The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu (3 page)

"But, Smith, this is almost incredible! What perverted genius
controls this awful secret movement?"

"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, with all the resources, if you will, of a wealthy
government-which, however, already has denied all knowledge of his
existence. Imagine that awful being, and you have a mental picture
of Dr. Fu-Manchu, the yellow peril incarnate in one man."

I sank into an arm-chair in my rooms and gulped down a strong
peg of brandy.

"We have been followed here," I said. "Why did you make no
attempt to throw the pursuers off the track, to have them
intercepted?"

Smith laughed.

"Useless, in the first place. Wherever we went, HE would find
us. And of what use to arrest his creatures? We could prove nothing
against them. Further, it is evident that an attempt is to be made
upon my life to-night-and by the same means that proved so
successful in the case of poor Sir Crichton."

His square jaw grew truculently prominent, and he leapt stormily
to his feet, shaking his clenched fists towards the window.

"The villain!" he cried. "The fiendishly clever villain! I
suspected that Sir Crichton was next, and I was right. But I came
too late, Petrie! That hits me hard, old man. To think that I knew
and yet failed to save him!"

He resumed his seat, smoking hard.

"Fu-Manchu has made the blunder common to all men of unusual
genius," he said. "He has underrated his adversary. He has not
given me credit for perceiving the meaning of the scented messages.
He has thrown away one powerful weapon-to get such a message into
my hands-and he thinks that once safe within doors, I shall sleep,
unsuspecting, and die as Sir Crichton died. But without the
indiscretion of your charming friend, I should have known what to
expect when I receive her 'information'-which by the way, consists
of a blank sheet of paper."

"Smith," I broke in, "who is she?"

"She is either Fu-Manchu's daughter, his wife, or his slave. I
am inclined to believe the last, for she has no will but his will,
except"-with a quizzical glance-"in a certain instance."

"How can you jest with some awful thing-Heaven knows
what-hanging over your head? What is the meaning of these perfumed
envelopes? How did Sir Crichton die?"

"He died of the Zayat Kiss. Ask me what that is and I reply 'I
do not know.' The zayats are the Burmese caravanserais, or
rest-houses. Along a certain route-upon which I set eyes, for the
first and only time, upon Dr. Fu-Manchu-travelers who use them
sometimes die as Sir Crichton died, with nothing to show the cause
of death but a little mark upon the neck, face, or limb, which has
earned, in those parts, the title of the 'Zayat Kiss.' The
rest-houses along that route are shunned now. I have my theory and
I hope to prove it to-night, if I live. It will be one more broken
weapon in his fiendish armory, and it is thus, and thus only, that
I can hope to crush him. This was my principal reason for not
enlightening Dr. Cleeve. Even walls have ears where Fu-Manchu is
concerned, so I feigned ignorance of the meaning of the mark,
knowing that he would be almost certain to employ the same methods
upon some other victim. I wanted an opportunity to study the Zayat
Kiss in operation, and I shall have one."

"But the scented envelopes?"

"In the swampy forests of the district I have referred to a rare
species of orchid, almost green, and with a peculiar scent, is
sometimes met with. I recognized the heavy perfume at once. I take
it that the thing which kills the traveler is attracted by this
orchid. You will notice that the perfume clings to whatever it
touches. I doubt if it can be washed off in the ordinary way. After
at least one unsuccessful attempt to kill Sir Crichton-you recall
that he thought there was something concealed in his study on a
previous occasion?-Fu-Manchu hit upon the perfumed envelopes. He
may have a supply of these green orchids in his possession-possibly
to feed the creature."

"What creature? How could any kind of creature have got into Sir
Crichton's room tonight?"

"You no doubt observed that I examined the grate of the study. I
found a fair quantity of fallen soot. I at once assumed, since it
appeared to be the only means of entrance, that something has been
dropped down; and I took it for granted that the thing, whatever it
was, must still be concealed either in the study or in the library.
But when I had obtained the evidence of the groom, Wills, I
perceived that the cry from the lane or from the park was a signal.
I noted that the movements of anyone seated at the study table were
visible, in shadow, on the blind, and that the study occupied the
corner of a two-storied wing and, therefore, had a short chimney.
What did the signal mean? That Sir Crichton had leaped up from his
chair, and either had received the Zayat Kiss or had seen the thing
which someone on the roof had lowered down the straight chimney. It
was the signal to withdraw that deadly thing. By means of the iron
stairway at the rear of Major-General Platt-Houston's, I quite
easily, gained access to the roof above Sir Crichton's study-and I
found this."

