President Fu-Manchu (19 page)

“What! On the booze, on a night like this?”

“I don’t suggest it. But, anyway, he is perfectly all right now.”

“Ask him to step right in here,” roared Harvey Bragg, his voice booming around the study. “I want a few words with Herman.”

“Cutting it rather fine. But if you insist…”

“I do insist.”

He cursed under his breath as Salvaletti went out, turned and stared angrily at Moya Adair; her calm aloofness maddened him.

“Something blasted funny going on,” he growled. “And, I guess, Miss Breon, you know all about it.”

“I know no more than you know, Mr. Bragg. I can only ask you in your own interests to remember—”

“The coaching! Sure I’ll remember it. I’m in up to the eyebrows. But after tonight, I climb out!”

The door was thrown open, and Herman Grosset burst in. His eyes were wild as he looked from face to face.

“Harvey,” he said hoarsely, “I’m real sorry. You won’t believe me, but I’ve been dead sober all day. I guess it must be blood pressure, or maybe incipient insanity. It’s in the family, isn’t it, Harvey? Listen”—he met the angry glare: “Don’t talk yet—give
me
a word. I got a funny phone message more than an hour back. I thought it needed investigation. But hell burn me! That’s all I can remember about it!”

“What do you mean?” growled Harvey Bragg.

“I mean I don’t know what happened from the time I got that message which I can’t remember—up to five minutes ago, when I found myself sitting on a chair down in the vestibule feeling darn sleepy and wondering where in hell I’d been.”

“You’re a drunken sot!” Harvey Bragg bawled. “That’s what you are—a drunken sot. You’ve been soused all afternoon. And this is the damn-fool story you think you can pull on me. Get out to the cars; we’re late already.”

“I don’t like your words,” said Herman Grosset truculently. “They ain’t just, and they ain’t right.”

“Right or wrong—get out!” yelled Harvey Bragg. “Get on with your job. I have to get on with mine…”

Two minutes later a trio of powerful cars roared down Park Avenue bound for Carnegie Hall. In the first were four armed bodyguards; in the second Harvey Bragg and Salvaletti; in the third, three more guards and Herman Grosset.

“Bluebeard” was well protected.

* * *

In Nayland Smith’s temporary office in Carnegie Hall silence, vibrant with unspoken thoughts, had fallen.

Maurice Norbert had just ceased speaking. He stood looking smilingly from face to face. Nayland Smith, seated on the edge of the desk, lean brown hands clutching one upraised knee, watched him unflinchingly. Sarah Lakin’s steady grave eyes were fixed upon him also.

Senator Lockly, one of Orwin Prescott’s most fervent supporters, had joined the party, and his red, good-humored face now registered bewilderment and doubt. Nayland Smith broke the silence.

“Your explanation, Mr. Norbert,” he rapped, “presents certain curious features into which at the moment we have no opportunity to inquire. We are to understand that Dr. Prescott communicated with you roughly at the same time that he communicated with Miss Lakin, and gave you certain instructions which you carried out. These necessitated your meeting a car at an agreed point and being driven to an unknown destination, where you found Dr. Prescott receiving medical attention under the care of a physician whom you did not meet?”

“Exactly.”

Maurice Norbert continued to smile.

“You had been instructed, to take a suit-case and other items, and we are to understand that Dr. Prescott has come to some arrangement with those responsible for his disappearance whereby he will be present here, tonight?”

“Exactly,” Maurice Norbert repeated.

Sarah Lakin continued fixedly to watch Norbert, but she did not speak. Senator Lockly cleared his throat and:

“I don’t understand,” he declared, “why, having found him, you left him. It seems to me there’s no guarantee even now that he will arrive.”

“One of the curious features,” rapped Nayland Smith, standing up and beginning to pace the floor, “to which I referred…” He turned suddenly, facing Norbert. “I don’t entirely understand your place in this matter, Mr. Norbert. And I believe”—glancing aside—“that Miss Lakin shares my doubts.”

“I do,” Sarah Lakin replied in her deep, calm voice.

