a fairly deep incision with a pear-shaped and superficial +scratch beneath it. One of the tiny wounds had penetrated the right +eye. + +The symptoms, or those which I had been enabled to observe as Forsyth +had first staggered into view from among the elms, were most puzzling. +Clearly enough the muscles of articulation and the respiratory +muscles had been affected; and now the livid face, dotted over with +tiny wounds (they were also on the throat), set me mentally groping +for a clue to the manner of his death. + +No clue presented itself; and my detailed examination of the body +availed me nothing. The grey herald of dawn was come when the police +arrived with the ambulance and took Forsyth away. + +I was just taking my cap from the rack when Nayland Smith returned. + +"Smith!" I cried, "have you found anything?" + +He stood there in the grey light of the hall-way tugging at the lobe +of his left ear. + +The bronzed face looked very gaunt, I thought, and his eyes were +bright with that febrile glitter which once I had disliked, but which +I had learned from experience to be due to tremendous nervous +excitement. At such times he could act with icy coolness, and his +mental faculties seemed temporarily to acquire an abnormal keenness. +He made no direct reply, but-- + +"Have you any milk?" he jerked abruptly. + +So wholly unexpected was the question that for a moment I failed to +grasp it. Then-- + +"Milk!" I began. + +"Exactly, Petrie! If you can find me some milk, I shall be obliged." + +I turned to descend to the kitchen, when-- + +"The remains of the turbot from dinner, Petrie, would also be welcome, +and I think I should like a trowel." + +I stopped at the stairhead and faced him. + +"I cannot suppose that you are joking, Smith," I said, "but--" + +He laughed dryly. + +"Forgive me, old man," he replied. "I was so preoccupied with my own +train of thought that it never occurred to me how absurd my request +must have sounded. I will explain my singular tastes later; at the +moment, hustle is the watchword." + +Evidently he was in earnest, and I ran downstairs accordingly, +returning with a garden trowel, a plate of cold fish, and a glass of +milk. + +"Thanks, Petrie," said Smith. "If you would put the milk in a jug--" + +I was past wondering, so I simply went and fetched a jug, into which +he poured the milk. Then, with the trowel in his pocket, the plate of +cold turbot in one hand and the milk-jug in the other, he made for the +door. He had it open, when another idea evidently occurred to him. + +"I'll trouble you for the pistol, Petrie." + +I handed him the pistol without a word. + +"Don't assume that I want to mystify you," he added, "but the presence +of any one else might jeopardize my plan. I don't expect to be long." + +The cold light of dawn flooded the hall-way momentarily; then the door +closed again and I went upstairs to my study, watching Nayland Smith +as he strode across the common in the early morning mist. He was +making for the Nine Elms, but I lost sight of him before he reached +them. + +I sat there for some time, watching for the first glow of sunrise. A +policeman tramped past the house, and, a while later, a belated +reveller in evening clothes. That sense of unreality assailed me +again. Out there in the grey mist a man who was vested with powers +which rendered him a law unto himself, who had the British Government +behind him in all that he might choose to do, who had been summoned +from Rangoon to London on singular and dangerous business, was +employing himself with a plate of cold turbot, a jug of milk, and a +trowel! + +Away to the right, and just barely visible, a tramcar stopped by the +common, then proceeded on its way, coming in a westerly direction. Its +lights twinkled yellowly through the greyness, but I was less +concerned with the approaching car than with the solitary traveller +who had descended from it. + +As the car went rocking by below me I strained my eyes in an endeavour +more clearly to discern the figure, which, leaving the high-road, had +struck-out across the common. It was that of a woman, who seemingly +carried a bulky bag or parcel. + +One must be a gross materialist to doubt that there are latent powers +in man which man, in modern times, neglects or knows not how to +develop. I became suddenly conscious of a burning curiosity respecting +this lonely traveller who travelled at an hour so strange. With no +definite plan in mind, I went downstairs, took a cap from the rack and +walked briskly out of the house and across the common in a direction +which I thought would enable me to head off the woman. + +I had slightly miscalculated the distance, as Fate would have it, and +with a patch of gorse effectually screening my approach, I came upon +her, kneeling on the damp grass and unfastening the bundle which had +attracted my attention. I stopped and watched her. + +She was dressed in bedraggled fashion in rusty black, wore a common +black straw hat and a thick veil; but it seemed to me that the +dexterous hands at work untying the bundle were slim and white, and I +perceived a pair of hideous cotton gloves lying on the turf beside +her. As she threw open the wrappings and lifted out something that +looked like a small shrimping-net, I stepped around the bush, crossed +silently the intervening patch of grass and stood beside her. + +A faint breath of perfume reached me--of a perfume which, like the +secret incense of Ancient Egypt, seemed to assail my soul. The glamour +of the Orient was in that subtle essence, and I only knew one woman +who used it. I bent over the kneeling figure. + +"Good morning," I said; "can I assist you in any way?" + +She came to her feet like a startled deer, and flung away from me with +the lithe movement of some Eastern dancing-girl. + +Now came the sun, and its heralding rays struck sparks from the jewels +upon the white fingers of this woman who wore the garments of a +mendicant. My heart gave a great leap. It was with difficulty that I +controlled my voice. + +"There is no cause for alarm," I added. + +She stood watching me; even through the coarse veil I could see how +her eyes glittered. I stooped and picked up the net. + +"Oh!" The whispered word was scarcely audible; but it was enough. I +doubted no longer. + +"This is a net for bird-snaring," I said. "What strange bird are you +seeking, _Karamaneh_?" + +With a passionate gesture Karamaneh snatched off the veil, and with it +the ugly black hat. The cloud of wonderful intractable hair came +rumpling about her face, and her glorious eyes blazed out upon me. How +beautiful they were, with the dark beauty of an Egyptian night; how +often had they looked into mine in dreams! + +To labour against a ceaseless yearning for a woman whom one knows, upon +evidence that none but a fool might reject, to be worthless--evil; is +there any torture to which the soul of man is subject, more pitiless? +Yet this was my lot, for what past sins assigned to me I was unable to +conjecture; and this was the woman, this lovely slave of a monster, this +creature of Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +"I suppose you will declare that you do not know me!" I said harshly. + +Her lips trembled, but she made no reply. + +"It is very convenient to forget, sometimes," I ran on bitterly, then +checked myself, for I knew that my words were prompted by a feckless +desire to hear her defence, by a fool's hope that it might be an +acceptable one. I looked again at the net contrivance in my hand; it +had a strong spring fitted to it and a line attached. Quite obviously +it was intended for snaring. "What were you about to do?" I demanded +sharply; but in my heart, poor fool that I was, I found admiration for +the exquisite arch of Karamaneh's lips, and reproach because they were +so tremulous. + +She spoke then. + +"Dr. Petrie--" + +"Well?" + +"You seem to be--angry with me, not so much because--of what I do, as +because I do not remember you. Yet--" + +"Kindly do not revert to the matter," I interrupted. "You have chosen, +very conveniently, to forget that once we were friends. Please +yourself; but answer my question." + +She clasped her hands with a sort of wild abandon. + +"Why do you treat me so?" she cried. She had the most fascinating +accent imaginable. "Throw me into prison, kill me if you like for what +I have done!" She stamped her foot. "For what I have done! But do not +torture me, try to drive me mad with your reproaches--that I forget +you! I tell you--again I tell you--that until you came one night, last +week, to rescue some one from"--(there was the old trick of hesitating +before the name of Fu-Manchu)--"from _him_, I had never, never seen +you!" + +The dark eyes looked into mine, afire with a positive hunger for +belief--or so I was sorely tempted to suppose. But the facts were +against her. + +"Such a declaration is worthless," I said, as coldly as I could. "You +are a traitress; you betray those who are mad enough to trust you--" + +"I am no traitress!" she blazed at me. Her eyes were magnificent. + +"This is mere nonsense. You think that it will pay you better to serve +Fu-Manchu than to remain true to your friends. Your 'slavery'--for I +take it you are posing as a slave again--is evidently not very harsh. +You serve Fu-Manchu, lure men to their destruction, and in return he +loads you with jewels, lavishes gifts--" + +"Ah! so!" + +She sprang forward, raising flaming eyes to mine; her lips were +slightly parted. With that wild abandon which betrayed the desert +blood in her veins, she wrenched open the neck of her bodice and +slipped a soft shoulder free of the garment. She twisted around, so +that the white skin was but inches removed from me. + +"These are some of the gifts that he lavishes upon me!" + +I clenched my teeth. Insane thoughts flooded my mind. For that creamy +skin was wealed with the marks of the lash! + +She turned, quickly rearranging her dress, and watching me the while. +I could not trust myself to speak for a moment, then-- + +"If I am a stranger to you, as you claim, why do you give me your +confidence?" I asked. + +"I have known you long enough to trust you!" she said simply, and +turned her head aside. + +"Then why do you serve this inhuman monster?" + +She snapped her fingers oddly, and looked up at me from under her +lashes. "Why do you question me if you think that everything I say is +a lie?" + +It was a lesson in logic--from a woman! I changed the subject. + +"Tell me what you came here to do," I demanded. + +She pointed to the net in my hands. + +"To catch birds; you have said so yourself." + +"What bird?" + +She shrugged her shoulders. + +And now a memory was born within my brain: it was that of the cry of +the nighthawk which had harbingered the death of Forsyth! The net was +a large and strong one; could it be that some horrible fowl of the +air--some creature unknown to Western naturalists--had been released +upon the common last night? I thought of the marks upon Forsyth's face +and throat; I thought of the profound knowledge of obscure and +dreadful things possessed by the Chinaman. + +The wrapping in which the net had been lay at my feet. I stooped and +took out from it a wicker basket. Karamaneh stood watching me and +biting her lip, but she made no move to check me. I opened the basket. +It contained a large phial, the contents of which possessed a pungent +and peculiar smell. + +I was utterly mystified. + +"You will have to accompany me to my house," I said sternly. + +Karamaneh upturned her great eyes to mine. They were wide with fear. +She was on the point of speaking when I extended my hand to grasp her. +At that, the look of fear was gone and one of rebellion held its +place. Ere I had time to realize her purpose, she flung back from me +with that wild grace which I had met with in no other woman, +turned--and ran! + +Fatuously, net and basket in hand, I stood looking after her. The idea +of pursuit came to me certainly; but I doubted if I could outrun her. +For Karamaneh ran, not like a girl used to town or even country life, +but with the lightness and swiftness of a gazelle; ran like the +daughter of the desert that she was. + +Some two hundred yards she went, stopped, and looked back. It would +seem that the sheer joy of physical effort had aroused the devil in +her, the devil that must lie latent in every woman with eyes like the +eyes of Karamaneh. + +In the ever-brightening sunlight I could see the lithe figure swaying; +no rags imaginable could mask its beauty. I could see the red lips and +gleaming teeth. Then--and it was music good to hear, despite its +taunt--she laughed defiantly, turned, and ran again! + +I resigned myself to defeat; I blush to add, gladly! Some evidences of +a world awakening were perceptible about me now. Feathered choirs +hailed the new day joyously. Carrying the mysterious contrivance which +I had captured from the enemy, I set out in the direction of my house, +my mind very busy with conjectures respecting the link between this +bird-snare and the cry like that of a nighthawk which we had heard at +the moment of Forsyth's death. + +The path that I had chosen led me around the border of the Mound +Pond--a small pool having an islet in the centre. Lying at the margin +of the pond I was amazed to see the plate and jug which Nayland Smith +had borrowed recently. + +Dropping my burden, I walked down to the edge of the water. I was +filled with a sudden apprehension. Then, as I bent to pick up the now +empty jug, came a hail: + +"All right, Petrie! Shall join you in a moment!" + +I started up, looked to right and left; but, although the voice had +been that of Nayland Smith, no sign could I discern of his presence! + +"Smith!" I cried. "Smith!" + +"Coming!" + +Seriously doubting my senses, I looked in the direction from which the +voice had seemed to proceed--and there was Nayland Smith. + +He stood on the islet in the centre of the pond, and, as I perceived +him, he walked down into the shallow water and waded across to me! + +"Good heavens!" I began. + +One of his rare laughs interrupted me. + +"You must think me mad this morning, Petrie!" he said. "But I have +made several discoveries. Do you know what that islet in the pond +really is?" + +"Merely an islet, I suppose." + +"Nothing of the kind; it is a burial mound, Petrie! It marks the site +of one of the Plague Pits where victims were buried during the Great +Plague of London. You will observe that although you have seen it +every morning for some years, it remains for a British Commissioner +lately resident in Burma to acquaint you with its history! +Hullo!"--the laughter was gone from his eyes, and they were steely +hard again--"what the blazes have we here?" + +He picked up the net. "What! A bird-trap!" + +"Exactly!" I said. + +Smith turned his searching gaze upon me. "Where did you find it, +Petrie?" + +"I did not exactly find it," I replied; and I related to him the +circumstances of my meeting with Karamaneh. + +He directed that cold stare upon me throughout the narrative, and +when, with some embarrassment, I had told him of the girl's escape-- + +"Petrie," he said succinctly, "you are an imbecile!" + +I flushed with anger, for not even from Nayland Smith, whom I esteemed +above all other men, could I accept such words uttered as he had +uttered them. We glared at one another. + +"Karamaneh," he continued coldly, "is a beautiful toy, I grant you; +but so is a cobra. Neither is suitable for playful purposes." + +"Smith!" I cried hotly, "drop that! Adopt another tone or I cannot +listen to you!" + +"You _must_ listen," he said, squaring his lean jaw truculently. "You +are playing, not only with a pretty girl who is the favourite of a +Chinese Nero, but with _my life_! And I object, Petrie, on purely +personal grounds!" + +I felt my anger oozing from me; for this was strictly just. I had +nothing to say and Smith continued: + +"You _know_ that she is utterly false, yet a glance or two from those +dark eyes of hers can make a fool of you! A woman made a fool of me +once, but I learned my lesson; you have failed to learn yours. If you +are determined to go to pieces on the rock that broke up Adam, do so! +But don't involve me in the wreck, Petrie, for that might mean a +yellow emperor of the world, and you know it!" + +"Your words are unnecessarily brutal, Smith," I said, feeling very +crestfallen, "but there--perhaps I fully deserve them all." + +"You _do_!" he assured me, but he relaxed immediately. "A murderous +attempt is made upon my life, resulting in the death of a perfectly +innocent man in no way concerned. Along you come and let an +accomplice, perhaps a participant, escape, merely because she has a +red mouth, or black lashes, or whatever it is that fascinates you so +hopelessly!" + +He opened the wicker basket, sniffing at the contents. + +"Ah!" he snapped, "do you recognize this odour?" + +"Certainly." + +"Then you have some idea respecting Karamaneh's quarry?" + +"Nothing of the kind!" + +Smith shrugged his shoulders. + +"Come along, Petrie," he said, linking his arm in mine. + +We proceeded. Many questions there were that I wanted to put to him, +but one above all. + +"Smith," I said, "what, in Heaven's name, were you doing on the mound? +Digging something up?" + +"No," he replied, smiling dryly, "burying something!" + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +UNDER THE ELMS + + +Dusk found Nayland Smith and me at the top bedroom window. We knew, +now that poor Forsyth's body had been properly examined, that he had +died from poisoning. Smith, declaring that I did not deserve his +confidence, had refused to confide in me his theory of the origin of +the peculiar marks upon the body. + +"On the soft ground under the trees," he said, "I found his tracks +right up to the point where--something happened. There were no other +fresh tracks for several yards around. He was attacked as he stood +close to the trunk of one of the elms. Six or seven feet away I found +some other tracks, very much like this." + +He marked a series of dots upon the blotting-pad, for this +conversation took place during the afternoon. + +"Claws!" I cried. "That eerie call! like the call of a nighthawk--is +it some unknown species of--flying thing?" + +"We shall see, shortly; possibly to-night," was his reply. "Since, +probably owing to the absence of any moon, a mistake was made"--his +jaw hardened at the thought of poor Forsyth--"another attempt along +the same lines will almost certainly follow--you know Fu-Manchu's +system?" + +So in the darkness, expectant, we sat watching the group of nine elms. +To-night the moon was come, raising her Aladdin's lamp up to the star +world and summoning magic shadows into being. By midnight the +high-road showed deserted, the common was a place of mystery; and save +for the periodical passage of an electric car, in blazing modernity, +this was a fit enough stage for an eerie drama. + +No notice of the tragedy had appeared in print; Nayland Smith was +vested with powers to silence the Press. No detectives, no special +constables, were posted. My friend was of opinion that the publicity +which had been given to the deeds of Dr. Fu-Manchu in the past, +together with the sometimes clumsy co-operation of the police, had +contributed not a little to the Chinaman's success. + +"There is only one thing to fear," he jerked suddenly; "he may not be +ready for another attempt to-night." + +"Why?" + +"Since he has only been in England for a short time, his menagerie of +venomous things may be a limited one at present." + +Earlier in the evening there had been a brief but violent +thunderstorm, with a tropical downpour of rain, and now clouds were +scudding across the blue of the sky. Through a temporary rift in the +veiling the crescent of the moon looked down upon us. It had a +greenish tint, and it set me thinking of the filmed, green eyes of +Fu-Manchu. + +The cloud passed and a lake of silver spread out to the edge of the +coppice; where it terminated at a shadow bank. + +"There it is, Petrie!" hissed Nayland Smith. + +A lambent light was born in the darkness; it rose slowly, unsteadily, +to a great height, and died. + +"It's under the trees, Smith!" + +But he was already making for the door. Over his shoulder: + +"Bring the pistol, Petrie!" he cried; "I have another. Give me at +least twenty yards' start or no attempt may be made. But the instant +I'm under the trees, join me." + +Out of the house we ran, and over on to the common, which latterly had +been a pageant-ground for phantom warring. The light did not appear +again; and as Smith plunged off toward the trees, I wondered if he +knew what uncanny thing was hidden there. I more than suspected that +he had solved the mystery. + +His instructions to keep well in the rear I understood. Fu-Manchu, or +the creature of Fu-Manchu, would attempt nothing in the presence of a +witness. But we knew full well that the instrument of death which was +hidden in the elm coppice could do its ghastly work and leave no clue, +could slay and vanish. For had not Forsyth come to a dreadful end +while Smith and I were within twenty yards of him? + +Not a breeze stirred, as Smith, ahead of me--for I had slowed my +pace--came up level with the first tree. The moon sailed clear of the +straggling cloud wisps which alone told of the recent storm; and I +noted that an irregular patch of light lay silvern on the moist ground +under the elms where otherwise lay shadow. + +He passed on, slowly. I began to run again. Black against the silvern +patch, I saw him emerge--and look up. + +"Be careful, Smith!" I cried--and I was racing under the trees to join +him. + +Uttering a loud cry, he leaped--away from the pool of light. + +"Stand back, Petrie!" he screamed. "Back! farther!" + +He charged into me, shoulder lowered, and sent me reeling! + +Mixed up with his excited cry I had heard a loud splintering and +sweeping of branches overhead; and now as we staggered into the +shadows it seemed that one of the elms was reaching down to touch us! +So, at least, the phenomenon presented itself to my mind in that +fleeting moment while Smith, uttering his warning cry, was hurling me +back. + +Then the truth became apparent. + +With an appalling crash, a huge bough fell from above. One piercing +awful shriek there was, a crackling of broken branches, and a choking +groan.... + +The crack of Smith's pistol close beside me completed my confusion of +mind. + +"Missed!" he yelled. "Shoot it, Petrie! On your left! For God's sake +don't miss it!" + +I turned. A lithe black shape was streaking past me. I +fired--once--twice. Another frightful cry made yet more hideous the +nocturne. + +Nayland Smith was directing the ray of a pocket torch upon the fallen +bough. + +"Have you killed it, Petrie?" he cried. + +"Yes, yes!" + +I stood beside him, looking down. From the tangle of leaves and twigs +an evil yellow face looked up at us. The features were contorted with +agony, but the malignant eyes, wherein light was dying, regarded us +with inflexible hatred. The man was pinned beneath the heavy bough; +his back was broken; and, as we watched, he expired, frothing slightly +at the mouth, and quitted his tenement of clay leaving those glassy +eyes set hideously upon us. + +"The pagan gods fight upon our side," said Smith strangely. "Elms have +a dangerous habit of shedding boughs in still weather--particularly +after a storm. Pan, god of the woods, with this one has performed +Justice's work of retribution." + +"I don't understand. Where was this man--?" + +"Up the tree, lying along the bough which fell, Petrie! That is why he +left no footmarks. Last night no doubt he made his escape by swinging +from bough to bough, ape-fashion, and descending to the ground +somewhere at the other side of the coppice." + +He glanced at me. + +"You are wondering, perhaps," he suggested, "what caused the +mysterious light? I could have told you this morning, but I fear I was +in a bad temper, Petrie. It's very simple; a length of tape soaked in +spirit or something of the kind, and sheltered from the view of any +one watching from your windows, behind the trunk of the tree; then, +the end ignited, lowered, still behind the tree, to the ground. The +operator swinging it around, the flame ascended, of course. I found +the unburned fragment of the tape used last night, a few yards from +here." + +I was peering down at Fu-Manchu's servant, the hideous yellow man who +lay dead in a bower of elm leaves. + +"He has some kind of leather bag beside him," I began. + +"Exactly!" rapped Smith. "In that he carried his dangerous instrument +of death; from that he released it!" + +"Released what?" + +"What your fascinating friend came to recapture this morning." + +"Don't taunt me, Smith!" I said bitterly. "Is it some species of +bird?" + +"You saw the marks on Forsyth's body, and I told you of those which I +had traced upon the ground here. They were caused by _claws_, Petrie!" + +"Claws! I thought so! But _what_ claws?" + +"The claws of a poisonous thing. I recaptured the one used last night, +killed it--against my will--and buried it on the mound. I was afraid +to throw it in the pond, lest some juvenile fisherman should pull it +out and sustain a scratch. I don't know how long the claws would +remain venomous." + +"You are treating me like a child, Smith," I said, slowly. "No doubt I +am hopelessly obtuse, but perhaps you will tell me what this Chinaman +carried in a leather bag and released upon Forsyth. It was something +which you recaptured, apparently with the aid of a plate of cold +turbot and a jug of milk. It was something, also, which Karamaneh had +been sent to recapture with the aid--" + +I stopped. + +"Go on," said Nayland Smith, turning the ray to the left; "what did +she have in the basket?" + +"Valerian," I replied mechanically. + +The ray rested upon the lithe creature that I had shot down. + +It was a black cat! + +"A cat will go through fire and water for valerian," said Smith; "but +I got first innings this morning with fish and milk! I had recognized +the imprints under the trees for those of a cat, and I knew that if a +cat had been released here it would still be hiding in the +neighbourhood, probably in the bushes. I finally located a cat, sure +enough, and came for bait! I laid my trap, for the animal was too +frightened to be approachable, and then shot it; I had to. That yellow +fiend used the light as a decoy. The branch which killed him jutted +out over the path at a spot where an opening in the foliage above +allowed some moon rays to penetrate. Directly the victim stood +beneath, the Chinaman uttered his bird-cry; the one below looked up, +and the cat, previously held silent and helpless in the leather sack, +was dropped accurately upon his head!" + +"But--" I was growing confused. + +Smith stooped lower. + +"The cat's claws are sheathed now," he said; "but if you could examine +them you would find that they are coated with a shining black +substance. Only Fu-Manchu knows what that substance is, Petrie; but +you and I know what it can do!" + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +ENTER MR. ABEL SLATTIN + + +"I don't blame you!" rapped Nayland Smith. "Suppose we say, then, a +thousand pounds if you show us the present hiding-place of Fu-Manchu, +the payment to be in no way subject to whether we profit by your +information or not?" + +Abel Slattin shrugged his shoulders, racially, and returned to the +armchair which he had just quitted. He reseated himself, placing his +hat and cane upon my writing-table. + +"A little agreement in black and white?" he suggested smoothly. + +Smith raised himself up out of the white cane chair, and, bending +forward over a corner of the table, scribbled busily upon a sheet of +notepaper with my fountain-pen. + +The while he did so, I covertly studied our visitor. He lay back in +the armchair, his heavy eyelids lowered deceptively. He was a thought +overdressed--a big man, dark-haired and well-groomed, who toyed with a +monocle most unsuitable to his type. During the preceding +conversation, I had been vaguely surprised to note Mr. Abel Slattin's +marked American accent. + +Sometimes, when Slattin moved, a big diamond which he wore upon the +third finger of his right hand glittered magnificently. There was a +sort of bluish tint underlying the dusky skin, noticeable even in his +hands but proclaiming itself significantly in his puffy face and +especially under the eyes. I diagnosed a labouring valve somewhere in +the heart system. + +Nayland Smith's pen scratched on. My glance strayed from our Semitic +caller to his cane, lying upon the red leather before me. It was of +most unusual workmanship, apparently Indian, being made of some kind +of dark brown, mottled wood, bearing a marked resemblance to a snake's +skin; and the top of the cane was carved in conformity, to represent +the head of what I took to be a puff-adder, fragments of stone, or +beads, being inserted to represent the eyes, and the whole thing being +finished with an artistic realism almost startling. + +When Smith had tossed the written page to Slattin, and he, having read +it with an appearance of carelessness, had folded it neatly and placed +it in his pocket, I said: + +"You have a curio here?" + +Our visitor, whose dark eyes revealed all the satisfaction which, by +his manner, he sought to conceal, nodded and took up the cane in his +hand. + +"It comes from Australia, doctor," he replied; "it's aboriginal work, +and was given to me by a client. You thought it was Indian? Everybody +does. It's my mascot." + +"Really?" + +"It is indeed. Its former owner ascribed magical powers to it! In +fact, I believe he thought that it was one of those staffs mentioned +in biblical history--" + +"Aaron's rod?" suggested Smith, glancing at the cane. + +"Something of the sort," said Slattin, standing up and again preparing +to depart. + +"You will 'phone us, then?" asked my friend. + +"You will hear from me to-morrow," was the reply. + +Smith returned to the cane armchair, and Slattin, bowing to both of +us, made his way to the door as I rang for the girl to show him out. + +"Considering the importance of his proposal," I began, as the door +closed, "you hardly received our visitor with cordiality." + +"I hate to have any relations with him," answered my friend; "but we +must not be squeamish respecting our instruments in dealing with Dr. +Fu-Manchu. Slattin has a rotten reputation--even for a private inquiry +agent. He is little better than a blackmailer--" + +"How do you know?" + +"Because I called on our friend Weymouth at the Yard yesterday and +looked up the man's record." + +"Whatever for?" + +"I knew that he was concerning himself, for some reason, in the case. +Beyond doubt he has established some sort of communication with the +Chinese group; I am only wondering--" + +"You don't mean--" + +"Yes--I do, Petrie! I tell you he is unscrupulous enough to stoop even +to that." + +No doubt Slattin knew that this gaunt, eager-eyed Burmese commissioner +was vested with ultimate authority in his quest of the mighty Chinaman +who represented things unutterable, whose potentialities for evil were +boundless as his genius, who personified a secret danger, the extent +and nature of which none of us truly understood. And, learning of +these things, with unerring Semitic instinct he had sought an opening +in this glittering Rialto. But there were _two_ bidders! + +"You think he may have sunk so low as to become a creature of +Fu-Manchu?" I asked, aghast. + +"Exactly! If it paid him well I do not doubt that he would serve that +master as readily as any other. His record is about as black as it +well could be. Slattin is, of course, an assumed name; he was known as +Lieutenant Pepley when he belonged to the New York Police, and he was +kicked out of the service for complicity in an unsavoury Chinatown +case." + +"Chinatown!" + +"Yes, Petrie, it made me wonder, too; and we must not forget that he +is undeniably a clever scoundrel." + +"Shall you keep any appointment which he may suggest?" + +"Undoubtedly. But I shall not wait until to-morrow." + +"What!" + +"I propose to pay a little informal visit to Mr. Abel Slattin +to-night." + +"At his office?" + +"No; at his private residence. If, as I more than suspect, his object +is to draw us into some trap, he will probably report his favourable +progress to his employer to-night!" + +"Then we should have followed him!" + +Nayland Smith stood up and divested himself of the old +shooting-jacket. + +"He _has_ been followed, Petrie," he replied, with one of his rare +smiles. "Two C.I.D. men have been watching the house all night!" + +This was entirely characteristic of my friend's farseeing methods. + +"By the way," I said, "you saw Eltham this morning. He will soon be +convalescent. Where, in Heaven's name, can he--" + +"Don't be alarmed on his behalf, Petrie," interrupted Smith. "His life +is no longer in danger." + +I stared, stupidly. + +"No longer in danger!" + +"He received, some time yesterday, a letter, written in Chinese, upon +Chinese paper, and enclosed in an ordinary business envelope, having a +typewritten address and bearing a London postmark." + +"Well?" + +"As nearly as I can render the message in English it reads: 'Although, +because you are a brave man, you would not betray your correspondent in +China, he has been discovered. He was a mandarin, and as I cannot write +the name of a traitor, I may not name him. He was executed four days +ago. I salute you and pray for your speedy recovery.--FU-MANCHU.'" + +"Fu-Manchu! But it is almost certainly a trap." + +"On the contrary, Petrie, Fu-Manchu would not have written in Chinese +unless he were sincere; and, to clear all doubt, I received a cable +this morning reporting that the Mandarin Yen-Sun-Yat was assassinated +in his own garden, in Nan-Yang, one day last week." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +DR. FU-MANCHU STRIKES + + +Together we marched down the slope of the quiet, suburban avenue; to +take pause before a small, detached house displaying the hatchet +boards of the estate agent. Here we found unkempt laurel bushes, and +acacias run riot, from which arboreal tangle protruded the notice: "To +be Let or Sold." + +Smith, with an alert glance to right and left, pushed open the wooden +gate and drew me in upon the gravel path. Darkness mantled all; for +the nearest street lamp was fully twenty yards beyond. + +From the miniature jungle bordering the path, a soft whistle sounded. + +"Is that Carter?" called Smith sharply. + +A shadowy figure uprose, and vaguely I made it out for that of a man +in the unobtrusive blue serge which is the undress uniform of the +Force. + +"Well?" rapped my companion. + +"Mr. Slattin returned ten minutes ago, sir," reported the constable. +"He came in a cab which he dismissed--" + +"He has not left again?" + +"A few minutes after his return," the man continued, "another cab came +up, and a lady alighted." + +"A lady!" + +"The same, sir, that has called upon him before." + +"Smith!" I whispered, plucking at his arm--"is it--?" + +He half turned, nodding his head; and my heart began to throb +foolishly. For now the manner of Slattin's campaign suddenly was +revealed to me. In our operations against the Chinese murder-group two +years before, we had had an ally in the enemy's camp--Karamaneh, the +beautiful slave, whose presence in those happenings of the past had +coloured the sometimes sordid drama with the opulence of old Arabia; +who had seemed a fitting figure for the romances of Bagdad during the +Caliphate--Karamaneh, whom I had thought sincere, whose inscrutable +Eastern soul I had presumed, fatuously, to have laid bare and +analysed. + +Now once again she was plying her old trade of go-between; professing +to reveal the secrets of Dr. Fu-Manchu, and all the time--I could not +doubt it--inveigling men into the net of this awful fisher. + +Yesterday, I had been her dupe; yesterday, I had rejoiced in my +captivity. To-day, I was not the favoured one; to-day I had not been +selected recipient of her confidences--confidences sweet, seductive, +deadly: but Abel Slattin, a plausible rogue, who, in justice, should +be immured in Sing Sing, was chosen out, was enslaved by those lovely +mysterious eyes, was taking to his soul the lies which fell from those +perfect lips, triumphant in a conquest that must end in his undoing; +deeming, poor fool, that for love of him this pearl of the Orient was +about to betray her master, to resign herself a prize to the victor! + +Companioned by these bitter reflections, I had lost the remainder of +the conversation between Nayland Smith and the police officer; now, +casting off the succubus memory which threatened to obsess me, I put +forth a giant mental effort to purge my mind of this uncleanness, and +became again an active participant in the campaign against the +Master--the director of all things noxious. + +Our plans being evidently complete, Smith seized my arm, and I found +myself again out upon the avenue. He led me across the road and into +the gate of a house almost opposite. From the fact that two upper +windows were illuminated, I adduced that the servants were retiring; +the other windows were in darkness, except for one on the ground floor +to the extreme left of the building, through the lowered venetian +blinds whereof streaks of light shone out. + +"Slattin's study!" whispered Smith. "He does not anticipate +surveillance, and you will note that the window is wide open!" + +With that my friend crossed the strip of lawn, and, careless of the +fact that his silhouette must have been visible to any one passing the +gate, climbed carefully up the artificial rockery intervening, and +crouched upon the window-ledge peering into the room. + +A moment I hesitated, fearful that if I followed I should stumble or +dislodge some of the lava blocks of which the rockery was composed. + +Then I heard that which summoned me to the attempt, whatever the cost. + +Through the open window came the sound of a musical voice--a voice +possessing a haunting accent, possessing a quality which struck upon +my heart and set it quivering as though it were a gong hung in my +bosom. + +Karamaneh was speaking. + +Upon hands and knees, heedless of damage to my garments, I crawled up +beside Smith. One of the laths was slightly displaced and over this my +friend was peering in. Crouching close beside him, I peered in also. + +I saw the study of a business man, with its files, neatly arranged +works of reference, roll-top desk, and Milner safe. Before the desk, +in a revolving chair, sat Slattin. He sat half-turned towards the +window, leaning back and smiling; so that I could note the gold crown +which preserved the lower left molar. In an armchair by the window, +close, very close, and sitting with her back to me, was Karamaneh! + +She, who, in my dreams, I always saw, was ever seeing, in an Eastern +dress, with gold bands about her white ankles, with jewel-laden +fingers, with jewels in her hair, wore now a fashionable costume and a +hat that could only have been produced in Paris. Karamaneh was the one +Oriental woman I had ever known who could wear European clothes; and +as I watched that exquisite profile, I thought that Delilah must have +been just such another as this; that, excepting the Empress Poppae, +history has record of no woman who, looking so innocent, was yet so +utterly vile. + +"Yes, my dear," Slattin was saying, and through his monocle ogling his +beautiful visitor, "I shall be ready for you to-morrow night." + +I felt Smith start at the words. + +"There will be a sufficient number of men?" + +Karamaneh put the question in a strangely listless way. + +"My dear little girl," replied Slattin, rising and standing looking +down at her, with his gold tooth twinkling in the lamplight, "there +will be a whole division, if a whole division is necessary." + +He sought to take her white gloved hand, which rested upon the chair +arm; but she evaded the attempt with seeming artlessness, and stood +up. Slattin fixed his bold gaze upon her. + +"So now, give me my orders," he said. + +"I am not prepared to do so, yet," replied the girl composedly; "but +now that I know you are ready, I can make my plans." + +She glided past him to the door, avoiding his outstretched arm with an +artless art which made me writhe; for once I had been the willing +victim of all these wiles. + +"But--" began Slattin. + +"I will ring you up in less than half an hour," said Karamaneh; and +without further ceremony, she opened the door. + +I still had my eyes glued to the aperture in the blind, when Smith +began tugging at my arm. + +"Down! you fool!" he hissed sharply; "if she sees us, all is lost!" + +Realizing this, and none too soon, I turned, and rather clumsily +followed my friend. I dislodged a piece of granite in my descent; but, +fortunately Slattin had gone out into the hall and could not well have +heard it. + +We were crouching around an angle of the house, when a flood of light +poured down the steps, and Karamaneh rapidly descended. I had a +glimpse of a dark-faced man who evidently had opened the door for her; +then all my thoughts were centred upon that graceful figure receding +from me in the direction of the avenue. She wore a loose cloak, and I +saw this fluttering for a moment against the white gate-posts; then +she was gone. + +Yet Smith did not move. Detaining me with his hand he crouched there +against a quick-set hedge; until, from a spot lower down the hill, we +heard the start of the cab, which had been waiting. Twenty seconds +elapsed, and from some other distant spot a second cab started. + +"That's Weymouth!" snapped Smith. "With decent luck, we should know +Fu-Manchu's hiding-place before Slattin tells us!" + +"But--" + +"Oh! as it happens he's apparently playing the game." In the +half-light, Smith stared at me significantly. "Which makes it all the +more important," he concluded, "that we should not rely upon his aid!" + +Those grim words were prophetic. + +My companion made no attempt to communicate with the detective (or +detectives) who shared our vigil; we took up a position close under +the lighted study window and waited--waited. + +Once, a taxi-cab laboured hideously up the steep gradient of the +avenue.... It was gone. The lights at the upper windows above us +became extinguished. A policeman tramped past the gateway, casually +flashing his lamp in at the opening. One by one the illuminated +windows in other houses visible to us became dull; then lived again as +mirrors for the pallid moon. In the silence, words spoken within the +study were clearly audible; and we heard some one--presumably the man +who had opened the door--inquire if his services would be wanted again +that night. + +Smith inclined his head and hung over me in a tense attitude, in order +to catch Slattin's reply. + +"Yes, Burke," it came, "I want you to sit up until I return; I shall +be going out shortly." + +Evidently the man withdrew at that; for a complete silence followed +which prevailed for fully half an hour. I sought cautiously to move my +cramped limbs, unlike Smith, who seeming to have sinews of piano-wire, +crouched beside me immovable, untiringly. Then loud upon the +stillness, broke the strident note of the telephone bell. + +I started, nervously, clutching at Smith's arm. It felt hard as iron +to my grip. + +"Hullo!" I heard Slattin call, "who is speaking?... Yes, yes! This is +Mr. A. S.... I am to come at once?... I know where--yes!... You will +meet me there?... Good!