Out from his pocket Nayland Smith drew a tangled piece of silk,
mixed up with which were a brass ring and a number of unusually
large-sized split-shot, nipped on in the manner usual on a
fishing-line.

"My theory proven," he resumed. "Not anticipating a search on
the roof, they had been careless. This was to weight the line and
to prevent the creature clinging to the walls of the chimney.
Directly it had dropped in the grate, however, by means of this
ring I assume that the weighted line was withdrawn, and the thing
was only held by one slender thread, which sufficed, though, to
draw it back again when it had done its work. It might have got
tangled, of course, but they reckoned on its making straight up the
carved leg of the writing-table for the prepared envelope. From
there to the hand of Sir Crichton-which, from having touched the
envelope, would also be scented with the perfume-was a certain
move."

"My God! How horrible!" I exclaimed, and glanced apprehensively
into the dusky shadows of the room. "What is your theory respecting
this creature-what shape, what color-?"

"It is something that moves rapidly and silently. I will venture
no more at present, but I think it works in the dark. The study was
dark, remember, save for the bright patch beneath the reading-lamp.
I have observed that the rear of this house is ivy-covered right up
to and above your bedroom. Let us make ostentatious preparations to
retire, and I think we may rely upon Fu-Manchu's servants to
attempt my removal, at any rate-if not yours."

"But, my dear fellow, it is a climb of thirty-five feet at the
very least."

"You remember the cry in the back lane? It suggested something
to me, and I tested my idea-successfully. It was the cry of a
dacoit. Oh, dacoity, though quiescent, is by no means extinct.
Fu-Manchu has dacoits in his train, and probably it is one who
operates the Zayat Kiss, since it was a dacoit who watched the
window of the study this evening. To such a man an ivy-covered wall
is a grand staircase."

The horrible events that followed are punctuated, in my mind, by
the striking of a distant clock. It is singular how trivialities
thus assert themselves in moments of high tension. I will proceed,
then, by these punctuations, to the coming of the horror that it
was written we should encounter.

The clock across the common struck two.

Having removed all traces of the scent of the orchid from our
hands with a solution of ammonia Smith and I had followed the
programme laid down. It was an easy matter to reach the rear of the
house, by simply climbing a fence, and we did not doubt that seeing
the light go out in the front, our unseen watcher would proceed to
the back.

The room was a large one, and we had made up my camp-bed at one
end, stuffing odds and ends under the clothes to lend the
appearance of a sleeper, which device we also had adopted in the
case of the larger bed. The perfumed envelope lay upon a little
coffee table in the center of the floor, and Smith, with an
electric pocket lamp, a revolver, and a brassey beside him, sat on
cushions in the shadow of the wardrobe. I occupied a post between
the windows.

No unusual sound, so far, had disturbed the stillness of the
night. Save for the muffled throb of the rare all-night cars
passing the front of the house, our vigil had been a silent one.
The full moon had painted about the floor weird shadows of the
clustering ivy, spreading the design gradually from the door,
across the room, past the little table where the envelope lay, and
finally to the foot of the bed.

The distant clock struck a quarter-past two.

A slight breeze stirred the ivy, and a new shadow added itself
to the extreme edge of the moon's design.

Something rose, inch by inch, above the sill of the westerly
window. I could see only its shadow, but a sharp, sibilant breath
from Smith told me that he, from his post, could see the cause of
the shadow.

Every nerve in my body seemed to be strung tensely. I was icy
cold, expectant, and prepared for whatever horror was upon us.

The shadow became stationary. The dacoit was studying the
interior of the room.

Then it suddenly lengthened, and, craning my head to the left, I
saw a lithe, black-clad form, surmounted by a Yellow face, sketchy
in the moonlight, pressed against the window-panes!

One thin, brown hand appeared over the edge of the lowered sash,
which it grasped-and then another. The man made absolutely no sound
whatever. The second hand disappeared-and reappeared. It held a
small, square box. There was a very faint CLICK.

The dacoit swung himself below the window with the agility of an
ape, as, with a dull, muffled thud, SOMETHING dropped upon the
carpet!

"Stand still, for your life!" came Smith's voice,
high-pitched.

A beam of white leaped out across the room and played full upon
the coffee-table in the center.

Prepared as I was for something horrible, I know that I paled at
sight of the thing that was running round the edge of the
envelope.

It was an insect, full six inches long, and of a vivid,
venomous, red color! It had something of the appearance of a great
ant, with its long, quivering antennae and its febrile, horrible
vitality; but it was proportionately longer of body and smaller of
head, and had numberless rapidly moving legs. In short, it was a
giant centipede, apparently of the scolopendra group, but of a form
quite new to me.