“Forgive me”—Norbert bowed to the speaker—“but in this hour of crisis we are naturally over-wrought, every one of us. It isn’t personal, it’s national. These facts will wear a different complexion tomorrow. But accept my assurance, everybody, that Dr. Prescott will be here.” He glanced at his wrist-watch. “In fact, I must go down to meet him. I beg that you will do as I have asked. Senator, will you join me. He has requested that we shall be with him on the platform.”

Senator Lockly looked rather helplessly from Sarah Lakin to Nayland Smith, and then followed Norbert out of the office. As the door closed behind them:

“How long employed by Dr. Prescott?” rapped Nayland Smith.

“Maurice Norbert,” Sarah Lakin replied, “has been in my cousin’s service for rather more than a year.”

“Hepburn has been checking up on him. It has proved difficult, but we expect all the details tomorrow.”

At which moment the door was thrown open again, and the Abbot of Holy Thorn, wearing the dress of a simple priest, stepped into the office!

The bearded face of Mark Hepburn might have been glimpsed over his left shoulder. Nayland Smith sprang forward.

“Dom Patrick Donegal!” he cried, “thank God I see you here—and safe!”

Mark Hepburn came in and closed the door.

“My experiences, Mr. Smith,” the abbot replied calmly, “on my journey to the city, have convinced me that I have incurred certain dangers.” He smiled and gripped the outstretched hand. “But I think I warned you that I am a prisoner hard to hold. It is my plain duty in this crisis, since I am denied the use of the air, to be here in person.”

“One of our patrol cars,” said Hepburn dryly, “picked up the abbot twenty minutes ago and brought him here under escort. I may add… that the escort was necessary.”

“That is quite true,” the priest admitted. “A very tough-looking party in a Cadillac had been following me for several miles. But”—he ceased to smile and assumed by a spiritual gesture the role of his Church—“I have achieved my purpose. If I am to consider myself technically under arrest I must nevertheless insist, Mr. Smith, upon one thing… Failing the appearance of my friend, Orwin Prescott, I shall confront Harvey Bragg tonight.”

A sound resembling an approaching storm made itself audible. Mark Hepburn nodded to Nayland Smith and went out. Sarah Lakin stood up, her grave calm ruffled at last. Smith stepped to the doorway and stared along the corridor.

The sound grew louder—it was the cheering of thousands of voices. Dimly the strains of a military band were heard. Mark Hepburn came running back.

“Dr. Prescott is on the platform!” he cried, completely lifted out of himself by the excitement of the moment. “Harvey Bragg has just arrived…”

* * *

The classic debate which the Moving Finger was writing into American history took place in an atmosphere of tension unequalled in the memory of anyone present. After the event there were many who recalled significant features: as, for instance, that Harvey Bragg used notes, his custom being to speak extemporaneously (if in the mood, for many hours). Also, that he frequently glanced in the direction of his secretary, Salvaletti, who seemed at times to be prompting him.

Hidden from the audience, Dom Patrick Donegal looked on; at the wordy duel. And, helpless now to intervene, he realized, as everyone in that vast gathering realized, that Dr. Orwin Prescott was a beaten man.

As oratory, his performance was perhaps the finest in his career; his beautiful voice, his scholarship, put to shame the coarse bellowing and lamentable historical ignorance of his opponent. But in almost every sentence he played into the hands of Harvey Bragg; he fell into traps that a child could have avoided. With dignity, assurance, perfect elocution, he made statements which even the kindest critic must have branded as those of a fool.

At times it seemed that he was conscious of this. More than once he raised his hand to his forehead as if to collect his thoughts, and especially it was noticed that points raised in response to the apparent promptings of Salvaletti resulted in disaster for Dr. Orwin Prescott.

His keenest supporters lost heart. It appeared long before the debate was ended that Harvey Bragg offered the country prosperity. Dr. Prescott had nothing to offer but beautifully phrased sentences.

And the greatest orator in the United States, the Abbot of Holy Thorn, dumbly listened—looked on! while his friend Orwin Prescott, with every word that he uttered, broke down the fine reputation which laboriously and honorably he had built up.

It was the triumph of “Bluebeard.”

* * *

In that book-lined room high above New York, where sometimes incense was burned, Dr. Fu-Manchu sat behind the lacquered table.