--I shall be with you in half an hour.... +Good-bye!" + +Distinctly I heard the creak of the revolving office-chair as Slattin +rose; then Smith had me by the arm, and we were flying swiftly away +from the door to take up our former post around the angle of the +building. This gained-- + +"He's going to his death!" rapped Smith beside me; "but Carter has a +cab from the Yard waiting in the nearest rank. We shall follow to see +where he goes--for it is possible that Weymouth may have been thrown +off the scent; then, when we are sure of his destination, we can take +a hand in the game! We--" + +The end of the sentence was lost to me--drowned in such a frightful +wave of sound as I despair to describe. It began with a high, thin +scream, which was choked off staccato fashion; upon it followed a loud +and dreadful cry uttered with all the strength of Slattin's lungs. + +"Oh, God!" he cried, and again--"Oh, God!" + +This in turn merged into a sort of hysterical sobbing. + +I was on my feet now, and automatically making for the door. I had a +vague impression of Nayland Smith's face beside me, the eyes glassy +with a fearful apprehension. Then the door was flung open, and, in the +bright light of the hall-way, I saw Slattin standing--swaying and +seemingly fighting with the empty air. + +"What is it? For God's sake, what has happened?" reached my ears +dimly--and the man Burke showed behind his master. White-faced I saw +him to be; for now Smith and I were racing up the steps. + +Ere we could reach him, Slattin, uttering another choking cry, pitched +forward and lay half across the threshold. + +We burst into the hall, where Burke stood with both his hands raised +dazedly to his head. I could hear the sound of running feet upon the +gravel, and knew that Carter was coming to join us. + +Burke, a heavy man with a lowering, bull-dog type of face, collapsed +on to his knees beside Slattin, and began softly to laugh in little +rising peals. + +"Drop that!" snapped Smith, and grasping him by the shoulders, he sent +him spinning along the hall-way, where he sank upon the bottom step of +the stairs, to sit with his outstretched fingers extended before his +face, and peering at us grotesquely through the crevices. + +There were rustlings and subdued cries from the upper part of the +house. Carter came in out of the darkness, carefully stepping over the +recumbent figure; and the three of us stood there in the lighted hall +looking down at Slattin. + +"Help me to move him back," directed Smith tensely; "far enough to +close the door." + +Between us we accomplished this, and Carter fastened the door. We were +alone with the shadow of Fu-Manchu's vengeance; for as I knelt beside +the body on the floor, a look and a touch sufficed to tell me that +this was but clay from which the spirit had fled! + +Smith met my glance as I raised my head, and his teeth came together +with a loud snap; the jaw muscles stood out prominently beneath the +dark skin; and his face was grimly set in that old, half-despairful +expression which I knew so well but which boded so ill for whomsoever +occasioned it. + +"Dead, Petrie--already?" + +"Lightning could have done the work no better. Can I turn him over?" + +Smith nodded. + +Together we stooped and rolled the heavy body on its back. A flood of +whispers came sibilantly from the stairway. Smith spun around rapidly, +and glared upon the group of half-dressed servants. + +"Return to your rooms!" he rapped imperiously: "let no one come into +the hall without my orders." + +The masterful voice had its usual result; there was a hurried retreat +to the upper landing. Burke, shaking like a man with an ague, sat on +the lower step, pathetically drumming his palms upon his uplifted +knees. + +"I warned him, I warned him!" he mumbled monotonously, "I warned him, +oh, I warned him!" + +"Stand up!" shouted Smith, "stand up and come here!" + +The man, with his frightened eyes turning to right and left, and +seeming to search for something in the shadows about him, advanced +obediently. + +"Have you a flask?" demanded Smith of Carter. + +The detective silently administered to Burke a stiff restorative. + +"Now," continued Smith, "you, Petrie, will want to examine him, I +suppose?" He pointed to the body. "And in the meantime I have some +questions to put to you, my man." + +He clapped his hand upon Burke's shoulder. + +"My God!" Burke broke out, "I was ten yards from him when it +happened!" + +"No one is accusing you," said Smith less harshly; "but since you were +the only witness, it is by your aid that we hope to clear the matter +up." + +Exerting a gigantic effort to regain control of himself, Burke nodded, +watching my friend with a childlike eagerness. During the ensuing +conversation, I examined Slattin for marks of violence; and of what I +found, more anon. + +"In the first place," said Smith, "you say that you warned him. When +did you warn him, and of what?" + +"I warned him, sir, that it would come to this--" + +"That _what_ would come to this?" + +"His dealings with the Chinamen!" + +"He had dealings with Chinamen?" + +"He accidentally met a Chinaman at an East End gaming-house, a man he +had known in 'Frisco--a man called Singapore Charlie--" + +"What! Singapore Charlie!" + +"Yes, sir, the same man that had a dope-shop, two years ago, down +Ratcliffe way--" + +"There was a fire--" + +"But Singapore Charlie escaped, sir." + +"And he is one of the gang?" + +"He is one of what we used to call, in New York, the Seven Group." + +Smith began to tug at the lobe of his left ear, reflectively, as I saw +out of the corner of my eye. + +"The Seven Group!" he mused. "That is significant. I always suspected +that Dr. Fu-Manchu and the notorious Seven Group were one and the +same. Go on, Burke." + +"Well, sir," the man continued more calmly, "the lieutenant--" + +"The lieutenant!" began Smith; then: "Oh! of course; Slattin used to +be a police lieutenant!" + +"Well, sir, he--Mr. Slattin--had a sort of hold on this Singapore +Charlie, and two years ago, when he first met him, he thought that +with his aid he was going to pull off the biggest thing of his life--" + +"Forestall _me_, in fact?" + +"Yes, sir; but you got in first with the big raid--and spoiled it." + +Smith nodded grimly, glancing at the Scotland Yard man, who returned +his nod with equal grimness. + +"A couple of months ago," resumed Burke, "he met Charlie again down +East, and the Chinaman introduced him to a girl--some sort of an +Egyptian girl." + +"Go on!" snapped Smith. "I know her." + +"He saw her a good many times--and she came here once or twice. She +made out that she and Singapore Charlie were prepared to give away the +boss of the Yellow gang--" + +"For a price, of course?" + +"I suppose so," said Burke; "but I don't know. I only know that I +warned him." + +"H'm!" muttered Smith. "And now, what took place to-night?" + +"He had an appointment here with the girl," began Burke. + +"I know all that," interrupted Smith. "I merely want to know what +took place after the telephone call." + +"Well, he told me to wait up, and I was dozing in the next room to the +study--the dining-room--when the 'phone bell aroused me. I heard the +lieutenant--Mr. Slattin--coming out, and I ran out too, but only in +time to see him taking his hat from the rack--" + +"But he wears no hat!" + +"He never got it off the peg! Just as he reached up to take it, he +gave a most frightful scream, and turned around like lightning as +though some one had attacked him from behind!" + +"There was no one else in the hall?" + +"No one at all. I was standing down there outside the dining-room just +by the stairs, but he didn't turn in my direction, he turned and +looked right behind him--where there was no one--nothing. His cries +were frightful." Burke's voice broke, and he shuddered feverishly. +"Then he made a rush for the front door. It seemed as though he had +not seen me. He stood there screaming; but, before I could reach him, +he fell...." + +Nayland Smith fixed a piercing gaze upon Burke. + +"Is that all you know?" he demanded slowly. + +"As God is my judge, sir, that's all I know, and all I saw. There was +no living thing near him when he met his death." + +"We shall see," muttered Smith. He turned to me. "What killed him, +Petrie?" he asked shortly. + +"Apparently something which occasioned a minute wound on the left +wrist," I replied, and, stooping, I raised the already cold hand in +mine. + +A tiny, inflamed wound showed on the wrist; and a certain puffiness +was becoming observable in the injured hand and arm. Smith bent down +and drew a quick, sibilant breath. + +"You know what this is, Petrie?" he cried. + +"Certainly. It was too late to employ a ligature and useless to +inject ammonia. Death was practically instantaneous. His heart...." + +There came a loud knocking and ringing. + +"Carter!" cried Smith, turning to the detective, "open that door to no +one--no one. Explain who I am--" + +"But if it is the inspector--?" + +"I said, open the door to _no one_!" snapped Smith. "Burke, stand +exactly where you are! Carter, you can speak to whoever knocks through +the letter-box. Petrie, don't move for your life! It may be here, in +the hall way!..." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE CLIMBER + + +Our search of the house of Abel Slattin ceased only with the coming of +the dawn and yielded nothing but disappointment. Failure followed upon +failure; for, in the grey light of the morning, our own quest +concluded, Inspector Weymouth returned to report that the girl, +Karamaneh, had thrown him off the scent. + +Again he stood before me, the big, burly friend of old and dreadful +days: a little greyer above the temples, which I set down for a record +of former horrors; but deliberate, stoical, thorough, as ever. His +blue eyes melted in the old generous way as he saw me, and he gripped +my hand in greeting. + +"Once again," he said, "your dark-eyed friend has been too clever for +me, doctor. But the track, as far as I could follow, leads to the old +spot. In fact"--he turned to Smith, who, grim-faced and haggard, +looked thoroughly ill in that grey light--"I believe Fu-Manchu's lair +is somewhere near the former opium-den of Shen-Yan--'Singapore +Charlie'!" + +Smith nodded. + +"We will turn our attention in that direction," he replied, "at a very +early date." + +Inspector Weymouth looked down at the body of Abel Slattin. + +"How was it done?" he asked softly. + +"Clumsily for Fu-Manchu," I replied. "A snake was introduced into the +house by some means--" + +"By Karamaneh!" rapped Smith. + +"Very possibly by Karamaneh," I continued firmly. "The thing has +escaped us." + +"My own idea," said Smith, "is that it was concealed about his +clothing. When he fell by the open door it glided out of the house. We +must have the garden searched thoroughly by daylight." + +"_He_"--Weymouth glanced at that which lay upon the floor--"must be +moved; but otherwise we can leave the place untouched, clear out the +servants, and lock the house up!" + +"I have already given orders to that effect," answered Smith. He spoke +wearily and with a note of conscious defeat in his voice. "Nothing has +been disturbed"--he swept his arm around comprehensively--"papers and +so forth you can examine at leisure." + +Presently we quitted that house upon which the fateful Chinaman had +set his seal, as the suburb was awakening to a new day. The clank of +milk-cans was my final impression of the avenue to which a dreadful +minister of death had come at the bidding of the death lord. We left +Inspector Weymouth in charge and returned to my rooms, scarcely +exchanging a word upon the way. + +Nayland Smith, ignoring my entreaties, composed himself for slumber in +the white cane chair in my study. About noon he retired to the +bath-room and, returning, made a pretence to breakfast; then resumed +his seat in the cane armchair. Carter reported in the afternoon, but +his report was merely formal. Returning from my round of professional +visits at half-past five, I found Nayland Smith in the same position; +and so the day waned into evening, and dusk fell uneventfully. + +In the corner of the big room by the empty fireplace, Nayland Smith +lay, his long, lean frame extended in the white cane chair. A tumbler, +from which two straws protruded, stood by his right elbow, and a +perfect continent of tobacco smoke lay between us, wafted towards the +door by the draught from an open window. He had littered the hearth +with matches and tobacco ash, being the most untidy smoker I had ever +met; and save for his frequent rappings out of his pipe bowl and +perpetual striking of matches, he had shown no sign of activity for +the past hour. Collarless and wearing an old tweed jacket, he had +spent the evening, as he had spent the day, in the cane chair, only +quitting it for some ten minutes, or less, to toy with dinner. + +My several attempts at conversation had elicited nothing but growls; +therefore, as dusk descended, having dismissed my few patients, I +busied myself collating my notes upon the renewed activity of the +Yellow Doctor, and was thus engaged when the 'phone bell disturbed me. +It was Smith who was wanted, however; and he went out eagerly, leaving +me to my task. + +At the end of a lengthy conversation, he returned from the 'phone and +began, restlessly, to pace the room. I made a pretence of continuing +my labours, but covertly I was watching him. He was twitching at the +lobe of his left ear, and his face was a study in perplexity. Abruptly +he burst out: + +"I shall throw the thing up, Petrie! Either I am growing too old to +cope with such an adversary as Fu-Manchu, or else my intellect has +become dull. I cannot seem to think clearly or consistently. For the +Doctor, this crime, this removal of Slattin, is clumsy--unfinished. +There are two explanations. Either he, too, is losing his old +cunning, or he has been interrupted!" + +"Interrupted!" + +"Take the facts, Petrie." Smith clapped his hands upon my table and +bent down, peering into my eyes. "Is it characteristic of Fu-Manchu to +kill a man by the direct agency of a snake and to implicate one of his +own damnable servants in this way?" + +"But we have found no snake!" + +"Karamaneh introduced one in some way. Do you doubt it?" + +"Certainly Karamaneh visited him on the evening of his death, but you +must be perfectly well aware that even if she had been arrested, no +jury could convict her." + +Smith resumed his restless pacings up and down. + +"You are very useful to me, Petrie," he rapped; "as a counsel for the +defence you constantly rectify my errors of prejudice. Yet I am +convinced that our presence at Slattin's house last night prevented +Fu-Manchu from finishing off this little matter as he had designed to +do." + +"What has given you this idea?" + +"Weymouth is responsible. He has rung me up from the Yard. The +constable on duty at the house where the murder was committed, reports +that some one, less than an hour ago, attempted to break in." + +"Break in!" + +"Ah! you are interested? _I_ thought the circumstance illuminating, +also!" + +"Did the officer see this person?" + +"No; he only heard him. It was some one who endeavoured to enter by +the bath-room window, which, I am told, may be reached fairly easily +by an agile climber." + +"The attempt did not succeed?" + +"No; the constable interrupted, but failed to make a capture or even +to secure a glimpse of the man." + +We were both silent for some moments; then-- + +"What do you propose to do?" I asked. + +"We must not let Fu-Manchu's servants know," replied Smith, "but +to-night I shall conceal myself in Slattin's house and remain there +for a week or a day--it matters not how long--until that attempt is +repeated. Quite obviously, Petrie, we have overlooked something which +implicates the murderer with the murder! In short, either by accident, +by reason of our superior vigilance, or by the clumsiness of his +plans, Fu-Manchu for once in an otherwise blameless career has left a +_clue_!" + + + + +CHAPTER X + +THE CLIMBER RETURNS + + +In utter darkness we groped our way through into the hall of Slattin's +house, having entered, stealthily, from the rear; for Smith had +selected the study as a suitable base of operations. We reached it +without mishap, and presently I found myself seated in the very chair +which Karamaneh had occupied; my companion took up a post just within +the widely opened door. + +So we commenced our ghostly business in the house of the murdered +man--a house from which, but a few hours since, his body had been +removed. This was such a vigil as I had endured once before, when, +with Nayland Smith and another, I had waited for the coming of one of +Fu-Manchu's death agents. + +Of all the sounds which one by one now began to detach themselves from +the silence, there was a particular sound, homely enough at another +time, which spoke to me more dreadfully than the rest. It was the +ticking of the clock upon the mantelpiece; and I thought how this +sound must have been familiar to Abel Slattin, how it must have formed +part and parcel of his life, as it were, and how it went on +now--_tick_-_tick_-_tick_-_tick_--whilst he, for whom it had ticked, +lay unheeding--would never heed it more. + +As I grew more accustomed to the gloom, I found myself staring at the +office chair; once I found myself expecting Abel Slattin to enter the +room and occupy it. There was a little China Buddha upon a bureau in +one corner, with a gilded cap upon its head, and as some reflection of +the moonlight sought out this little cap, my thoughts grotesquely +turned upon the murdered man's gold tooth. + +Vague creakings from within the house, sounds as though of stealthy +footsteps upon the stairs, set my nerves tingling; but Nayland Smith gave +no sign, and I knew that my imagination was magnifying these ordinary night +sounds out of all proportion to their actual significance. Leaves rustled +faintly outside the window at my back: I construed their sibilant whispers +into the dreaded name--_Fu-Manchu_--_Fu-Manchu_--_Fu-Manchu_! + +So wore on the night; and, when the ticking clock hollowly boomed the +hour of one, I almost leapt out of my chair, so highly strung were my +nerves, and so appallingly did the sudden clangour beat upon them. +Smith, like a man of stone, showed no sign. He was capable of so +subduing his constitutionally high-strung temperament, at times, that +temporarily he became immune from human dreads. On such occasion he +would be icily cool amid universal panic; but, his object +accomplished, I have seen him in such a state of collapse, that utter +nervous exhaustion is the only term by which I can describe it. + +_Tick_-_tick_-_tick_-_tick_ went the clock, and, my heart still +thumping noisily in my breast, I began to count the tickings; _one_, +_two_, _three_, _four_, _five_, and so on to a hundred, and from one +hundred to many hundreds. + +Then, out from the confusion of minor noises, a new, arresting sound +detached itself. I ceased my counting; no longer I noted the +_tick_-_tick_ of the clock, nor the vague creakings, rustlings and +whispers. I saw Smith, shadowly, raise his hand in warning--in +needless warning; for I was almost holding my breath in an effort of +acute listening. + +From high up in the house this new sound came--from above the topmost +rooms, it seemed, up under the roof; a regular squeaking, oddly +familiar, yet elusive. Upon it followed a very soft and muffled thud; +then a metallic sound as of a rusty hinge in motion; then a new +silence, pregnant with a thousand possibilities more eerie than any +clamour. + +My mind was rapidly at work. Lighting the topmost landing of the house +was a sort of glazed trap, evidently set in the floor of a loft-like +place extending over the entire building. Somewhere in the red-tiled +roof above, there presumably existed a corresponding skylight or +lantern. + +So I argued; and, ere I had come to any proper decision, another +sound, more intimate, came to interrupt me. + +This time I could be in no doubt; some one was lifting the trap above +the stairhead--slowly, cautiously, and all but silently. Yet to my +ears, attuned to trifling disturbances, the trap creaked and groaned +noisily. + +Nayland Smith waved to me to take a stand on the other side of the +opened door--behind it, in fact, where I should be concealed from the +view of any one descending the stair. + +I stood up and crossed the floor to my new post. + +A dull thud told of the trap fully raised and resting upon some +supporting joist. A faint rustling (of discarded garments, I told +myself) spoke to my newly awakened, acute perceptions, of the visitor +preparing to lower himself to the landing. Followed a groan of +woodwork submitted to sudden strain--and the unmistakable pad of bare +feet upon the linoleum of the top corridor. + +I knew now that one of Dr. Fu-Manchu's uncanny servants had gained the +roof of the house by some means, had broken through the skylight and +had descended by means of the trap beneath on to the landing. + +In such a tensed-up state as I cannot describe, nor, at this hour +mentally reconstruct, I waited for the creaking of the stairs which +should tell of the creature's descent. + +I was disappointed. Removed scarce a yard from me as he was, I could +hear Nayland Smith's soft, subdued breathing; but my eyes were all for +the darkened hall-way, for the smudgy outline of the stair-rail with +the faint patterning in the background, which, alone, indicated the +wall. + +It was amid an utter silence, unheralded by even so slight a sound as +those which I had acquired the power of detecting--that I saw the +continuity of the smudgy line of stair-rail to be interrupted. + +A dark patch showed upon it, just within my line of sight, invisible +to Smith on the other side of the doorway, and some ten or twelve +stairs up. + +No sound reached me, but the dark patch vanished--and reappeared three +feet lower down. + +Still I knew that this phantom approach must be unknown to my +companion--and I knew that it was impossible for me to advise him of +it unseen by the dreaded visitor. + +A third time the dark patch--the hand of one who, ghostly, silent, was +creeping down into the hall-way--vanished and reappeared on a level +with my eyes. Then a vague shape became visible; no more than a blur +upon the dim design of the wall-paper ... and Nayland Smith got his +first sight of the stranger. + +The clock on the mantelpiece boomed out the half-hour. + +At that, such was my state (I blush to relate it), I uttered a faint +cry! + +It ended all secrecy--that hysterical weakness of mine. It might have +frustrated our hopes; that it did not do so was in no measure due to +me. But in a sort of passionate whirl, the ensuing events moved +swiftly. + +Smith hesitated not one instant. With a panther-like leap he hurled +himself into the hall. + +"The lights, Petrie!" he cried, "the lights! The switch is near the +street door!" + +I clenched my fists in a swift effort to regain control of my +treacherous nerves, and, bounding past Smith, and past the foot of the +stair, I reached out my hand to the switch, the situation of which, +fortunately, I knew. + +Around I came, in response to a shrill cry from behind me--an inhuman +cry, less a cry than the shriek of some enraged animal.... + +With his left foot upon the first stair, Nayland Smith stood, his lean +body bent perilously backward, his arms rigidly thrust out, and his +sinewy fingers gripping the throat of an almost naked man--a man whose +brown body glistened unctuously, whose shaven head was apish low, +whose bloodshot eyes were the eyes of a mad dog! His teeth, upper and +lower, were bared; they glistened, they gnashed, and a froth was on +his lips. With both his hands, he clutched a heavy stick, and +once--twice, he brought it down upon Nayland Smith's head! + +I leapt forward to my friend's aid; but as though the blows had been +those of a feather, he stood like some figure of archaic statuary, nor +for an instant relaxed the death-grip which he had upon his +adversary's throat. + +Thrusting my way up the stairs, I wrenched the stick from the hand of +the dacoit--for in this glistening brown man I recognized one of that +deadly brotherhood who hailed Dr. Fu-Manchu their Lord and Master. + + * * * * * + +I cannot dwell upon the end of that encounter; I cannot hope to make +acceptable to my readers an account of how Nayland Smith, glassy-eyed, +and with consciousness ebbing from him instant by instant, stood +there, a realization of Leighton's "Athlete," his arms rigid as iron +bars even after Fu-Manchu's servant hung limply in that frightful +grip. + +In his last moment of consciousness, with the blood from his wounded +head trickling down into his eyes, he pointed to the stick which I had +torn from the grip of the dacoit, and which I still held in my hand. + +"Not Aaron's rod, Petrie!" he gasped hoarsely ... "the rod of +Moses!--Slattin's stick!" + +Even in upon my anxiety for my friend, amazement intruded. + +"But," I began--and turned to the rack in which Slattin's favourite +cane at that moment reposed--had reposed at the time of his death. + +Yes! There stood Slattin's cane; we had not moved it; we had disturbed +nothing in that stricken house; there it stood, in company with an +umbrella and a malacca. + +I glanced at the cane in my hand. Surely there could not be two such +in the world? + +Smith collapsed on the floor at my feet. + +"Examine the one in the rack, Petrie," he whispered, almost inaudibly, +"but do not touch it. It may not be yet...." + +I propped him up against the foot of the stairs, and as the constable +began knocking violently at the street door, crossed to the rack and +lifted out the replica of the cane which I held in my hand. + +A faint cry from Smith--and as if it had been a leprous thing, I +dropped the cane instantly. + +"Merciful God!" I groaned. + +Although, in every other particular, it corresponded with that which I +held--which I had taken from the dacoit--which he had come to +substitute for the cane now lying upon the floor--in one dreadful +particular it differed. + +Up to the snake's head it was an accurate copy; _but the head lived_! + +Either from pain, fear, or starvation, the thing confined in the +hollow tube of this awful duplicate was become torpid. Otherwise, no +power on earth could have saved me from the fate of Abel Slattin; for +the creature was an Australian death-adder. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +THE WHITE PEACOCK + + +Nayland Smith wasted no time in pursuing the plan of campaign which he +had mentioned to Inspector Weymouth. Less than forty-eight hours after +quitting the house of the murdered Slattin I found myself bound along +Whitechapel Road upon strange enough business. + +A very fine rain was falling, which rendered it difficult to see +clearly from the windows; but the weather apparently had little effect +upon the commercial activities of the district. The cab was threading +a hazardous way through the cosmopolitan throng crowding the street. +On either side of me extended a row of stalls, seemingly established +in opposition to the more legitimate shops upon the inner side of the +pavement. + +Jewish hawkers, many of them in their shirt-sleeves, acclaimed the +rarity of the bargains which they had to offer; and, allowing for the +difference of costume, these tireless Israelites, heedless of climatic +conditions, sweating at their mongery, might well have stood, not in +a squalid London thoroughfare, but in an equally squalid market-street +of the Orient. + +They offered linen and fine raiment; from foot-gear to hair-oil their +wares ranged. They enlivened their auctioneering with conjuring tricks +and witty stories, selling watches by the aid of legerdemain, and +fancy vests by grace of a seasonable anecdote. + +Poles, Russians, Serbs, Roumanians, Jews of Hungary, and Italians of +Whitechapel mingled in the throng. Near East and Far East rubbed +shoulders. Pidgin English contested with Yiddish for the ownership of +some tawdry article offered by an auctioneer whose nationality defied +conjecture, save that always some branch of his ancestry had drawn +nourishment from the soil of Eternal Judaea. + +Some wearing men's caps, some with shawls thrown over their oily +locks, and some, more true to primitive instincts, defying, +bare-headed, the unkindly elements, bedraggled women--more often than +not burdened with muffled infants--crowded the pavements and the +roadway, thronged about the stalls like white ants about some choicer +carrion. + +And the fine drizzling rain fell upon all alike, pattering upon the +hood of the taxi-cab; trickling down the front windows; glistening +upon the unctuous hair of those in the street who were hatless; dewing +the bare arms of the auctioneers, and dripping, melancholy, from the +tarpaulin coverings of the stalls. Heedless of the rain above and of +the mud beneath, North, South, East and West mingled their cries, +their bids, their blandishments, their raillery, mingled their persons +in that joyless throng. + +Sometimes a yellow face showed close to one of the streaming windows; +sometimes a black-eyed, pallid face, but never a face wholly sane and +healthy. This was an underworld where squalor and vice went hand in +hand through the beautiless streets, a melting-pot of the world's +outcasts; this was the shadowland which last night had swallowed up +Nayland Smith. + +Ceaselessly I peered to right and left, searching amid that +rain-soaked company for any face known to me. Whom I expected to find +there, I know not, but I should have counted it no matter for surprise +had I detected amid that ungracious ugliness the beautiful face of +Karamaneh, the Eastern slave-girl, the leering yellow face of a +Burmese dacoit, the gaunt, bronze features of Nayland Smith; a hundred +times I almost believed that I had seen the ruddy countenance of +Inspector Weymouth, and once (at what instant my heart seemed to stand +still) I suffered from the singular delusion that the oblique green +eyes of Dr. Fu-Manchu peered out from the shadows between two stalls. + +It was mere phantasy, of course, the sick imaginings of a mind +overwrought. I had not slept and had scarcely tasted food for more +than thirty hours; for, following up a faint clue supplied by Burke, +Slattin's man, and, like his master, an ex-officer of New York Police, +my friend, Nayland Smith, on the previous evening, had set out in +quest of some obscene den where the man called Shen-Yan--former keeper +of an opium shop--was now said to be in hiding. Shen-Yan we knew to be +a creature of the Chinese doctor, and only a most urgent call had +prevented me from joining Smith upon this promising, though hazardous +expedition. + +At any rate, Fate willing it so, he had gone without me; and +now--although Inspector Weymouth, assisted by a number of C.I.D. men, +was sweeping the district about me--to the time of my departure +nothing whatever had been heard of Smith. The ordeal of waiting +finally had proved too great to be borne. With no definite idea of +what I proposed to do, I had thrown myself into the search, filled +with such dreadful apprehensions as I hope never again to experience. + +I did not know the exact situation of the place to which Smith was +gone, for owing to the urgent case which I have mentioned, I had been +absent at the time of his departure; nor could Scotland Yard enlighten +me upon this point. Weymouth was in charge of the case--under Smith's +direction--and since the inspector had left the Yard, early that +morning, he had disappeared as completely as Smith, no report having +been received from him. + +As my driver turned into the black mouth of a narrow, ill-lighted +street, and the glare and clamour of the greater thoroughfare died +behind me, I sank into the corner of the cab burdened with such a +sense of desolation as mercifully comes but rarely. + +We were heading now for that strange settlement off the West India +Dock Road, which, bounded by Limehouse Causeway and Pennyfields, and +narrowly confined within four streets, composes an unique Chinatown, a +miniature of that at Liverpool, and of the greater one in San +Francisco. Inspired with an idea which promised hopefully, I raised +the speaking-tube: + +"Take me first to the River Police Station," I directed; "along +Ratcliffe Highway." + +The man turned and nodded comprehendingly, as I could see through the +wet pane. + +Presently we swerved to the right and into an even narrower street. +This inclined in an easterly direction, and proved to communicate with +a wide thoroughfare along which passed brilliantly lighted electric +trams. I had lost all sense of direction, and when, swinging to the +left and to the right again, I looked through the window and perceived +that we were before the door of the Police Station, I was dully +surprised. + +In quite mechanical fashion I entered the depot. Inspector Ryman, our +associate in one of the darkest episodes of the campaign with the +Yellow Doctor two years before, received me in his office. + +By a negative shake of the head, he answered my unspoken question. + +"The ten o'clock boat is lying off the Stone Stairs, doctor," he said, +"and co-operating with some of the Scotland Yard men who are dragging +that district--" + +I shuddered at the word "dragging"; Ryman had not used it literally, but +nevertheless it had conjured up a dread possibility--a possibility in +accordance with the methods of Dr. Fu-Manchu. All within space of an +instant I saw the tide of Limehouse Reach, the Thames lapping about the +green-coated timbers of a dock pier; and rising--falling--sometimes +disclosing to the pallid light a rigid hand, sometimes a horribly +bloated face--I saw the body of Nayland Smith at the mercy of those oily +waters. Ryman continued: + +"There is a launch out, too, patrolling the riverside from here to +Tilbury. Another lies at the breakwater." He jerked his thumb over his +shoulder. "Should you care to take a run down and see for yourself?" + +"No, thanks," I replied, shaking my head. "You are doing all that can +be done. Can you give me the address of the place to which Mr. Smith +went last night?" + +"Certainly," said Ryman; "I thought you knew it. You remember +Shen-Yan's place--by Limehouse Basin? Well, farther east--east of the +Causeway, between Gill Street and Three Colt Street--is a block of +wooden buildings. You recall them?" + +"Yes," I replied. "Is the man established there again, then?" + +"It appears so, but although you have evidently not been informed of +the fact, Weymouth raided the establishment in the early hours of this +morning!" + +"Well?" I cried. + +"Unfortunately with no result," continued the inspector. "The +notorious Shen-Yan was missing, and although there is no real doubt +that the place is used as a gaming-house, not a particle of evidence +to that effect could be obtained. Also--there was no sign of Mr. +Nayland Smith, and no sign of the American Burke, who had led him to +the place." + +"Is it certain that they went there?" + +"Two C.I.D. men, who were shadowing, actually saw the pair of them +enter. A signal had been arranged, but it was never given; and at +about half-past four the place was raided." + +"Surely some arrests were made?" + +"But there was no evidence!" cried Ryman. "Every inch of the +rat-burrow was searched. The Chinese gentleman who posed as the +proprietor of what he claimed to be a respectable lodging-house, +offered every facility to the police. What could we do?" + +"I take it that the place is being watched?" + +"Certainly," said Ryman. "Both from the river and from the shore. Oh! +they are not there! God knows where they are, but they are not +_there_!" + +I stood for a moment in silence, endeavouring to determine my course; +then, telling Ryman that I hoped to see him later, I walked out slowly +into the rain and mist, and nodding to the taxi-driver to proceed to +our original destination, I re-entered the cab. + +As we moved off, the lights of the River Police depot were swallowed +up in the humid murk, and again I found myself being carried through +the darkness of those narrow streets, which, like a maze, hold secret +within their Labyrinth mysteries great, and at least as foul, as that +of Parsiphae. + +The marketing centres I had left far behind me; to my right stretched +the broken range of riverside buildings, and beyond them flowed the +Thames, a stream heavily burdened with secrets as ever were Tiber or +Tigris. On my left, occasional flickering lights broke through the +mist, for the most part the lights of taverns; and saving these rents +in the veil, the darkness was punctuated with nothing but the faint +and yellow luminance of the street lamps. + +Ahead was a black mouth, which promised to swallow me up as it had +swallowed up my friend. + +In short, what with my lowered condition, and consequent frame of +mind, and what with the traditions, for me inseparable from that +gloomy quarter of London, I was in the grip of a shadowy menace which +at any moment might become tangible--I perceived, in the most +commonplace objects, the yellow hand of Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +When the cab stopped in a place of utter darkness, I aroused myself +with an effort, opened the door, and stepped out into the mud of a +narrow lane. A high brick wall frowned upon me from one side, and, +dimly perceptible, there towered a smoke stack beyond. On my right +uprose the side of a wharf building, shadowly, and some distance +ahead, almost obscured by the drizzling rain, a solitary lamp +flickered. + +I turned up the collar of my raincoat, shivering, as much at the +prospect as from physical chill. + +"You will wait here," I said to the man; and, feeling in my +breast-pocket, I added: "If you hear the note of a whistle, drive on +and rejoin me." + +He listened attentively and with a certain eagerness. I had selected +him that night for the reason that he had driven Smith and myself on +previous occasions and had proved himself a man of intelligence. +Transferring a Browning pistol from my hip-pocket to that of my +raincoat, I trudged on into the mist. + +The headlights of the taxi were swallowed up behind me, and just +abreast of the street lamp I stood listening. + +Save for the dismal sound of rain, and the trickling of water along +the gutters, all about me was silent. Sometimes this silence would be +broken by the distant, muffled note of a steam siren; and always, +forming a sort of background to the near stillness, was the remote din +of riverside activity. + +I walked on to the corner just beyond the lamp. This was the street in +which the wooden buildings were situated. I had expected to detect +some evidences of surveillance, but if any were indeed being observed, +it was effectively masked. Not a living creature was visible, peer as +I would. + +Plans I had none, and perceiving that the street was empty, and that +no lights showed in any of the windows, I passed on, only to find that +I had entered a cul-de-sac. + +A rickety gate gave access to a descending flight of stone steps, the +bottom invisible in the denser shadows of an archway, beyond which, I +doubted not, lay the river. + +Still uninspired by any definite design, I tried the gate and found +that it was unlocked. Like some wandering soul, as it has since seemed +to me, I descended. There was a lamp over the archway, but the glass +was broken, and the rain apparently had extinguished the light; as I +passed under it, I could hear the gas whistling from the burner. + +Continuing my way, I found myself upon a narrow wharf with the Thames +flowing gloomily beneath me. A sort of fog hung over the river, +shutting me in. Then came an incident. + +Suddenly, quite near, there arose a weird and mournful cry--a cry +indescribable, and inexpressibly uncanny! + +I started back so violently that how I escaped falling into the river +I do not know to this day. That cry, so eerie and so wholly +unexpected, had unnerved me; and realizing the nature of my +surroundings, and the folly of my presence alone in such a place, I +began to edge back towards the foot of the steps, away from the thing +that cried; when--a great white shape uprose like a phantom before +me!... + +There are few men, I suppose, whose lives have been crowded with so +many eerie happenings as mine, but this phantom thing which grew out +of the darkness, which seemed about to envelop me, takes rank in my +memory amongst the most fearsome apparitions which I have witnessed. + +I know that I was frozen with a sort of supernatural terror. I stood +there, my hands clenched, staring--staring--at that white shape, which +seemed to float. + +And as I stared, every nerve in my body thrilling, I distinguished the +outline of the phantom. With a subdued cry, I stepped forward. A new +sensation claimed me. In that one stride I passed from the horrible to +the bizarre. + +I found myself confronted with something tangible certainly, but +something whose presence in that place was utterly extravagant--could +only be reconcilable in the dreams of an opium slave. + +Was I awake? was I sane? Awake and sane beyond doubt, but surely +moving, not in the purlieus of Limehouse, but in the fantastic realms +of fairyland. + +Swooping, with open arms, I rounded up in an angle against the +building and gathered in this screaming thing which had inspired in me +so keen a terror. + +The great, ghostly fan was closed as I did so, and I stumbled back +towards the stair with my struggling captive tucked under my arm; I +mounted into one of London's darkest slums, carrying a beautiful white +peacock! + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +DARK EYES LOOK INTO MINE + + +My adventure had done nothing to relieve the feeling of unreality +which held me enthralled. Grasping the struggling bird firmly by the +body, and having the long white tail fluttering a yard or so behind +me, I returned to where the taxi waited. + +"Open the door!" I said to the man--who greeted me with such a stare +of amazement that I laughed outright, though my mirth was but hollow. + +He jumped into the road and did as I directed. Making sure that both +windows were closed, I thrust the peacock into the cab and shut the +door upon it. + +"For God's sake, sir--" began the driver. + +"It has probably escaped from some collector's place on the +riverside," I explained, "but one never knows. See that it does not +escape again, and if at the end of an hour, as arranged, you do not +hear from me, take it back with you to the River Police Station." + +"Right you are, sir," said the man, remounting his seat. "It's the +first time I ever saw a peacock in Limehouse!" + +It was the first time _I_ had seen one, and the incident struck me as +being more than odd; it gave me an idea, and a new, faint hope. I +returned to the head of the steps, at the foot of which I had met with +this singular experience, and gazed up at the dark building beneath +which they led. Three windows were visible, but they were broken and +neglected. One, immediately above the arch, had been pasted up with +brown paper, and this was now peeling off in the rain, a little stream +of which trickled down from the detached corner to drop, drearily, +upon the stone stairs beneath. + +Where were the detectives? I could only assume that they had directed +their attention elsewhere, for had the place not been utterly +deserted, surely I had been challenged. + +In pursuit of my new idea, I again descended the steps. The persuasion +(shortly to be verified) that I was close upon the secret hold of the +Chinaman, grew stronger, unaccountably. I had descended some eight +steps, and was at the darkest part of the archway or tunnel, when +confirmation of my theories came to me. + +A noose settled accurately upon my shoulders, was snatched tight about my +throat, and with a feeling of insupportable agony at the base of my skull, +and a sudden supreme knowledge that I was being strangled--hanged--I lost +consciousness! + +How long I remained unconscious, I was unable to determine at the +time, but I learned later that it was for no more than half an hour; +at any rate, recovery was slow. + +The first sensation to return to me was a sort of repetition of the +asphyxia. The blood seemed to be forcing itself into my eyes--I +choked--I felt that my end was come. And, raising my hands to my +throat, I found it to be swollen and inflamed. Then the floor upon +which I lay seemed to be rocking like the deck of a ship, and I glided +back again into a place of darkness and forgetfulness. + +My second awakening was heralded by a returning sense of smell; for I +became conscious of a faint, exquisite perfume. + +It brought me to my senses as nothing else could have done, and I sat +upright with a hoarse cry. I could have distinguished that perfume +amid a thousand others, could have marked it apart from the rest in a +scent bazaar. For me it had one meaning, and one meaning +only--Karamaneh. + +She was near to me, or had been near to me! + +And in the first moments of my awakening I groped about in the +darkness blindly seeking her. Then my swollen throat and throbbing +head, together with my utter inability to move my neck even slightly, +reminded me of the facts as they were. I knew in that bitter moment +that Karamaneh was no longer my friend; but, for all her beauty and +charm, was the most heartless, the most fiendish creature in the +service of Dr. Fu-Manchu. I groaned aloud in my despair and misery. + +Something stirred near to me in the room, and set my nerves creeping +with a new apprehension. I became fully alive to the possibilities of +the darkness. + +To my certain knowledge, Dr. Fu-Manchu at this time had been in +England for fully three months, which meant that by now he must be +equipped with all the instruments of destruction, animate and +inanimate, which dread experience had taught me to associate with him. + +Now, as I crouched there in that dark apartment, listening for a +repetition of the sound, I scarcely dared to conjecture what might +have occasioned it, but my imagination peopled the place with reptiles +which writhed upon the floor, with tarantulas and other deadly insects +which crept upon the walls, which might drop upon me from the ceiling +at any moment. + +Then, since nothing stirred about me, I ventured to move, turning my +shoulders, for I was unable to move my aching head; and I looked in +the direction from which a faint, very faint, light proceeded. + +A regular tapping sound now began to attract my attention, and, having +turned about, I perceived that behind me was a broken window, in +places patched with brown paper; the corner of one sheet of paper was +detached, and the rain trickled down upon it with a rhythmical sound. + +In a flash I realized that I lay in the room immediately above the +archway; and listening intently, I perceived above the other faint +sounds of the night, or thought that I perceived, the hissing of the +gas from the extinguished lamp-burner. + +Unsteadily I rose to my feet, but found myself swaying like a drunken +man. I reached out for support, stumbling in the direction of the +wall. My foot came in contact with something that lay there, and I +pitched forward and fell.... + +I anticipated a crash which would put an end to my hopes of escape, +but my fall was comparatively noiseless--for I fell upon the body of a +man who lay bound up with rope close against the wall! + +A moment I stayed as I fell, the chest of my fellow captive rising and +falling beneath me as he breathed. Knowing that my life depended upon +retaining a firm hold upon myself, I succeeded in overcoming the +dizziness and nausea which threatened to drown my senses, and, moving +back so that I knelt upon the floor, I fumbled in my pocket for the +electric lamp which I had placed there. My raincoat had been removed +whilst I was unconscious, and with it my pistol, but the lamp was +untouched. + +I took it out, pressed the button, and directed the ray upon the face +of the man beside me. + +It was Nayland Smith! + +Trussed up and fastened to a ring in the wall he lay, having a cork +gag strapped so tightly between his teeth that I wondered how he had +escaped suffocation. + +But although a greyish pallor showed through the tan of his skin, his +eyes were feverishly bright, and there, as I knelt beside him, I +thanked Heaven silently, but fervently. + +Then, in furious haste, I set to work to remove the gag. It was most +ingeniously secured by means of leather straps buckled at the back of +his head, but I unfastened these without much difficulty, and he spat +out the gag, uttering an exclamation of disgust. + +"Thank God, old man!" he said huskily. "Thank God that you are alive! +I saw them drag you in, and I thought...." + +"I have been thinking the same about you for more than twenty-four +hours," I said reproachfully. "Why did you start without--?" + +"I did not want you to come, Petrie," he replied. "I had a sort of +premonition. You see it was realized; and instead of being as helpless +as I, Fate has made you the instrument of my release. Quick! You have +a knife? Good!" The old, feverish energy was by no means extinguished +in him. "Cut the ropes about my wrists and ankles, but don't otherwise +disturb them." + +I set to work eagerly. + +"Now," Smith continued, "put that filthy gag in place again--but you +need not strap it so tightly! Directly they find that you are alive, +they will treat you the same--you understand? She has been here three +times--" + +"Karamaneh?..." + +"_Ssh_!" + +I heard a sound like the opening of a distant door. + +"Quick! the straps of the gag!" whispered Smith, "and pretend to +recover consciousness just as they enter--" + +Clumsily I followed his directions, for my fingers were none too +steady, replaced the lamp in my pocket, and threw myself upon the +floor. + +Through half-shut eyes, I saw the door open and obtained a glimpse of +a desolate, empty passage beyond. On the threshold stood Karamaneh. +She held in her hand a common tin oil lamp which smoked and flickered +with every movement, filling the already none too cleanly air with an +odour of burning paraffin. + +She personified the _outre_; nothing so incongruous as her presence in +that place could well be imagined. She was dressed as I remembered +once to have seen her two years before, in the gauzy silks of the +harem. There were pearls glittering like great tears amid the cloud of +her wonderful hair. She wore broad gold bangles upon her bare arms, +and her fingers were laden with jewellery. A heavy girdle swung from +her hips, defining the lines of her slim shape, and about one white +ankle was a gold band. + +As she appeared in the doorway I almost entirely closed my eyes, but +my gaze rested fascinatedly upon the little red slippers which she +wore. + +Again I detected the exquisite, elusive perfume which, like a breath +of musk, spoke of the Orient; and, as always, it played havoc with my +reason, seeming to intoxicate me as though it were the very essence of +her loveliness. + +But I had a part to play, and throwing out one clenched hand so that +my fist struck upon the floor, I uttered a loud groan, and made as if +to rise upon my knees. + +One quick glimpse I had of her wonderful eyes, widely opened and +turned upon me with such an enigmatical expression as set my heart +leaping wildly--then, stepping back, Karamaneh placed the lamp upon +the boards of the passage and clapped her hands. + +As I sank upon the floor in assumed exhaustion, a Chinaman with a +perfectly impassive face, and a Burman whose pock-marked, evil +countenance was set in an apparently habitual leer, came running into +the room past the girl. + +With a hand which trembled violently, she held the lamp whilst the two +yellow ruffians tied me. I groaned and struggled feebly, fixing my +gaze upon the lamp bearer in a silent reproach which was by no means +without its effect. + +She lowered her eyes and I could see her biting her lip, whilst the +colour gradually faded from her cheeks. Then, glancing up again +quickly, and still meeting that reproachful stare, she turned her head +aside altogether, and rested one hand upon the wall, swaying slightly +as she did so. + +It was a singular ordeal for more than one of that incongruous group; +but in order that I may not be charged with hypocrisy or with seeking +to hide my own folly, I confess, here, that when again I found myself +in darkness, my heart was leaping not because of the success of my +strategy, but because of the success of that reproachful glance which +I had directed toward the lovely, dark-eyed Karamaneh, toward the +faithless evil Karamaneh! So much for myself. + +The door had not been closed ten seconds, ere Smith again was spitting +out the gag, swearing under his breath, and stretching his cramped +limbs free from their binding. Within a minute from the time of my +trussing, I was a free man again; save that look where I would--to +right, to left, or inward, to my own conscience--two dark eyes met +mine, enigmatically. + +"What now?" I whispered. + +"Let me think," replied Smith. "A false move would destroy us." + +"How long have you been here?" + +"Since last night." + +"Is Fu-Manchu--" + +"Fu-Manchu is here!" replied Smith grimly, "and not only Fu-Manchu, +but--another." + +"Another!" + +"A higher than Fu-Manchu, apparently. I have an idea of the identity +of this person, but no more than an idea. Something unusual is going +on, Petrie; otherwise I should have been a dead man twenty four hours +ago. Something even more important than my death engages Fu-Manchu's +attention--and this can only be the presence of the mysterious +visitor. Your seductive friend, Karamaneh, is arrayed in her very +becoming national costume in his honour, I presume." He stopped +abruptly; then added "I would give five hundred pounds for a glimpse +of that visitor's face!" + +"Is Burke--?" + +"God knows what has become of Burke, Petrie! We were both caught +napping in the establishment of the amiable Shen-Yan, where, amid a +very mixed company of poker players, we were losing our money like +gentlemen." + +"But Weymouth--" + +"Burke and I had both been neatly sand-bagged, my dear Petrie, and +removed elsewhere, some hours before Weymouth raided the gaming house. +Oh! I don't know how they smuggled us away with the police watching +the place; but my presence here is sufficient evidence of the fact. +Are you armed?" + +"No; my pistol was in my raincoat, which is missing." + +In the dim light from the broken window I could see Smith tugging +reflectively at the lobe of his left ear. + +"I am without arms, too," he mused. "We might escape from the +window--" + +"It's a long drop!" + +"Ah! I imagined so. If only I had a pistol, or a revolver--" + +"What should you do?" + +"I should present myself before the important meeting, which, I am +assured, is being held somewhere in this building; and to-night would +see the end of my struggle with the Fu-Manchu group--the end of the +whole Yellow menace! For not only is Fu-Manchu here, Petrie, with all +his gang of assassins, but he whom I believe to be the real head of +the group--a certain mandarin--is here also!