CHAPTER XV. BEWITCHMENT
"You say you have two items of news for me?" said Nayland Smith, lookingacross the breakfast table to where Inspector Weymouth sat sippingcoffee.
"There are two points--yes," replied the Scotland Yard man, whilst Smithpaused, 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 inthe East End."
"How can you be sure of that?"
"For two reasons. In the first place, that district must now be too hotto hold Dr. Fu-Manchu; in the second place, we have just completed ahouse-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, wereconfined for a time--"
"Yes?" snapped Smith, attacking his egg.
"Well," continued the inspector, "it is all deserted, now. There is notthe slightest doubt that the Chinaman has fled to some other abode. I amcertain of it. My second piece of news will interest you very much, I amsure. You were taken to the establishment of the Chinaman, Shen-Yan, bya certain ex-officer of New York Police--Burke..."
"Good God!" cried Smith, looking up with a start; "I thought they hadhim!"
"So did I," replied Weymouth grimly; "but they haven't! He got away inthe confusion following the raid, and has been hiding ever since with acousin, a nurseryman out Upminster way..."
"Hiding?" snapped Smith.
"Exactly--hiding. He has been afraid to stir ever since, and hasscarcely shown his nose outside the door. He says he is watched nightand 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 constantsurveillance that he came away secretly, hidden under the boxes of amarket-wagon. He landed at Covent Garden in the early hours of thismorning 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 thathe 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 Burkeseems to think that you are a more likely market than the policeauthorities."
"I see," snapped Smith. "He wants to see me?"
"He wants you to go and see him," was the reply. "I think he anticipatesthat 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 shortconversation one day, over the fence which divides his cousin's flowerplantations from the lane adjoining."
"Gipsy girl!" I whispered, glancing rapidly at Smith.
"I think you are right, Doctor," said Weymouth with his slow smile; "itwas Karamaneh. She asked him the way to somewhere or other and got himto write it upon a loose page of his notebook, so that she should notforget it."
"You hear that, Petrie?" rapped Smith.
"I hear it," I replied, "but I don't see any special significance in thefact."
"I do!" rapped Smith; "I didn't sit up the greater part of last nightthrashing my weary brains for nothing! But I am going to the BritishMuseum 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! younever 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 reallypossesses information inimical to the safety of Fu-Manchu, he can onlyescape doom by means of a miracle similar to that which has hithertoprotected you and me."
"Burke insists," said Weymouth at this point, "that something comesalmost every night after dusk, slinking about the house--it's an oldfarmhouse, I understand; and on two or three occasions he has beenawakened (fortunately for him he is a light sleeper) by sounds ofcoughing immediately outside his window. He is a man who sleeps with apistol 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 tilesof the roof, which slopes up to his room, into the flower beds below..."
"Creature!" said Smith, his gray eyes ablaze now--"you said creature!"
"I used the word deliberately," replied Weymouth, "because Burke seemsto 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 wouldprobably employ his hands as well as his feet."
"Quite so," agreed the inspector. "I am merely reporting the impressionof Burke."
"Has he heard no other sound?" rapped Smith; "one like the cracking ofdry 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, "hasremained behind at Covent Garden and will return late this afternoon.I propose that you and I, Mr. Smith, imitate Burke and ride down toUpminster under the empty boxes!"
Nayland Smith stood up, leaving his breakfast half finished, and beganto wander up and down the room, reflectively tugging at his ear. Then hebegan to fumble in the pockets of his dressing-gown and finally producedthe inevitable pipe, dilapidated pouch, and box of safety matches. Hebegan to load the much-charred agent of reflection.
"Do I understand that Burke is actually too afraid to go out openly evenin daylight?" he asked suddenly.
"He has not hitherto left his cousin's plantations at all," repliedWeymouth. "He seems to think that openly to communicate with theauthorities, or with you, would be to seal his death warrant."
"He's right," snapped Smith.
"Therefore he came and returned secretly," continued the inspector; "andif 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 theinterior for us, will be drawn up outside the office of Messrs. Pikeand 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 thejourney."
The speaker glanced in my direction interrogatively.
"Include me in the program," I said. "Will there be room in the wagon?"
"Certainly," was the reply; "it is most commodious, but I cannotguarantee its comfort."