The debate at Carnegie Hall was being broadcast from coast to coast. Robed in yellow, his mandarin’s cap upon his head, he sat listening. Reflected light from the green-shaded table-lamp enhanced his uncanny resemblance to the Pharaoh Seti I; for the eyes of Dr. Fu-Manchu were closed as he listened.

His hands, stretched out upon the table before him, had remained quite motionless as Orwin Prescott became involved more deeply in the net cunningly spread for him by Harvey Bragg. Only at times, when the latter hesitated, fumbled for words, would the long pointed nails tap lightly upon the polished surface.

On three occasions during this memorable debate an amber point came to life on the switchboard.

Without in any way allowing his attention to be distracted, Dr. Fu-Manchu listened to reports from the man of miraculous memory. These all related to Numbers detailed to intercept Abbot Donegal. The third and last induced a slight tapping of long nails upon the lacquered surface. It was a report to the effect that a government patrol had rescued the abbot (picked up at last within a few miles of New York) from a Z-car which had been tracking him…

The meeting concluded with wildly unrestrained cheers for Harvey Bragg. In that one hour he had advanced many marches nearer to the White House. Politically he had obliterated the only really formidable opponent who remained in the field. Except for the silent Abbot of Holy Thorn, the future of the United States now lay between the old régime and Harvey Bragg.

Deafening cheers were still ringing throughout Carnegie Hall when Dr. Fu-Manchu disconnected. Silence fell in that small book-lined room distant from the scene of conflict. Bony fingers opened the silver box: Fu-Manchu sought the inspiration of opium…

Orwin Prescott, bewildered, even now not understanding that he had wiped himself off the political map, that he was committed to fatal statements which he could never recall, dropped down into an armchair in Nayland Smith’s office, closed his eyes and buried his face in his hands.

Sarah Lakin crossed and sat beside him. Senator Lockly had disappeared. Nayland Smith glanced at Mark Hepburn, and they went out together. In the corridor:

“Where is Abbot Donegal?” said Nayland Smith.

“In care of Lieutenant Johnson,” Hepburn answered dryly. “Johnson won’t make a second mistake. Abbot Donegal stays until he has your permission to leave.”

“Orwin Prescott was either drugged or hypnotized, or both,” rapped Nayland Smith. “It’s the most damnably cunning thing Fu-Manchu has ever done. With one stroke tonight, he has put the game into Harvey Bragg’s hands.”

“I know.” Mark Hepburn ran his fingers through his disheveled hair. “It was pathetic to listen to, and impossible to watch. Abbot Donegal was just quivering. Sir Denis! this man is a magician! I begin to despair.”

Nayland Smith suddenly grabbed his arm as they walked along the corridor.

“Don’t despair,” he snapped, “yet! There’s more to come.”

They had begun to descend to the floor below when Harvey Bragg, flushed with triumph, already tasting the sweets of dictatorship, the cheers of that vast gathering echoing in his ears, came out into a small lobby packed with privileged visitors and newspapermen.

His bodyguard, as tough a bunch as any man had ever collected in the United States, followed him in. Paul Salvaletti walked beside him.

“Folks!” Bragg cried, “I know just how you feel.” He struck his favorite pose, arms raised. “You’re all breathing the air of a new and better America… That’s just how I feel! Another obstacle to national happiness is swept away. Folks! there’s no plan but my plan. At last we are getting near to the first ideal form of government America has ever known.”

“Which any country has ever known,” said Salvaletti, his clear, musical voice audible above the uproar. “America, Africa, Europe—or Asia.”

As he spoke the word
Asia
, Herman Grosset, hitherto flushed with excitement, suddenly became deathly pale. His eyes glared, foam appeared at the corners of his mouth. With that lightning movement which no man of the bodyguard could equal, he snatched an automatic from his pocket, sprang forward and shot Harvey Bragg twice through the heart…

There was a moment of dazed silence; a sound resembling a moan. Then the faithful bodyguard, one second too late, almost literally made a sieve with their bullets of Herman Grosset.

He died before the man he had assassinated. Riddled with lead, he crashed to the floor of the lobby as Harvey Bragg collapsed in the arms of Salvaletti.

“Herman! my God!
Herman!
” were Bragg’s dying words.