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +THE SACRED ORDER + + +Smith stepped quietly across the room and tried the door. It proved to +be unlocked, and an instant later we were both outside in the passage. +Coincident with our arrival there, arose a sudden outcry from some +place at the westward end. A high-pitched, grating voice, in which +guttural notes alternated with a serpent-like hissing, was raised in +anger. + +"Dr. Fu-Manchu!" whispered Smith, grasping my arm. + +Indeed it was the unmistakable voice of the Chinaman, raised +hysterically in one of those outbursts which in the past I had +diagnosed as symptomatic of dangerous mania. + +The voice rose to a scream, the scream of some angry animal rather +than anything human. Then, chokingly, it ceased. Another short sharp +cry followed--but not in the voice of Fu-Manchu--a dull groan, and the +sound of a fall. + +With Smith still grasping my wrist, I shrank back into the doorway, as +something that looked in the darkness like a great ball of fluff came +rapidly along the passage toward me. Just at my feet the thing +stopped, and I made it out for a small animal. The tiny, gleaming eyes +looked up at me, and, chattering wickedly, the creature bounded past +and was lost from view. + +It was Dr. Fu-Manchu's marmoset. + +Smith dragged me back into the room which we had just left. As he +partly reclosed the door, I heard the clapping of hands. In a +condition of most dreadful suspense, we waited; until a new, ominous +sound proclaimed itself. Some heavy body was being dragged into the +passage. I heard the opening of a trap. Exclamations in guttural +voices told of a heavy task in progress; there was a great straining +and creaking--whereupon the trap was softly reclosed. + +Smith bent to my ear. + +"Fu-Manchu has chastised one of his servants," he whispered. "There +will be food for the grappling-irons to-night!" + +I shuddered violently, for, without Smith's words, I knew that a +bloody deed had been done in that house within a few yards of where we +stood. + +In the new silence, I could hear the drip, drip, drip of the rain +outside the window; then a steam siren hooted dismally upon the river, +and I thought how the screw of that very vessel, even as we listened, +might be tearing the body of Fu-Manchu's servant! + +"Have you some one waiting?" whispered Smith eagerly. + +"How long was I insensible?" + +"About half an hour." + +"Then the cabman will be waiting." + +"Have you a whistle with you?" + +I felt in my coat pocket. + +"Yes," I reported. + +"Good! Then we will take a chance." + +Again we slipped out into the passage and began a stealthy progress to +the west. Ten paces amid absolute darkness, and we found ourselves +abreast of a branch corridor. At the farther end, through a kind of +little window, a dim light shone. + +"See if you can find the trap," whispered Smith; "light your lamp." + +I directed the ray of the pocket lamp upon the floor, and there at my +feet was a square wooden trap. As I stooped to examine it, I glanced +back painfully, over my shoulder--and saw Nayland Smith tiptoeing away +from me along the passage toward the light! + +Inwardly I cursed his folly, but the temptation to peep in at that +little window proved too strong for me, as it had proved too strong +for him. + +Fearful that some board would creak beneath my tread, I followed; and +side by side we two crouched, looking into a small rectangular room. +It was a bare and cheerless apartment, with unpapered walls and +carpetless floor. A table and a chair constituted the sole furniture. + +Seated in the chair, with his back towards us, was a portly Chinaman +who wore a yellow, silken robe. His face it was impossible to see; but +he was beating his fists upon the table, and pouring out a torrent of +words in a thin, piping voice. So much I perceived at a glance, then, +into view at the distant end of the room, paced a tall, +high-shouldered figure--a figure, unforgettable, at once imposing and +dreadful, stately and sinister. + +With the long, bony hands behind him, fingers twining and intertwining +serpentinely about the handle of a little fan, and with the pointed +chin resting on the breast of the yellow robe, so that the light from +the lamp swinging in the centre of the ceiling gleamed upon the great, +dome-like brow, this tall man paced sombrely from left to right. + +He cast a sidelong, venomous glance at the voluble speaker out of +half-shut eyes; in the act they seemed to light up as with an internal +luminance; momentarily, they sparkled like emeralds; then their +brilliance was filmed over as one sees in the eyes of a bird when the +membrane is lowered. + +My blood seemed to chill, and my heart to double its pulsations; +beside me Smith was breathing more rapidly than usual. I knew now the +explanation of the feeling which had claimed me when first I had +descended the stone stairs. I knew what it was that hung like a miasma +over that house. It was the aura, the glamour, which radiated from +this wonderful and evil man as light radiates from radium. It was the +_vril_, the _force_, of Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +I began to move away from the window. But Smith held my wrist as in a +vice. He was listening raptly to the torrential speech of the Chinaman +who sat in the chair; and I perceived in his eyes the light of a +sudden comprehension. + +As the tall figure of the Chinese doctor came pacing into view again, +Smith, his head below the level of the window, pushed me gently along +the passage. + +Regaining the site of the trap, he whispered to me: + +"We owe our lives, Petrie, to the national childishness of the +Chinese! A race of ancestor worshippers is capable of anything, and +Dr. Fu-Manchu, the dreadful being who has rained terror upon Europe, +stands in imminent peril of disgrace for having lost a decoration." + +"What do you mean, Smith?" + +"I mean that this is no time for delay, Petrie! Here, unless I am +greatly mistaken, lies the rope by means of which you made your +entrance. It shall be the means of your exit. Open the trap!" + +Handing the lamp to Smith, I stooped and carefully raised the +trap-door. At which moment, a singular and a dramatic thing happened. + +A softly musical voice--the voice of my dreams!--spoke. + +"Not that way! Oh, God, not that way!" + +In my surprise and confusion I all but let the trap fall, but I +retained sufficient presence of mind to replace it gently. Standing +upright, I turned ... and there, with her little jewelled hand resting +upon Smith's arm, stood Karamaneh! + +In all my experience of him, I had never seen Nayland Smith so utterly +perplexed. Between anger, distrust and dismay, he wavered; and each +passing emotion was written legibly upon the lean bronzed features. +Rigid with surprise, he stared at the beautiful face of the girl. She, +although her hand still rested upon Smith's arm, had her dark eyes +turned upon me with that same enigmatical expression. Her lips were +slightly parted, and her breast heaved tumultuously. + +This ten seconds of silence in which we three stood looking at one +another encompassed the whole gamut of human emotion. The silence was +broken by Karamaneh. + +"They will be coming back that way!" she whispered, bending eagerly +toward me. (How, in the most desperate moments, I loved to listen to +that odd, musical accent!) "Please, if you would save your life, and +spare mine, trust me!" She suddenly clasped her hands together and +looked up into my face, passionately. "Trust me--just for once--and I +will show you the way!" + +Nayland Smith never removed his gaze from her for a moment, nor did he +stir. + +"Oh!" she whispered tremulously, and stamped one little red slipper +upon the floor. "_Won't_ you heed me? _Come_, or it will be too late!" + +I glanced anxiously at my friend; the voice of Dr. Fu-Manchu, now +raised again in anger, was audible above the piping tones of the other +Chinaman. And as I caught Smith's eye, in silent query--the trap at my +feet began slowly to lift! + +Karamaneh stifled a little sobbing cry; but the warning came too late. +A hideous yellow face, with oblique squinting eyes, appeared in the +aperture. + +I found myself inert, useless; I could neither think nor act. Nayland +Smith, however, as if instinctively, delivered a pitiless kick at the +head protruding above the trap. + +A sickening crushing sound, with a sort of muffled snap, spoke of a +broken jaw-bone; and with no word or cry, the Chinaman fell. As the +trap descended with a bang, I heard the thud of his body on the stone +stairs beneath. + +But we were lost. Karamaneh fled along one of the passages lightly as +a bird, and disappeared--as Dr. Fu-Manchu, his top lip drawn up above +his teeth in the manner of an angry jackal, appeared from the other. + +"This way!" cried Smith, in a voice that rose almost to a +shriek--"this way!"--and he led toward the room overhanging the steps. + +Off we dashed with panic swiftness, only to find that this retreat +also was cut off. Dimly visible in the darkness was a group of yellow +men, and despite the gloom, the curved blades of the knives which +they carried glittered menacingly. The passage was full of dacoits! + +Smith and I turned, together. The trap was raised again, and the +Burman, who had helped to tie me, was just scrambling up beside Dr. +Fu-Manchu, who stood there watching us, a shadowy, sinister figure. + +"The game's up, Petrie!" muttered Smith. "It has been a long fight, +but Fu-Manchu wins!" + +"Not entirely!" I cried. + +I whipped the police whistle from my pocket, and raised it to my lips; +but brief as the interval had been, the dacoits were upon me. + +A sinewy brown arm shot over my shoulder, and the whistle was dashed +from my grasp. Then came a riot of maelstrom fighting, with Smith and +myself ever sinking lower amid a whirlpool, as it seemed, of +blood-lustful eyes, yellow fangs, and gleaming blades. + +I had some vague idea that the rasping voice of Fu-Manchu broke once +through the turmoil, and when, with my wrists tied behind me, I +emerged from the strife to find myself lying beside Smith in the +passage, I could only assume that the Chinaman had ordered his bloody +servants to take us alive; for saving numerous bruises and a few +superficial cuts, I was unwounded. + +The place was utterly deserted again, and we two panting captives +found ourselves alone with Dr. Fu-Manchu. The scene was unforgettable: +that dimly-lighted passage, its extremities masked in shadows, and the +tall, yellow-robed figure of the Satanic Chinaman towering over us +where we lay. + +He had recovered his habitual calm, and as I peered at him through the +gloom, I was impressed anew with the tremendous intellectual force of +the man. He had the brow of a genius, the features of a born ruler; +and even in that moment I could find time to search my memory, and to +discover that the face, saving the indescribable evil of its +expression, was identical with that of Seti I, the mighty Pharaoh who +lives in the Cairo Museum. + +Down the passage came leaping and gambolling the Doctor's marmoset. +Uttering its shrill, whistling cry, it leapt on to his shoulder, +clutched with its tiny fingers at the scanty, neutral-coloured hair +upon his crown, and bent forward, peering grotesquely into that still, +dreadful face. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu stroked the little creature and crooned to it, as a +mother to her infant. Only this crooning, and the laboured breathing +of Smith and myself, broke that impressive stillness. + +Suddenly the guttural voice began: + +"You come at an opportune time, Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith and Dr. +Petrie; at a time when the greatest man in China flatters me with a +visit. In my absence from home, a tremendous honour has been conferred +upon me, and, in the hour of this supreme honour, dishonour and +calamity have befallen! For my services to China--the New China, the +China of the future--I have been admitted by the Sublime Prince to the +Sacred Order of the White Peacock." + +Warming to his discourse, he threw wide his arms, hurling the +chattering marmoset fully five yards along the corridor. + +"Oh, god of Cathay!" he cried sibilantly, "in what have I sinned that +this catastrophe has been visited upon my head! Learn, my two dear +friends, that the sacred white peacock, brought to these misty shores +for my undying glory has been lost to me! Death is the penalty of such +a sacrilege; death shall be my lot, since death I deserve." + +Covertly Smith nudged me with his elbow. I knew what the nudge was +designed to convey; he would remind me of his words--anent the +childish trifles which sway the life of intellectual China. + +Personally, I was amazed. That Fu-Manchu's anger, grief, sorrow and +resignation were real, no one watching him, and hearing his voice, +could doubt. He continued: + +"By one deed, and one deed alone, may I win a lighter punishment. By +one deed, and the resignation of all my titles, all my lands, and all +my honours, may I merit to be spared to my work--which has only +begun." + +I knew now that we were lost, indeed; these were confidences which our +graves should hold inviolate! He suddenly opened fully those blazing +green eyes and directed their baneful glare upon Nayland Smith. + +"The Director of the universe," he continued softly, "has relented +toward me. To-night, you die! To-night, the arch-enemy of our caste +shall be no more. This is my offering--the price of redemption...." + +My mind was working again, and actively. I managed to grasp the +stupendous truth--and the stupendous possibility. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu was in the act of clapping his hands, when I spoke. + +"Stop!" I cried. + +He paused, and the weird film, which sometimes became visible in his +eyes, now obscured their greenness, and lent him the appearance of a +blind man. + +"Dr. Petrie," he said softly, "I shall always listen to you with +respect." + +"I have an offer to make," I continued, seeking to steady my voice. +"Give us our freedom, and I will restore your shattered honour--I will +restore the sacred peacock!" + +Dr. Fu-Manchu bent forward until his face was so close to mine that I +could see the innumerable lines which, an intricate network, covered +his yellow skin. + +"Speak!" he hissed. "You lift up my heart from a dark pit!" + +"I can restore your white peacock," I said; "I, and I alone, know +where it is!"--and I strove not to shrink from the face so close to +mine. + +Upright shot the tall figure; high above his head Fu-Manchu threw his +arms--and a light of exaltation gleamed in the now widely-opened, +catlike eyes. + +"Oh, god!" he screamed frenziedly. "Oh, god of the Golden Age! like a +phoenix I arise from the ashes of myself!" He turned to me. "Quick! +Quick! make your bargain! End my suspense!" + +Smith stared at me like a man dazed; but, ignoring him, I went on: + +"You will release me, now, immediately. In another ten minutes it will +be too late; my friend will remain. One of your--servants--can +accompany me, and give the signal when I return with the peacock. Mr. +Nayland Smith and yourself, or another, will join me at the corner of +the street where the raid took place last night. We will then give you +ten minutes' grace, after which we shall take whatever steps we +choose." + +"Agreed!" cried Fu-Manchu. "I ask but one thing from an Englishman; +your word of honour?" + +"I give it." + +"I, also," said Smith hoarsely. + + * * * * * + +Ten minutes later, Nayland Smith and I, standing beside the cab, whose +lights gleamed yellowly through the mist, exchanged a struggling, +frightened bird for our lives--capitulated with the enemy of the white +race. + +With characteristic audacity--and characteristic trust in the British +sense of honour--Dr. Fu-Manchu came in person with Nayland Smith, in +response to the wailing signal of the dacoit who had accompanied me. +No word was spoken, save that the cabman suppressed a curse of +amazement; and the Chinaman, his sinister servant at his elbow, bowed +low--and left us, surely to the mocking laughter of the gods! + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +THE COUGHING HORROR + + +I leapt up in bed with a great start. + +My sleep was troubled often enough in those days which immediately +followed our almost miraculous escape from the den of Fu-Manchu; and +now, as I crouched there, nerves aquiver--listening--listening--I +could not be sure if this dank panic which possessed me had its origin +in nightmare or in something else. + +Surely a scream, a choking cry for help, had reached my ears; but now, +almost holding my breath in that sort of nervous tensity peculiar to +one aroused thus, I listened, and the silence seemed complete. Perhaps +I had been dreaming.... + +"Help! Petrie! _Help_!..." + +It was Nayland Smith in the room above me! + +My doubts were resolved; this was no trick of an imagination +disordered. Some dreadful menace threatened my friend. Not delaying +even to snatch my dressing-gown, I rushed out on to the landing, up +the stairs, bare-footed as I was, threw open the door of Smith's room +and literally hurled myself in. + +Those cries had been the cries of one assailed, had been uttered, I +judged, in the brief interval of a life and death struggle; had been +choked off.... + +A certain amount of moonlight found access to the room, without +spreading so far as the bed in which my friend lay. But at the moment +of my headlong entrance, and before I had switched on the light, my +gaze automatically was directed to the pale moonbeam streaming through +the window and down on to one corner of the sheep skin rug beside the +bed. + +There came a sound of faint and muffled coughing, + +What with my recent awakening and the panic at my heart, I could not +claim that my vision was true; but across this moonbeam passed a sort +of grey streak, for all the world as though some long thin shape had +been withdrawn, snakelike, from the room, through the open window.... +From somewhere outside the house, and below, I heard the cough again, +followed by a sharp cracking sound like the lashing of a whip. + +I depressed the switch, flooding the room with light, and as I leapt +forward to the bed a word picture of what I had seen formed in my +mind; and I found that I was thinking of a grey feather boa. + +"Smith!" I cried (my voice seemed to pitch itself, unwilled, in a very +high key), "Smith, old man!" + +He made no reply, and a sudden, sorrowful fear clutched at my +heart-strings. He was lying half out of bed flat upon his back, his +head at a dreadful angle with his body. As I bent over him and seized +him by the shoulders, I could see the whites of his eyes. His arms +hung limply, and his fingers touched the carpet. + +"My God!" I whispered, "what has happened?" + +I heaved him back on to the pillow, and looked anxiously into his +face. Habitually gaunt, the flesh so refined away by the consuming +nervous energy of the man as to reveal the cheekbones in sharp +prominence, he now looked truly ghastly. His skin was so sun-baked as +to have changed constitutionally; nothing could ever eradicate that +tan. But to-night a fearful greyness was mingled with the brown, his +lips were purple ... and there were marks of strangulation upon the +lean throat--ever darkening weals of clutching fingers. + +He began to breathe stertorously and convulsively, inhalation being +accompanied by a significant gurgle in the throat. But now my calm was +restored in face of a situation which called for professional +attention. + +I aided my friend's laboured respirations by the usual means, setting +to work vigorously; so that presently he began to clutch at his +inflamed throat which that murderous pressure had threatened to close. + +I could hear sounds of movements about the house, showing that not I +alone had been awakened by those hoarse screams. + +"It's all right, old man," I said, bending over him: "brace up!" + +He opened his eyes--they looked bleared and bloodshot--and gave me a +quick glance of recognition. + +"It's all right, Smith!" I said--"no! don't sit up; lie there for a +moment." + +I ran across to the dressing-table, whereon I perceived his flask to +lie, and mixed him a weak stimulant with which I returned to the bed. + +As I bent over him again, my housekeeper appeared in the doorway, pale +and wide-eyed. + +"There is no occasion for alarm," I said over my shoulder; "Mr. +Smith's nerves are overwrought and he was awakened by some disturbing +dream. You can return to bed, Mrs. Newsome." + +Nayland Smith seemed to experience much difficulty in swallowing the +contents of the tumbler which I held to his lips; and, from the way in +which he fingered the swollen glands, I could see that his throat, +which I had vigorously massaged, was occasioning him great pain. But +the danger was past, and already that glassy look was disappearing +from his eyes, nor did they protrude so unnaturally. + +"God, Petrie!" he whispered, "that was a near shave! I haven't the +strength of a kitten!" + +"The weakness will pass off," I replied; "there will be no collapse, +now. A little more fresh air...." + +I stood up, glancing at the windows, then back at Smith, who forced a +wry smile in answer to my look. + +"Couldn't be done, Petrie," he said huskily. + +His words referred to the state of the windows. Although the night was +oppressively hot, these were only opened some four inches at top and +bottom. Farther opening was impossible because of iron brackets +screwed firmly into the casements, which prevented the windows being +raised or lowered farther. + +It was a precaution adopted after long experience of the servants of +Dr. Fu-Manchu. + +Now, as I stood looking from the half-strangled man upon the bed to +those screwed-up windows, the fact came home to my mind that this +precaution had proved futile. I thought of the thing which I had +likened to a feather boa; and I looked at the swollen weals made by +clutching fingers upon the throat of Nayland Smith. + +The bed stood fully four feet from the nearest window. + +I suppose the question was written in my face; for, as I turned again +to Smith, who, having struggled upright, was still fingering his +injured throat ruefully--"God only knows, Petrie!" he said; "no human +arm could have reached me...." + +For us, the night was ended so far as sleep was concerned. Arrayed in +his dressing-gown, Smith sat in the white cane chair in my study with +a glass of brandy and water beside him, and (despite my official +prohibition) with the cracked briar, which had sent up its incense in +many strange and dark places of the East and which yet survived to +perfume these prosy rooms in suburban London, between his teeth. I +stood with my elbow resting upon the mantelpiece looking down at him +where he sat. + +"By God! Petrie," he said, yet again, with his fingers straying gently +over the surface of his throat, "that was a narrow shave--a damned +narrow shave!" + +"Narrower than perhaps you appreciate, old man," I replied. "You were +a most unusual shade of blue when I found you...." + +"I managed," said Smith evenly, "to tear those clutching fingers away +for a moment and to give a cry for help. It was only for a moment, +though. Petrie! they were fingers of steel--of steel!" + +"The bed...." I began. + +"I know that," rapped Smith. "I shouldn't have been sleeping in it, +had it been within reach of the window; but, knowing that the Doctor +avoids noisy methods, I had thought myself fairly safe so long as I +made it impossible for any one actually to enter the room...." + +"I have always insisted, Smith," I cried, "that there was danger! What +of poisoned darts? What of the damnable reptiles and insects which +form part of the armoury of Fu-Manchu?" + +"Familiarity breeds contempt, I suppose," he replied. "But as it +happened, none of those agents was employed. The very menace that I +sought to avoid reached me somehow. It would almost seem that Dr. +Fu-Manchu deliberately accepted the challenge of those screwed up +windows! Hang it all, Petrie! one cannot sleep in a room hermetically +sealed in weather like this! It's positively Burmese; and although I +can stand tropical heat, curiously enough the heat of London gets me +down almost immediately." + +"The humidity; that's easily understood. But you'll have to put up +with it in the future. After nightfall our windows must be closed +entirely, Smith." + +Nayland Smith knocked out his pipe upon the side of the fireplace. The +bowl sizzled furiously, but without delay he stuffed broad-cut mixture +into the hot pipe, dropping a liberal quantity upon the carpet during +the process. He raised his eyes to me, and his face was very grim. + +"Petrie," he said, striking a match on the heel of his slipper, "the +resources of Dr. Fu-Manchu are by no means exhausted. Before we quit +this room it is up to us to come to a decision upon a certain point." +He got his pipe well alight. "What kind of thing, what unnatural, +distorted creature, laid hands upon my throat to-night? I owe my life, +primarily, to you, old man, but secondarily, to the fact that I was +awakened, just before the attack, by the creature's _coughing_--by its +vile, high pitched _coughing_...." + +I glanced around at the books upon my shelves. Often enough, following +some outrage by the brilliant, Chinese doctor whose genius was +directed to the discovery of new and unique death agents, we had +obtained a clue in those works of a scientific nature which bulk +largely in the library of a medical man. There are creatures, there +are drugs, which, ordinarily innocuous, may be so employed as to +become inimical to human life; and in the distorting of nature, in the +disturbing of balances and the diverting of beneficent forces into +strange and dangerous channels, Dr. Fu-Manchu excelled. I had known +him to enlarge, by artificial culture, a minute species of fungus so +as to render it a powerful agent capable of attacking man; his +knowledge of venomous insects has probably never been paralleled in +the history of the world; whilst, in the sphere of pure toxicology, he +had, and has, no rival: the Borgias were children by comparison. But, +look where I would, think how I might, no adequate explanation of this +latest outrage seemed possible along normal lines. + +"There's the clue," said Nayland Smith, pointing to a little ash-tray +upon the table near by. "Follow it if you can." + +But I could not. + +"As I have explained," continued my friend, "I was awakened by a sound +of coughing; then came a death grip on my throat, and instinctively my +hands shot out in search of my attacker. I could not reach him; my +hands came in contact with nothing palpable. Therefore I clutched at +the fingers which were dug into my windpipe, and found them to be +small--as the marks show--and _hairy_. I managed to give that first +cry for help, and with all my strength I tried to unfasten the grip +that was throttling the life out of me. At last I contrived to move +one of the hands, and I called out again, though not so loudly. Then +both the hands were back again; I was weakening; but I clawed like a +madman at the thin, hairy arms of the strangling thing, and with a +blood-red mist dancing before my eyes, I seemed to be whirling madly +round and round until all became a blank. Evidently I used my nails +pretty freely--and there's the trophy." + +For the twentieth time, I should think, I raised the ash-tray in my +hand and held it immediately under the table lamp in order to examine +its contents. In the little brass bowl lay a blood-stained fragment of +greyish hair attached to a tatter of skin. This fragment of epidermis +had an odd bluish tinge, and the attached hair was much darker at the +roots than elsewhere. Saving its singular colour, it might have been +torn from the forearm of a very hirsute human; but although my +thoughts wandered, unfettered, north, south, east and west; although, +knowing the resources of Fu-Manchu, I considered all the recognized +Mongolian types, and, in quest of hirsute mankind, even roamed, far +north among the blubber-eating Esquimaux; although I glanced at +Australasia, at Central Africa, and passed in mental review the dark +places of the Congo, nowhere in the known world, nowhere in the +history of the human species, could I come upon a type of man +answering to the description suggested by our strange clue. + +Nayland Smith was watching me curiously as I bent over the little +brass ash-tray. + +"You are puzzled," he rapped in his short way. "So am I--utterly +puzzled. Fu-Manchu's gallery of monstrosities clearly has become +reinforced; for even if we identified the type, we should not be in +sight of our explanation." + +"You mean--" I began. + +"Fully four feet from the window, Petrie, and that window but a few +inches open! Look"--he bent forward, resting his chest against the +table, and stretched out his hand towards me--"you have a rule there; +just measure." + +Setting down the ash-tray, I opened out the rule and measured the +distance from the farther edge of the table to the tips of Smith's +fingers. + +"Twenty-eight inches--and _I_ have a long reach!" snapped Smith, +withdrawing his arm and striking a match to relight his pipe. "There's +one thing, Petrie, often proposed before, which now we must do without +delay. The ivy must be stripped from the walls at the back. It's a +pity, but we cannot afford to sacrifice our lives to our sense of the +aesthetic. What do you make of the sound like the cracking of a whip?" + +"I make nothing of it, Smith," I replied wearily. "It might have been +a thick branch of ivy breaking beneath the weight of a climber." + +"Did it sound like it?" + +"I must confess that the explanation does not convince me, but I have +no better one." + +Smith, permitting his pipe to go out, sat staring straightly before +him, and tugging at the lobe of his left ear. + +"The old bewilderment is seizing me," I continued. "At first, when I +realized that Dr. Fu-Manchu was back in England, when I realized that +an elaborate murder-machine was set up somewhere in London, it seemed +unreal, fantastical. Then I met--Karamaneh! She, whom we thought to be +his victim, showed herself again to be his slave. Now, with Weymouth +and Scotland Yard at work, the old secret evil is established again in +our midst, unaccountably--our lives are menaced--sleep is a +danger--every shadow threatens death ... oh! it is awful." + +Smith remained silent; he did not seem to have heard my words. I knew +these moods and had learnt that it was useless to seek to interrupt +them. With his brows drawn down, and his deep-set eyes staring into +space, he sat there gripping his cold pipe so tightly that my own jaw +muscles ached sympathetically. No man was better equipped than this +gaunt British Commissioner to stand between society and the menace of +the Yellow Doctor; I respected his meditations, for, unlike my own, +they were informed by an intimate knowledge of the dark and secret +things of the East, of that mysterious East out of which Fu-Manchu +came, of that jungle of noxious things whose miasma had been wafted +Westward with the implacable Chinaman. + +I walked quietly from the room, occupied with my own bitter +reflections. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +BEWITCHMENT + + +"You say you have two pieces of news for me?" said Nayland Smith, +looking across the breakfast table to where Inspector Weymouth sat +sipping coffee. + +"There are two points--yes," replied the Scotland Yard man, whilst +Smith paused, egg-spoon in hand, and fixed his keen eyes upon the +speaker. "The first is this: the headquarters of the yellow group is +no longer in the East End." + +"How can you be sure of that?" + +"For two reasons. In the first place, that district must now be too +hot to hold Dr. Fu-Manchu; in the second place, we have just completed +a house-to-house inquiry which has scarcely overlooked a rathole or a +rat. That place where you say Fu-Manchu was visited by some Chinese +mandarin; where you, Mr. Smith, and"--glancing in my direction--"you, +doctor, were confined for a time--" + +"Yes?" snapped Smith, attacking his egg. + +"Well," continued the Inspector, "it is all deserted now. There is not +the slightest doubt that the Chinaman has fled to some other abode. I +am certain of it. My second piece of news will interest you very much, +I am sure. You were taken to the establishment of the Chinaman, +Shen-Yan, by a certain ex-officer of New York Police--Burke...." + +"Good God!" cried Smith, looking up with a start; "I thought they had +him!" + +"So did I," replied Weymouth grimly; "but they haven't! He got away in +the confusion following the raid, and has been hiding ever since with +a cousin--a nurseryman out Upminster way...." + +"Hiding?" snapped Smith. + +"Exactly--hiding. He has been afraid to stir ever since, and has +scarcely shown his nose outside the door. He says he is watched night +and day." + +"Then how ...!" + +"He realized that something must be done," continued the Inspector, +"and made a break this morning. He is so convinced of this constant +surveillance that he came away secretly, hidden under the boxes of a +market-wagon. He landed at Covent Garden in the early hours of this +morning and came straight away to the Yard." + +"What is he afraid of exactly?" + +Inspector Weymouth put down his coffee cup and bent forward slightly. + +"He knows something," he said in a low voice, "and _they_ are aware +that he knows it!" + +"And what is this he knows?" + +Nayland Smith stared eagerly at the detective. + +"Every man has his price," replied Weymouth, with a smile, "and Burke +seems to think that you are a more likely market than the police +authorities." + +"I see," snapped Smith. "He wants to see _me_?" + +"He wants you to go and see _him_," was the reply. "I think he +anticipates that you may make a capture of the person or persons +spying upon him." + +"Did he give you any particulars?" + +"Several. He spoke of a sort of gipsy girl with whom he had a short +conversation one day, over the fence which divides his cousin's flower +plantations from the lane adjoining." + +"Gipsy girl!" I whispered, glancing rapidly at Smith. + +"I think you are right, doctor," said Weymouth with his slow smile; +"it was Karamaneh. She asked him the way to somewhere or other and got +him to write it upon a loose page of his notebook, so that she should +not forget it." + +"You hear that, Petrie?" rapped Smith. + +"I hear it," I replied, "but I don't see any special significance in +the fact." + +"I do!" rapped Smith. "I didn't sit up the greater part of last night +thrashing my weary brains for nothing! But I am going to the British +Museum to-day, to confirm a certain suspicion." He turned to Weymouth. +"Did Burke go back?" he demanded abruptly. + +"He returned hidden under the empty boxes," was the reply. "Oh! you +never saw a man in such a funk in all your life!" + +"He may have good reasons," I said. + +"He _has_ good reasons!" replied Nayland Smith grimly; "if that man +really possesses information inimical to the safety of Fu-Manchu, he +can only escape doom by means of a miracle similar to that which +hitherto has protected you and me." + +"Burke insists," said Weymouth at this point, "that something comes +almost every night after dusk, slinking about the house--it's an old +farmhouse, I understand; and on two or three occasions he has been +awakened (fortunately for him he is a light sleeper) by sounds of +_coughing_ immediately outside his window. He is a man who sleeps with +a pistol under his pillow, and more than once, on running to the +window, he has had a vague glimpse of some creature leaping down from +the tiles of the roof, which slopes up to his room, into the flower +beds below...." + +"Creature!" said Smith, his grey eyes ablaze now, "you said +_creature_!" + +"I used the word deliberately," replied Weymouth, "because Burke seems +to have the idea that it goes on all fours." + +There was a short and rather strained silence. Then: + +"In descending a sloping roof," I suggested, "a human being would +probably employ his hands as well as his feet." + +"Quite so," agreed the Inspector. "I am merely reporting the +impression of Burke." + +"Has he heard no other sound?" rapped Smith; "one like the cracking of +dry branches, for instance?" + +"He made no mention of it," replied Weymouth, staring. + +"And what is the plan?" + +"One of his cousin's vans," said Weymouth, with his slight smile, "has +remained behind at Covent Garden and will return late this afternoon. +I propose that you and I, Mr. Smith, imitate Burke and ride down to +Upminster under the empty boxes." + +Nayland Smith stood up, leaving his breakfast half finished, and began +to wander up and down the room, reflectively tugging at his ear. Then +he began to fumble in the pockets of his dressing-gown and finally +produced the inevitable pipe, dilapidated pouch, and box of safety +matches. He began to load the much-charred agent of reflection. + +"Do I understand that Burke is actually too afraid to go out openly +even in daylight?" he asked suddenly. + +"He has not hitherto left his cousin's plantations at all," replied +Weymouth. "He seems to think that openly to communicate with the +authorities, or with you, would be to seal his death warrant." + +"He's right," snapped Smith. + +"Therefore he came and returned secretly," continued the inspector; +"and if we are to do any good, obviously we must adopt similar +precautions. The market wagon, loaded in such a way as to leave ample +space in the interior for us, will be drawn up outside the office of +Messrs. Pike and Pike, in Covent Garden, until about five o'clock this +afternoon. At say, half-past four, I propose that we meet there and +embark upon the journey." + +The speaker glanced in my direction interrogatively. + +"Include me in the programme," I said. "Will there be room in the +wagon?" + +"Certainly," was the reply; "it is most commodious, but I cannot +guarantee its comfort." + +Nayland Smith promenaded the room unceasingly, and presently he walked +out altogether, only to return ere the Inspector and I had had time to +exchange more than a glance of surprise, carrying a brass ash-tray. He +placed this on a corner of the breakfast table before Weymouth. + +"Ever seen anything like that?" he inquired. + +The Inspector examined the gruesome relic with obvious curiosity, +turning it over with the tip of his little finger and manifesting +considerable repugnance in touching it at all. Smith and I watched him +in silence, and, finally, placing the tray again upon the table, he +looked up in a puzzled way. + +"It's something like the skin of a water-rat," he said. + +Nayland Smith stared at him fixedly. + +"A water-rat? Now that you come to mention it, I perceive a certain +resemblance--yes. But"--he had been wearing a silk scarf about his +throat and now he unwrapped it--"did you ever see a water-rat that +could make marks like these?" + +Weymouth started to his feet with some muttered exclamation. + +"What is this?" he cried. "When did it happen, and how?" + +In his own terse fashion, Nayland Smith related the happenings of the +night. At the conclusion of the story: + +"By heaven!" whispered Weymouth, "the thing on the roof--the coughing +thing that goes on all fours, seen by Burke...." + +"My own idea exactly!" cried Smith. + +"Fu-Manchu," I said excitedly, "has brought some new, some dreadful +creature, from Burma...." + +"No, Petrie," snapped Smith, turning upon me suddenly. "Not from +Burma--from Abyssinia." + + * * * * * + +That day was destined to be an eventful one; a day never to be +forgotten by any of us concerned in those happenings which I have to +record. Early in the morning Nayland Smith set off for the British +Museum to pursue his mysterious investigations, and I, having +performed my brief professional round (for, as Nayland Smith had +remarked on one occasion, this was a beastly healthy district), I +found, having made the necessary arrangements, that, with over three +hours to spare, I had nothing to occupy my time until the appointment +in Covent Garden Market. My lonely lunch completed, a restless fit +seized me, and I felt unable to remain longer in the house. Inspired +by this restlessness, I attired myself for the adventure of the +evening, not neglecting to place a pistol in my pocket, and, walking +to the neighbouring Tube station, I booked to Charing Cross, and +presently found myself rambling aimlessly along the crowded streets. +Led on by what link of memory I know not, I presently drifted into New +Oxford Street, and looked up with a start--to learn that I stood +before the shop of a second-hand bookseller where once two years +before I had met Karamaneh. + +The thoughts conjured up at that moment were almost too bitter to be +borne, and without so much as glancing at the books displayed for +sale, I crossed the roadway, entered Museum Street, and, rather in +order to distract my mind than because I contemplated any purchase, +began to examine the Oriental pottery, Egyptian statuettes, Indian +armour, and other curios, displayed in the window of an antique +dealer. + +But, strive as I would to concentrate my mind upon the objects in the +window, my memories persistently haunted me, and haunted me to the +exclusion even of the actualities. The crowds thronging the pavement, +the traffic in New Oxford Street, swept past unheeded; my eyes saw +nothing of pot nor statuette, but only met, in a misty imaginative +world, the glance of two other eyes--the dark and beautiful eyes of +Karamaneh. In the exquisite tinting of a Chinese vase dimly +perceptible in the background of the shop, I perceived only the +blushing cheeks of Karamaneh; her face rose up, a taunting phantom, +from out of the darkness between a hideous, gilded idol and an Indian +sandal-wood screen. + +I strove to dispel this obsessing thought, resolutely fixing my +attention upon a tall Etruscan vase in the corner of the window, near +to the shop door. Was I losing my senses indeed? A doubt of my own +sanity momentarily possessed me. For, struggle as I would to dispel +the illusion--there, looking out at me over that ancient piece of +pottery, was the bewitching face of the slave-girl! + +Probably I was glaring madly, and possibly I attracted the notice of +the passers-by; but of this I cannot be certain, for all my attention +was centred upon that phantasmal face, with the cloudy hair, slightly +parted red lips, and the brilliant dark eyes which looked into mine +out of the shadows of the shop. + +It was bewildering--it was uncanny; for, delusion or verity, the +glamour prevailed. I exerted a great mental effort, stepped to the +door, turned the handle, and entered the shop with as great a show of +composure as I could muster. + +A curtain draped in a little door at the back of one counter swayed +slightly, with no greater violence than may have been occasioned by +the draught. But I fixed my eyes upon this swaying curtain almost +fiercely ... as an impassive half-caste of some kind who appeared to +be a strange cross between a Graeco-Hebrew and a Japanese, entered and +quite unemotionally faced me, with a slight bow. + +So wholly unexpected was this apparition that I started back. + +"Can I show you anything, sir?" inquired the new arrival, with a +second slight inclination of the head. + +I looked at him for a moment in silence. Then: + +"I thought I saw a lady of my acquaintance here a moment ago," I said. +"Was I mistaken?" + +"Quite mistaken, sir," replied the shopman, raising his black eyebrows +ever so slightly; "a mistake possibly due to a reflection in the +window. Will you take a look around now that you are here?" + +"Thank you," I replied, staring him hard in the face; "at some other +time." + +I turned and quitted the shop abruptly. Either I was mad, or Karamaneh +was concealed somewhere therein. + +However, realizing my helplessness in the matter, I contented myself +with making a mental note of the name which appeared above the +establishment--J. Salaman--and walked on, my mind in a chaotic +condition and my heart beating with unusual rapidity. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +THE QUESTING HANDS + + +Within my view, from the corner of the room where I sat in deepest +shadow, through the partly opened window (it was screwed, like our +own) were rows of glass-houses gleaming in the moonlight, and, beyond +them, orderly ranks of flower-beds extending into a blue haze of +distance. By reason of the moon's position, no light entered the room, +but my eyes, from long watching, were grown familiar with the +darkness, and I could see Burke quite clearly as he lay in the bed +between my post and the window. I seemed to be back again in those +days of the troubled past when first Nayland Smith and I had come to +grips with the servants of Dr. Fu-Manchu. A more peaceful scene than +this flower-planted corner of Essex it would be difficult to imagine; +but, either because of my knowledge that its peace was chimerical, or +because of that outflung consciousness of danger which actually, or in +my imagination, preceded the coming of the Chinaman's agents, to my +seeming the silence throbbed electrically and the night was laden with +stilly omens. + +Already cramped by my journey in the market-cart, I found it difficult +to remain very long in any one position. What information had Burke to +sell? He had refused, for some reason, to discuss the matter that +evening, and now, enacting the part allotted him by Nayland Smith, he +feigned sleep consistently, although at intervals he would whisper to +me his doubts and fears. + +All the chances were in our favour to-night; for whilst I could not +doubt that Dr. Fu-Manchu was set upon the removal of the ex-officer of +New York police, neither could I doubt that our presence in the farm +was unknown to the agents of the Chinaman. According to Burke, +constant attempts had been made to achieve Fu-Manchu's purpose, and +had only been frustrated by his (Burke's) wakefulness. There was every +probability that another attempt would be made to-night. + +Any one who has been forced by circumstance to undertake such a vigil +as this will be familiar with the marked changes (corresponding with +phases of the earth's movement) which take place in the atmosphere, at +midnight, at two o'clock, and again at four o'clock. During those four +hours falls a period wherein all life is at its lowest ebb, and every +physician is aware that there is a greater likelihood of a patient's +passing between midnight and 4 a.m., than at any other period during +the cycle of the hours. + +To-night I became specially aware of this lowering of vitality, and +now, with the night at that darkest phase which precedes the dawn, an +indescribable dread, such as I had known before in my dealings with +the Chinaman, assailed me, when I was least prepared to combat it. The +stillness was intense Then: + +"_Here it is!_" whispered Burke from the bed. + +The chill at the very centre of my being, which but corresponded with +the chill of all surrounding nature at that hour, became intensified, +keener, at the whispered words. + +I rose stealthily out of my chair, and from my nest of shadows +watched--watched intently, the bright oblong of the window.... + +Without the slightest heralding sound--a black silhouette crept up +against the pane ... the silhouette of a small, malformed head, a +dog-like head, deep-set in square shoulders. Malignant eyes peered +intently in. Higher it rose--that wicked head--against the window, +then crouched down on the sill and became less sharply defined as the +creature stooped to the opening below. There was a faint sound of +sniffing. + +Judging from the stark horror which I experienced myself, I doubted, +now, if Burke could sustain the role allotted him. In beneath the +slightly raised window came a hand, perceptible to me despite the +darkness of the room. It seemed to project from the black silhouette +outside the pane, to be thrust forward--and forward--and forward ... +that small hand with the outstretched fingers. + +The unknown possesses unique terrors; and since I was unable to +conceive what manner of thing this could be, which, extending its +incredibly long arms, now sought the throat of the man upon the bed, I +tasted of that sort of terror which ordinarily one knows only in +dreams. + +"Quick, sir--_quick_!" screamed Burke, starting up from the pillow. + +The questing hands had reached his throat! + +Choking down an urgent dread that I had of touching the thing which +had reached through the window to kill the sleeper, I sprang across +the room and grasped the rigid, hairy forearms. + +Heavens! Never have I felt such muscles, such tendons, as those +beneath the hirsute skin! They seemed to be of steel wire, and with a +sudden frightful sense of impotence, I realized that I was as +powerless as a child to relax that strangle-hold. Burke was making the +most frightful sounds and quite obviously was being asphyxiated before +my eyes! + +"Smith!" I cried, "Smith! Help! _help_! for God's sake!" + +Despite the confusion of my mind I became aware of sounds outside and +below me. Twice the thing at the window coughed; there was an +incessant, lash-like cracking, then some shouted words which I was +unable to make out; and finally the sharp report of a pistol. + +Snarling like that of a wild beast came from the creature with the +hairy arms, together with renewed coughing. But the steel grip relaxed +not one iota. I realized two things: the first, that in my terror at +the suddenness of the attack I had omitted to act as prearranged: the +second, that I had discredited the strength of the visitant, whilst +Smith had foreseen it. + +Desisting in my vain endeavour to pit my strength against that of the +nameless thing, I sprang back across the room and took up the weapon +which had been left in my charge earlier in the night, but which I had +been unable to believe it would be necessary to employ. This was a +sharp and heavy axe which Nayland Smith, when I had met him in Covent +Garden, had brought with him, to the great amazement of Weymouth and +myself. + +As I leapt back to the window and uplifted this primitive weapon, a +second shot sounded from below, and more fierce snarling, coughing, +and guttural mutterings assailed my ears from beyond the pane. + +Lifting the heavy blade, I brought it down with all my strength upon +the nearer of those hairy arms where it crossed the window-ledge, +severing muscle, tendon and bone as easily as a knife might cut +cheese.... + +A shriek--a shriek neither human nor animal, but gruesomely compound +of both--followed ... and merged into a choking cough. Like a flash +the other shaggy arm was withdrawn, and some vaguely seen body went +rolling down the sloping red tiles and crashed on to the ground +beneath. + +With a second piercing shriek, louder than that recently uttered by +Burke, wailing through the night from somewhere below, I turned +desperately to the man on the bed, who now was become significantly +silent. A candle with matches, stood upon a table hard by, and, my +fingers far from steady, I set about obtaining a light. This +accomplished, I stood the candle upon the little chest-of-drawers and +returned to Burke's side. + +"Merciful God!" I cried. + +Of all the pictures which remain in my memory, some of them dark +enough, I can find none more horrible than that which now confronted +me in the dim candle-light. Burke lay crosswise on the bed, his head +thrown back and sagging; one rigid hand he held in the air, and with +the other grasped the hairy forearm which I had severed with the axe; +for, in a death-like grip, the dead fingers were still fastened, +vice-like, at his throat. + +His face was nearly black, and his eyes projected from their sockets +horribly. Mastering my repugnance, I seized the hideous piece of +bleeding anatomy and strove to release it. It defied all my efforts; +in death it was as implacable as in life. I took a knife from my +pocket, and, tendon by tendon, cut away that uncanny grip from Burke's +throat.... + +But my labour was in vain. Burke was dead! + +I think I failed to realize this for some time. My clothes were +sticking clammily to my body; I was bathed in perspiration, and, +shaking furiously, I clutched at the edge of the window, avoiding the +bloody patch upon the ledge, and looked out over the roofs to where, +in the more distant plantations, I could hear excited voices. What had +been the meaning of that scream which I had heard but to which in my +frantic state of mind I had paid comparatively little attention? + +There was a great stirring all about me. + +"Smith!" I cried from the window; "Smith, for mercy's sake where are +you?" + +Footsteps came racing up the stairs. Behind me the door burst open and +Nayland Smith stumbled into the room. + +"God!" he said, and started back in the doorway. + +"Have you got it, Smith?" I demanded hoarsely. "In sanity's name what +is it--_what is it?_" + +"Come downstairs," replied Smith quietly, "and see for yourself." He +turned his head aside from the bed. + +Very unsteadily I followed him down the stairs and through the +rambling old house out into the stone-paved courtyard. There were +figures moving at the end of a long alleyway between the glass houses, +and one, carrying a lantern, stooped over something which lay upon the +ground. + +"That's Burke's cousin with the lantern," whispered Smith, in my ear; +"don't tell him yet." + +I nodded, and we hurried up to join the group. I found myself looking +down at one of those thickset Burmans whom I always associated with +Fu-Manchu's activities. He lay quite flat, face downward; but the back +of his head was a shapeless blood-clotted mass, and a heavy +stock-whip, the butt end ghastly because of the blood and hair which +clung to it, lay beside him. I started back appalled as Smith caught +my arm. + +"_It_ turned on its keeper!" he hissed in my ear. "I wounded it twice +from below, and you severed one arm; in its insensate fury, its +unreasoning malignity, it returned--and there lies its second +victim...." + +"Then...." + +"It's gone, Petrie! It has the strength of four men even now. Look!" + +He stooped, and from the clenched left hand of the dead Burman, +extracted a piece of paper and opened it. + +"Hold the lantern a moment," he said. + +In the yellow light he glanced at the scrap of paper. + +"As I expected--a leaf of Burke's notebook; it worked by _scent_." He +turned to me with an odd expression in his grey eyes. "I wonder what +piece of _my_ personal property Fu-Manchu has pilfered," he said, "in +order to enable it to sleuth _me_?" + +He met the gaze of the man holding the lantern. + +"Perhaps you had better return to the house," he said, looking him +squarely in the eyes. + +The other's face blanched. + +"You don't mean, sir--you don't mean...." + +"Brace up!" said Smith, laying his hand upon his shoulder. +"Remember--he chose to play with fire!" + +One wild look the man cast from Smith to me, then went off, +staggering, toward the farm. + +"Smith--" I began. + +He turned to me with an impatient gesture. + +"Weymouth has driven into Upminster," he snapped; "and the whole +district will be scoured before morning. They probably motored here, +but the sounds of the shots will have enabled whoever was with the car +to make good his escape. And--exhausted from loss of blood, its +capture is only a matter of time, Petrie." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +ONE DAY IN RANGOON + + +Nayland Smith returned from the telephone. Nearly twenty-four hours +had elapsed since the awful death of Burke. + +"No news, Petrie," he said shortly. "It must have crept into some +inaccessible hole to die." + +I glanced up from my notes. Smith settled into the white cane +armchair, and began to surround himself with clouds of aromatic smoke. +I took up a half-sheet of foolscap covered with pencilled writing in +my friend's cramped characters, and transcribed the following, in +order to complete my account of the latest Fu-Manchu outrage: + +"The Amharun, a Semitic tribe allied to the Falashas, who have been +settled for many generations in the southern province of Shoa +(Abyssinia), have been regarded as unclean and outcast, apparently +since the days of Menelek--son of Suleyman and the Queen of +Sheba--from whom they claim descent. Apart from their custom of eating +meat cut from living beasts, they are accursed because of their +alleged association with the _Cynocephalus hamadryas_ (Sacred Baboon). +I, myself, was taken to a hut on the banks of the Hawash and shown a +creature ... whose predominant trait was an unreasoning malignity +toward ... and a ferocious tenderness for the society of its furry +brethren. Its powers of _scent_ were fully equal to those of a +bloodhound, whilst its abnormally long forearms possessed incredible +strength ... a _Cynocephalyte_ such as this, contracts phthisis even +in the more northern provinces of Abyssinia...." + +"You have not yet explained to me, Smith," I said, having completed +this note, "how you got in touch with Fu-Manchu; how you learnt that +he was not dead, as we had supposed, but living--active." + +Nayland Smith stood up and fixed his steely eyes upon me with an +indefinable expression in them. Then: + +"No," he replied; "I haven't. Do you wish to know?" + +"Certainly," I said with surprise; "is there any reason why I should +not?" + +"There is no real reason," said Smith; "or"--staring at me very +hard--"I hope there is no real reason." + +"What do you mean?" + +"Well"--he grabbed up his pipe from the table and began furiously to +load it--"I blundered upon the truth one day in Rangoon. I was +walking out of a house which I occupied there for a time, and as I +swung around the corner into the main street, I ran into--literally +ran into...." + +Again he hesitated oddly; then closed up his pouch and tossed it into +the cane chair. He struck a match. + +"I ran into Karamaneh," he continued abruptly, and began to puff away +at his pipe, filling the air with clouds of tobacco smoke. + +I caught my breath. This was the reason why he had kept me so long in +ignorance of the story. He knew of my hopeless, uncrushable sentiments +towards the gloriously beautiful but utterly hypocritical and evil +Eastern girl who was perhaps the most dangerous of all Dr. Fu-Manchu's +servants; for the power of her loveliness was magical, as I knew to my +cost. + +"What did you do?" I asked quietly, my fingers drumming upon the +table. + +"Naturally enough," continued Smith, "with a cry of recognition I held +out both my hands to her gladly. I welcomed her as a dear friend +regained; I thought of the joy with which _you_ would learn that I had +found the missing one; I thought how you would be in Rangoon just as +quickly as the fastest steamer would get you there...." + +"Well?" + +"Karamaneh started back and treated me to a glance of absolute +animosity! No recognition was there, and no friendliness--only a sort +of scornful anger." + +He shrugged his shoulders and began to walk up and down the room. + +"I do not know what _you_ would have done in the circumstances, +Petrie, but I--" + +"Yes?" + +"I dealt with the situation rather promptly, I think. I simply picked +her up without another word, right there in the public street, and +raced back into the house, with her kicking and fighting like a +little demon! She did not shriek or do anything of that kind, but +fought silently like a vicious wild animal. Oh! I had some scars, I +assure you; but I carried her up into my office, which fortunately was +empty at the time, plumped her down in a chair, and stood looking at +her." + +"Go on" I said rather hollowly; "what next?" + +"She glared at me with those wonderful eyes, an expression of +implacable hatred in them! Remembering all that we had done for her; +remembering our former friendship; above all, remembering _you_--this +look of hers almost made me shiver. She was dressed very smartly in +European fashion, and the whole thing had been so sudden that as I +stood looking at her I half expected to wake up presently and find it +all a day-dream. But it was real--as real as her enmity. I felt the +need for reflection, and having vainly endeavoured to draw her into +conversation, and elicited no other answer than this glare of +hatred--I left her there, going out and locking the door behind me." + +"Very high-handed?" + +"A Commissioner has certain privileges, Petrie; and any action I might +choose to take was not likely to be questioned. There was only one +window to the office, and it was fully twenty feet above the level; it +overlooked a narrow street off the main thoroughfare (I think I have +explained that the house stood on a corner), so I did not fear her +escaping. I had an important engagement which I had been on my way to +fulfil when the encounter took place, and now, with a word to my +native servant--who chanced to be downstairs--I hurried off." + +Smith's pipe had gone out as usual, and he proceeded to relight it, +whilst, my eyes lowered, I continued to drum upon the table. + +"This boy took her some tea later in the afternoon," he continued, +"and apparently found her in a more placid frame of mind. I returned +immediately after dusk, and he reported that when last he had looked +in, about half an hour earlier, she had been seated in an armchair +reading a newspaper (I may mention that everything of value in the +office was securely locked up!). I was determined upon a certain +course by this time, and I went slowly upstairs, unlocked the door, +and walked into the darkened office. I turned up the light ... the +place was empty!" + +"Empty!" + +"The window was open, and the bird flown! Oh! it was not so simple a +flight--as you would realize if you knew the place. The street, which +the window overlooked, was bounded by a blank wall, on the opposite +side, for thirty or forty yards along; and as we had been having heavy +rains, it was full of glutinous mud. Furthermore, the boy whom I had +left in charge had been sitting in the doorway immediately below the +office window watching for my return ever since his last visit to the +room above...." + +"She must have bribed him," I said bitterly, "or corrupted him with +her infernal blandishments." + +"I'll swear she did not," rapped Smith decisively. "I know my man, and +I'll swear she did not. There were no marks in the mud of the road to +show that a ladder had been placed there; moreover, nothing of the +kind could have been attempted whilst the boy was sitting in the +doorway; that was evident. In short, she did not descend into the +roadway and did not come out by the door...." + +"Was there a gallery outside the window?" + +"No; it was impossible to climb to right or left of the window or up +on to the roof. I convinced myself of that." + +"But, my dear man!" I cried, "you are eliminating every natural mode +of egress! Nothing remains but flight." + +"I am aware, Petrie, that nothing remains but flight; in other words, +I have never to this day understood how she quitted the room. I only +know that she did." + +"And then?" + +"I saw in this incredible escape the cunning hand of Dr. +Fu-Manchu--saw it at once. Peace was ended; and I set to work along +certain channels without delay. In this manner I got on the track at +last, and learnt, beyond the possibility of doubt, that the Chinese +doctor lived--nay! was actually on his way to Europe again!" + +There followed a short silence. Then-- + +"I suppose it's a mystery that will be cleared up some day," concluded +Smith; "but to date the riddle remains intact." He glanced at the +clock. "I have an appointment with Weymouth; therefore, leaving you to +the task of solving this problem which thus far has defied my own +efforts, I will get along." + +He read a query in my glance. + +"Oh! I shall not be late," he added; "I think I may venture out alone +on this occasion without personal danger." + +Nayland Smith went upstairs to dress, leaving me seated at my +writing-table deep in thought. My notes upon the renewed activity of +Dr. Fu-Manchu were stacked on my left hand, and, opening a new +writing-block, I commenced to add to them particulars of this +surprising event in Rangoon which properly marked the opening of the +Chinaman's second campaign. Smith looked in at the door on his way +out, but seeing me thus engaged, did not disturb me. + +I think I have made it sufficiently evident in these records that my +practice was not an extensive one, and my hour for receiving patients +arrived and passed with only two professional interruptions. + +My task concluded, I glanced at the clock, and determined to devote +the remainder of the evening to a little private investigation of my +own. From Nayland Smith I had preserved the matter a secret, largely +because I feared his ridicule; but I had by no means forgotten that I +had seen, or had strongly imagined that I had seen, Karamaneh--that +beautiful anomaly who (in modern London) asserted herself to be a +slave--in the shop of an antique dealer not a hundred yards from the +British Museum! + +A theory was forming in my brain, which I was burningly anxious to put +to the test. I remembered how, two years before, I had met Karamaneh +near to this same spot; and I had heard Inspector Weymouth assert +positively that Fu-Manchu's headquarters were no longer in the East +End, as of yore. There seemed to me to be a distinct probability that +a suitable centre had been established for his reception in this +place, so much less likely to be suspected by the authorities. Perhaps +I attached too great a value to what may have been a delusion; perhaps +my theory rested upon no more solid foundation than the belief that I +had seen Karamaneh in the shop of the curio dealer. If her appearance +there should prove to have been imaginary, the structure of my theory +would be shattered at its base. To-night I should test my premises, +and upon the result of my investigations determine my future action. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +THE SILVER BUDDHA + + +Museum Street certainly did not seem a likely spot for Dr. Fu-Manchu +to establish himself, yet, unless my imagination had strangely +deceived me, from the window of the antique dealer who traded under +the name of J. Salaman, those wonderful eyes of Karamaneh, like the +velvet midnight of the Orient, had looked out at me. + +As I paced slowly along the pavement toward that lighted window, my +heart was beating far from normally, and I cursed the folly which, +despite all, refused to die, but lingered on, poisoning my life. +Comparative quiet reigned in Museum Street, at no time a busy +thoroughfare, and, excepting another shop at the Museum end, +commercial activities had ceased there. The door of a block of +residential chambers almost immediately opposite to the shop which was +my objective, threw out a beam of light across the pavement; not more +than two or three people were visible upon either side of the street. + +I turned the knob of the door and entered the shop. + +The same dark and immobile individual whom I had seen before, and +whose nationality defied conjecture, came out from the curtained +doorway at the back to greet me. + +"Good evening, sir," he said monotonously, with a slight inclination +of the head; "is there anything which you desire to inspect?" + +"I merely wish to take a look round," I replied. "I have no particular +item in view." + +The shopman inclined his head again, swept a yellow hand +comprehensively about, as if to include the entire stock, and seated +himself on a chair behind the counter. + +I lighted a cigarette with such an air of nonchalance as I could +summon to the operation, and began casually to inspect the varied +articles of _virtu_ loading the shelves and tables about me. I am +bound to confess that I retain no one definite impression of this +tour. Vases I handled, statuettes, Egyptian scarabs, bead necklaces, +illuminated missals, portfolios of old prints, jade ornaments, +bronzes, fragments of rare lace, early printed books, Assyrian +tablets, daggers, Roman rings, and a hundred other curiosities, +leisurely, and I trust with apparent interest, yet without forming +the slightest impression respecting any one of them. + +Probably I employed myself in this way for half an hour or more, and +whilst my hands busied themselves among the stock of J. Salaman, my +mind was occupied entirely elsewhere. Furtively I was studying the +shopman himself, a human presentment of a Chinese idol; I was +listening and watching: especially I was watching the curtained +doorway at the back of the shop. + +"We close at about this time, sir," the man interrupted me, speaking +in the emotionless, monotonous voice which I had noted before. + +I replaced upon the glass counter a little Sekhet boat, carved in wood +and highly coloured, and glanced up with a start. Truly my methods +were amateurish; I had learnt nothing; I was unlikely to learn +anything. I wondered how Nayland Smith would have conducted such an +inquiry, and I racked my brains for some means of penetrating into the +recesses of the establishment. Indeed I had been seeking such a plan +for the past half an hour, but my mind had proved incapable of +suggesting one. + +Why I did not admit failure I cannot imagine, but, instead, I began to +tax my brains anew for some means of gaining further time; and, as I +looked about the place, the shopman very patiently awaiting my +departure, I observed an open case at the back of the counter. The +three lower shelves were empty, but upon the fourth shelf squatted a +silver Buddha. + +"I should like to examine the silver image yonder," I said; "what +price are you asking for it?" + +"It is not for sale, sir," replied the man, with a greater show of +animation than he had yet exhibited. + +"Not for sale!" I said, my eyes ever seeking the curtained doorway; +"how's that?" + +"It is sold." + +"Well, even so, there can be no objection to my examining it?" + +"It is not for sale, sir." + +Such a rebuff from a tradesman would have been more than sufficient to +call for a sharp retort at any other time, but now it excited the +strangest suspicions. The street outside looked comparatively +deserted, and prompted, primarily, by an emotion which I did not pause +to analyse, I adopted a singular measure; without doubt I relied upon +the unusual powers vested in Nayland Smith to absolve me in the event +of error. I made as if to go out into the street, then turned, leapt +past the shopman, ran behind the counter, and grasped at the silver +Buddha! + +That I was likely to be arrested for attempted larceny I cared not; +the idea that Karamaneh was concealed somewhere in the building ruled +absolutely, and a theory respecting this silver image had taken +possession of my mind. Exactly what I expected to happen at that +moment I cannot say, but what actually happened was far more startling +than anything I could have imagined. + +At the instant that I grasped the figure I realized that it was +attached to the woodwork; in the next I knew that it was a handle ... +as I tried to pull it toward me I became aware that this handle was +the handle of a door. For that door swung open before me, and I found +myself at the foot of a flight of heavily carpeted stairs. + +Anxious as I had been to proceed a moment before, I was now trebly +anxious to retire, and for this reason: on the bottom step of the +stairs, facing me, _stood Dr. Fu-Manchu!_ + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +DR. FU-MANCHU'S LABORATORY + + +I cannot conceive that any ordinary mortal ever attained to anything +like an intimacy with Dr. Fu-Manchu; I cannot believe that any man +could ever grow used to his presence, could ever cease to fear him. I +suppose I had set eyes upon Fu-Manchu some five or six times prior to +this occasion, and now he was dressed in the manner which I always +associated with him, probably because it was thus I first saw him. He +wore a plain yellow robe, and, his pointed chin resting upon his +bosom, he looked down at me, revealing a great expanse of the +marvellous brow with its sparse, neutral-coloured hair. + +Never in my experience have I known such _force_ to dwell in the +glance of any human eye as dwelt in that of this uncanny being. His +singular affliction (if affliction it were), the film or slight +membrane which sometimes obscured the oblique eyes, was particularly +evident at the moment that I crossed the threshold, but now as I +looked up at Dr. Fu-Manchu, it lifted--revealing the eyes in all their +emerald greenness. + +The idea of physical attack upon this incredible being seemed +childish--inadequate. But, following that first instant of +stupefaction, I forced myself to advance upon him. + +A dull, crushing blow descended on the top of my skull, and I became +oblivious of all things. + +My return to consciousness was accompanied by tremendous pains in my +head, whereby, from previous experience, I knew that a sandbag had +been used against me by some one in the shop, presumably by the +immobile shopman. This awakening was accompanied by none of those hazy +doubts respecting previous events and present surroundings which are +the usual symptoms of revival from sudden unconsciousness; even before +I opened my eyes, before I had more than a partial command of my +senses, I knew that, with my wrists handcuffed behind me, I lay in a +room which was also occupied by Dr. Fu-Manchu. This absolute certainty +of the Chinaman's presence was evidenced, not by my senses, but only +by an inner consciousness, and the same that always awakened into life +at the approach not only of Fu-Manchu in person but of certain of his +uncanny servants. + +A faint perfume hung in the air about me; I do not mean that of any +essence or of any incense, but rather the smell which is suffused by +Oriental furniture, by Oriental draperies; the indefinable but +unmistakable perfume of the East. + +Thus, London has a distinct smell of its own, and so has Paris, whilst +the difference between Marseilles and Suez, for instance, is even more +marked. Now the atmosphere surrounding me was Eastern, but not of the +East that I knew; rather it was Far Eastern. Perhaps I do not make +myself very clear, but to me there was a mysterious significance in +that perfumed atmosphere. I opened my eyes. + +I lay upon a long low settee, in a fairly large room which was +furnished, as I had anticipated, in an absolutely Oriental fashion. +The two windows were so screened as to have lost, from the interior +point of view, all resemblance to European windows, and the whole +structure of the room had been altered in conformity, bearing out my +idea that the place had been prepared for Fu-Manchu's reception some +time before his actual return. I doubt if, East or West, a duplicate +of that singular apartment could be found. + +The end in which I lay was, as I have said, typical of an Eastern +house, and a large, ornate lantern hung from the ceiling almost +directly above me. The farther end of the room was occupied by tall +cases, some of them containing books, but the majority filled with +scientific paraphernalia: rows of flasks and jars, frames of +test-tubes, retorts, scales, and other objects of the laboratory. At a +large and very finely carved table sat Dr. Fu-Manchu, a yellow and +faded volume open before him, and some dark red fluid, almost like +blood, bubbling in a test-tube which he held over the flame of a +Bunsen-burner. + +The enormously long nail of his right index finger rested upon the +opened page of the book, to which he seemed constantly to refer, +dividing his attention between the volume, the contents of the +test-tube, and the progress of a second experiment, or possibly a part +of the same, which was taking place upon another corner of the +littered table. + +A huge glass retort (the bulb was fully two feet in diameter), fitted +with a Liebig's Condenser, rested in a metal frame, and within the +bulb, floating in an oily substance, was a fungus some six inches +high, shaped like a toadstool, but of a brilliant and venomous orange +colour. Three flat tubes of light were so arranged as to cast violet +rays upward into the retort, and the receiver, wherein condensed the +product of this strange experiment, contained some drops of a red +fluid which may have been identical with that boiling in the +test-tube. + +These things I perceived at a glance; then the filmy eyes of Dr. +Fu-Manchu were raised from the book, turned in my direction, and all +else was forgotten. + +"I regret," came the sibilant voice, "that unpleasant measures were +necessary, but hesitation would have been fatal. I trust, Dr. Petrie, +that you suffer no inconvenience?" + +To this speech no reply was possible, and I attempted none. + +"You have long been aware of my esteem for your acquirements," +continued the Chinaman, his voice occasionally touching deep guttural +notes, "and you will appreciate the pleasure which this visit affords +me. I kneel at the feet of my silver Buddha. I look to you, when you +shall have overcome your prejudices--due to ignorance of my true +motives--to assist me in establishing that intellectual control which +is destined to be the new World Force. I bear you no malice for your +ancient enmity, and even now"--he waved one yellow hand toward the +retort--"I am conducting an experiment designed to convert you from +your misunderstanding, and to adjust your perspective." + +Quite unemotionally he spoke, then turned again to his book, his +test-tube and retort, in the most matter-of-fact way imaginable. I do +not think the most frenzied outburst on his part, the most fiendish +threats, could have produced such effect upon me as those cold and +carefully calculated words, spoken in that unique voice. In its tones, +in the glance of the green eyes, in the very pose of the gaunt, +high-shouldered body, there was power--force. + +I counted myself lost, and in view of the Doctor's words, studied the +progress of the experiment with frightful interest. But a few moments +sufficed in which to realize that, for all my training, I knew as +little of Chemistry--of Chemistry as understood by this man's +genius--as a junior student in surgery knows of trephining. The +process in operation was a complete mystery to me; the means and the +end were alike incomprehensible. + +Thus, in the heavy silence of that room, a silence only broken by the +regular bubbling from the test-tube, I found my attention straying +from the table to the other objects surrounding it; and at one of them +my gaze stopped and remained chained with horror. + +It was a glass jar, some five feet in height and filled with viscous +fluid of a light amber colour. Out from this peered a hideous, +dog-like face, low-browed, with pointed ears and a nose almost +hoggishly flat. By the death-grin of the face the gleaming fangs were +revealed; and the body, the long yellow-grey body, rested, or seemed +to rest, upon short, malformed legs, whilst one long limp arm, the +right, hung down straightly in the preservative. The left arm had been +severed above the elbow. + +Fu-Manchu, finding his experiment to be proceeding favourably, lifted +his eyes to me again. + +"You are interested in my poor _Cynocephalyte_?" he said; and his eyes +were filmed like the eyes of one afflicted with cataract. "He was a +devoted servant, Dr. Petrie, but the lower influences in his genealogy +sometimes conquered. Then he got out of hand; and at last he was so +ungrateful toward those who had educated him, that, in one of those +paroxysms of his, he attacked and killed a most faithful Burman, one +of my oldest followers." + +Fu-Manchu returned to his experiment. + +Not the slightest emotion had he exhibited thus far, but had chatted +with me as any other scientist might chat with a friend who casually +visits his laboratory. The horror of the thing was playing havoc with +my own composure, however. There I lay, fettered, in the same room +with this man whose existence was a menace to the entire white race, +whilst placidly he pursued an experiment designed, if his own words +were believable, to cut me off from my kind--to wreak some change, +psychological or physiological I knew not; to place me, it might be, +upon a level with such brute things as that which now hung, half +floating, in the glass jar! + +Something I know of the history of that ghastly specimen, that thing +neither man nor ape; for within my own knowledge had it not attempted +the life of Nayland Smith, and was it not _I_ who, with an axe, had +maimed it in the instant of one of its last slayings? + +Of these things Dr. Fu-Manchu was well aware, so that his placid +speech was doubly, trebly horrible to my ears. I sought, furtively, to +move my arms, only to realize that, as I had anticipated, the +handcuffs were chained to a ring in the wall behind me. The +establishments of Dr. Fu-Manchu were always well provided with such +contrivances as these. + +I uttered a short, harsh laugh. Fu-Manchu stood up slowly from the +table, and, placing the test-tube in a rack, deposited the latter +carefully upon a shelf at his side. + +"I am happy to find you in such good humour," he said softly. "Other +affairs call me; and, in my absence, that profound knowledge of +chemistry, of which I have had evidence in the past, will enable you +to follow with intelligent interest the action of these violet rays +upon this exceptionally fine specimen of Siberian _Amanita muscaria_. +At some future time, possibly when you are my guest in China--which +country I am now making arrangements for you to visit--I shall discuss +with you some lesser-known properties of this species; and I may say +that one of your first tasks when you commence your duties as +assistant in my laboratory in Kiangsu, will be to conduct a series of +twelve experiments, which I have outlined, into other potentialities +of this unique fungus." + +He walked quietly to a curtained doorway, with his catlike yet awkward +gait, lifted the drapery, and, bestowing upon me a slight bow of +farewell, went out of the room. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +THE CROSSBAR + + +How long I lay there alone I had no means of computing. My mind was +busy with many matters, but principally concerned with my fate in the +immediate future. That Dr. Fu-Manchu entertained for me a singular +kind of regard, I had had evidence before. He had formed the erroneous +opinion that I was an advanced scientist who could be of use to him in +his experiments, and I was aware that he cherished a project of +transporting me to some place in China where his principal laboratory +was situated. Respecting the means which he proposed to employ, I was +unlikely to forget that this man, who had penetrated further along +certain byways of science than seemed humanly possible, undoubtedly +was master of a process for producing artificial catalepsy. It was my +lot, then, to be packed in a chest (to all intents and purposes a dead +man for the time being) and dispatched to the interior of China! + +What a fool I had been. To think that I had learnt nothing from my +long and dreadful experience of the methods of Dr. Fu-Manchu; to think +that I had come _alone_ in quest of him; that, leaving no trace behind +me, I had deliberately penetrated to his secret abode! + +I have said that my wrists were manacled behind me, the manacles being +attached to a chain fastened in the wall. I now contrived, with +extreme difficulty, to reverse the position of my hands; that is to +say, I climbed backward through the loop formed by my fettered arms, +so that instead of the gyves being behind me, they now were in front. + +Then I began to examine them, learning, as I had anticipated, that +they fastened with a lock. I sat gazing at the steel bracelets in the +light of the lamp which swung over my head, and it became apparent to +me that I had gained little by my contortion. + +A slight noise disturbed these unpleasant reveries. It was nothing +less than the rattling of keys! + +For a moment I wondered if I had heard aright, or if the sound +portended the coming of some servant of the Doctor who was locking up +the establishment for the night. The jangling sound was repeated, and +in such a way that I could not suppose it to be accidental. Some one +was deliberately rattling a small bunch of keys in an adjoining room. + +And now my heart leapt wildly--then seemed to stand still. + +With a low whistling cry a little grey shape shot through the doorway +by which Fu-Manchu had retired, and rolled like a ball of fluff blown +by the wind, completely under the table which bore the weird +scientific appliances of the Chinaman; the advent of the grey object +was accompanied by a further rattling of keys. + +My fear left me, and a mighty anxiety took its place. This creature +which now crouched chattering at me from beneath the big table was +Fu-Manchu's marmoset, and in the intervals of its chatterings and +grimacing, it nibbled, speculatively, at the keys upon the ring which +it clutched in its tiny hands. Key after key it sampled in this +manner, evincing a growing dissatisfaction with the uncrackable nature +of its find. + +One of those keys might be that of the handcuffs! + +I could not believe that the tortures of Tantalus were greater than +were mine at this moment. In all my hopes of rescue or release, I had +included nothing so strange, so improbable as this. A sort of awe +possessed me; for if by this means the key which should release me +should come into my possession, how ever again could I doubt a +beneficent Providence? + +But they were not yet in my possession; moreover, the key of the +handcuffs might not be amongst the bunch. + +Were there no means whereby I could induce the marmoset to approach +me? + +Whilst I racked my brains for some scheme, the little animal took the +matter out of my hands. Tossing the ring with its jangling contents a +yard or so across the carpet in my direction, it leapt in pursuit, +picked up the ring, whirled it over its head, and then threw a +complete somersault around it. Now it snatched up the keys again, and +holding them close to its ear, rattled them furiously. Finally, with +an incredible spring, it leapt on to the chain supporting the lamp +above my head, and with the garish shade swinging and spinning wildly, +clung there looking down at me like an acrobat on a trapeze. The tiny, +bluish face, completely framed in grotesque whiskers, enhanced the +illusion of an acrobatic comedian. Never for a moment did it release +its hold upon the key-ring. + +My suspense now was almost intolerable. I feared to move, lest, +alarming the marmoset, it should run off again, taking the keys with +it. So as I lay there, looking up at the little creature swinging +above me, the second wonder of the night came to pass. + +A voice that I could never forget, strive how I would, a voice that +haunted my dreams by night, and for which by day I was ever listening, +cried out from some adjoining room: + +"_Ta'ala hina!_" it called. "_Ta'ala hina, Peko!_" + +It was Karamaneh! + +The effect upon the marmoset was instantaneous. Down came the bunch of +keys upon one side of the shade, almost falling on my head, and down +leapt the ape upon the other. In two leaps it had traversed the room +and had vanished through the curtained doorway. + +If ever I had need of coolness it was now; the slightest mistake would +be fatal! The keys had slipped from the mattress of the divan, and now +lay just beyond reach of my fingers. Rapidly I changed my position, +and sought, without undue noise, to move the keys with my foot. + +I had actually succeeded in sliding them back on to the mattress, +when, unheralded by any audible footstep, Karamaneh came through the +doorway, holding the marmoset in her arms. She wore a dress of fragile +muslin material, and out from its folds protruded one silk-stockinged +foot, resting in a high-heeled red shoe.... + +For a moment she stood watching me, with a sort of enforced composure; +then her glance strayed to the keys lying upon the floor. Slowly, and +with her eyes fixed again upon my face, she crossed the room, stooped, +and took up the key-ring. + +It was one of the poignant moments of my life; for by that simple act +all my hopes had been shattered! + +Any poor lingering doubt that I may have had left me now. Had the +slightest spark of friendship animated the bosom of Karamaneh, most +certainly she would have overlooked the presence of the keys--of the +keys which represented my one hope of escape from the clutches of the +fiendish Chinaman. + +There is a silence more eloquent than words. For half a minute or +more, Karamaneh stood watching me--forcing herself to watch me--and I +looked up at her with a concentrated gaze in which rage and reproach +must have been strangely mingled. + +What eyes she had!