Nayland Smith promenaded the room, unceasingly, and presently he walkedout altogether, only to return ere the inspector and I had had time toexchange more than a glance of surprise, carrying a brass ash-tray. Heplaced 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 manifestingconsiderable repugnance--in touching it at all. Smith and I watchedhim in silence, and, finally, placing the tray again upon the table, helooked 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 certainresemblance--yes. But"--he had been wearing a silk scarf about histhroat and now he unwrapped it--"did you ever see a water rat that couldmake 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 thenight. At the conclusion of the story:
"By heaven!" whispered Weymouth, "the thing on the roof--the coughingthing that goes on all fours, seen by Burke..."
"My own idea exactly!" cried Smith...
"Fu-Manchu," I said excitedly, "has b
rought some new, some dreadfulcreature, from Burma..."
"No, Petrie," snapped Smith, turning upon me suddenly. "Not fromBurma--from Abyssinia."
That day was destined to be an eventful one; a day never to be forgottenby any of us concerned in those happenings which I have to record. Earlyin the morning Nayland Smith set off for the British Museum topursue his mysterious investigations, and having performed my briefprofessional round (for, as Nayland Smith had remarked on one occasion,this was a beastly healthy district), I found, having made the necessaryarrangements, that, with over three hours to spare, I had nothing tooccupy my time until the appointment in Covent Garden Market. My lonelylunch completed, a restless fit seized me, and I felt unable to remainlonger in the house. Inspired by this restlessness, I attired myselffor the adventure of the evening, not neglecting to place a pistol inmy pocket, and, walking to the neighboring Tube station, I booked toCharing Cross, and presently found myself rambling aimlessly along thecrowded streets. Led on by what link of memory I know not, I presentlydrifted into New Oxford Street, and looked up with a start--to learnthat I stood before the shop of a second-hand book-seller where once twoyears before I had met Karamaneh.
The thoughts conjured up at that moment were almost too bitter to beborne, and without so much as glancing at the books displayed for sale,I crossed the roadway, entered Museum Street, and, rather in order todistract my mind than because I contemplated any purchase, began toexamine the Oriental Pottery, Egyptian statuettes, Indian armor, andother curios, displayed in the window of an antique dealer.
But, strive as I would to concentrate my mind upon the objects in thewindow, my memories persistently haunted me, and haunted me to theexclusion even of the actualities. The crowds thronging the Pavement,the traffic in New Oxford Street, swept past unheeded; my eyes sawnothing of pot nor statuette, but only met, in a misty imaginativeworld, the glance of two other eyes--the dark and beautiful eyes ofKaramaneh. In the exquisite tinting of a Chinese vase dimly perceptiblein the background of the shop, I perceived only the blushing cheeksof Karamaneh; her face rose up, a taunting phantom, from out of thedarkness between a hideous, gilded idol and an Indian sandalwood screen.
I strove to dispel this obsessing thought, resolutely fixing myattention upon a tall Etruscan vase in the corner of the window, near tothe shop door. Was I losing my senses indeed? A doubt of my own sanitymomentarily possessed me. For, struggle as I would to dispel theillusion--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 thepassers-by; but of this I cannot be certain, for all my attention wascentered upon that phantasmal face, with the cloudy hair, slightlyparted red lips, and the brilliant dark eyes which looked into mine outof the shadows of the shop.
It was bewildering--it was uncanny; for, delusion or verity, the glamourprevailed. I exerted a great mental effort, stepped to the door, turnedthe handle, and entered the shop with as great a show of composure as Icould muster.
A curtain draped in a little door at the back of one counter swayedslightly, with no greater violence than may have been occasioned bythe draught. But I fixed my eyes upon this swaying curtain almostfiercely... as an impassive half-caste of some kind who appeared to be astrange cross between a Graeco-Hebrew and a Japanese, entered and quiteunemotionally 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 secondslight 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 eyebrowsever 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 othertime."
I turned and quitted the shop abruptly. Either I was mad, or Karamanehwas concealed somewhere therein.
However, realizing my helplessness in the matter, I contented myselfwith making a mental note of the name which appeared above theestablishment--J. Salaman--and walked on, my mind in a chaotic conditionand my heart beating with unusual rapidity.