--of that blackly lustrous sort nearly always +associated with unusually dark complexions; but Karamaneh's complexion +was peachlike, or rather of an exquisite and delicate fairness which +reminded me of the petal of a rose. By some I have been accused of +romancing about this girl's beauty, but only by those who had not met +her; for indeed she was astonishingly lovely. + +At last her eyes fell, the long lashes drooped upon her cheeks. She +turned and walked slowly to the chair wherein Fu-Manchu had sat. +Placing the keys upon the table amid the scientific litter, she rested +one dimpled elbow upon the yellow page of the book, and with her chin +in her palm, again directed upon me that enigmatical gaze. + +I dared not think of the past, of the past in which this beautiful, +treacherous girl had played a part; yet, watching her, I could not +believe, even now, that she was false! My state was truly a pitiable +one; I could have cried out in sheer anguish. With her long lashes +partly lowered, she watched me awhile, then spoke; and her voice was +music which seemed to mock me; every inflection of that elusive accent +reopened, lancet-like, the ancient wound. + +"Why do you look at me so?" she said, almost in a whisper. "By what +right do you reproach me?--Have you ever offered me friendship, that I +should repay you with friendship? When first you came to the house +where I was, by the river--came to save some one from" (there was the +familiar hesitation which always preceded the name of Fu-Manchu) +"from--_him_, you treated me as your enemy, although--I would have +been your friend...." + +There was appeal in the soft voice, but I laughed mockingly, and threw +myself back upon the divan. Karamaneh stretched out her hands toward +me, and I shall never forget the expression which flashed into those +glorious eyes; but, seeing me intolerant of her appeal, she drew back +and quickly turned her head aside. Even in this hour of extremity, of +impotent wrath, I could find no contempt in my heart for her feeble +hypocrisy; with all the old wonder I watched that exquisite profile, +and Karamaneh's very deceitfulness was a salve--for had she not cared +she would not have attempted it! + +Suddenly she stood up, taking the keys in her hands, and approached +me. + +"Not by word, nor by look," she said quietly, "have you asked for my +friendship, but because I cannot bear you to think of me as you do, I +will prove that I am not the hypocrite and the liar you think me. You +will not trust me, but I will trust you." + +I looked up into her eyes, and knew a pagan joy when they faltered +before my searching gaze. She threw herself upon her knees beside me, +and the faint exquisite perfume inseparable from my memories of her, +became perceptible, and seemed as of old to Intoxicate me. The lock +clicked ... and I was free. + +Karamaneh rose swiftly to her feet as I stood up and outstretched my +cramped arms. For one delirious moment her bewitching face was close +to mine, and the dictates of madness almost ruled; but I clenched my +teeth and turned sharply aside. I could not trust myself to speak. + +With Fu-Manchu's marmoset again gambolling before us, we walked +through the curtained doorway into the room beyond. It was in +darkness, but I could see the slave-girl in front of me, a slim +silhouette, as she walked to a screened window, and, opening the +screen in the manner of a folding door, also threw up the window. + +"Look!" she whispered. + +I crept forward and stood beside her. I found myself looking down into +the Museum Street from a first-floor window! Belated traffic still +passed along New Oxford Street on the left, but not a solitary figure +was visible to the right, as far as I could see, and that was nearly +to the railings of the Museum. Immediately opposite, in one of the +flats which I had noticed earlier in the evening, another window was +opened. I turned, and in the reflected light saw that Karamaneh held a +cord in her hand. Our glances met in the semi-darkness. + +She began to haul the cord into the window, and, looking upward, I +perceived that it was looped in some way over the telegraph cables +which crossed the street at that point. It was a slender cord, and it +appeared to be passed across a joint in the cables almost immediately +above the centre of the roadway. As it was hauled in, a second and +stronger line attached to it was pulled, in turn, over the cables, and +thence in by the window. Karamaneh twisted a length of it around a +metal bracket fastened in the wall, and placed a light wooden crossbar +in my hand. + +"Make sure that there is no one in the street," she said, craning out +and looking to right and left, "then _swing across_. The length of the +rope is just sufficient to enable you to swing through the open window +opposite, and there is a mattress inside to drop upon. But release the +bar immediately, or you may be dragged back. The door of the room in +which you will find yourself is unlocked, and you have only to walk +down the stairs and out into the street." + +I peered at the crossbar in my hand, then looked hard at the girl +beside me. I missed something of the old fire of her nature; she was +very subdued, to-night. + +"Thank you, Karamaneh," I said softly. + +She suppressed a little cry as I spoke her name, and drew back into +the shadows. + +"I believe you are my friend," I said, "but I cannot understand. Won't +you help me to understand?" + +I took her unresisting hand, and drew her toward me. My very soul +seemed to thrill at the contact of her lithe body.... + +She was trembling wildly and seemed to be trying to speak, but +although her lips framed the words no sound followed. Suddenly +comprehension came to me. I looked down into the street, hitherto +deserted ... and into the upturned face of Fu-Manchu! + +Wearing a heavy fur-collared coat, and with his yellow, malignant +countenance grotesquely horrible beneath the shadow of a large tweed +motor cap, he stood motionless, looking up at me. That he had seen me, +I could not doubt; but had he seen my companion? + +In a choking whisper Karamaneh answered my unspoken question. + +"He has not seen me! I have done much for you; do in return a small +thing for me! Save my life!" + +She dragged me back from the window and fled across the room to the +weird laboratory where I had lain captive. Throwing herself upon the +divan, she held out her white wrists and glanced significantly at the +manacles. + +"Lock them upon me!" she said rapidly. "Quick! quick!" + +Great as was my mental disturbance, I managed to grasp the purpose of +this device. The very extremity of my danger found me cool. I fastened +the manacles, which so recently had confined my own wrists, upon the +slim wrists of Karamaneh. A faint and muffled disturbance, doubly +ominous because there was nothing to proclaim its nature, reached me +from some place below, on the ground floor. + +"Tie something around my mouth!" directed Karamaneh with nervous +rapidity. As I began to look about me: "Tear a strip from my dress," +she said; "do not hesitate--be quick! be quick!" + +I seized the flimsy muslin and tore off half a yard or so from the hem +of the skirt. The voice of Dr. Fu-Manchu became audible. He was +speaking rapidly, sibilantly, and evidently was approaching--would be +upon me in a matter of moments. I fastened the strip of fabric over +the girl's mouth and tied it behind, experiencing a pang half +pleasurable and half fearful as I found my hands in contact with the +foamy luxuriance of her hair. + +Dr. Fu-Manchu was entering the room immediately beyond. + +Snatching up the bunch of keys, I turned and ran, for in another +instant my retreat would be cut off. As I burst once more into the +darkened room I became aware that a door on the farther side of it was +open; and framed in the opening was the tall high-shouldered figure of +the Chinaman, still enveloped in his fur coat and wearing the +grotesque cap. As I saw him, so he perceived me; and as I sprang to +the window, he advanced. + +I turned desperately and hurled the bunch of keys with all my force +into the dimly seen face.... + +Either because they possessed a chatoyant quality of their own (as I +had often suspected), or by reason of the light reflected through the +open window, the green eyes gleamed upon me vividly like those of a +giant cat. One short guttural exclamation paid tribute to the accuracy +of my aim; then I had the crossbar in my hand. + +I threw one leg across the sill, and dire as was my extremity, +hesitated for an instant ere trusting myself to the flight.... + +A vice-like grip fastened upon my left ankle. + +Hazily I became aware that the dark room was become flooded with +figures. The whole yellow gang were upon me--the entire murder-group +composed of units recruited from the darkest places of the East! + +I have never counted myself a man of resource, and have always envied +Nayland Smith his possession of that quality, in him extraordinarily +developed; but on this occasion the gods were kind to me, and I +resorted to the only device, perhaps, which could have saved me. +Without releasing my hold upon the crossbar, I clutched at the ledge +with the fingers of both hands and swung back, into the room, my +right leg, which was already across the sill. With all my strength I +kicked out. My heel came in contact, in sickening contact, with a +human head; beyond doubt I had split the skull of the man who held me. + +The grip upon my ankle was released automatically; and now consigning +all my weight to the rope, I slipped forward, as a diver, across the +broad ledge and found myself sweeping through the night like a winged +thing.... + +The line, as Karamaneh had assured me, was of well-judged length. Down +I swept to within six or seven feet of the street level, then up, up, +at ever-decreasing speed, toward the vague oblong of the open window +beyond. + +I hope I have been successful, in some measure, in portraying the +varied emotions which it was my lot to experience that night, and it +may well seem that nothing more exquisite could remain for me. Yet it +was written otherwise; for as I swept up to my goal, describing the +inevitable arc which I had no power to check, I saw that _one_ awaited +me. + +Crouching forward half out of the open window was a Burmese dacoit, a +cross-eyed, leering being whom I well remembered to have encountered +two years before in my dealings with Dr. Fu-Manchu. One bare, sinewy +arm held rigidly at right angles before his breast, he clutched a long +curved knife and waited--waited--for the critical moment when my +throat should be at his mercy! + +I have said that a strange coolness had come to my aid; even now it +did not fail me, and so incalculably rapid are the workings of the +human mind that I remembered complimenting myself upon an achievement +which Smith himself could not have bettered, and this in the +immeasurable interval which intervened between the commencement of my +upward swing and my arrival on a level with the window. + +I threw my body back and thrust my feet forward. As my legs went +through the opening, an acute pain in one calf told me that I was not +to escape scathless from the night's melee. But the dacoit went +rolling over in the darkness of the room, as helpless in face of that +ramrod stroke as the veriest infant.... + +Back I swept upon my trapeze, a sight to have induced any passing +citizen to question his sanity. With might and main I sought to check +the swing of the pendulum, for if I should come within reach of the +window behind I doubted not that other knives awaited me. It was no +difficult feat, and I succeeded in checking my flight. Swinging there +above Museum Street I could even appreciate, so lucid was my mind, the +ludicrous element of the situation. + +I dropped. My wounded leg almost failed me; and greatly shaken, but +with no other serious damage, I picked myself up from the dust of the +roadway--to see the bar vanishing into the darkness above. It was a +mockery of Fate that the problem which Nayland Smith had set me to +solve should have been solved thus: for I could not doubt that by +means of the branch of a tall tree or some other suitable object +situated opposite to Smith's house in Rangoon, Karamaneh had made her +escape as to-night I had made mine. + +Apart from the acute pain in my calf I knew that the dacoit's knife +had bitten deeply by reason of the fact that a warm liquid was +trickling down into my boot. Like any drunkard I stood there in the +middle of the road looking up at the vacant window where the dacoit +had been, and up at the window above the shop of J. Salaman where I +knew Fu-Manchu to be. But for some reason the latter window had been +closed or almost closed, and as I stood there this reason became +apparent to me. + +The sound of running footsteps came from the direction of New Oxford +Street. I turned--to see two policemen bearing down upon me! + +This was a time for quick decisions and prompt action. I weighed all +the circumstances in the balance, and made the last vital choice of +the night; I turned and ran toward the British Museum as though the +worst of Fu-Manchu's creatures, and not my allies the police, were at +my heels! + +No one else was in sight, but, as I whirled into the Square, the red +lamp of a slowly retreating taxi became visible some hundred yards to +the left. My leg was paining me greatly, but the nature of the wound +did not interfere with my progress; therefore I continued my headlong +career, and ere the police had reached the end of Museum Street I had +my hand upon the door handle of the cab--for, the Fates being +persistently kind to me, the vehicle was for hire. + +"Dr. Cleeve's, Harley Street!" I shouted at the man. "Drive like hell! +It's an urgent case." + +I leapt into the cab. + +Within five seconds from the time that I slammed the door and dropped +back panting upon the cushions, we were speeding westward toward the +house of the famous pathologist, thereby throwing the police +hopelessly off the track. + +Faintly to my ears came the purr of a police whistle. The taxi-man +evidently did not hear the significant sound. Merciful Providence had +rung down the curtain; for to-night my role in the yellow drama was +finished. + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +CRAGMIRE TOWER + + +Less than two hours later, Inspector Weymouth and a party from New +Scotland Yard raided the house in Museum Street. They found the stock +of J. Salaman practically intact, and, in the strangely appointed +rooms above, every evidence of a hasty outgoing. But of the +instruments, drugs and other laboratory paraphernalia not one item +remained. I would gladly have given my income for a year, to have +gained possession of the books, alone; for beyond all shadow of doubt, +I knew them to contain formulae calculated to revolutionize the science +of medicine. + +Exhausted, physically and mentally, and with my mind a +whispering-gallery of conjectures (it were needless for me to mention +_whom_ respecting), I turned in, gratefully, having patched up the +slight wound in my calf. + +I seemed scarcely to have closed my eyes, when Nayland Smith was +shaking me into wakefulness. + +"You are probably tired out," he said; "but your crazy expedition of +last night entitles you to no sympathy. Read this. There is a train in +an hour. We will reserve a compartment and you can resume your +interrupted slumbers in a corner seat." + +As I struggled upright in bed, rubbing my eyes sleepily, Smith handed +me the _Daily Telegraph_, pointing to the following paragraph upon the +literary page: + +"Messrs. M---- announce that they will publish shortly the +long-delayed work of Kegan Van Roon, the celebrated American +traveller, Orientalist and psychic investigator, dealing with his +recent inquiries in China. It will be remembered that Mr. Van Roon +undertook to motor from Canton to Siberia last winter, but met with +unforeseen difficulties in the province of Ho-Nan. He fell into the +hands of a body of fanatics and was fortunate to escape with his life. +His book will deal in particular with his experiences in Ho-Nan, and +some sensational revelations regarding the awakening of that most +mysterious race, the Chinese, are promised. For reasons of his own he +has decided to remain in England until the completion of his book +(which will be published simultaneously in New York and London), and +has leased Cragmire Tower, Somersetshire, in which romantic and +historical residence he will collate his notes and prepare for the +world a work ear-marked as a classic even before it is published." + +I glanced up from the paper, to find Smith's eyes fixed upon me +inquiringly. + +"From what I have been able to learn," he said evenly, "we should +reach Saul, with decent luck, just before dusk." + +As he turned and quitted the room without another word, I realized, in +a flash, the purport of our mission; I understood my friend's ominous +calm, betokening suppressed excitement. + +Fortune was with us (or so it seemed); and whereas we had not hoped to +gain Saul before sunset, as a matter of fact the autumn afternoon was +in its most glorious phase as we left the little village with its +old-time hostelry behind us and set out in an easterly direction, with +the Bristol Channel far away on our left and a gently sloping upland +on our right. + +The crooked high-street practically constituted the entire hamlet of +Saul, and the inn, The Wagoners, was the last house in the street. +Now, as we followed the ribbon of moor-path to the top of the rise, we +could stand and look back upon the way we had come; and although we +had covered fully a mile of ground, it was possible to detect the +sunlight gleaming now and then upon the gilt lettering of the inn +sign as it swayed in the breeze. The day had been unpleasantly warm, +but relieved by this same sea breeze, which, although but slight, had +in it the tang of the broad Atlantic. Behind us, then, the footpath +sloped down to Saul, unpeopled by any living thing; east and +north-east swelled the monotony of the moor right out to the hazy +distance where the sky began and the sea remotely lay hidden; west +fell the gentle gradient from the top of the slope which we had +mounted, and here, as far as the eye could reach, the country had an +appearance suggestive of a huge and dried-up lake. This idea was borne +out by an odd blotchiness, for sometimes there would be half a mile or +more of seeming moorland, then a sharply defined change (or it seemed +sharply defined from that bird's-eye point of view). A vivid greenness +marked these changes, which merged into a dun coloured smudge and +again into the brilliant green; then the moor would begin once more. + +"That will be the Tor of Glastonbury, I suppose," said Smith, suddenly +peering through his field-glasses in an easterly direction; "and +yonder, unless I am greatly mistaken, is Cragmire Tower." + +Shading my eyes with my hand, I also looked ahead, and saw the place +for which we were bound; one of those round towers, more common in +Ireland, which some authorities have declared to be of Phoenician +origin. Ramshackle buildings clustered untidily about its base, and to +it a sort of tongue of that oddly venomous green which patched the +lowlands shot out and seemed almost to reach the tower-base. The land +for miles around was as flat as the palm of my hand, saving certain +hummocks, lesser tors, and irregular piles of boulders which dotted +its expanse. Hills and uplands there were in the hazy distance, +forming a sort of mighty inland bay which I doubted not in some past +age had been covered by the sea. Even in the brilliant sunlight the +place had something of a mournful aspect, looking like a great +dried-up pool into which the children of giants had carelessly cast +stones. + +We met no living soul upon the moor. With Cragmire Tower but a quarter +of a mile off, Smith paused again, and raising his powerful glasses +swept the visible landscape. + +"Not a sign, Petrie," he said softly; "yet...." + +Dropping the glasses back into their case, my companion began to tug +at his left ear. + +"Have we been over-confident?" he said, narrowing his eyes in +speculative fashion. "No less than three times I have had the idea +that something, or some one, has just dropped out of sight, _behind_ +us, as I focussed...." + +"What do you mean, Smith?" + +"Are we"--he glanced about him as though the vastness were peopled +with listening Chinamen--"_followed_?" + +Silently we looked into one another's eyes, each seeking for the dread +which neither had named. Then: + +"Come on, Petrie!" said Smith, grasping my arm: and at quick march we +were off again. + +Cragmire Tower stood upon a very slight eminence, and what had looked +like a green tongue, from the moorland slopes above, was in fact a +creek, flanked by lush land, which here found its way to the sea. The +house which we were come to visit consisted in a low, two-storey +building, joining the ancient tower on the east, with two smaller +out-buildings. There was a miniature kitchen-garden, and a few stunted +fruit trees in the north-west corner; the whole being surrounded by a +grey stone wall. + +The shadow of the tower fell sharply across the path, which ran up +almost alongside of it. We were both extremely warm by reason of our +long and rapid walk on that hot day, and this shade should have been +grateful to us. In short, I find it difficult to account for the +unwelcome chill which I experienced at the moment that I found myself +at the foot of the time-worn monument. I know that we both pulled up +sharply and looked at one another as though acted upon by some mutual +disturbance. + +But not a sound broke the stillness save the remote murmuring, until a +solitary sea-gull rose in the air and circled directly over the tower, +uttering its mournful and unmusical cry. Automatically to my mind +sprang the lines of the poem: + + Far from all brother-men, in the weird of the fen, + With God's creatures I bide, 'mid the birds that I ken; + Where the winds ever dree, where the hymn of the sea + Brings a message of peace from the ocean to me. + +Not a soul was visible about the premises; there was no sound of human +activity and no dog barked. Nayland Smith drew a long breath, glanced +back along the way we had come, then went on, following the wall, I +beside him, until we came to the gate. It was unfastened, and we +walked up the stone path through a wilderness of weeds. Four windows +of the house were visible, two on the ground floor and two above. +Those on the ground floor were heavily boarded up, those above, though +glazed, boasted neither blinds nor curtains. Cragmire Tower showed not +the slightest evidence of tenancy. + +We mounted three steps and stood before a tremendously massive oaken +door. An iron bell-pull, ancient and rusty, hung on the right of the +door, and Smith, giving me an odd glance, seized the ring and tugged +it. + +From somewhere within the building answered a mournful clangour, a +cracked and toneless jangle, which, seeming to echo through empty +apartments, sought and found an exit apparently by way of one of the +openings in the round tower; for it was from above our heads that the +noise came to us. + +It died away, that eerie ringing--that clanging so dismal that it +could chill my heart even then with the bright sunlight streaming +down out of the blue; it awoke no other response than the mournful cry +of the sea-gull circling over our heads. Silence fell. We looked at +one another, and we were both about to express a mutual doubt, when, +unheralded by any unfastening of bolts or bars, the door was opened, +and a huge mulatto, dressed in white, stood there regarding us. + +I started nervously, for the apparition was so unexpected, but Nayland +Smith, without evidence of surprise, thrust a card into the man's +hand. + +"Take my card to Mr. Van Roon, and say that I wish to see him on +important business," he directed authoritatively. + +The mulatto bowed and retired. His white figure seemed to be swallowed +up by the darkness within, for beyond the patch of uncarpeted floor +revealed by the peeping sunlight, was a barn-like place of densest +shadow. I was about to speak, but Smith laid his hand upon my arm +warningly, as, out from the shadows, the mulatto returned. He stood on +the right of the door and bowed again. + +"Be pleased to enter," he said, in his harsh, negro voice. "Mr. Van +Roon will see you." + +The gladness of the sun could no longer stir me; a chill and sense of +foreboding bore me company as beside Nayland Smith I entered Cragmire +Tower. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +THE MULATTO + + +The room in which Van Roon received us was roughly of the shape of an +old-fashioned key-hole; one end if it occupied the base of the tower, +upon which the remainder had evidently been built. In many respects it +was a singular room, but the feature which caused me the greatest +amazement was this--it had no windows! + +In the deep alcove formed by the tower sat Van Roon at a littered +table, upon which stood an oil reading-lamp, green-shaded, of the +"Victoria" pattern, to furnish the entire illumination of the +apartment. That book-shelves lined the rectangular portion of this +strange study I divined, although that end of the place was dark as a +catacomb. The walls were wood-panelled, and the ceiling was +oaken-beamed. A small book shelf and tumble-down cabinet stood upon +either side of the table, and the celebrated American author and +traveller lay propped up in a long split-cane chair. He wore smoke +glasses, and had a clean-shaven, olive face, with a profusion of +jet-black hair. He was garbed in a dirty red dressing-gown, and a +perfect fog of cigar smoke hung in the room. He did not rise to greet +us, but merely extended his right hand, between two fingers whereof he +held Smith's card. + +"You will excuse the seeming discourtesy of an invalid, gentlemen?" he +said; "but I am suffering from undue temerity in the interior of +China!" + +He waved his hand vaguely, and I saw that two rough deal chairs stood +near the table. Smith and I seated ourselves, and my friend, leaning +his elbow upon the table, looked fixedly at the face of the man whom +we were come from London to visit. Although comparatively unfamiliar +to the British public, the name of Van Roon was well known in American +literary circles; for he enjoyed in the United States a reputation +somewhat similar to that which had rendered the name of our mutual +friend, Sir Lionel Barton, a household word in England. It was Van +Roon who, following in the footsteps of Madame Blavatsky, had sought +out the haunts of the fabled mahatmas in the Himalayas, and Van Roon +who had essayed to explore the fever swamps of Yucatan in quest of the +secret of lost Atlantis; lastly, it was Van Roon, who, with an +overland car specially built for him by a celebrated American firm, +had undertaken the journey across China. + +I studied the olive face with curiosity. Its natural impassivity was +so greatly increased by the presence of the coloured spectacles that +my study was as profitless as if I had scrutinized the face of a +carven Buddha. The mulatto had withdrawn, and in an atmosphere of +gloom and tobacco smoke Smith and I sat staring, perhaps rather +rudely, at the object of our visit to the West Country. + +"Mr. Van Roon," began my friend abruptly, "you will no doubt have seen +this paragraph. It appeared in this morning's _Daily Telegraph_." + +He stood up, and taking out the cutting from his notebook, placed it +on the table. + +"I have seen this--yes," said Van Roon, revealing a row of even white +teeth in a rapid smile. "Is it to this paragraph that I owe the +pleasure of seeing you here?" + +"The paragraph appeared in this morning's issue," replied Smith. "An +hour from the time of seeing it, my friend, Dr. Petrie, and I were +entrained for Bridgwater." + +"Your visit delights me, gentlemen, and I should be ungrateful to +question its cause; but frankly I am at a loss to understand why you +should have honoured me thus. I am a poor host, God knows; for what +with my tortured limb, a legacy from the Chinese devils whose secrets +I surprised, and my semi-blindness, due to the same cause, I am but +sorry company." + +Nayland Smith held up his right hand deprecatingly. Van Roon tendered +a box of cigars and clapped his hands, whereupon the mulatto entered. + +"I see that you have a story to tell me, Mr. Smith," he said; +"therefore I suggest whisky-and-soda--or you might prefer tea, as it +is nearly tea-time?" + +Smith and I chose the former refreshment, and the soft-footed +half-breed having departed upon his errand, my companion, leaning +forward earnestly across the littered table, outlined for Van Roon the +story of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the great and malign being whose mission in +England at that moment was none other than the stoppage of just such +information as our host was preparing to give to the world. + +"There is a giant conspiracy, Mr. Van Roon," he said, "which had its +birth in this very province of Ho-Nan, from which you were so +fortunate to escape alive; whatever its scope or limitations, a great +secret society is established among the yellow races. It means that +China, which has slumbered for so many generations, now stirs in that +age-long sleep. I need not tell _you_ how much more it means, this +seething in the pot...." + +"In a word," interrupted Van Roon, pushing Smith's glass across the +table, "you would say--" + +"That your life is not worth that!" replied Smith, snapping his +fingers before the other's face. + +A very impressive silence fell. I watched Van Roon curiously as he sat +propped up among his cushions, his smooth face ghastly in the green +light from the lamp-shade. He held the stump of a cigar between his +teeth, but, apparently unnoticed by him, it had long since gone out. +Smith, out of the shadows, was watching him, too. Then-- + +"Your information is very disturbing," said the American. "I am the +more disposed to credit your statement because I am all too painfully +aware of the existence of such a group as you mention, in China, but +that they had an agent here in England is something I had never +conjectured. In seeking out this solitary residence I have unwittingly +done much to assist their designs.... But--my dear Mr. Smith, I am +very remiss! Of course you will remain to-night, and I trust for some +days to come?" + +Smith glanced rapidly across at me, then turned again to our host. + +"It seems like forcing our company upon you," he said, "but in your +own interests I think it will be best to do as you are good enough to +suggest. I hope and believe that our arrival here has not been noticed +by the enemy; therefore it will be well if we remain concealed as much +as possible for the present, until we have settled upon some plan." + +"Hagar shall go to the station for your baggage," said the American +rapidly, and clapped his hands, his usual signal to the mulatto. + +Whilst the latter was receiving his orders I noticed Nayland Smith +watching him closely; and when he had departed: + +"How long has that man been in your service?" snapped my friend. + +Van Roon peered blindly through his smoked glasses. + +"For some years," he replied; "he was with me in India--and in China." + +"Where did you engage him?" + +"Actually, in St. Kitts." + +"H'm," muttered Smith, and automatically he took out and began to fill +his pipe. + +"I can offer you no company but my own, gentlemen," continued Van +Roon, "but unless it interfere, with your plans, you may find the +surrounding district of interest and worthy of inspection, between now +and dinner-time. By the way, I think I can promise you quite a +satisfactory meal, for Hagar is a model chef." + +"A walk would be enjoyable," said Smith, "but dangerous." + +"Ah! perhaps you are right. Evidently you apprehend some attempt upon +me?" + +"At any moment!" + +"To one in my crippled condition, an alarming outlook! However, I +place myself unreservedly in your hands. But really, you must not +leave this interesting district before you have made the acquaintance +of some of its historical spots. To me, steeped as I am in what I may +term the lore of the odd, it is a veritable wonderland, almost as +interesting, in its way, as the caves and jungles of Hindustan +depicted by Madame Blavatsky." + +His high-pitched voice, with a certain laboured intonation, not quite +so characteristically American as was his accent, rose even higher; he +spoke with the fire of the enthusiast. + +"When I learnt that Cragmire Tower was vacant," he continued, "I leapt +at the chance (excuse the metaphor, from a lame man!). This is a +ghost-hunter's paradise. The tower itself is of unknown origin, though +probably Phoenician, and the house traditionally sheltered Dr. +Macleod, the necromancer, after his flight from the persecution of +James of Scotland. Then, to add to its interest, it borders on +Sedgemoor, the scene of the bloody battle during the Monmouth rising, +whereat a thousand were slain on the field. It is a local legend that +the unhappy Duke and his staff may be seen, on stormy nights, crossing +the path which skirts the mire, after which this building is named, +with flaming torches held aloft." + +"Merely marsh-lights, I take it?" interjected Smith, gripping his pipe +hard between his teeth. + +"Your practical mind naturally seeks a practical explanation," smiled +Van Roon, "but I myself have other theories. Then in addition to the +charms of Sedgemoor--haunted Sedgemoor--on a fine day it is quite +possible to see the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey from here; and +Glastonbury Abbey, as you may know, is closely bound up with the +history of Alchemy. It was in the ruins of Glastonbury Abbey that the +adept Kelly, companion of Dr. Dee, discovered, in the reign of +Elizabeth, the famous caskets of St. Dunstan, containing the two +tinctures...." + +So he ran on, enumerating the odd charms of his residence, charms +which for my part I did not find appealing. Finally-- + +"We cannot presume further upon your kindness," said Nayland Smith, +standing up. "No doubt we can amuse ourselves in the neighbourhood of +the house until the return of your servant." + +"Look upon Cragmire Tower as your own, gentlemen!" cried Van Roon. +"Most of the rooms are unfurnished, and the garden is a wilderness, +but the structure of the brickwork in the tower may interest you +archaeologically, and the view across the moor is at least as fine as +any in the neighbourhood." + +So, with his brilliant smile and a gesture of one thin yellow hand, +the crippled traveller made us free of his odd dwelling. As I passed +out from the room close at Smith's heels, I glanced back, I cannot say +why. Van Roon already was bending over his papers, in his +green-shadowed sanctuary, and the light shining down upon his smoked +glasses created the odd illusion that he was looking over the tops of +the lenses and not down at the table as his attitude suggested. +However, it was probably ascribable to the weird chiaroscuro of the +scene, although it gave the seated figure an oddly malignant +appearance, and I passed through the utter darkness of the outer room +to the front door. Smith opening it, I was conscious of surprise to +find dusk come--to meet darkness where I had looked for sunlight. + +The silver wisps which had raced along the horizon, as we came to +Cragmire Tower, had been harbingers of other and heavier banks. A +stormy sunset smeared crimson streaks across the skyline, where a +great range of clouds, like the oily smoke of a city burning, was +banked, mountain topping mountain, and lighted from below by this +angry red. As we came down the steps and out by the gate, I turned and +looked across the moor behind us. A sort of reflection from this +distant blaze encrimsoned the whole landscape. The inland bay glowed +sullenly, as if internal fires and not reflected light were at work; +a scene both wild and majestic. + +Nayland Smith was staring up at the cone-like top of the ancient tower +in a curious, speculative fashion. Under the influence of our host's +conversation I had forgotten the reasonless dread which had touched me +at the moment of our arrival, but now, with the red light blazing over +Sedgemoor, as if in memory of the blood which had been shed there, and +with the tower of unknown origin looming above me, I became very +uncomfortable again, nor did I envy Van Roon his eerie residence. The +proximity of a tower of any kind, at night, makes in some inexplicable +way for awe, and to-night there were other agents, too. + +"What's that?" snapped Smith suddenly, grasping my arm. + +He was peering southward, toward the distant hamlet, and, starting +violently at his words and the sudden grasp of his hand, I, too, +stared in that direction. + +"We were followed, Petrie," he almost whispered. "I never got a sight +of our follower, but I'll swear we were followed. Look! there's +something moving over yonder!" + +Together we stood staring into the dusk; then Smith burst abruptly +into one of his rare laughs, and clapped me upon the shoulder. + +"It's Hagar, the mulatto!" he cried, "and our grips. That +extraordinary American with his tales of witch-lights and haunted +abbeys has been playing the devil with our nerves." He glanced up at +the tower. "What a place to live in! Frankly, I don't think I could +stand it." + +Together we waited by the gate until the half-caste appeared on the +bend of the path with a grip in either hand. He was a great, muscular +fellow with a stoic face, and, for the purpose of visiting Saul, +presumably, he had doffed his white raiment and now wore a sort of +livery, with a peaked cap. + +Smith watched him enter the house. Then-- + +"I wonder where Van Roon obtains his provisions and so forth," he +muttered. "It's odd they knew nothing about the new tenant of Cragmire +Tower at 'The Wagoners.'" + +There came a sort of sudden expectancy into his manner for which I +found myself at a loss to account. He turned his gaze inland and stood +there tugging at his left ear and clicking his teeth together. He +stared at me, and his eyes looked very bright in the dusk, for a sort +of red glow from the sunset touched them; but he spoke no word, merely +taking my arm and leading me off on a rambling walk around and about +the house. Neither of us spoke a word until we stood at the gate of +Cragmire Tower again; then-- + +"I'll swear, now, that we were followed here to-day!" muttered Smith. + +The lofty place immediately within the doorway proved, in the light of +a lamp now fixed in an iron bracket, to be a square entrance hall +meagrely furnished. The closed study door faced the entrance, and on +the left of it ascended an open staircase up which the mulatto led the +way. We found ourselves on the floor above, in a corridor traversing +the house from back to front. An apartment on the immediate left was +indicated by the mulatto as that allotted to Smith. It was a room of +fair size, furnished quite simply but boasting a wardrobe cupboard, +and Smith's grip stood beside the white-enamelled bed. I glanced +around, and then prepared to follow the man, who had awaited me in the +doorway. + +He still wore his dark livery, and as I followed the lithe yet brawny +figure along the corridor, I found myself considering critically his +breadth of shoulder and the extraordinary thickness of his neck. + +I have repeatedly spoken of a sort of foreboding, an elusive stirring +in the depths of my being, of which I became conscious at certain +times in my dealings with Dr. Fu-Manchu and his murderous servants. +This sensation, or something akin to it, claimed me now, +unaccountably, as I stood looking into the neat bedroom, on the same +side of the corridor but at the extreme end, wherein I was to sleep. A +voiceless warning urged me to return; a kind of childish panic came +fluttering about my heart, a dread of entering the room, of allowing +the mulatto to come _behind me_. + +Doubtless this was no more than a subconscious product of my +observations respecting his abnormal breadth of shoulder. But whatever +the origin of the impulse, I found myself unable to disobey it. +Therefore, I merely nodded, turned on my heel and went back to Smith's +room. + +I closed the door, then turned to face Smith, who stood regarding me. + +"Smith," I said, "that man sends cold water trickling down my spine!" + +Still regarding me fixedly, my friend nodded his head. + +"You are curiously sensitive to this sort of thing," he replied +slowly; "I have noticed it before as a useful capacity. I don't like +the look of the man myself. The fact that he has been in Van Roon's +employ for some years goes for nothing. We are neither of us likely to +forget Kwee, the Chinese servant of Sir Lionel Barton, and it is quite +possible that Fu-Manchu has corrupted this man as he corrupted the +other. It is quite possible...." + +His voice trailed off into silence, and he stood looking across the +room with unseeing eyes, meditating deeply. It was quite dark, now, +outside, as I could see through the uncurtained window, which opened +upon the dreary expanse stretching out to haunted Sedgemoor. Two +candles were burning upon the dressing-table; they were but recently +lighted, and so intense was the stillness that I could distinctly hear +the spluttering of one of the wicks, which was damp. Without giving +the slightest warning of his intention, Smith suddenly made two +strides forward, stretched out his long arms, and snuffed the pair of +candles in a twinkling! + +The room became plunged in impenetrable darkness. + +"Not a word, Petrie!" whispered my companion. + +I moved cautiously to join him, but as I did so, perceived that he was +moving, too. Vaguely, against the window I perceived him silhouetted. +He was looking out across the moor, and-- + +"See! see!" he hissed. + +My heart thumping furiously in my breast, I bent over him; and for the +second time since our coming to Cragmire Tower, my thoughts flew to +"The Fenman." + + There are shades in the fen; ghosts of women and men + Who have sinned and have died, but are living again. + O'er the waters they tread, with their lanterns of dread, + And they peer in the pools--in the pools of the dead.... + +A light was dancing out upon the moor, a witch-light that came and +went unaccountably, up and down, in and out, now clearly visible, now +masked in the darkness! + +"Lock the door!" snapped my companion--"if there's a key." + +I crept across the room and fumbled for a moment; then-- + +"There is no key," I reported. + +"Then wedge the chair under the knob and let no one enter until I +return!" he said amazingly. + +With that he opened the window to its fullest extent, threw his leg +over the sill, and went creeping along a wide concrete ledge, in which +ran a leaded gutter, in the direction of the tower on the right! + +Not pausing to follow his instructions respecting the chair, I craned +out of the window, watching his progress, and wondering with what +sudden madness he was bitten. Indeed, I could not credit my senses, +could not believe that I heard and saw aright. Yet there out in the +darkness on the moor moved the will-o'-the-wisp, and ten yards along +the gutter crept my friend, like a great gaunt cat. Unknown to me he +must have prospected the route by daylight, for now I saw his design. +The ledge terminated only where it met the ancient wall of the tower, +and it was possible for an agile climber to step from it to the edge +of the unglazed window some four feet below, and to scramble from that +point to the stone fence and thence on to the path by which we had +come from Saul. + +This difficult operation Nayland Smith successfully performed, and, to +my unbounded amazement, went racing into the darkness toward the +dancing light, headlong, like a madman! The night swallowed him up, +and between my wonder and my fear my hands trembled so violently that +I could scarce support myself where I rested, with my full weight upon +the sill. + +I seemed now to be moving through the fevered phases of a nightmare. +Around and below me Cragmire Tower was profoundly silent, but a faint +odour of cookery was now perceptible. Outside, from the night, came a +faint whispering as of the distant sea, but no moon and no stars +relieved the impenetrable blackness. Only out over the moor the +mysterious light still danced and moved. + +One--two--three--four--five minutes passed. The light vanished and did +not appear again. Five more age-long minutes elapsed in absolute +silence, whilst I peered into the darkness of the night and listened, +muscles tensed, for the return of Nayland Smith. Yet two more minutes, +which embraced an agony of suspense, passed in the same fashion; then +a shadowy form grew, phantomesque, out of the gloom; a moment more, +and I distinctly heard the heavy breathing of a man nearly spent, and +saw my friend scrambling up toward the black embrasure in the tower. +His voice came huskily, pantingly: + +"Creep along and lend me a hand, Petrie! I am nearly winded." + +I crept through the window, steadied my quivering nerves by an effort +of the will, and reached the end of the ledge in time to take Smith's +extended hand and to draw him up beside me against the wall of the +tower. He was shaking with his exertions, and must have fallen, I +think, without my assistance. Inside the room again-- + +"Quick! light the candles!" he breathed hoarsely. "Did any one come?" + +"No one--nothing." + +Having expended several matches in vain, for my fingers twitched +nervously, I ultimately succeeded in relighting the candles. + +"Get along to your room!" directed Smith. "Your apprehensions are +unfounded at the moment, but you may as well leave both doors wide +open!" + +I looked into his face--it was very drawn and grim, and his brow was +wet with perspiration, but his eyes had the fighting glint, and I knew +that we were upon the eve of strange happenings. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +A CRY ON THE MOOR + + +Of the events intervening between this moment and that when death +called to us out of the night, I have the haziest recollections. An +excellent dinner was served in the bleak and gloomy dining-room by +the mulatto, and the crippled author was carried to the head of the +table by this same herculean attendant, as lightly as though he had +had but the weight of a child. + +Van Roon talked continuously, revealing a deep knowledge of all sorts +of obscure matters; and in the brief intervals, Nayland Smith talked +also, with almost feverish rapidity. Plans for the future were +discussed. I can recall no one of them. + +I could not stifle my queer sentiments in regard to the mulatto, and +every time I found him behind my chair I was hard put to it to repress +a shudder. In this fashion the strange evening passed; and to the +accompaniment of distant, muttering thunder, we two guests retired to +our chambers in Cragmire Tower. Smith had contrived to give me my +instructions in a whisper, and five minutes after entering my own +room, I had snuffed the candles, slipped a wedge, which he had given +me, under the door, crept out through the window on to the guttered +ledge, and joined Smith in his room. He, too, had extinguished his +candles, and the place was in darkness. As I climbed in, he grasped my +wrist to silence me, and turned me forcibly toward the window again. + +"Listen!" he said. + +I turned and looked out upon a prospect which had been a fit setting +for the witch scene in _Macbeth_. Thunderclouds hung low over the +moor, but through them ran a sort of chasm, or rift, allowing a bar of +lurid light to stretch across the drear, from east to west--a sort of +lane walled by darkness. There came a remote murmuring, as of a +troubled sea--a hushed and distant chorus; and sometimes in upon it +broke the drums of heaven. In the west lightning flickered, though but +faintly, intermittently. + +Then came the _call_. + +Out of the blackness of the moor it came, wild and distant--"_Help! +help!_" + +"Smith!" I whispered--"what is it? What...." + +"Mr. Smith!" came the agonized cry ... "Nayland Smith, help! for God's +sake...." + +"Quick, Smith!" I cried, "quick, man! It's Van Roon--he's been dragged +out ... they are murdering him...." + +Nayland Smith held me in a vice-like grip, silent, unmoved! + +Louder and more agonized came the cry for aid, and I felt more than +ever certain that it was poor Van Roon who uttered it. + +"Mr. Smith! Dr. Petrie! for God's sake come ... or ... it will be ... +too ... late...." + +"Smith!" I said, turning furiously upon my friend, "if you are going +to remain here whilst murder is done, _I_ am not!" + +My blood boiled now with hot resentment. It was incredible, inhuman, +that we should remain there inert whilst a fellow-man, and our host to +boot, was being done to death out there in the darkness. I exerted all +my strength to break away; but although my efforts told upon him, as +his loud breathing revealed, Nayland Smith clung to me tenaciously. +Had my hands been free, in my fury I could have struck him; for the +pitiable cries, growing fainter now, told their own tale. Then Smith +spoke--shortly and angrily--breathing hard between the words. + +"Be quiet, you fool!" he snapped. "It's little less than an insult, +Petrie, to think me capable of refusing help where help is needed!" + +Like, a cold douche his words acted; in that instant I knew myself a +fool. + +"You remember the Call of Siva?" he said, thrusting me away +irritably, "--two years ago--and what it meant to those who obeyed it?" + +"You might have told me...." + +"_Told_ you! You would have been through the window before I had +uttered two words!" + +I realized the truth of his assertion, and the justness of his anger. + +"Forgive me, old man," I said, very crestfallen, "but my impulse was a +natural one, you'll admit. You must remember that I have been trained +never to refuse aid when aid is asked." + +"Shut up, Petrie!" he growled; "forget it." + +The cries had ceased, now, entirely, and a peal of thunder, louder +than any yet, echoed over distant Sedgemoor. The chasm of light +splitting the heavens closed in, leaving the night wholly black. + +"Don't talk!" rapped Smith; "act! You wedged your door?" + +"Yes." + +"Good. Get into that cupboard, have your Browning ready, and keep the +door very slightly ajar." + +He was in that mood of repressed fever which I knew and which always +communicated itself to me. I spoke no further word, but stepped into +the wardrobe indicated and drew the door nearly shut. The recess just +accommodated me, and through the aperture I could see the bed, +vaguely, the open window, and part of the opposite wall. I saw Smith +cross the floor, as a mighty clap of thunder boomed over the house. + +A gleam of lightning flickered through the gloom. + +I saw the bed for a moment, distinctly, and it appeared to me that +Smith lay therein, with the sheets pulled up over his head. The light +was gone and I could hear big drops of rain pattering upon the leaden +gutter below the open window. + +My mood was strange, detached, and characterized by vagueness. That +Van Roon lay dead upon the moor I was convinced; and--although I +recognized that it must be a sufficient one--I could not even dimly +divine the reason why we had refrained from lending him aid. To have +failed to save him, knowing his peril, would have been bad enough; to +have _refused_, I thought, was shameful. Better to have shared his +fate--yet.... + +The downpour was increasing, and beating now a regular tattoo upon the +gutter-way. Then, splitting the oblong of greater blackness which +marked the casement, quivered dazzlingly another flash of lightning in +which I saw the bed again, with that impression of Smith curled up in +it. The blinding light died out; came the crash of thunder, harsh and +fearsome, more imminently above the tower than ever. The building +seemed to shake. + +Coming as they did, horror and the wrath of heaven together, suddenly, +crashingly, black and angry after the fairness of the day, these +happenings and their setting must have terrorized the stoutest heart; +but somehow I seemed detached, as I have said, and set apart from the +whirl of events; a spectator. Even when a vague yellow light crept +across the room from the direction of the door, and flickered +unsteadily on the bed, I remained unmoved to a certain degree, +although passively alive to the significance of the incident. I +realised that the ultimate issue was at hand, but either because I was +emotionally exhausted, or from some other cause, the pending climax +failed to disturb me. + +Going on tiptoe, in stockinged feet, across my field of vision, passed +Kegan Van Roon! He was in his shirt-sleeves and held a lighted candle +in one hand whilst with the other he shaded it against the draught +from the window. He was a cripple no longer, and the smoked glasses +were discarded; most of the light, at the moment when first I saw him, +shone upon his thin, olive face, and at sight of his eyes much of the +mystery of Cragmire Tower was resolved. For they were oblique, very +slightly, but nevertheless unmistakably oblique. Though highly +educated, and possibly an American citizen, _Van Roon was a Chinaman!_ + +Upon the picture of his face as I saw it then, I do not care to +dwell. It lacked the unique horror of Dr. Fu-Manchu's unforgettable +countenance, but possessed a sort of animal malignancy which the +latter lacked.... He approached within three or four feet of the bed, +peering--peering. Then, with a timidity which spoke well for Nayland +Smith's reputation, he paused and beckoned to some one who evidently +stood in the doorway behind him. As he did so I saw that the legs of +his trousers were caked with greenish-brown mud nearly up to the +knees. + +The huge mulatto, silent-footed, crossed to the bed in three strides. +He was stripped to the waist, and excepting some few professional +athletes, I had never seen a torso to compare with that which, brown +and glistening, now bent over Nayland Smith. The muscular development +was simply enormous; the man had a neck like a column, and the thews +around his back and shoulders were like ivy tentacles wreathing some +gnarled oak. + +Whilst Van Roon, his evil gaze upon the bed, held the candle aloft, +the mulatto, with a curious preparatory writhing movement of the +mighty shoulders, lowered his outstretched fingers to the disordered +bed linen.... + +I pushed open the cupboard door and thrust out the Browning. As I did +so a dramatic thing happened. A tall, gaunt figure shot suddenly +upright from _beyond_ the bed. It was Nayland Smith! + +Upraised in his hand he held a heavy walking cane. I knew the handle +to be leaded, and I could judge of the force with which he wielded it +by the fact that it cut the air with a keen _swishing_ sound. It +descended upon the back of the mulatto's skull with a sickening thud, +and the great brown body dropped inert upon the padded bed--in which +not Smith, but his grip, reposed. There was no word, no cry. Then-- + +"Shoot, Petrie! Shoot the fiend! _Shoot_!..." + +Van Roon, dropping the candle, in the falling gleam of which I saw +the whites of the oblique eyes, turned and leapt from the room with +the agility of a wild cat. The ensuing darkness was split by a streak +of lightning ... and there was Nayland Smith scrambling around the +foot of the bed and making for the door in hot pursuit. + +We gained it almost together. Smith had dropped the cane, and now held +his pistol in his hand. Together we fired into the chasm of the +corridor, and in the flash, saw Van Roon hurling himself down the +stairs. He went silently in his stockinged feet, and our own clatter +was drowned by the awful booming of the thunder which now burst over +us again. + +Crack!--crack!--crack! Three times our pistols spat venomously after +the flying figure ... then we had crossed the hall below and were in +the wilderness of the night with the rain descending upon us in +sheets. Vaguely I saw the white shirt-sleeves of the fugitive near the +corner of the stone fence. A moment he hesitated, then darted away +inland, not toward Saul, but toward the moor and the cup of the inland +bay. + +"Steady, Petrie! steady!" cried Nayland Smith. He ran, panting, beside +me. "It is the path to the mire." He breathed sibilantly between every +few words. "It was out there ... that he hoped to lure us ... with the +cry for help." + +A great blaze of lightning illuminated the landscape as far as the eye +could see. Ahead of us a flying shape, hair lank and glistening in the +downpour, followed a faint path skirting that green tongue of morass +which we had noted from the upland. + +It was Kegan Van Roon. He glanced over his shoulder, showing a yellow, +terror-stricken face. We were gaining upon him. Darkness fell, and the +thunder cracked and boomed as though the very moor were splitting +about us. + +"Another fifty yards, Petrie," breathed Nayland Smith, "and after that +it's uncharted ground." + +On we went through the rain and the darkness; then-- + +"Slow up! slow up!" cried Smith. "It feels soft!" + +Indeed, already I had made one false step--and the hungry mire had +fastened upon my foot, almost tripping me. + +"Lost the path!" + +We stopped dead. The falling rain walled us in. I dared not move, for +I knew that the mire, the devouring mire, stretched, eager, close +about my feet. We were both waiting for the next flash of lightning, I +think, but, before it came, out of the darkness ahead of us rose a cry +that sometimes rings in my ears to this hour. Yet it was no more than +a repetition of that which had called to us, deathfully, awhile +before. + +"Help! help! for God's sake help! Quick! I am sinking...." + +Nayland Smith grasped my arm furiously. + +"We dare not move, Petrie--we dare not move!" he breathed. "It's God's +justice--visible for once." + +Then came the lightning; and--ignoring a splitting crash behind us--we +both looked ahead, over the mire. + +Just on the edge of the venomous green patch, not thirty yards away, I +saw the head and shoulders and upstretched, appealing arms of Van +Roon. Even as the lightning flickered and we saw him, he was gone; +with one last, long, drawn-out cry, horribly like the mournful wail of +a sea-gull, he was gone! + +The eerie light died, and in the instant before the sound of the +thunder came shatteringly, we turned about ... in time to see Cragmire +Tower, a blacker silhouette against the night, topple and fall! A red +glow began to be perceptible above the building. The thunder came +booming through the caverns of space. Nayland Smith lowered his wet +face close to mine and shouted in my ear: + +"Kegan Van Roon never returned from China. It was a trap. Those were +two creatures of Dr. Fu-Manchu...." + +The thunder died away, hollowly, echoing over the distant sea.... + +"That light on the moor to-night?" + +"You have not learnt the Morse Code, Petrie. It was a signal, and it +read: S M I T H ... S O S." + +"Well?" + +"I took the chance, as you know. And it was Karamaneh! She knew of the +plot to bury us in the mire. She had followed from London, but could +do nothing until dusk. God forgive me if I've mis-judged her--for we +owe her our lives to-night." + +Flames were bursting up from the building beside the ruin of the +ancient tower which had faced the storms of countless ages only to +succumb at last. The lightning literally had cloven it in twain. + +"The mulatto?..." + +Again the lightning flashed, and we saw the path and began to retrace +our steps. Nayland Smith turned to me; his face was very grim in that +unearthly light, and his eyes shone like steel. + +"I killed him, Petrie ... as I meant to do." + +From out over Sedgemoor it came, cracking and rolling and booming +towards us, swelling in volume to a stupendous climax, that awful +laughter of Jove the destroyer of Cragmire Tower. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +STORY OF THE GABLES + + +In looking over my notes dealing with the second phase of Dr. +Fu-Manchu's activities in England, I find that one of the worst hours +of my life was associated with the singular and seemingly inconsequent +adventure of the fiery hand. I shall deal with it in this place, +begging you to bear with me if I seem to digress. + +Inspector Weymouth called one morning, shortly after the Van Roon +episode, and entered upon a surprising account of a visit to a house +at Hampstead which enjoyed the sinister reputation of being +uninhabitable. + +"But in what way does the case enter into your province?" inquired +Nayland Smith, idly tapping out his pipe on a bar of the grate. + +We had not long finished breakfast, but from an early hour Smith had +been at his eternal smoking, which only the advent of the meal had +interrupted. + +"Well," replied the Inspector, who occupied a big armchair near the +window, "I was sent to look into it, I suppose, because I had nothing +better to do at the moment." + +"Ah!" jerked Smith, glancing over his shoulder. + +The ejaculation had a veiled significance; for our quest of Dr. +Fu-Manchu had come to an abrupt termination by reason of the fact that +all trace of that malignant genius, and of the group surrounding him, +had vanished with the destruction of Cragmire Tower. + +"The house is called The Gables," continued the Scotland Yard man, +"and I knew I was on a wild-goose chase from the first--" + +"Why?" snapped Smith. + +"Because I was there before, six months ago or so--just before your +present return to England--and I knew what to expect." + +Smith looked up with some faint dawning of interest perceptible in his +manner. + +"I was unaware," he said with a slight smile, "that the cleaning-up of +haunted houses came within the province of New Scotland Yard. I am +learning something." + +"In the ordinary way," replied the big man good-humouredly, "it +doesn't. But a sudden death always excites suspicion, and--" + +"A sudden death?" I said, glancing up; "you didn't explain that the +ghost had killed any one!" + +"I'm afraid I'm a poor hand at yarn-spinning, doctor," said Weymouth, +turning his blue, twinkling eyes in my direction. "Two people have +died at The Gables within the last six months." + +"You begin to interest me," declared Smith, and there came something +of the old, eager look into his gaunt face, as, having lighted his +pipe, he tossed the match-end into the hearth. + +"I had hoped for some little excitement, myself," confessed the +Inspector. "This dead-end, with not a shadow of a clue to the +whereabouts of the Yellow fiend, has been getting on my nerves--" + +Nayland Smith grunted sympathetically. + +"Although Dr. Fu-Manchu had been in England for some months, now," +continued Weymouth, "I have never set eyes upon him; the house we +raided in Museum Street proved to be empty; in a word, I am wasting my +time. So that I volunteered to run up to Hampstead and look into the +matter of The Gables, principally as a distraction. It's a queer +business, but more in the Psychical Research Society's line than mine, +I'm afraid. Still, if there were no Dr. Fu-Manchu it might be of +interest to you--and to you, Dr. Petrie--because it illustrates the +fact that, given the right sort of subject, death can be brought +about without any elaborate mechanism--such as our Chinese friends +employ." + +"You interest me more and more," declared Smith, stretching himself in +the long, white cane rest-chair. + +"Two men, both fairly sound, except that the first one had an +asthmatic heart, have died at The Gables without any one laying a +little finger upon them. Oh! there was no jugglery! They weren't +poisoned, or bitten by venomous insects, or suffocated, or anything +like that. They just died of fear--stark fear." + +With my elbows resting upon the table cover, and my chin in my hands, +I was listening attentively, now, and Nayland Smith, a big cushion +behind his head, was watching the speaker with a keen and speculative +look in those steely eyes of his. + +"You imply that Dr. Fu-Manchu has something to learn from The Gables?" +he jerked. + +Weymouth nodded stolidly. + +"I can't work up anything like amazement in these days," continued the +latter; "every other case seems stale and hackneyed alongside _the_ +case. But I must confess that when The Gables came on the books of the +Yard the second time, I began to wonder. I thought there might be some +tangible clue, some link connecting the two victims; perhaps some +evidence of robbery or of revenge--of some sort of motive. In short, I +hoped to find evidence of human agency at work, but, as before, I was +disappointed." + +"It's a legitimate case of a haunted house, then?" said Smith. + +"Yes; we find them occasionally, these uninhabitable places, where +there is _something_, something malignant and harmful to human life, +but something that you cannot arrest, that you cannot hope to bring +into court." + +"Ah," replied Smith slowly; "I suppose you are right. There are +historic instances, of course: Glamys Castle and Spedlins Tower in +Scotland, Peel Castle, Isle of Man, with its _Maudhe Dhug_, the grey +lady of Rainham Hall, the headless horses of Caistor, the Wesley ghost +of Epworth Rectory and others. But I have never come in personal +contact with such a case, and if I did I should feel very humiliated +to have to confess that there was _any_ agency which could produce a +_physical_ result--death,--but which was immune from physical +retaliation." + +Weymouth nodded his head again. + +"_I_ might feel a bit sour about it, too," he replied, "if it were not +that I haven't much pride left in these days, considering the show of +physical retaliation I have made against Dr. Fu-Manchu." + +"A home-thrust, Weymouth!" snapped Nayland Smith, with one of those +rare boyish laughs of his. "We're children to that Chinese doctor, +Inspector, to that weird product of a weird people who are as old in +evil as the Pyramids are old in mystery. But about The Gables?" + +"Well, it's an uncanny place. You mentioned Glamys Castle a moment +ago, and it's possible to understand an old stronghold like that being +haunted, but The Gables was only built about 1870; it's quite a modern +house. It was built for a wealthy Quaker family, and they occupied it, +uninterruptedly and apparently without anything unusual occurring for +over forty years. Then it was sold to a Mr. Maddison--and Mr. Maddison +died there six months ago." + +"Maddison?" said Smith sharply, staring across at Weymouth. "What was +he? Where did he come from?" + +"He was a retired tea-planter from Colombo," replied the Inspector. + +"Colombo?" + +"There was a link with the East, certainly, if that's what you are +thinking; and it was this fact which interested me at the time, and +which led me to waste precious days and nights on the case. But there +was no mortal connection between this liverish individual and the +schemes of Dr. Fu-Manchu. I'm certain of that." + +"And how did he die?" I asked interestedly. + +"He just died in his chair one evening, in the room which he used as a +library. It was his custom to sit there every night, when there were +no visitors, reading, until twelve o'clock or later. He was a +bachelor, and his household consisted of a cook, a housemaid, and a +man who had been with him for thirty years, I believe. At the time of +Mr. Maddison's death, his household had recently been deprived of two +of its members. The cook and housemaid both resigned one morning, +giving as their reason the fact that the place was haunted." + +"In what way?" + +"I interviewed the precious pair at the time, and they told me absurd +and various tales about dark figures wandering along the corridors and +bending over them in bed at night, whispering; but their chief trouble +was a continuous ringing of bells about the house." + +"Bells?" + +"They said that it became unbearable. Night and day there were bells +ringing all over the house. At any rate, they went, and for three or +four days The Gables was occupied only by Mr. Maddison and his man, +whose name was Stevens. I interviewed the latter also, and he was an +altogether more reliable witness; a decent, steady sort of man whose +story impressed me very much at the time." + +"Did he confirm the ringing?" + +"He swore to it--a sort of jangle, sometimes up in the air, near the +ceilings, and sometimes under the floor, like the shaking of silver +bells." + +Nayland Smith stood up abruptly and began to pace the room, leaving +great trails of blue-grey smoke behind him. + +"Your story is sufficiently interesting, Inspector," he declared, +"even to divert my mind from the eternal contemplation of the +Fu-Manchu problem. This would appear to be distinctly a case of an +'astral bell' such as we sometimes hear of in India." + +"It was Stevens," continued Weymouth, "who found Mr. Maddison. He +(Stevens) had been out on business connected with the household +arrangements, and at about eleven o'clock he returned, letting himself +in with a key. There was a light in the library, and getting no +response to his knocking, Stevens entered. He found his master sitting +bolt upright in a chair, clutching the arms with rigid fingers and +staring straight before him with a look of such frightful horror on +his face, that Stevens positively ran from the room and out of the +house. Mr. Maddison was stone dead. When a doctor, who lives at no +great distance away, came and examined him, he could find no trace of +violence whatever; he had apparently died of fright, to judge from the +expression on his face." + +"Anything else?" + +"Only this: I learnt, indirectly, that the last member of the Quaker +family to occupy the house had apparently witnessed the apparition, +which had led to his vacating the place. I got the story from the wife +of a man who had been employed as gardener there at that time. The +apparition--which he witnessed in the hall-way, if I remember +rightly--took the form of a sort of luminous hand clutching a long, +curved knife." + +"Oh, heavens!" cried Smith, and laughed shortly; "that's quite in +order!" + +"This gentleman told no one of the occurrence until after he had left +the house, no doubt in order that the place should not acquire an evil +reputation. Most of the original furniture remained, and Mr. Maddison +took the house furnished. I don't think there can be any doubt that +what killed him was fear at seeing a repetition--" + +"Of the fiery hand?" concluded Smith. + +"Quite so. Well, I examined The Gables pretty closely, and, with +another Scotland Yard man, spent a night in the empty house. We saw +nothing; but once, very faintly, we heard the ringing of bells." + +Smith spun around upon him rapidly. + +"You can swear to that?" he snapped. + +"I can swear to it," declared Weymouth stolidly. "It seemed to be over +our heads. We were sitting in the dining-room. Then it was gone, and +we heard nothing more whatever of an unusual nature. Following the +death of Mr. Maddison, The Gables remained empty until a while ago, +when a French gentleman, named Lejay, leased it--" + +"Furnished?" + +"Yes; nothing was removed--" + +"Who kept the place in order?" + +"A married couple living in the neighbourhood undertook to do so. The +man attended to the lawn and so forth, and the woman came once a week, +I believe, to clean up the house." + +"And Lejay?" + +"He came in only last week, having leased the house for six months. +His family were to have joined him in a day or two, and he, with the +aid of the pair I have just mentioned, and assisted by a French +servant he brought over with him, was putting the place in order. At +about twelve o'clock on the Friday night this servant ran into a +neighbouring house screaming 'the fiery hand!' and when at last a +constable arrived and a frightened group went up the avenue of The +Gables, they found M. Lejay, dead in the avenue, near the steps just +outside the hall door! He had the same face of horror...." + +"What a tale for the Press!" snapped Smith. + +"The owner has managed to keep it quiet so far, but this time I think +it will leak into the Press--yes." + +There was a short silence; then-- + +"And you have been down to The Gables again?" + +"I was there on Saturday, but there's not a scrap of evidence. The man +undoubtedly died of fright in the same way as Maddison. The place +ought to be pulled down; it's unholy." + +"Unholy is the word," I said. "I never heard anything like it. This M. +Lejay had no enemies?--there could be no possible motive?" + +"None whatever. He was a business man from Marseilles, and his affairs +necessitated his remaining in or near to London for some considerable +time; therefore, he decided to make his headquarters here, +temporarily, and leased The Gables with that intention." + +Nayland Smith was pacing the floor with increasing rapidity; he was +tugging at the lobe of his left ear and his pipe had long since gone +out. + + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +THE BELLS + + +I started to my feet as a tall, bearded man swung open the door and +hurled himself impetuously into the room. He wore a silk hat, which +fitted him very ill, and a black frock-coat which did not fit him at +all. + +"It's all right, Petrie!" cried the apparition; "I've leased The +Gables!" + +It was Nayland Smith! I stared at him in amazement. + +"The first time I have employed a disguise," continued my friend +rapidly, "since the memorable episode of the false pigtail." He threw +a small brown leather grip upon the floor. "In case you should care to +visit the house, Petrie, I have brought these things. My tenancy +commences to-night!" + +Two days had elapsed, and I had entirely forgotten the strange story +of The Gables which Inspector Weymouth had related to us; evidently it +was otherwise with my friend, and utterly at a loss for an explanation +of his singular behaviour, I stooped mechanically and opened the grip. +It contained an odd assortment of garments, and amongst other things +several grey wigs and a pair of gold-rimmed spectacles. + +Kneeling there with this strange litter about me, I looked up +amazedly. Nayland Smith, the unsuitable silk hat set right upon the +back of his head, was pacing the room excitedly, his fuming pipe +protruding from the tangle of factitious beard. + +"You see, Petrie," he began again, rapidly, "I did not entirely trust +the agent. I've leased the house in the name of Professor Maxton...." + +"But, Smith," I cried, "what possible reason can there be for +disguise?" + +"There's every reason," he snapped. + +"Why should you interest yourself in The Gables?" + +"Does no explanation occur to you?" + +"None whatever; to me the whole thing smacks of stark lunacy." + +"Then you won't come?" + +"I've never stuck at anything, Smith," I replied, "however +undignified, when it has seemed that my presence could be of the +slightest use." + +As I rose to my feet, Smith stepped in front of me, and the steely +grey eyes shone out strangely from the altered face. He clapped his +hands upon my shoulders. + +"If I assure you that your presence is necessary to my safety," he +said, "that if you fail me I must seek another companion--will you +come?" + +Intuitively, I knew that he was keeping something back, and I was +conscious of some resentment, but, nevertheless, my reply was a +foregone conclusion, and--with the borrowed appearance of an extremely +untidy old man--I crept guiltily out of my house that evening and into +the cab which Smith had waiting. + +The Gables was a roomy and rambling place lying back a considerable +distance from the road. A semi-circular drive gave access to the door, +and so densely wooded was the ground, that for the most part the drive +was practically a tunnel--a verdant tunnel. A high brick wall +concealed the building from the point of view of any one on the +roadway, but either horn of the crescent drive terminated at a heavy, +wrought-iron gateway. + +Smith discharged the cab at the corner of the narrow and winding road +upon which The Gables fronted. It was walled in on both sides; on the +left the wall being broken by tradesmen's entrances to the houses +fronting upon another street, and on the right following, +uninterruptedly, the grounds of The Gables. As we came to the gate-- + +"Nothing now," said Smith, pointing into the darkness of the road +before us, "except a couple of studios, until one comes to the Heath." + +He inserted the key in the lock of the gate and swung it creakingly +open. I looked into the black arch of the avenue, thought of the haunted +residence that lay hidden somewhere beyond, of those who had died in +it--especially of the one who had died there under the trees ... and +found myself out of love with the business of the night. + +"Come on!" said Nayland Smith briskly, holding the gate open; "there +should be a fire in the library, and refreshments, if the charwoman +has followed instructions." + +I heard the great gate clang to behind us. Even had there been any +moon (and there was none) I doubted if more than a patch or two of +light could have penetrated there. The darkness was extraordinary. +Nothing broke it, and I think Smith must have found his way by the aid +of some sixth sense. At any rate, I saw nothing of the house until I +stood some five paces from the steps leading up to the porch. A light +was burning in the hall-way, but dimly and inhospitably; of the facade +of the building I could perceive little. + +When we entered the hall and the door was closed behind us, I began +wondering anew what purpose my friend hoped to serve by a vigil in +this haunted place. There was a light in the library, the door of +which was ajar, and on the large table were decanters, a siphon, and +some biscuits and sandwiches. A large grip stood upon the floor also. +For some reason which was a mystery to me, Smith had decided that we +must assume false names whilst under the roof of The Gables; and-- + +"Now, Pearce," he said, "a whisky-and-soda before we look around?" + +The proposal was welcome enough, for I felt strangely dispirited, and, +to tell the truth, in my strange disguise not a little ridiculous. + +All my nerves, no doubt, were highly strung, and my sense of hearing +unusually acute, for I went in momentary expectation of some uncanny +happening. I had not long to wait. As I raised the glass to my lips +and glanced across the table at my friend, I heard the first faint +sound heralding the coming of the bells. + +It did not seem to proceed from anywhere within the library, but from +some distant room, far away overhead. A musical sound it was, but +breaking in upon the silence of that ill-omened house, its music was +the music of terror. In a faint and very sweet cascade it rippled; a +ringing as of tiny silver bells. + +I set down my glass upon the table, and rising slowly from the chair +in which I had been seated, stared fixedly at my companion, who was +staring with equal fixity at me. I could see that I had not been +deluded; Nayland Smith had heard the ringing, too. + +"The ghosts waste no time!" he said softly. "This is not new to me; I +spent an hour here last night--and heard the same sound...." + +I glanced hastily around the room. It was furnished as a library, and +contained a considerable collection of works, principally novels. I +was unable to judge of the outlook, for the two lofty windows were +draped with heavy purple curtains which were drawn close. A +silk-shaded lamp swung from the centre of the ceiling, and immediately +over the table by which I stood. There was much shadow about the room; +and now I glanced apprehensively about me, but specially toward the +open door. + +In that breathless suspense of listening we stood awhile; then-- + +"There it is again!" whispered Smith tensely. + +The ringing of bells was repeated, and seemingly much nearer to us; in +fact it appeared to come from somewhere above, up near the ceiling of +the room in which we stood. Simultaneously we looked up, then Smith +laughed shortly. + +"Instinctive, I suppose," he snapped; "but what do we expect to see in +the air?" + +The musical sound now grew in volume; the first tiny peal seemed to be +reinforced by others and by others again, until the air around about +us was filled with the pealings of these invisible bell-ringers. + +Although, as I have said, the sound was rather musical than horrible, +it was, on the other hand, so utterly unaccountable as to touch the +supreme heights of the uncanny. I could not doubt that our presence +had attracted these unseen ringers to the room in which we stood, and +I knew quite well that I was growing pale. This was the room in which +at least one unhappy occupant of The Gables had died of fear. I +recognized the fact that if this mere overture were going to affect my +nerves to such an extent, I could not hope to survive the ordeal of +the night; a great effort was called for. I emptied my glass at a +draught, and stared across the table at Nayland Smith with a sort of +defiance. He was standing very upright and motionless, but his eyes +were turning right and left, searching every visible corner of the big +room. + +"Good!" he said in a very low voice. "The terrorizing power of the +Unknown is boundless, but we must not get in the grip of panic, or we +could not hope to remain in this house ten minutes." + +I nodded without speaking. Then Smith, to my amazement, suddenly began +to speak in a loud voice, a marked contrast to that, almost a whisper, +in which he had spoken formerly. + +"My dear Pearce," he cried, "do you hear the ringing of bells?" + +Clearly the latter words were spoken for the benefit of the unseen +intelligence controlling these manifestations; and although I regarded +such finesse as somewhat wasted, I followed my friend's lead and +replied in a voice as loud as his own: + +"Distinctly, Professor!" + +Silence followed my words, a silence in which both stood watchful and +listening. Then, very faintly, I seemed to detect the silvern ringing +receding away through distant rooms. Finally it became inaudible, and +in the stillness of The Gables I could distinctly hear my companion +breathing. For fully ten minutes we two remained thus, each +momentarily expecting a repetition of the ringing, or the coming of +some new and more sinister manifestation. But we heard nothing and saw +nothing. + +"Hand me that grip, and don't stir until I come back!" hissed Smith in +my ear. + +He turned and walked out of the library, his boots creaking very +loudly in that awe-inspiring silence. + +Standing beside the table, I watched the open door for his return, +crushing down a dread that _another_ form than his might suddenly +appear there. + +I could hear him moving from room to room, and presently, as I waited +in hushed, tense watchfulness, he came in, depositing the grip upon +the table. His eyes were gleaming feverishly. + +"The house is haunted, Pearce!" he cried. "But no ghost ever +frightened _me_! Come, I will show you your room." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI + +THE FIERY HAND + + +Smith walked ahead of me upstairs; he had snapped up the light in the +hall-way, and now he turned and cried back loudly: + +"I fear we should never get servants to stay here." + +Again I detected the appeal to a hidden Audience; and there was +something very uncanny in the idea. The house now was deathly still; +the ringing had entirely subsided. In the upper corridor my companion, +who seemed to be well acquainted with the position of the switches, +again turned up all the lights, and in pursuit of the strange comedy +which he saw fit to enact, addressed me continuously in the loud and +unnatural voice which he had adopted as part of his disguise. + +We looked into a number of rooms all well and comfortably furnished, +but although my imagination may have been responsible for the idea, +they all seemed to possess a chilly and repellent atmosphere. I felt +that to essay sleep in any one of them would be the merest farce, that +the place to all intents and purposes was uninhabitable, that +something incalculably evil presided over the house. + +And through it all, so obtuse was I that no glimmer of the truth +entered my mind. Outside again in the long, brightly lighted corridor, +we stood for a moment as if a mutual anticipation of some new event +pending had come to us. It was curious--that sudden pulling up and +silent questioning of one another; because, although we acted thus, no +sound had reached us. A few seconds later our anticipation was +realized. From the direction of the stairs it came--a low wailing in a +woman's voice; and the sweetness of the tones added to the terror of +the sound. I clutched at Smith's arm convulsively whilst that uncanny +cry rose and fell--rose and fell--and died away. + +Neither of us moved immediately. My mind was working with feverish +rapidity and seeking to run down a memory which the sound had stirred +into faint quickness. My heart was still leaping wildly when the +wailing began again, rising and falling in regular cadence. At that +instant I identified it. + +During the time Smith and I had spent together in Egypt, two years +before, searching for Karamaneh, I had found myself on one occasion in +the neighbourhood of a native cemetery near to Bedrasheen. Now, the +scene which I had witnessed there rose up again vividly before me, and +I seemed to see a little group of black-robed women clustered together +about a native grave; for the wailing which now was dying away again +in The Gables was the same, or almost the same, as the wailing of +those Egyptian mourners. + +The house was very silent, now. My forehead was damp with +perspiration, and I became more and more convinced that the uncanny +ordeal must prove too much for my nerves. Hitherto, I had accorded +little credence to tales of the supernatural, but face to face with +such manifestations as these, I realized that I would have faced +rather a group of armed dacoits, nay! Dr. Fu-Manchu himself, than have +remained another hour in that ill-omened house. + +My companion must have read as much in my face. But he kept up the +strange and, to me, purposeless comedy when presently he spoke. + +"I feel it to be incumbent upon me to suggest," he said, "that we +spend the night at an hotel after all." + +He walked rapidly downstairs and into the library and began to strap +up the grip. + +"Yet," he said, "there may be a natural explanation of what we've +heard; for it is noteworthy that we have actually _seen_ nothing. It +might even be possible to get used to the ringing and the wailing +after a time. Frankly, I am loath to go back on my bargain!" + +Whilst I stared at him in amazement, he stood there indeterminate as +it seemed. Then-- + +"Come, Pearce!" he cried loudly, "I can see that you do not share my +views; but for my own part I shall return to-morrow and devote further +attention to the phenomena." + +Extinguishing the light, he walked out into the hall-way, carrying the +grip in his hand. I was not far behind him. We walked toward the door +together, and-- + +"Turn the light out, Pearce," directed Smith; "the switch is at your +elbow. We can see our way to the door well enough, now." + +In order to carry out these instructions, it became necessary for me +to remain a few paces in the rear of my companion, and I think I have +never experienced such a pang of nameless terror as pierced me at the +moment of extinguishing the light; for Smith had not yet opened the +door, and the utter darkness of The Gables was horrible beyond +expression. Surely darkness is the most potent weapon of the Unknown. +I know that at the moment my hand left the switch I made for the door +as though the hosts of hell pursued me. I collided violently with +Smith. He was evidently facing toward me in the darkness, for at the +moment of our collision he grasped my shoulder as in a vice. + +"My God, Petrie! look behind you!" he whispered. + +I was enabled to judge of the extent and reality of his fear by the +fact that the strange subterfuge of addressing me always as Pearce was +forgotten. I turned in a flash.... + +Never can I forget what I saw. Many strange and terrible memories are +mine, memories stranger and more terrible than those of the average +man; but this _thing_ which now moved slowly down upon us through the +impenetrable gloom of that haunted place was (if the term be +understood) almost absurdly horrible. It was a mediaeval legend come to +life in modern London; it was as though some horrible chimera of the +black and ignorant past was become create and potent in the present. + +A luminous hand--a hand in the veins of which fire seemed to run so +that the texture of the skin and the shape of the bones within were +perceptible--in short a hand of glowing, fiery flesh, clutching a +short knife or dagger which also glowed with the same hellish, +infernal luminance, was advancing upon us where we stood--was not +three paces removed! + +What I did or how I came to do it, I can never recall. In all my years +I have experienced nothing to equal the stark panic which seized upon +me then. I know that I uttered a loud and frenzied cry: I know that I +tore myself like a madman from Smith's restraining grip.... + +"Don't touch it! Keep away, for your life!" I heard.... + +But, dimly I recollect that, finding the thing approaching yet +nearer, I lashed out with my fists--madly, blindly--and struck +something palpable.... + +What was the result, I cannot say. At that point my recollections +merge into confusion. Something or some one (Smith, as I afterwards +discovered) was hauling me by main force through the darkness; I fell +a considerable distance on to gravel which lacerated my hands and +gashed my knees. Then, with the cool night air fanning my brow, I was +running--running--my breath coming in hysterical sobs. Beside me fled +another figure.... And my definite recollections commence again at +that point. For this companion of my flight from The Gables threw +himself roughly against me to alter my course. + +"Not that way! not that way!" came pantingly. "Not on to the Heath ... +we must keep to the roads...." + +It was Nayland Smith. That healing realization came to me, bringing +such a gladness as no word of mine can express nor convey. Still we +ran on. + +"There's a policeman's lantern," panted my companion. "They'll attempt +nothing, now!" + + * * * * * + +I gulped down the stiff brandy-and-soda, then glanced across to where +Nayland Smith lay extended in the long cane chair. + +"Perhaps you will explain," I said, "for what purpose you submitted me +to that ordeal. If you proposed to correct my scepticism concerning +supernatural manifestations, you have succeeded." + +"Yes," said my companion musingly, "they are devilishly clever; but we +knew that already." + +I stared at him, fatuously. + +"Have you ever known me to waste my time when there was important work +to do?" he continued. "Do you seriously believe that my ghost-hunting +was undertaken for amusement? Really, Petrie, although you are very +fond of assuring me that I need a holiday, I think the shoe is on the +other foot!" + +From the pocket of his dressing-gown he took out a piece of silk +fringe which had apparently been torn from a scarf, and rolling it +into a ball, tossed it across to me. + +"Smell!" he snapped. + +I did as he directed--and gave a great start. The silk exhaled a faint +perfume, but its effect upon me was as though someone had cried aloud: +"_Karamaneh!_" + +Beyond doubt the silken fragment had belonged to the beautiful servant +of Dr. Fu-Manchu, to the dark-eyed, seductive Karamaneh. Nayland Smith +was watching me keenly. + +"You recognize it--yes?" + +I placed the piece of silk upon the table, slightly shrugging my +shoulders. + +"It was sufficient evidence in itself," continued my friend, "but I +thought it better to seek confirmation, and the obvious way was to +pose as a new lessee of The Gables...." + +"But, Smith--" I began. + +"Let me explain, Petrie. The history of The Gables seemed to be +susceptible of only one explanation; in short it was fairly evident to +me that the object of the manifestations was to ensure the place being +kept empty. This idea suggested another, and with them both in mind, I +set out to make my inquiries, first taking the precaution to disguise +my identity, to which end Weymouth gave me the freedom of Scotland +Yard's fancy wardrobe. I did not take the agent into my confidence, +but posed as a stranger who had heard that the house was to let +furnished and thought it might suit his purpose. My inquiries were +directed to a particular end, but I failed to achieve it at the time. +I had theories, as I have said, and when, having paid the deposit and +secured possession of the keys, I was enabled to visit the place +alone, I was fortunate enough to obtain evidence to show that my +imagination had not misled me. + +"You were very curious the other morning, I recall, respecting my +object in borrowing a large brace-and-bit. My object, Petrie, was to +bore a series of holes in the wainscoting of various rooms at The +Gables--in inconspicuous positions, of course...." + +"But, my dear Smith!" I cried, "you are merely adding to my +mystification." + +He stood up and began to pace the room in his restless fashion. + +"I had cross-examined Weymouth closely regarding the phenomenon of the +bell-ringing, and an exhaustive search of the premises led to the +discovery that the house was in such excellent condition that, from +ground-floor to attic, there was not a solitary crevice large enough +to admit of the passage of a mouse." + +I suppose I must have been staring very foolishly indeed, for Nayland +Smith burst into one of his sudden laughs. + +"A mouse, I said, Petrie!" he cried. "With the brace-and-bit I +rectified that matter. I made the holes I have mentioned, and before +each I set a trap baited with a piece of succulent, toasted cheese. +Just open that grip!" + +The light at last was dawning upon my mental darkness, and I pounced +upon the grip, which stood upon a chair near the window, and opened +it. A sickly smell of cooked cheese assailed my nostrils. + +"Mind your fingers!" cried Smith; "some of them are still set, +possibly." + +Out from the grip I began to take _mouse-traps_! Two or three of them +were still set, but in the case of the greater number the catches had +slipped. Nine I took out and placed upon the table, and all were +empty. In the tenth there crouched, panting, its soft furry body dank +with perspiration, a little white mouse! + +"Only one capture!" cried my companion, "showing how well fed the +creatures were. Examine his tail!" + +But already I had perceived that to which Smith would draw my +attention, and the mystery of the "astral bells" was a mystery no +longer. Bound to the little creature's tail, close to the root, with +fine soft wire such as is used for making up bouquets, were three tiny +silver bells. I looked across at my companion in speechless surprise. + +"Almost childish, is it not?" he said; "yet by means of this simple +device The Gables had been emptied of occupant after occupant. There +was small chance of the trick being detected, for, as I have said, +there was absolutely no aperture from roof to basement by means of +which one of them could have escaped into the building." + +"Then--" + +"They were admitted into the wall cavities and the rafters, from some +cellar underneath, Petrie, to which, after a brief scamper under the +floors and over the ceilings, they instinctively returned for the food +they were accustomed to receive, and for which, even had it been +possible (which it was not), they had no occasion to forage." + +I, too, stood up; for excitement was growing within me. I took up the +piece of silk from the table. + +"Where did you find this?" I asked, my eyes upon Smith's keen face. + +"In a sort of wine cellar, Petrie," he replied, "under the stair. +There is no cellar proper to The Gables--at least no such cellar +appears in the plans." + +"But--" + +"But there _is_ one beyond doubt--yes! It must be part of some older +building which occupied the site before The Gables was built. One can +only surmise that it exists, although such a surmise is a fairly safe +one, and the entrance to the subterranean portion of the building is +situated beyond doubt in the wine cellar. Of this we have at least two +evidences: the finding of the fragment of silk there, and the fact +that in one case at least--as I learnt--the light was extinguished in +the library unaccountably. This could only have been done in one way: +by manipulating the main switch, which is also in the wine cellar." + +"But, Smith!" I cried, "do you mean that _Fu-Manchu_ ...?" + +Nayland Smith turned in his promenade of the floor, and stared into my +eyes. + +"I mean that Dr. Fu-Manchu has had a hiding-place under The Gables for +an indefinite period!" he replied. "I always suspected that a man of +his genius would have a second retreat prepared for him, anticipating +the event of the first being discovered. Oh! I don't doubt it! The +place probably is extensive, and I am almost certain--though the point +has to be confirmed--that there is another entrance from the studio +further along the road. We know, now, why our recent searchings in the +East End have proved futile; why the house in Museum Street was +deserted: he has been lying low in this burrow at Hampstead!" + +"But the hand, Smith, the luminous hand...." + +Nayland Smith laughed shortly. + +"Your superstitious fears overcame you to such an extent, Petrie--and +I don't wonder at it; the sight was a ghastly one--that probably you +don't remember what occurred when you struck out at that same ghostly +hand?" + +"I seemed to hit something." + +"That was why we ran. But I think our retreat had all the appearance +of a rout, as I intended that it should. Pardon my playing upon your +very natural fears, old man, but you could not have _simulated_ panic +half so naturally! And if they had suspected that the device was +discovered, we might never have quitted The Gables alive. It was +touch-and-go for a moment." + +"But--" + +"Turn out the light!" snapped my companion. + +Wondering greatly, I did as he desired. I turned out the light ... and +in the darkness of my study I saw a fiery fist being shaken at me +threateningly!... The bones were distinctly visible, and the +luminosity of the flesh was truly ghastly. + +"Turn on the light again!" cried Smith. + +Deeply mystified, I did so ... and my friend tossed a little electric +pocket-lamp on to the writing table. + +"They used merely a small electric lamp fitted into the handle of a +glass dagger," he said with a sort of contempt. "It was very +effective, but the luminous hand is a phenomenon producible by anyone +who possesses an electric torch." + +"The Gables will be watched?" + +"At last, Petrie, I think we have Fu-Manchu--in his own trap!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXVII + +THE NIGHT OF THE RAID + + +"Dash it all, Petrie!" cried Smith, "this is most annoying!" + +The bell was ringing furiously, although midnight was long past. Whom +could my late visitor be? Almost certainly this ringing portended an +urgent case. In other words, I was not fated to take part in what I +anticipated would prove to be the closing scene of the Fu-Manchu +drama. + +"Every one is in bed," I said ruefully; "and how can I possibly see a +patient--in this costume?" + +Smith and I were both arrayed in rough tweeds, and anticipating the +labours before us, had dispensed with collars and wore soft mufflers. +It was hard to be called upon to face a professional interview dressed +thus, and having a big tweed cap pulled down over my eyes. + +Across the writing-table we confronted one another, in dismayed +silence, whilst, below, the bell sent up its ceaseless clangour. + +"It has to be done, Smith," I said regretfully. "Almost certainly it +means a journey and probably an absence of some hours." + +I threw my cap upon the table, turned up my coat to hide the absence +of collar, and started for the door. My last sight of Smith showed him +standing looking after me, tugging at the lobe of his ear and clicking +his teeth together with suppressed irritability. I stumbled down the +dark stairs, along the hall, and opened the front door. Vaguely +visible in the light of a street lamp which stood at no great distance +away, I saw a slender man of medium height confronting me. From the +shadowed face two large and luminous eyes looked out into mine. My +visitor, who, despite the warmth of the evening, wore a heavy +greatcoat, was an Oriental! + +I drew back, apprehensively; then:-- + +"Ah! Dr. Petrie!" he said in a softly musical voice which made me +start again, "to God be all praise that I have found you!" + +Some emotion, which at present I could not define, was stirring within +me. Where had I seen this graceful Eastern youth before? Where had I +heard that soft voice? + +"Do you wish to see me professionally?" I asked--yet even as I put +the question, I seemed to know it unnecessary. + +"So you know me no more?" said the stranger--and his teeth gleamed in +a slight smile. + +Heavens! I knew now what had struck that vibrant chord within me! The +voice, though infinitely deeper, yet had an unmistakable resemblance +to the dulcet tones of Karamaneh--of Karamaneh, whose eyes haunted my +dreams, whose beauty had done much to embitter my years. + +The Oriental youth stepped forward, with outstretched hand. + +"So you know me no more?" he repeated; "but I know _you_, and give +praise to Allah that I have found you!" + +I stepped back, pressed the electric switch, and turned, with leaping +heart, to look into the face of my visitor. It was a face of the +purest Greek beauty, a face that might have served as a model for +Praxiteles; the skin had a golden pallor, which, with the crisp black +hair and magnetic yet velvety eyes, suggested to my fancy that this +was the young Antinoues risen from the Nile, whose wraith now appeared +to me out of the night. I stifled a cry of surprise, not unmingled +with gladness. + +It was Aziz--the brother of Karamaneh! + +Never could the entrance of a figure upon the stage of a drama have +been more dramatic than the coming of Aziz upon this night of all +nights. I seized the outstretched hand and drew him forward, then +reclosed the door and stood before him a moment in doubt. + +A vaguely troubled look momentarily crossed the handsome face; with +the Oriental's unerring instinct, he had detected the reserve of my +greeting. Yet, when I thought of the treachery of Karamaneh, when I +remembered how she, whom we had befriended, whom we had rescued from +the house of Fu-Manchu, now had turned like the beautiful viper that +she was to strike at the hand that caressed her; when I thought how +to-night we were set upon raiding the place where the evil Chinese +doctor lurked in hiding, were set upon the arrest of that malignant +genius and of all his creatures, Karamaneh amongst them, is it strange +that I hesitated? Yet, again, when I thought of my last meeting with +her, and of how, twice, she had risked her life to save me.... + +So, avoiding the gaze of the lad, I took his arm, and in silence we +two ascended the stairs and entered my study ... where Nayland Smith +stood bolt upright beside the table, his steely eyes fixed upon the +face of the new arrival. + +No look of recognition crossed the bronzed features, and Aziz, who had +started forward with outstretched hands, fell back a step and looked +pathetically from me to Nayland Smith, and from the grim Commissioner +back again to me. The appeal in the velvet eyes was more than I could +tolerate, unmoved. + +"Smith," I said shortly, "you remember Aziz?" + +Not a muscle visibly moved in Smith's face, as he snapped back: + +"I remember him perfectly." + +"He has come, I think, to seek our assistance." + +"Yes, yes!" cried Aziz, laying his hand upon my arm with a gesture +painfully reminiscent of Karamaneh--"I came only to-night to London. +Oh, my gentlemen! I have searched, and searched, and searched, until I +am weary. Often I have wished to die. And then at last I come to +Rangoon...." + +"To Rangoon!" snapped Smith, still with the grey eyes fixed almost +fiercely upon the lad's face. + +"To Rangoon--yes; and there I hear news at last. I hear that you have +seen her--have seen Karamaneh--that you are back in London." He was +not entirely at home with his English. "I know then that she must be +here, too. I ask them everywhere, and they answer 'yes.' Oh, Smith +Pasha!"--he stepped forward and impulsively seized both Smith's +hands--"You know where she is--take me to her!" + +Smith's face was a study in perplexity now. In the past we had +befriended the young Aziz, and it was hard to look upon him in the +light of an enemy. Yet had we not equally befriended his sister?--and +she.... + +At last Smith glanced across at me where I stood just within the +doorway. + +"What do you make of it, Petrie?" he said harshly. "Personally I take +it to mean that our plans have leaked out." He sprang suddenly back +from Aziz, and I saw his glance travelling rapidly over the slight +figure as if in quest of concealed arms. "I take it to be a trap!" + +A moment he stood so, regarding him, and despite my well-grounded +distrust of the Oriental character, I could have sworn that the +expression of pained surprise upon the youth's face was not simulated +but real. Even Smith, I think, began to share my view; for suddenly he +threw himself into the white cane rest-chair, and, still fixedly +regarding Aziz: + +"Perhaps I have wronged you," he said. "If I have, you shall know the +reason presently. Tell your own story!" + +There was a pathetic humidity in the velvet eyes of Aziz--eyes so like +those others that were ever looking into mine in dreams--as glancing +from Smith to me he began, hands outstretched, characteristically, +palms upward and fingers curling, to tell in broken English the story +of his search for Karamaneh.... + +"It was Fu-Manchu, my kind gentlemen--it was the _hakim_ who is really +not a man at all, but an _efreet_. He found us again less than four +days after you had left us, Smith Pasha!... He found us in Cairo, and +to Karamaneh he made the forgetting of all things--even of me--even of +me...." + +Nayland Smith snapped his teeth together sharply; then: + +"What do you mean by that?" he demanded. + +For my own part I understood well enough, remembering how the +brilliant Chinese doctor once had performed such an operation as this +upon poor Inspector Weymouth; how, by means of an injection of some +serum, prepared (as Karamaneh afterwards told us) from the venom of a +swamp adder or similar reptile, he had induced _amnesia_, or complete +loss of memory. I felt every drop of blood recede from my cheeks. + +"Smith!" I began.... + +"Let him speak for himself," interrupted my friend sharply. + +"They tried to take us both," continued Aziz, still speaking in that +soft, melodious manner, but with deep seriousness. "I escaped, I, who +am swift of foot, hoping to bring help."--He shook his head +sadly--"But, except the All Powerful, who is so powerful as the +_Hakim_ Fu-Manchu? I hid, my gentlemen, and watched and waited, +one--two--three weeks. At last I saw her again, my sister Karamaneh; +but ah! she did not know me, did not know _me_, Aziz, her brother! She +was in an _arabeeyeh_, and passed me quickly along the _Sharia +en-Nahhasin_. I ran, and ran, and ran, crying her name, but although +she looked back, she did not know me--she did not know me! I felt that +I was dying, and presently I fell--upon the steps of the Mosque of +Abu." + +He dropped the expressive hands wearily to his sides and sank his chin +upon his breast. + +"And then?" I said huskily--for my heart was fluttering like a captive +bird. + +"Alas! from that day to this I see her no more, my gentlemen. I travel +not only in Egypt but near and far, and still I see her no more until +in Rangoon I hear that which brings me to England again"--he extended +his palms naively--"and here I am--Smith Pasha." + +Smith sprang upright again and turned to me. + +"Either I am growing over-credulous," he said, "or Aziz speaks the +truth. But"--he held up his hand--"you can tell me all that at some +other time, Petrie! We must take no chances. Sergeant Carter is +downstairs with the cab; you might ask him to step up. He and Aziz can +remain here until our return." + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII + +THE SAMURAI'S SWORD + + +The muffled drumming of sleepless London seemed very remote from us, +as side by side we crept up the narrow path to the studio. This was a +starry but moonless night, and the little dingy white building with a +solitary tree peeping, in silhouette above its glazed roof, bore an +odd resemblance to one of those tombs which form a city of the dead so +near to the city of feverish life, on the slopes of the Mokattam +Hills. This line of reflection proved unpleasant, and I dismissed it +sternly from my mind. + +The shriek of a train-whistle reached me, a sound which breaks the +stillness of the most silent London night, telling of the ceaseless, +febrile life of the great world-capital whose activity ceases not with +the coming of darkness. Around and about us a very great stillness +reigned, however, and the velvet dusk--which, with the star-jewelled +sky, was strongly suggestive of an Eastern night--gave up no sign to +show that it masked the presence of more than twenty men. Some +distance away on our right was The Gables, that sinister and deserted +mansion which we assumed, and with good reason, to be nothing less +than the gateway to the subterranean abode of Dr. Fu Manchu; before us +was the studio, which, if Nayland Smith's deductions were accurate, +concealed a second entrance to the same mysterious dwelling. + +As my friend, glancing cautiously all about him, inserted the key in +the lock, an owl hooted dismally almost immediately above our heads. I +caught my breath sharply, for it might be a signal; but, looking +upward, I saw a great black shape float slantingly from the tree +beyond the studio into the coppice on the right which hemmed in The +Gables. Silently the owl winged its uncanny flight into the greater +darkness of the trees, and was gone. Smith opened the door and we +stepped into the studio. Our plans had been well considered, and in +accordance with these, I now moved up beside my friend, who was dimly +perceptible to me in the starlight which found access through the +glass roof, and pressed the catch of my electric pocket-lamp.... + +I suppose that by virtue of my self-imposed duty as chronicler of the +deeds of Dr. Fu Manchu--the greatest and most evil genius whom the +later centuries have produced, the man who dreamt of a universal +Yellow Empire--I should have acquired a certain facility in describing +bizarre happenings. But I confess that it fails me now as I attempt in +cold English to portray my emotions when the white beam from the +little lamp cut through the darkness of the studio, and shone fully +upon the beautiful face of _Karamaneh_! + +Less than six feet away from me she stood, arrayed in the gauzy dress +of the harem, her fingers and slim white arms laden with barbaric +jewelry! The light wavered in my suddenly nerveless hand, gleaming +momentarily upon bare ankles and golden anklets, upon little +red-leather shoes. + +I spoke no word, and Smith was as silent as I; both of us, I think, +were speechless rather from amazement than in obedience to the +evident wishes of Fu-Manchu's slave-girl. Yet I have only to close my +eyes at this moment to see her as she stood, one finger raised to her +lips, enjoining us to silence. She looked ghastly pale in the light of +the lamp, but so lovely that my rebellious heart threatened already to +make a fool of me. + +So we stood in that untidy studio, with canvases and easels heaped +against the wall and with all sorts of litter about us, a trio +strangely met, and one to have amused the high gods watching through +the windows of the stars. + +"Go back!" came in a whisper from Karamaneh. + +I saw the red lips moving and read a dreadful horror in the widely +opened eyes, in those eyes like pools of mystery to taunt the thirsty +soul. The world of realities was slipping past me; I seemed to be +losing my hold on things actual; I had built up an Eastern palace +about myself and Karamaneh, wherein, the world shut out, I might pass +the hours in reading the mystery of those dark eyes. Nayland Smith +brought me sharply to my senses. + +"Steady with the light, Petrie!" he hissed in my ear. "My scepticism +has been shaken to-night, but I am taking no chances." + +He moved from my side and forward toward that lovely, unreal figure +which stood immediately before the model's throne and its background +of plush curtains. Karamaneh started forward to meet him, suppressing +a little cry, whose real anguish could not have been simulated. + +"Go back! go back!" she whispered urgently, and thrust out her hands +against Smith's breast. "For God's sake, go back! I have risked my +life to come here to-night. _He knows_, and is ready...." + +The words were spoken with passionate intensity, and Nayland Smith +hesitated. To my nostrils was wafted that faint, delightful perfume +which, since one night, two years ago, it had come to disturb my +senses, had taunted me many times as the mirage taunts the parched +Sahara traveller. I took a step forward. + +"Don't move!" snapped Smith. + +Karamaneh clutched frenziedly at the lapels of his coat. + +"Listen to me!" she said beseechingly, and stamped one little foot +upon the floor--"listen to me! You are a clever man, but you know +nothing of a woman's heart--nothing--_nothing_--if seeing me, hearing +me, knowing, as you do know, what I risk, you can doubt that I speak +the truth. And I tell you that it is death to go behind those +curtains--that _he_...." + +"That's what I wanted to know!" snapped Smith. His voice quivered with +excitement. + +Suddenly grasping Karamaneh by the waist, he lifted her and set her +aside; then in three bounds he was on to the model's throne and had +torn the plush curtains bodily from their fastenings. + +How it occurred I cannot hope to make clear, for here my recollections +merge into a chaos. I know that Smith seemed to topple forward amid +the purple billows of velvet, and his muffled cry came to me: + +"Petrie! My God, Petrie!..." + +The pale face of Karamaneh looked up into mine and her hands were +clutching me, but the glamour of her personality had lost its hold, +for I knew--heavens how poignantly it struck home to me!--that Nayland +Smith was gone to his death. What I hoped to achieve, I know not, but +hurling the trembling girl aside, I snatched the Browning pistol from +my coat pocket, and with the ray of the lamp directed upon the purple +mound of velvet, I leaped forward. + +I think I realized that the curtains had masked a collapsible trap, a +sheer pit of blackness, an instant before I was precipitated into it, +but certainly the knowledge came too late. With the sound of a soft, +shuddering cry in my ears, I fell, dropping lamp and pistol, and +clutching at the fallen hangings. But they offered me no support. My +head seemed to be bursting; I could utter only a hoarse groan, as I +fell--fell--fell.... + + * * * * * + +When my mind began to work again, in returning consciousness, I found +it to be laden with reproach. How often in the past had we blindly +hurled ourselves into just such a trap as this? Should we never learn +that, where Fu-Manchu was, impetuosity must prove fatal? On two +distinct occasions in the past we had been made the victims of this +device, yet although we had had practically conclusive evidence that +this studio was used by Dr. Fu-Manchu, we had relied upon its floor +being as secure as that of any other studio, we had failed to sound +every foot of it ere trusting our weight to its support.... + +"There is such a divine simplicity in the English mind that one may +lay one's plans with mathematical precision, and rely upon the Nayland +Smiths and Dr. Petries to play their allotted parts. Excepting two +faithful followers, my friends are long since departed. But here, in +these vaults which time has overlooked and which are as secret and as +serviceable to-day as they were two hundred years ago, I wait +patiently, with my trap set, like the spider for the fly!..." + +To the sound of that taunting voice, I opened my eyes. As I did so I +strove to spring upright--only to realize that I was tied fast to a +heavy ebony chair inlaid with ivory, and attached by means of two iron +brackets to the floor. + +"Even children learn from experience," continued the unforgettable +voice, alternately guttural and sibilant, but always as deliberate as +though the speaker were choosing with care words which should +perfectly clothe his thoughts. "For 'a burnt child fears the fire,' +says your English adage. But Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith, who +enjoys the confidence of the India Office, and who is empowered to +control the movements of the Criminal Investigation Department, learns +nothing from experience. He is less than a child, since he has twice +rashly precipitated himself into a chamber charged with an anaesthetic +prepared, by a process of my own, from the _lycoperdon_ or Common +Puffball." + +I became fully master of my senses, and I became fully alive to a +stupendous fact. At last it was ended; we were utterly in the power of +Dr. Fu Manchu; our race was run. + +I sat in a low vaulted room. The roof was of ancient brickwork, but +the walls were draped with exquisite Chinese fabric having a green +ground whereon was a design representing a grotesque procession of +white peacocks. A green carpet covered the floor, and the whole of the +furniture was of the same material as the chair to which I was +strapped, viz. ebony inlaid with ivory. This furniture was scanty. +There was a heavy table in one corner of the dungeonesque place, on +which were a number of books and papers. Before this table was a +high-backed, heavily carven chair. A smaller table stood upon the +right of the only visible opening, a low door partially draped with +bead-work curtains, above which hung a silver lamp. On this smaller +table, a stick of incense, in a silver holder, sent up a pencil of +vapour into the air, and the chamber was loaded with the sickly sweet +fumes. A faint haze from the incense-stick hovered up under the roof. + +In the high-backed chair sat Dr. Fu Manchu, wearing a green robe upon +which was embroidered a design, the subject of which at first glance +was not perceptible, but which presently I made out to be a huge white +peacock. He wore a little cap perched upon the dome of his amazing +skull, and one clawish hand resting upon the ebony of the table, he +sat slightly turned toward me, his emotionless face a mask of +incredible evil. In spite of, or because of, the high intellect +written upon it, the face of Dr. Fu-Manchu was more utterly repellent +than any I have ever known, and the green eyes, eyes green as those of +a cat in the darkness, which sometimes burnt like witch-lamps, and +sometimes were horribly filmed like nothing human or imaginable, might +have mirrored not a soul, but an emanation of Hell, incarnate in this +gaunt, high-shouldered body. + +Stretched flat upon the floor lay Nayland Smith, partially stripped, +his arms thrown back over his head and his wrists chained to a stout +iron staple attached to the wall; he was fully conscious and staring +intently at the Chinese doctor. His bare ankles also were manacled, +and fixed to a second chain, which quivered tautly across the green +carpet and passed out through the doorway, being attached to something +beyond the curtain, and invisible to me from where I sat. + +Fu-Manchu was now silent. I could hear Smith's heavy breathing and +hear my watch ticking in my pocket. I suddenly realized that although +my body was lashed to the ebony chair, my hands and arms were free. +Next, looking dazedly about me, my attention was drawn to a heavy +sword which stood hilt upward against the wall within reach of my +hand. It was a magnificent piece, of Japanese workmanship; a long, +curved Damascened blade having a double-handed hilt of steel, inlaid +with gold, and resembling fine Kuft work. A host of possibilities +swept through my mind. Then I perceived that the sword was attached to +the wall by a thin steel chain some five feet in length. + +"Even if you had the dexterity of a Mexican knife-thrower," came the +guttural voice of Fu-Manchu, "you would be unable to reach me, dear +Dr. Petrie." + +The Chinaman had read my thoughts. + +Smith turned his eyes upon me momentarily, only to look away again in +the direction of Fu Manchu. My friend's face was slightly pale beneath +the tan, and his jaw muscles stood out with unusual prominence. By +this fact alone did he reveal the knowledge that he lay at the mercy +of this enemy of the white race, of this inhuman being who himself +knew no mercy, of this man whose very genius was inspired by the cool, +calculated cruelty of his race, of that race which to this day +disposes of hundreds, nay, thousands, of its unwanted girl-children by +the simple measure of throwing them down a well specially dedicated to +the purpose. + +"The weapon near your hand," continued the Chinaman imperturbably, "is +a product of the civilization of our near neighbours the Japanese, a +race to whose courage I prostrate myself in meekness. It is the sword +of a _samurai_, Dr. Petrie. It is of very great age, and was, until an +unfortunate misunderstanding with myself led to the extinction of the +family, a treasured possession of a noble Japanese house...." + +The soft voice, into which an occasional sibilance crept, but which +never rose above a cool monotone, gradually was lashing me into fury, +and I could see the muscles moving in Smith's jaws as he convulsively +clenched his teeth; whereby I knew that, impotent, he burned with a +rage at least as great as mine. But I did not speak, and did not move. + +"The ancient tradition of _seppuku_," continued the Chinaman, "or +_hara-kira_, still rules, as you know, in the great families of Japan. +There is a sacred ritual, and the _samurai_ who dedicates himself to +this honourable end, must follow strictly the ritual. As a physician, +the exact nature of the ceremony might possibly interest you, Dr. +Petrie, but a technical account of the two incisions which the +sacrificant employs in his self-dismissal, might, on the other hand, +bore Mr. Nayland Smith. Therefore I will merely enlighten you upon +one little point, a minor one, but interesting to the student of human +nature. In short, even a _samurai_--and no braver race has ever +honoured the world--sometimes hesitates to complete the operation. The +weapon near to your hand, my dear Dr. Petrie, is known as the Friend's +Sword. On such occasions as we are discussing, a trusty friend is +given the post--an honoured one--of standing behind the brave man who +offers himself to his gods, and should the latter's courage +momentarily fail him, the friend with the trusty blade (to which now I +especially direct your attention) diverts the hierophant's mind from +his digression, and rectifies his temporary breach of etiquette by +severing the cervical vertebrae of the spinal column with the friendly +blade--which you can reach quite easily, Dr. Petrie, if you care to +extend your hand." + +Some dim perception of the truth was beginning to creep into my mind. +When I say a perception of the truth, I mean rather of some part of +the purpose of Dr. Fu-Manchu; of the whole horrible truth, of the +scheme which had been conceived by that mighty, evil man, I had no +glimmering, but I foresaw that a frightful ordeal was before us both. + +"That I hold you in high esteem," continued Fu-Manchu, "is a fact +which must be apparent to you by this time, but in regard to your +companion, I entertain very different sentiments...." + +Always underlying the deliberate calm of the speaker, sometimes +showing itself in an unusually deep guttural, sometimes in an +unusually serpentine sibilant, lurked the frenzy of hatred which in +the past had revealed itself occasionally in wild outbursts. +Momentarily I expected such an outburst now, but it did not come. + +"One quality possessed by Mr. Nayland Smith," resumed the Chinaman, "I +admire; I refer to his courage. I would wish that so courageous a man +should seek his own end, should voluntarily efface himself from the +path of that world-movement which he is powerless to check. In short, +I would have him show himself a _samurai_. Always his friend, you +shall remain so to the end, Dr. Petrie. I have arranged for this." + +He struck lightly a little silver gong, dependent from the corner of +the table, whereupon, from the curtained doorway, there entered a +short, thickly built Burman whom I recognized for a dacoit. He wore a +shoddy blue suit, which had been made for a much larger man; but these +things claimed little of my attention, which automatically was +directed to the load beneath which the Burman laboured. + +Upon his back he carried a sort of wire box rather less than six feet +long, some two feet high, and about two feet wide. In short, it was a +stout framework covered with fine wire-netting on the tops, sides and +ends, but open at the bottom. It seemed to be made in five sections, +or to contain four sliding partitions which could be raised or lowered +at will. These were of wood, and in the bottom of each was cut a +little arch. The arches in the four partitions varied in size, so that +whereas the first was not more than five inches high, the fourth +opened almost to the wire roof of the box or cage; and a fifth, which +was but little higher than the first, was cut in the actual end of the +contrivance. + +So intent was I upon this device, the purpose of which I was wholly +unable to divine, that I directed the whole of my attention upon it. +Then, as the Burman paused in the doorway, resting a corner of the +cage upon the brilliant carpet, I glanced toward Dr. Fu-Manchu. He was +watching Nayland Smith, and revealing his irregular yellow teeth--the +teeth of an opium smoker--in the awful mirthless smile which I knew. + +"God!" whispered Smith, "the Six Gates!" + +"Your knowledge of my beautiful country serves you well," replied +Fu-Manchu gently. + +Instantly I looked to my friend ... and every drop of blood seemed to +recede from my heart, leaving it cold in my breast. If _I_ did not +know the purpose of the cage, obviously Smith knew it all too well. +His pallor had grown more marked, and although his grey eyes stared +defiantly at the Chinaman, I, who knew him, could read a deathly +horror in their depths. + +The dacoit, in obedience to a guttural order from Dr. Fu Manchu, +placed the cage upon the carpet, completely covering Smith's body, but +leaving his neck and head exposed. The seared and pock-marked face set +in a sort of placid leer, the dacoit adjusted the sliding partitions +to Smith's recumbent form, and I saw the purpose of the graduated +arches. They were intended to divide a human body in just such +fashion, and, as I realized, were most cunningly shaped to that end. +The whole of Smith's body lay now in the wire cage, each of the five +compartments whereof was shut off from its neighbour. + +The Burman stepped back and stood waiting in the doorway. Dr. Fu +Manchu, removing his gaze from the face of my friend, directed it now +upon me. + +"Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith shall have the honour of acting as +hierophant, admitting himself to the Mysteries," said Fu Manchu +softly, "and you, Dr. Petrie, shall be the Friend." + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX + +THE SIX GATES + + +He glanced toward the Burman, who retired immediately, to re-enter a +moment later carrying a curious leather sack, in shape not unlike that +of a _sakka_ or Arab water-carrier. Opening a little trap in the top +of the first compartment of the cage (that is, the compartment which +covered Smith's bare feet and ankles), he inserted the neck of the +sack, then suddenly seized it by the bottom and shook it vigorously. +Before my horrified gaze, four huge rats came tumbling out from the +bag into the cage! + +The dacoit snatched away the sack and snapped the shutter fast. A +moving mist obscured my sight, a mist through which I saw the green +eyes of Dr. Fu-Manchu fixed upon me, and through which, as from a +great distance, his voice, sunk to a snakelike hiss, came to my ears. + +"Cantonese rats, Dr. Petrie ... the most ravenous in the world ... +they have eaten nothing for nearly a week!" + +Then all became blurred as though a painter with a brush steeped in +red had smudged out the details of the picture. For an indefinite +period, which seemed like many minutes yet probably was only a few +seconds, I saw nothing and heard nothing; my sensory nerves were +dulled entirely. From this state I was awakened and brought back to +the realities by a sound which ever afterward I was doomed to +associate with that ghastly scene. + +This was the squealing of the rats. + +The red mist seemed to disperse at that, and with frightfully intense +interest, I began to study the awful torture to which Nayland Smith +was being subjected. The dacoit had disappeared, and Fu-Manchu +placidly was watching the four lean and hideous animals in the cage. +As I also turned my eyes in that direction, the rats overcame their +temporary fear, and began.... + +"You have been good enough to notice," said the Chinaman, his voice +still sunk in that sibilant whisper, "my partiality for dumb allies. +You have met my scorpions, my death-adders, my baboon-man. The uses of +such a playful little animal as a marmoset have never been fully +appreciated before, I think, but to an indiscretion of this last-named +pet of mine I seem to remember that you owed something in the past, +Dr. Petrie...." + +Nayland Smith stifled a deep groan. One rapid glance I ventured at his +face. It was a greyish hue now, and dank with perspiration. His gaze +met mine. + +The rats had almost ceased squealing. + +"Much depends upon yourself, doctor," continued Fu-Manchu, slightly +raising his voice. "I credit Mr. Commissioner Nayland Smith with +courage high enough to sustain the raising of all the gates; but I +estimate the strength of your friendship highly, also, and predict +that you will use the sword of the _samurai_ certainly not later than +the time when I shall raise the third gate...." + +A low shuddering sound, which I cannot hope to describe, but alas! can +never forget, broke from the lips of the tortured man. + +"In China," resumed Fu-Manchu, "we call this quaint fancy the Six +Gates of Joyful Wisdom. The first gate, by which the rats are +admitted, is called the Gate of Joyous Hope; the second, the Gate of +Mirthful Doubt. The third gate is poetically named the Gate of True +Rapture, and the fourth, the Gate of Gentle Sorrow. I once was +honoured in the friendship of an exalted mandarin who sustained the +course of Joyful Wisdom to the raising of the fifth gate (called the +Gate of Sweet Desires) and the admission of the twentieth rat. I +esteem him almost equally with my ancestors. The sixth, or Gate +Celestial--whereby a man enters into the Joy of Complete +Understanding--I have dispensed with, here, substituting a Japanese +fancy of an antiquity nearly as great and honourable. The introduction +of this element of speculation I count a happy thought, and +accordingly take pride to myself." + +"The sword, Petrie!" whispered Smith. I should not have recognized his +voice, but he spoke quite evenly and steadily. "I rely upon you, old +man, to spare me the humiliation of asking mercy from that yellow +fiend!" + +My mind throughout this time had been gaining a sort of dreadful +clarity. I had avoided looking at the sword of _kara-kiri_, but my +thoughts had been leading me mercilessly up to the point at which we +were now arrived. No vestige of anger, of condemnation of the inhuman +being seated in the ebony chair, remained; that was past. Of all that +had gone before, and of what was to come in the future, I thought +nothing, knew nothing. Our long fight against the yellow group, our +encounters with the numberless creatures of Fu Manchu, the +dacoits--even Karamaneh--were forgotten, blotted out. I saw nothing of +the strange appointments of that subterranean chamber; but face to +face with the supreme moment of a lifetime, I was alone with my poor +friend--and God. + +The rats began squealing again. They were fighting.... + +"Quick, Petrie! Quick, man! I am weakening...." + +I turned and took up the _samurai_ sword. My hands were very hot and +dry, but perfectly steady, and I tested the edge of the heavy weapon +upon my left thumb-nail as quietly as one might test a razor blade. It +was keen, this blade of ghastly history, as any razor ever wrought in +Sheffield. I seized the graven hilt, bent forward in my chair, and +raised the Friend's Sword high above my head. With the heavy weapon +poised there, I looked into my friend's eyes. They were feverishly +bright, but never in all my days, nor upon the many beds of suffering +which it had been my lot to visit, had I seen an expression like that +within them. + +"The raising of the First Gate is always a crucial moment," came the +guttural voice of the Chinaman. + +Although I did not see him, and barely heard his words, I was aware +that he had stood up and was bending forward over the lower end of the +cage. + +"Now, Petrie! now! God bless you ... and good-bye...." + + * * * * * + +From somewhere--somewhere remote--I heard a hoarse and animal-like +cry, followed by the sound of a heavy fall. I can scarcely bear to +write of that moment, for I had actually begun the downward sweep of +the great sword when that sound came--a faint Hope, speaking of aid +where I had thought no aid possible. + +How I contrived to divert the blade, I do not know to this day; but I +do know that its mighty sweep sheared a lock from Smith's head and +laid open the scalp. With the hilt in my quivering hands I saw the +blade bite deeply through the carpet and floor above Nayland Smith's +skull. There, buried fully two inches in the woodwork, it stuck, and +still clutching the hilt, I looked to the right and across the room--I +looked to the curtained doorway. + +Fu-Manchu, with one long, claw-like hand upon the top of the first +gate, was bending over the trap, but his brilliant green eyes were +turned in the same direction as my own--upon the curtained doorway. + +Upright within it, her beautiful face as pale as death, but her great +eyes blazing with a sort of splendid madness, stood Karamaneh! + +She looked, not at the tortured man, not at me, but fully at Dr. +Fu-Manchu. One hand clutched the trembling draperies; now she suddenly +raised the other, so that the jewels on her white arm glittered in the +light of the lamp above the door. She held my Browning pistol! +Fu-Manchu sprang upright, inhaling sibilantly, as Karamaneh pointed +the pistol point-blank at his high skull and fired.... + +I saw a little red streak appear, up by the neutral-coloured hair, +under the black cap. I became as a detached intelligence, unlinked +with the corporeal, looking down upon a thing which for some reason I +had never thought to witness. + +Fu-Manchu threw up both arms, so that the sleeves of the green robe +fell back to the elbows. He clutched at his head and the black cap +fell behind him. He began to utter short, guttural cries; he swayed +backward--to the right--to the left--then lurched forward right across +the cage. There he lay, writhing, for a moment, his baneful eyes +turned up, revealing the whites; and the great grey rats, released, +began leaping about the room. Two shot like grey streaks past the slim +figure in the doorway, one darted behind the chair to which I was +lashed, and the fourth ran all around against the wall.... Fu-Manchu, +prostrate across the overturned cage, lay still, his massive head +sagging downward. + +I experienced a mental repetition of my adventure in the earlier +evening--I was dropping, dropping, dropping into some bottomless pit ... +warm arms were about my neck; and burning kisses upon my lips. + + + + +CHAPTER XXX + +THE CALL OF THE EAST + + +I seemed to haul myself back out of the pit of unconsciousness by the +aid of two little hands which clasped my own. I uttered a sigh that +was almost a sob, and opened my eyes. + +I was sitting in the big red-leathern armchair in my own study ... and +a lovely but truly bizarre figure, in a harem dress, was kneeling on +the carpet at my feet; so that my first sight of the world was the +sweetest sight that the world had to offer me, the dark eyes of +Karamaneh, with tears trembling like jewels upon her lashes! + +I looked no further than that, heeded not if there were others in the +room beside we two, but, gripping the jewel-laden fingers in what must +have been a cruel clasp, I searched the depths of the glorious eyes in +ever-growing wonder. What change had taken place in those limpid, +mysterious pools? Why was a wild madness growing up within me like a +flame? Why was the old longing returned, ten-thousandfold, to snatch +that pliant, exquisite shape to my breast? + +No word was spoken, but the spoken words of a thousand ages could not +have expressed one tithe what was held in that silent communion. A +hand was laid hesitatingly on my shoulder. I tore my gaze away from +the lovely face so near to mine, and glanced up. + +Aziz stood at the back of my chair! + +"God is all merciful," he said. "My sister is restored to us" (I loved +him for the plural) "and she _remembers_." + +Those few words were enough; I understood now that this lovely girl, +who half knelt, half lay at my feet, was not the evil, perverted +creature of Fu-Manchu whom we had gone out to arrest with the other +vile servants of the Chinese doctor, but was the old, beloved +companion of two years ago, the Karamaneh for whom I had sought long +and wearily in Egypt, who had been swallowed up and lost to me in that +land of mystery. + +The loss of memory which Fu-Manchu had artificially induced was +subject to the same inexplicable laws which ordinarily rule in cases +of _amnesia_. The shock of her brave action that night had begun to +effect a cure; the sight of Aziz had completed it. + +Inspector Weymouth was standing by the writing-table. My mind cleared +rapidly now, and standing up, but without releasing the girl's hands, +so that I drew her up beside me, I said: + +"Weymouth--where is--? + +"He's waiting to see you, doctor," replied the Inspector. + +A pang, almost physical, struck at my heart. + +"Poor, dear old Smith!" I cried, with a break in my voice. + +Dr. Gray, a neighbouring practitioner, appeared in the doorway at the +moment that I spoke the words. + +"It's all right, Petrie," he said, reassuringly; "I think we took it +in time. I have thoroughly cauterised the wounds, and granted that no +complication sets in, he'll be on his feet again in a week or two." + +I suppose I was in a condition closely bordering upon the hysterical. +At any rate, my behaviour was extraordinary. I raised both my hands +above my head. + +"Thank God!" I cried at the top of my voice, "thank God!--thank God!" + +"Thank Him, indeed," responded the musical voice of Aziz. He spoke +with all the passionate devoutness of the true Moslem. + +Everything, even Karamaneh, was forgotten, and I started for the door +as though my life depended upon my speed. With one foot upon the +landing, I turned, looked back, and met the glance of Inspector +Weymouth. + +"What have you done with the--body?" I asked. + +"We haven't been able to get to it. That end of the vault collapsed +two minutes after we hauled you out!" + + * * * * * + +As I write, now, of these strange days, already they seem remote and +unreal. But, where other and more dreadful memories already are grown +misty, the memory of that evening in my rooms remains clear-cut and +intimate. It marked a crisis in my life. + +During the days that immediately followed, whilst Smith was slowly +recovering from his hurts, I made my plans, deliberately; I prepared +to cut myself off from old associations--prepared to exile myself, +gladly; how gladly I cannot hope to express in mere cold words. + +That my friend approved of my projects I cannot truthfully state, but +his disapproval at least was not openly expressed. To Karamaneh I said +nothing of my plans, but her complete reliance in my powers to protect +her, now, from all harm, was at once pathetic and exquisite. + +Since, always, I have sought in these chronicles, to confine myself to +the facts directly relating to the malignant activity of Dr. +Fu-Manchu, I shall abstain from burdening you with details of my +private affairs. As an instrument of the Chinese doctor, it has +sometimes been my duty to write of the beautiful Eastern girl; I +cannot suppose that my readers have any further curiosity respecting +her from the moment that Fate freed her from that awful servitude. +Therefore, when I shall have dealt with the episodes which marked our +voyage to Egypt--I had opened negotiations in regard to a practice in +Cairo--I may honourably lay down my pen. + +These episodes opened, dramatically upon the second night of the +voyage from Marseilles. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI + +"MY SHADOW LIES UPON YOU" + + +I suppose I did not awake very readily. Following the nervous +vigilance of the past six months, my tired nerves, in the enjoyment of +this relaxation, were rapidly recuperating. I no longer feared to +awaken to find a knife at my throat, no longer dreaded the darkness as +a foe. + +So that the voice may have been calling (indeed, _had_ been calling) +for some time, and of this I had been hazily conscious before finally +I awoke. Then, ere the new sense of security came to reassure me, the +old sense of impending harm set my heart leaping nervously. There is +always a certain physical panic attendant upon such awakenings in the +still of night, especially in novel surroundings. Now I sat up +abruptly, clutching at the rail of my berth and listening. + +There was a soft thudding on my cabin door, and a voice, low and +urgent, was crying my name. + +Through the port-hole the moonlight streamed into my room, and save +for a remote and soothing throb, inseparable from the progress of a +great steamship, nothing else disturbed the stillness; I might have +floated lonely upon the bosom of the Mediterranean. But there was the +drumming on the door again, and the urgent appeal: + +"Dr. Petrie! Dr. Petrie!" + +I threw off the bedclothes and stepped on to the floor of the cabin, +fumbling hastily for my slippers. A fear that something was amiss, +that some aftermath, some wraith of the dread Chinaman, was yet to +come to disturb our premature peace, began to haunt me. I threw open +the door. + +Upon the gleaming deck, blackly outlined against a wondrous sky, +stood a man who wore a blue greatcoat over his pyjamas, and whose +unstockinged feet were thrust into red slippers. It was Platts, the +Marconi operator. + +"I'm awfully sorry to disturb you, Dr. Petrie," he said, "and I was +even less anxious to arouse your neighbour; but somebody seems to be +trying to get a message, presumably urgent, through to you." + +"To me!" I cried. + +"I cannot make it out," admitted Platts, running his fingers through +dishevelled hair, "but I thought it better to arouse you. Will you +come up?" + +I turned without a word, slipped into my dressing-gown, and with +Platts passed aft along the deserted deck. The sea was as calm as a +great lake. Ahead, on the port bow, an angry flambeau burnt redly +beneath the peaceful vault of the heavens. Platts nodded absently in +the direction of the weird flames. + +"Stromboli," he said; "we shall be nearly through the Straits by +breakfast-time." + +We mounted the narrow stair to the Marconi deck. At the table sat +Platts' assistant with the Marconi attachment upon his head--an +apparatus which always set me thinking of the electric chair. + +"Have you got it?" demanded my companion as we entered the room. + +"It's still coming through," replied the other without moving, "but in +the same jerky fashion. Every time I get it, it seems to have gone +back to the beginning--just _Dr. Petrie_--_Dr. Petrie_." + +He began to listen again for the elusive message. I turned to Platts. + +"Where is it being sent from?" I asked. + +Platts shook his head. + +"That's the mystery," he declared. "Look!"--he pointed to the table; +"according to the Marconi chart, there's a Messageries boat due west +between us and Marseilles, and the homeward-bound P. & O. which we +passed this morning must be getting on that way also, by now. The +_Isis_ is somewhere ahead, but I've spoken all these, and the message +comes from none of them." + +"Then it may come from Messina." + +"It doesn't come from Messina," replied the man at the table, +beginning to write rapidly. + +Platts stepped forward and bent over the message which the other was +writing. + +"Here it is!" he cried excitedly; "we're getting it." + +Stepping in turn to the table, I leant over between the two and read +these words as the operator wrote them down: _Dr. Petrie_--_my +shadow_.... + +I drew a quick breath and gripped Platt's shoulder harshly. His +assistant began fingering the instrument with irritation. + +"Lost it again!" he muttered. + +"This message...." I began. + +But again the pencil was travelling over the paper:--_lies upon you +all_ ... _end of message_. + +The operator stood up and unclasped the receivers from his ears. +There, high above the sleeping ship's company, with the blue carpet of +the Mediterranean stretched indefinitely about us, we three stood +looking at one another. By virtue of a miracle of modern science, some +one, divided from me by mile upon mile of boundless ocean, had +spoken--and had been heard. + +"Is there no means of learning," I said, "from whence this message +emanated?" + +Platts shook his head, perplexedly. + +"They gave no code word," he said. "God knows who they were. It's a +strange business and a strange message. Have you any sort of idea, Dr. +Petrie, respecting the identity of the sender?" + +I stared him hard in the face; an idea had mechanically entered my +mind, but one of which I did not choose to speak, since it was opposed +to human possibility. + +But had I not seen with my own eyes the bloody streak across his +forehead as the shot fired by Karamaneh entered his high skull, had I +not known, so certainly as it is given to men to know, that the giant +intellect was no more, the mighty will impotent, I should have +replied: + +"The message is from Dr. Fu Manchu!" + +My reflections were rudely terminated and my sinister thoughts given +new stimulus, by a loud though muffled cry which reached me from +somewhere in the ship below. Both my companions started as violently +as I, whereby I knew that the mystery of the wireless message had not +been without its effect upon their minds also. But whereas they paused +in doubt, I leapt from the room and almost threw myself down the +ladder. + +It was Karamaneh who had uttered that cry of fear and horror! + +Although I could perceive no connection betwixt the strange message +and the cry in the night, intuitively I linked them, intuitively I +knew that my fears had been well grounded; that the shadow of Fu +Manchu still lay upon us. + +Karamaneh occupied a large stateroom aft on the main deck; so that I +had to descend from the upper deck on which my own room was situated +to the promenade deck, again to the main deck, and thence proceed +nearly the whole length of the alleyway. + +Karamaneh and her brother, Aziz, who occupied a neighbouring room, met +me, near the library. Karamaneh's eyes were wide with fear; her +peerless colouring had fled, and she was white to the lips. Aziz, who +wore a dressing-gown thrown hastily over his night attire, had his arm +protectively about the girl's shoulders. + +"The mummy!" she whispered tremulously, "the mummy!" + +There came a sound of opening doors, and several passengers, whom +Karamaneh's cries had alarmed, appeared in various stages of undress. +A stewardess came running from the far end of the alleyway, and I +found time to wonder at my own speed; for, starting from the distant +Marconi deck, yet I had been the first to arrive upon the scene. + +Stacey, the ship's doctor, was quartered at no great distance from the +spot, and he now joined the group. Anticipating the question which +trembled upon the lips of several of those about me-- + +"Come to Dr. Stacey's room," I said, taking Karamaneh's arm; "we will +give you something to enable you to sleep." I turned to the group. "My +patient has had severe nerve trouble," I explained, "and has developed +somnambulistic tendencies." + +I declined the stewardess's offer of assistance, with a slight shake +of the head, and shortly the four of us entered the doctor's cabin, on +the deck above. Stacey carefully closed the door. He was an old +fellow-student of mine, and already he knew much of the history of the +beautiful Eastern girl and her brother Aziz. + +"I fear there's mischief afoot, Petrie," he said. "Thanks to your +presence of mind, the ship's gossips need know nothing of it." + +I glanced at Karamaneh, who, since the moment of my arrival, had never +once removed her gaze from me; she remained in that state of passive +fear in which I had found her, the lovely face pallid; and she stared +at me fixedly in a childish, expressionless way which made me dread +that the shock to which she had been subjected, whatever its nature, +had caused a relapse into that strange condition of forgetfulness from +which a previous shock had aroused her. I could see that Stacey shared +my view, for-- + +"Something has frightened you," he said gently, seating himself on the +arm of Karamaneh's chair and patting her hand as if to reassure her. +"Tell us all about it." + +For the first time since our meeting that night, the girl turned her +eyes from me and glanced up at Stacey, a sudden warm blush stealing +over her face and throat and as quickly departing, to leave her even +more pale than before. She grasped Stacey's hand in both her own--and +looked again at me. + +"Send for Mr. Nayland Smith without delay!" she said, and her sweet +voice was slightly tremulous. "He must be put on his guard!" + +I started up. + +"Why?" I said. "For God's sake tell us what has happened!" + +Aziz, who evidently was as anxious as myself for information, and who +now knelt at his sister's feet looking up at her with that strange +love, which was almost adoration, in his eyes, glanced back at me and +nodded his head rapidly. + +"Something "--Karamaneh paused, shuddering violently--"some dreadful +thing, like a mummy escaped from its tomb, came into my room to-night +through the port-hole...." + +"Through the port-hole?" echoed Dr. Stacey amazedly. + +"Yes, yes, through the port-hole! A creature tall and very, very thin. +He wore wrappings--yellow wrappings, swathed about his head, so that +only his eyes, his evil gleaming eyes, were visible.... From waist to +knees he was covered, also, but his body, his feet, and his legs were +bare...." + +"Was he--?" I began. + +"He was a brown man, yes." Karamaneh, divining my question, nodded, +and the shimmering cloud of her wonderful hair, hastily confined, +burst free and rippled about her shoulders. "A gaunt, fleshless brown +man, who bent, and writhed bony fingers--so!" + +"A thug!" I cried. + +"He--it--the mummy thing--would have strangled me if I had slept, for +he crouched over the berth--seeking--seeking...." + +I clenched my teeth convulsively. + +"But I was sitting up--" + +"With the light on?" interrupted Stacey in surprise. + +"No," added Karamaneh; "the light was out." She turned her eyes toward +me, as the wonderful blush overspread her face once more. "I was +sitting thinking. It all happened within a few seconds, and quite +silently. As the mummy crouched over the berth, I unlocked the door +and leapt out into the passage. I think I screamed; I did not mean to. +Oh, Dr. Stacey, there is not a moment to spare! Mr. Nayland Smith must +be warned immediately. Some horrible servant of Dr. Fu-Manchu is on +the ship!" + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII + +THE TRAGEDY + + +Nayland Smith leant against the edge of the dressing-table, attired in +pyjamas. The little stateroom was hazy with smoke, and my friend +gripped the charred briar between his teeth and watched the blue-grey +clouds arising from the bowl, in an abstracted way. I knew that he was +thinking hard, and from the fact that he had exhibited no surprise +when I had related to him the particulars of the attack upon +Karamaneh, I judged that he had half anticipated something of the +kind. Suddenly he stood up, staring at me fixedly. + +"Your tact has saved the situation, Petrie," he snapped. "It failed +you momentarily, though, when you proposed to me just now that we +should muster the lascars for inspection. Our game is to pretend that +we know nothing--that we believe Karamaneh to have had a bad dream." + +"But, Smith--" I began. + +"It would be useless, Petrie," he interrupted me. "You cannot suppose +that I overlooked the possibility of some creature of the Doctor's +being among the lascars. I can assure you that not one of them answers +to the description of the midnight assailant. From the girl's account +we have to look (discarding the idea of a revivified mummy) for a man +of unusual height--and there's no lascar of unusual height on board; +and from the visible evidence, that he entered the stateroom through +the port-hole, we have to look for a man more than normally thin. In a +word, the servant of Dr. Fu-Manchu who attempted the life of Karamaneh +is either in hiding in the ship, or if visible, is disguised." + +With his usual clarity, Nayland Smith had visualized the facts of the +case; I passed in mental survey each one of the passengers, and those +of the crew whose appearances were familiar to me, with the result +that I had to admit the justice of my friend's conclusions. Smith +began to pace the narrow strip of carpet between the dressing-table +and the door. Suddenly he began again. + +"From our knowledge of Fu-Manchu--and of the group surrounding him +(and, don't forget, _surviving_ him)--we may further assume that the +wireless message was no gratuitous piece of melodrama, but that it was +directed to a definite end. Let us endeavour to link up the chain a +little. You occupy an upper-berth; so do I. Experience of the Chinaman +has formed a habit in both of us: that of sleeping with closed +windows. Your port was fastened and so was my own. Karamaneh is +quartered on the main deck, and her brother's stateroom opens into the +same alleyway. Since the ship is in the Straits of Messina, and the +glass set fair, the stewards have not closed the port-holes nightly +at present. We know that that of Karamaneh's stateroom was open. +Therefore, in any attempt upon our quarter, Karamaneh would +automatically be selected for the victim, since failing you or myself +she may be regarded as being the most obnoxious to Dr. Fu-Manchu." + +I nodded comprehendingly. Smith's capacity for throwing the white +light of reason into the darkest places often amazed me. + +"You may have noticed," he continued, "that Karamaneh's room is +directly below your own. In the event of any outcry, you would be +sooner upon the scene than I should, for instance, because I sleep on +the opposite side of the ship. This circumstance I take to be the +explanation of the wireless message, which, because of its hesitancy +(a piece of ingenuity very characteristic of the group), led to your +being awakened and invited up to the Marconi deck; in short, it gave +the would-be assassin a better chance of escaping before your +arrival." + +I watched my friend in growing wonder. The strange events, seemingly +having no link, took their place in the drama, and became well-ordered +episodes in a plot that only a criminal genius could have devised. As +I studied the keen, bronzed face, I realized to the full the +stupendous mental power of Dr. Fu-Manchu, measuring it by the +criterion of Nayland Smith's. For the cunning Chinaman, in a sense, +had foiled this brilliant man before me, whereby if by naught else I +might know him a master of his evil art. + +"I regard the episode," continued Smith, "as a posthumous attempt of +the Doctor's; a legacy of hate which may prove more disastrous than +any attempt made upon us by Fu-Manchu in life. Some fiendish member of +the murder group is on board the ship. We must, as always, meet guile +with guile. There must be no appeal to the Captain, no public +examination of passengers and crew. One attempt has failed; I do not +doubt that others will be made. At present, you will enact the role of +physician-in-attendance upon Karamaneh, and will put it about for whom +it may interest that a slight return of her nervous trouble is causing +her to pass uneasy nights. I can safely leave this part of the case to +you, I think?" + +I nodded rapidly. + +"I haven't troubled to make inquiries," added Smith, "but I think it +probable that the regulation respecting closed ports will come into +operation immediately we have passed the Straits, or at any rate +immediately there is any likelihood of bad weather." + +"You mean--" + +"I mean that no alteration should be made in our habits. A second +attempt along similar lines is to be apprehended--to-night. After that +we may begin to look out for a new danger." + +"I pray we may avoid it," I said fervently. + +As I entered the saloon for breakfast in the morning, I was subjected +to solicitous inquiries from Mrs. Prior, the gossip of the ship. Her +room adjoined Karamaneh's, and she had been one of the passengers +aroused by the girl's cries in the night. Strictly adhering to my +role, I explained that my patient was threatened with a second nervous +breakdown, and was subject to vivid and disturbing dreams. One or two +other inquiries I met in the same way, ere escaping to the corner +table reserved to us. + +That iron-bound code of conduct which rules the Anglo-Indian, in the +first days of the voyage had threatened to ostracise Karamaneh and +Aziz, by reason of the Eastern blood to which their brilliant but +peculiar type of beauty bore witness. Smith's attitude, however--and, +in a Burmese Commissioner, it constituted something of a law--had done +much to break down the barriers; the extraordinary beauty of the girl +had done the rest. So that now, far from finding themselves shunned, +the society of Karamaneh and her romantic-looking brother was +universally courted. The last inquiry that morning, respecting my +interesting patient, came from the Bishop of Damascus, a benevolent +old gentleman whose ancestry was not wholly innocent of Oriental +strains, and who sat at a table immediately behind me. As I settled +down to my porridge, he turned his chair slightly and bent to my ear. + +"Mrs. Prior tells me that your charming friend was disturbed last +night," he whispered. "She seems rather pale this morning; I sincerely +trust that she is suffering no ill effect." + +I swung around, with a smile. Owing to my carelessness, there was a +slight collision, and the poor bishop, who had been invalided to +England after typhoid, in order to undergo special treatment, +suppressed an exclamation of pain, although his fine dark eyes gleamed +kindly upon me through the pebbles of his gold-rimmed pince-nez. + +Indeed, despite his Eastern blood, he might have posed for a Sadler +picture, his small and refined features seeming out of place above the +bulky body. + +"Can you forgive my clumsiness?" I began. + +But the bishop raised his small, slim-fingered hand of old-ivory hue +deprecatingly. + +His system was supercharged with typhoid bacilli, and, as sometimes +occurs, the superfluous "bugs" had sought exit. He could only walk +with the aid of two stout sticks, and bent very much at that. His left +leg had been surgically scraped to the bone, and I appreciated the +exquisite torture to which my awkwardness had subjected him. But he +would entertain no apologies, pressing his inquiry respecting +Karamaneh, in the kindly manner which had made him so deservedly +popular on board. + +"Many thanks for your solicitude," I said; "I have promised her sound +repose to-night, and since my professional reputation is at stake, I +shall see that she secures it." + +In short, we were in pleasant company, and the day passed happily +enough and without notable event. Smith spent some considerable time +with the chief officer, wandering about unfrequented parts of the +ship. I learnt later that he had explored the lascars' quarters, the +forecastle, the engine-room, and had even descended to the stoke-hold; +but this was done so unostentatiously that it occasioned no comment. + +With the approach of evening, in place of that physical contentment +which usually heralds the dinner-hour, at sea, I experienced a fit of +the seemingly causeless apprehension which too often in the past had +harbingered the coming of grim events; which I had learnt to associate +with the nearing presence of one of Fu-Manchu's death-agents. In view +of the facts, as I afterwards knew them to be, I cannot account for +this. + +Yet, in an unexpected manner, my forebodings were realized. That night +I was destined to meet a sorrow surpassing any which my troubled life +had known. Even now I experience great difficulty in relating the +matters which befell, in speaking of the sense of irrevocable loss +which came to me. Briefly, then, at about ten minutes before the +dining hour, whilst all the passengers, myself included, were below, +dressing, a faint cry arose from somewhere aft on the upper deck--a +cry which was swiftly taken up by other voices, so that presently a +deck-steward echoed it immediately outside my own stateroom: + +"Man overboard! Man overboard!" + +All my premonitions rallying in that one sickening moment, I sprang +out on the deck, half dressed as I was, and leaping past the boat +which swung nearly opposite my door, craned over the rail, looking +astern. + +For a long time I could detect nothing unusual. The engine-room +telegraph was ringing--and the motion of the screws momentarily +ceased; then, in response to further ringing, recommenced, but so as +to jar the whole structure of the vessel; whereby I knew that the +engines were reversed. Peering intently into the wake of the ship, I +was but dimly aware of the ever-growing turmoil around me, of the +swift mustering of a boat's crew, of the shouted orders of the third +officer. Suddenly I saw it--the sight which was to haunt me for +succeeding days and nights. + +Half in the streak of the wake and half out of it, I perceived the +sleeve of a white jacket, and, near to it, a soft felt hat. The sleeve +rose up once into clear view, seemed to describe a half-circle in the +air, then sank back again into the glassy swell of the water. Only the +hat remained floating upon the surface. + +By the evidence of the white sleeve alone I might have remained +unconvinced, although upon the voyage I had become familiar enough +with the drill shooting-jacket, but the presence of the grey felt hat +was almost conclusive. + +The man overboard was Nayland Smith! + +I cannot hope, writing now, to convey in any words at my command, a +sense, even remote, of the utter loneliness which in that dreadful +moment closed coldly down upon me. + +To spring overboard to the rescue was a natural impulse, but to have +obeyed it would have been worse than quixotic. In the first place, the +drowning man was close upon half a mile astern; in the second place, +others had seen the hat and the white coat as clearly as I; among them +the third officer, standing upright in the stern of the boat--which, +with commendable promptitude, had already been swung into the water. +The steamer was being put about, describing a wide arc around the +little boat dancing on the deep blue rollers.... + +Of the next hour, I cannot bear to write at all. Long as I had known +him, I was ignorant of my friend's powers as a swimmer, but I judged +that he must have been a poor one from the fact that he had sunk so +rapidly in a calm sea. Except the hat, no trace of Nayland Smith +remained when the boat got to the spot. + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII + +THE MUMMY + + +Dinner was out of the question that night for all of us. Karamaneh, +who had spoken no word, but, grasping my hands, had looked into my +eyes--her own glassy with unshed tears--and then stolen away to her +cabin, had not since reappeared. Seated upon my berth, I stared +unseeingly before me, upon a changed ship, a changed sea and sky--upon +another world. The poor old Bishop, my neighbour, had glanced in +several times, as he hobbled by, and his spectacles were unmistakably +humid; but even he had vouchsafed no word, realizing that my sorrow +was too deep for such consolation. + +When at last I became capable of connected thought, I found myself +faced by a big problem. Should I place the facts of the matter, as I +knew them to be, before the Captain? or could I hope to apprehend +Fu-Manchu's servant by the methods suggested by my poor friend? That +Smith's death was an accident, I did not believe for a moment; it was +impossible not to link it with the attempt upon Karamaneh. In my +misery and doubt, I determined to take counsel with Dr. Stacey. I +stood up, and passed out on to the deck. + +Those passengers whom I met on my way to his room regarded me in +respectful silence. By contrast, Stacey's attitude surprised and even +annoyed me. + +"I'd be prepared to stake all I possess--although it's not much," he +said, "that this was not the work of your hidden enemy." + +He blankly refused to give me his reasons for the statement and +strongly advised me to watch and wait but to make no communication to +the Captain. + +At this hour I can look back and savour again something of the +profound dejection of that time. I could not face the passengers; I +even avoided Karamaneh and Aziz. I shut myself in my cabin and sat +staring aimlessly into the growing darkness. The steward knocked, +once, inquiring if I needed anything, but I dismissed him abruptly. So +I passed the evening and the greater part of the night. + +Those groups of promenaders who passed my door invariably were +discussing my poor friend's tragic end; but as the night wore on, the +deck grew empty, and I sat amid a silence that in my miserable state I +welcomed more than the presence of any friend, saving only the one +whom I should never welcome again. + +Since I had not counted the bells, to this day I have only the vaguest +idea respecting the time whereat the next incident occurred which it +is my duty to chronicle. Perhaps I was on the verge of falling asleep, +seated there as I was; at any rate, I could scarcely believe myself +awake, when, unheralded by any footsteps to indicate his coming, some +one who seemed to be crouching outside my stateroom, slightly raised +himself and peered in through the port-hole--which I had not troubled +to close. + +He must have been a fairly tall man to have looked in at all, and +although his features were indistinguishable in the darkness, his +outline, which was clearly perceptible against the white boat beyond, +was unfamiliar to me. He seemed to have a small and oddly swathed +head, and what I could make out of the gaunt neck and square shoulders +in some way suggested an unnatural thinness; in short, the smudgy +silhouette in the port-hole was weirdly like that of a _mummy_! + +For some moments I stared at the apparition; then, rousing myself from +the apathy into which I had sunk, I stood up very quickly and stepped +across the room. As I did so the figure vanished, and when I threw +open the door and looked out upon the deck ... the deck was wholly +untenanted! + +I realized at once that it would be useless, even had I chosen the +course, to seek confirmation of what I had seen from the officer on +the bridge: my own cabin, together with the one adjoining--that of the +Bishop--was not visible from the bridge. + +For some time I stood in my doorway, wondering in a disinterested +fashion which now I cannot explain, if the hidden enemy had revealed +himself to me, or if disordered imagination had played me a trick. +Later, I was destined to know the truth of the matter, but when at +last I fell into a troubled sleep, that night, I was still in some +doubt upon the point. + +My state of mind when I awakened on the following day was +indescribable; I found it difficult to doubt that Nayland Smith would +meet me on the way to the bath-room as usual, with the cracked briar +fuming between his teeth. I felt myself almost compelled to pass +around to his stateroom in order to convince myself that he was not +really there. The catastrophe was still unreal to me, and the world a +dream-world. Indeed, I retain scarcely any recollections of the +traffic of that day, or of the days that followed it until we reached +Port Said. + +Two things only made any striking appeal to my dulled intelligence at +that time. These were: the aloof attitude of Dr. Stacey, who seemed +carefully to avoid me; and a curious circumstance which the second +officer mentioned in conversation one evening as we strolled up and +down the main deck together. + +"Either I was fast asleep at my post, Dr. Petrie," he said, "or last +night, in the middle watch, someone or something came over the side of +the ship just aft the bridge, slipped across the deck, and +disappeared." + +I stared at him wonderingly. + +"Do you mean something that came up out of the sea?" I said. + +"Nothing could very well have come up out of the sea," he replied, +smiling slightly, "so that it must have come up from the deck below." + +"Was it a man?" + +"It looked like a man, and a fairly tall one, but he came and was gone +like a fish, and I saw no more of him up to the time I was relieved. +To tell you the truth, I did not report it because I thought I must +have been dozing; it's a dead slow watch, and the navigation on this +part of the run is child's play." + +I was on the point of telling him what I had seen myself, two evenings +before, but for some reason I refrained from doing so, although I +think, had I confided in him, he would have abandoned the idea that +what he had seen was phantasmal; for the pair of us could not very +well have been dreaming. Some malignant presence haunted the ship; I +could not doubt this; yet I remained passive, sunk in a lethargy of +sorrow. + +We were scheduled to reach Port Said at about eight o'clock in the +evening, but by reason of the delay occasioned so tragically, I learnt +that in all probability we should not arrive earlier than midnight, +whilst passengers would not go ashore until the following morning. +Karamaneh, who had been staring ahead all day, seeking a first glimpse +of her native land, was determined to remain up until the hour of our +arrival, but after dinner a notice was posted up stating that we +should not be in before two a.m. Even those passengers who were the +most enthusiastic thereupon determined to postpone, for a few hours, +their first glimpse of the land of the Pharaohs and even to forgo the +sight--one of the strangest and most interesting in the world--of Port +Said by night. + +For my own part, I confess that all the interest and hope with which I +had looked forward to our arrival had left me, and often I detected +tears in the eyes of Karamaneh; whereby I knew that the coldness in my +heart had manifested itself even to her. I had sustained the greatest +blow of my life, and not even the presence of so lovely a companion +could entirely recompense me for the loss of my dearest friend. + +The lights on the Egyptian shore were faintly visible when the last +group of stragglers on deck broke up. I had long since prevailed upon +Karamaneh to retire, and now, utterly sick at heart, I sought my own +stateroom, mechanically undressed, and turned in. + +It may, or may not be singular that I had neglected all precautions +since the night of the tragedy; I was not even conscious of a desire +to visit retribution upon our hidden enemy; in some strange fashion I +took it for granted that there would be no further attempts upon +Karamaneh, Aziz, or myself. I had not troubled to confirm Smith's +surmise respecting the closing of the port-holes; but I know now for a +fact that, whereas they had been closed from the time of our leaving +the Straits of Messina, to-night, in sight of the Egyptian coasts, the +regulation was relaxed again. I cannot say if this is usual, but that +it occurred on this ship is a fact to which I can testify--a fact to +which my attention was to be drawn dramatically. + +The night was steamingly hot, and because I welcomed the circumstance +that my own port was widely opened, I reflected that those on the +lower decks might be open also. A faint sense of danger stirred within +me; indeed, I sat upright and was about to spring out of my berth when +that occurred which induced me to change my mind. + +All passengers had long since retired, and a midnight silence +descended upon the ship, for we were not yet close enough to port for +any unusual activities to have commenced. + +Clearly outlined in the open port-hole there suddenly arose that same +grotesque silhouette which I had seen once before. + +Prompted by I know not what, I lay still and simulated heavy +breathing; for it was evident to me that I must be partly visible to +the watcher, so bright was the night. For ten--twenty--thirty seconds +he studied me in absolute silence, that gaunt thing so like a mummy; +and, my eyes partly closed, I watched him, breathing heavily all the +time. Then making no more noise than a cat, he moved away across the +deck, and I could judge of his height by the fact that his small +swathed head remained visible almost to the time that he passed to the +end of the white boat which swung opposite my stateroom. + +In a moment I slipped quietly to the floor, crossed and peered out of +the port-hole; so that at last I had a clear view of the sinister +mummy-man. He was crouching under the bow of the boat, and attaching +to the white rails, below, a contrivance of a kind with which I was +not entirely unfamiliar. This was a thin ladder of silken rope, having +bamboo rungs, with two metal hooks for attaching it to any suitable +object. + +The one thus engaged was, as Karamaneh had declared, almost +superhumanly thin. His loins were swathed in a sort of linen garment, +and his head so bound about, turban fashion, that only his gleaming +eyes remained visible. The bare limbs and body were of a dusky yellow +colour, and, at sight of him, I experienced a sudden nausea. + +My pistol was in my cabin-trunk, and to have found it in the dark, +without making a good deal of noise, would have been impossible. +Doubting how I should act, I stood watching the man with the swathed +head whilst he threw the end of the ladder over the side, crept past +the bow of the boat, and swung his gaunt body over the rail, +exhibiting the agility of an ape. One quick glance fore and aft he +gave, then began to swarm down the ladder; in which instant I knew his +mission. + +With a choking cry, which forced itself unwilled from my lips, I tore +at the door, threw it open, and sprang across the deck. Plans, I had +none, and since I carried no instrument wherewith to sever the ladder, +the murderer might indeed have carried out his design for all that I +could have done to prevent him, were it not that another took a hand +in the game.... + +At the moment that the mummy-man--his head now on a level with the +deck--perceived me, he stopped dead. Coincident with his stopping, the +crack of a pistol sounded--from immediately beyond the boat. + +Uttering a sort of sobbing sound, the creature fell--then clutched, +with straining yellow fingers, at the rails, and, seemingly by dint of +a great effort, swarmed along aft some twenty feet, with incredible +swiftness and agility, and clambered on to the deck. + +A second shot cracked sharply; and a voice (God, was I mad?) cried: +"Hold him, Petrie!" + +Rigid with fearful astonishment I stood, as out from the boat above me +leapt a figure attired solely in shirt and trousers. The new-comer +leapt away in the wake of the mummy-man--who had vanished around the +corner by the smokeroom. Over his shoulder he cried back at me: + +"The Bishop's stateroom! See that no one enters!" + +I clutched at my head--which seemed to be fiery hot; I realized, in my +own person, the sensations of one who knows himself mad. + +For the man who pursued the mummy was _Nayland Smith_! + + * * * * * + +I stood in the Bishop's stateroom, Nayland Smith, his gaunt face wet +with perspiration, beside me, handling certain odd-looking objects +which littered the place, and lay about amid the discarded garments of +the absent cleric. + +"Pneumatic pads!" he snapped. "The man was a walking air-cushion!" He +gingerly fingered two strange rubber appliances. "For distending the +cheeks," he muttered, dropping them disgustedly on the floor. "His +hands and wrists betrayed him, Petrie. He wore his cuffs unusually +long but could not entirely hide his bony wrists. To have watched him, +whilst remaining myself unseen, was next to impossible; hence my +device of tossing a dummy overboard, calculated to float for less than +ten minutes! It actually floated nearly fifteen, as a matter of fact, +and I had some horrible moments!" + +"Smith!" I said, "how could you submit me ...?" + +He clapped his hands on my shoulders. + +"My dear old chap--there was no other way, believe me. From that boat +I could see right into his stateroom, but, once in, I dare not leave +it--except late at night, stealthily! The second spotted me one night +and I thought the game was up, but evidently he didn't report it." + +"But you might have confided...." + +"Impossible! I'll admit I nearly fell to the temptation that first +night; for I could see into your room as well as into his!" He slapped +me boisterously on the back, but his grey eyes were suspiciously +moist. "Dear old Petrie! Thank God for our friends! But you'd be the +first to admit, old man, that you're a dead poor actor! Your portrayal +of grief for the loss of a valued chum would not have convinced a soul +on board! + +"Therefore I made use of Stacey, whose callous attitude was less +remarkable. Gad, Petrie! I nearly bagged our man the first night! The +elaborate plan--Marconi message to get you out of the way, and so +forth--had miscarried, and he knew the port-hole trick would be +useless once we got into the open sea. He took a big chance. He +discarded his clerical guise and peeped into your room--you +remember?--but you were awake, and I made no move when he slipped back +to his own cabin; I wanted to take him red-handed." + +"Have you any idea ...?" + +"Who he is? No more than _where_ he is! Probably some creature of Dr. +Fu-Manchu specially chosen for the purpose; obviously a man of +culture, and probably of thug ancestry. I hit him--in the shoulder; +but even then he ran like a hare. We've searched the ship, without +result. He may have gone overboard and chanced the swim to shore...." + +We stepped out on to the deck. Around us was that unforgettable +scene--Port Said by night. The ship was barely moving through the +glassy water, now. Smith took my arm and we walked forward. Above us +was the mighty peace of Egypt's sky ablaze with splendour; around and +about us moved the unique turmoil of the clearing-house of the Near +East. + +"I would give much to know the real identity of the Bishop of +Damascus," muttered Smith. + +He stopped abruptly, snapping his teeth together and grasping my arm +as in a vice. Hard upon his words had followed the rattling clangour +as the great anchor was let go; but horribly intermingled with the +metallic roar there came to us such a fearful inarticulate shrieking +as to chill one's heart. + +The anchor plunged into the water of the harbour; the shrieking +ceased. Smith turned to me, and his face was tragic in the light of +the arc lamp swung hard by. + +"We shall never know," he whispered. "God forgive him--he must be in +bloody tatters now. Petrie, the poor fool was hiding in the +_chain-locker!_" + +A little hand stole into mine. I turned quickly. Karamaneh stood +beside me. I placed my arm about her shoulders, drawing her close; and +I blush to relate that all else was forgotten. + +For a moment, heedless of the fearful turmoil forward, Nayland Smith +stood looking at us. Then he turned, with his rare smile, and walked +aft. + +"Perhaps you're right, Petrie!" he said. + + * * * * * + + + + +Uniform with this Volume + + +36 De Profundis Oscar Wilde + +37 Lord Arthur Savile's Crime Oscar Wilde + +38 Selected Poems Oscar Wilde + +39 An Ideal Husband Oscar Wilde + +40 Intentions Oscar Wilde + +41 Lady Windermere's Fan Oscar Wilde + +77 Selected Prose Oscar Wilde + +85 The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde + +146 A Woman of No Importance Oscar Wilde + +43 Harvest Home E. V. Lucas + +44 A Little of Everything E. V. Lucas + +78 The Best of Lamb E. V. Lucas + +141 Variety Lane E. V. Lucas + +292 Mixed Vintages E. V. Lucas + +45 Vailima Letters Robert Louis Stevenson + +80 Selected Letters Robert Louis Stevenson + +46 Hills and the Sea Hilaire Belloc + +96 A Picked Company Hilaire Belloc + +193 On Nothing Hilaire Belloc + +226 On Everything Hilaire Belloc + +254 On Something Hilaire Belloc + +47 The Blue Bird Maurice Maeterlinck + +214 Select Essays Maurice Maeterlinck + +50 Charles Dickens G. K. Chesterton + +94 All Things Considered G. K. Chesterton + +346 Tremendous Trifles G. K. Chesterton + +54 The Life of John Ruskin W. G. Collingwood + +57 Sevastopol and other Stories Leo Tolstoy + +91 Social Evils and their Remedy Leo Tolstoy + +223 Two Generations Leo Tolstoy + +253 My Childhood and Boyhood Leo Tolstoy + +286 My Youth Leo Tolstoy + +58 The Lore of the Honey-Bee Tickner Edwardes + +63 Oscar Wilde Arthur Ransome + +64 The Vicar of Morwenstow S. Baring-Gould + +76 Home Life in France M. Betham-Edwards + +83 Reason and Belief Sir Oliver Lodge + +93 The Substance of Faith Sir Oliver Lodge + +116 The Survival of Man Sir Oliver Lodge + +284 Modern Problems Sir Oliver Lodge + +95 The Mirror of the Sea Joseph Conrad + +126 Science from an Easy Chair Sir Ray Lankester + +326 More Science from an Easy Chair Sir Ray Lankester + +149 A Shepherd's Life W. H. Hudson + +200 Jane Austen and her Times G. E. Mitton + +218 R. L. S. Francis Watt + +285 The Old Time Parson P. H. Ditchfield + +287 The Customs of Old England F. J. Snell + +71 The Gates of Wrath Arnold Bennett + +81 The Card Arnold Bennett + +125 The Regent Arnold Bennett + +288 A Great Man Arnold Bennett + +316 Whom God Hath Joined Arnold Bennett + +355 A Man from the North Arnold Bennett + +4 Spanish Gold G. A. Birmingham + +87 Lalage's Lovers G. A. Birmingham + +108 The Adventures of Dr. Whitty G. A. Birmingham + +349 The Island Mystery G. A. Birmingham + +296 William, by the Grace of God Marjorie Bowen + +342 Jean of the Lazy A B. M. Bower + +261 Tarzan of the Apes Edgar Rice Burroughs + +304 The Return of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +368 The Beasts of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +382 The Son of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +383 Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar Edgar Rice Burroughs + +384 Jungle Tales of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs + +385 A Princess of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs + +392 The Gods of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs + +393 The Warlord of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs + +315 The Flying Inn G. K. Chesterton + +212 Under Western Eyes Joseph Conrad + +325 A Set of Six Joseph Conrad + +143 Sandy Married Dorothea Conyers + +1 The Mighty Atom Marie Corelli + +2 Jane Marie Corelli + +3 Boy Marie Corelli + +231 Cameos Marie Corelli + +336 The O'Ruddy Stephen Crane and + Robert Barr + +18 Round the Red Lamp Sir A. Conan Doyle + +332 Rachel Jane H. Findlater + +396 Tongues of Conscience Robert Hichens + +20 Light Freights W. W. Jacobs + +92 White Fang Jack London + +374 Ninety-six Hours' Leave Stephen McKenna + +389 The Sixth Sense Stephen McKenna + +330 The Fortune of Christina McNab S. Macnaughtan + +303 The Carissima Lucas Malet + +391 Clementina A. E. W. Mason + +289 The Rest Cure W. B. Maxwell + +334 Bellamy Elinor Mordaunt + +215 Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo E. Phillips Oppenheim + +295 The Hillman E. Phillips Oppenheim + +276 Mary All-alone John Oxenham + +329 '1914' John Oxenham + +399 The Closed Book Wm. Le Queux + +113 Lavender and Old Lace Myrtle Reed + +135 A Spinner in the Sun Myrtle Reed + +343 The Shadow of Victory Myrtle Reed + +137 The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu Sax Rohmer + +290 The Devil Doctor Sax Rohmer + +293 The Si-Fan Mysteries Sax Rohmer + +352 Tales of Secret Egypt Sax Rohmer + +388 The Orchard of Tears Sax Rohmer + +395 The Golden Scorpion Sax Rohmer + +229 My Friend the Chauffeur C. N. and A. M. Williamson + +279 The War Wedding C. N. and A. M. Williamson + +344 This Woman to this Man C. N. and A. M. Williamson + +9 The Unofficial Honeymoon Dolf Wyllarde + +A short Selection only. + + * * * * * + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Devil Doctor, by Sax Rohmer + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE DEVIL DOCTOR *** + +***** This file should be named 19142.txt or 19142.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/1/4/19142/ + +Produced by David Clarke, Sankar Viswanathan, and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License (available with this file or online at +http://gutenberg.org/license). + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH F3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS' WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTIBILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need, is critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation web page at http://www.pglaf.org. + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Its 501(c)(3) letter is posted at +http://pglaf.org/fundraising. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at +809 North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887, email +business@pglaf.org. Email contact links and up to date contact +information can be found at the Foundation's web site and official +page at http://pglaf.org + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit http://pglaf.org + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: http://pglaf.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart is the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For thirty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/19142.zip b/19142.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..1d69101 --- /dev/null +++ b/19142.zip diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..06436b8 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #19142 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/19142) |