These things I realized in one breathless instant; in the
next-Smith had dashed the thing's poisonous life out with one
straight, true blow of the golf club!

I leaped to the window and threw it widely open, feeling a silk
thread brush my hand as I did so. A black shape was dropping, with
incredible agility from branch to branch of the ivy, and, without
once offering a mark for a revolver-shot, it merged into the
shadows beneath the trees of the garden. As I turned and switched
on the light Nayland Smith dropped limply into a chair, leaning his
head upon his hands. Even that grim courage had been tried
sorely.

"Never mind the dacoit, Petrie," he said. "Nemesis will know
where to find him. We know now what causes the mark of the Zayat
Kiss. Therefore science is richer for our first brush with the
enemy, and the enemy is poorer-unless he has any more unclassified
centipedes. I understand now something that has been puzzling me
since I heard of it-Sir Crichton's stifled cry. When we remember
that he was almost past speech, it is reasonable to suppose that
his cry was not 'The red hand!' but 'The red ANT!' Petrie, to think
that I failed, by less than an hour, to save him from such an
end!"

"The body of a lascar, dressed in the manner usual on the P.
& O. boats, was recovered from the Thames off Tilbury by the
river police at six A.M. this morning. It is supposed that the man
met with an accident in leaving his ship."

Nayland Smith passed me the evening paper and pointed to the
above paragraph.

"For 'lascar' read 'dacoit,'" he said. "Our visitor, who came by
way of the ivy, fortunately for us, failed to follow his
instructions. Also, he lost the centipede and left a clew behind
him. Dr. Fu-Manchu does not overlook such lapses."

It was a sidelight upon the character of the awful being with
whom we had to deal. My very soul recoiled from bare consideration
of the fate that would be ours if ever we fell into his hands.

The telephone bell rang. I went out and found that Inspector
Weymouth of New Scotland Yard had called us up.

"Will Mr. Nayland Smith please come to the Wapping River Police
Station at once," was the message.

Peaceful interludes were few enough throughout that wild
pursuit.

"It is certainly something important," said my friend; "and, if
Fu-Manchu is at the bottom of it-as we must presume him to
be-probably something ghastly."

A brief survey of the time-tables showed us that there were no
trains to serve our haste. We accordingly chartered a cab and
proceeded east.

Smith, throughout the journey, talked entertainingly about his
work in Burma. Of intent, I think, he avoided any reference to the
circumstances which first had brought him in contact with the
sinister genius of the Yellow Movement. His talk was rather of the
sunshine of the East than of its shadows.

But the drive concluded-and all too soon. In a silence which
neither of us seemed disposed to break, we entered the police
depot, and followed an officer who received us into the room where
Weymouth waited.

The inspector greeted us briefly, nodding toward the table.

"Poor Cadby, the most promising lad at the Yard," he said; and
his usually gruff voice had softened strangely.

Smith struck his right fist into the palm of his left hand and
swore under his breath, striding up and down the neat little room.
No one spoke for a moment, and in the silence I could hear the
whispering of the Thames outside-of the Thames which had so many
strange secrets to tell, and now was burdened with another.

The body lay prone upon the deal table-this latest of the
river's dead-dressed in rough sailor garb, and, to all outward
seeming, a seaman of nondescript nationality-such as is no stranger
in Wapping and Shadwell. His dark, curly hair clung clammily about
the brown forehead; his skin was stained, they told me. He wore a
gold ring in one ear, and three fingers of the left hand were
missing.

"It was almost the same with Mason." The river police inspector
was speaking. "A week ago, on a Wednesday, he went off in his own
time on some funny business down St. George's way-and Thursday
night the ten-o'clock boat got the grapnel on him off Hanover Hole.
His first two fingers on the right hand were clean gone, and his
left hand was mutilated frightfully."

He paused and glanced at Smith.

"That lascar, too," he continued, "that you came down to see,
sir; you remember his hands?"

Smith nodded.

"He was not a lascar," he said shortly. "He was a dacoit."

Silence fell again.

I turned to the array of objects lying on the table-those which
had been found in Cadby's clothing. None of them were noteworthy,
except that which had been found thrust into the loose neck of his
shirt. This last it was which had led the police to send for
Nayland Smith, for it constituted the first clew which had come to
light pointing to the authors of these mysterious tragedies.

It was a Chinese pigtail. That alone was sufficiently
remarkable; but it was rendered more so by the fact that the
plaited queue was a false one being attached to a most ingenious
bald wig.

"You're sure it wasn't part of a Chinese make-up?" questioned
Weymouth, his eye on the strange relic. "Cadby was clever at
disguise."

Smith snatched the wig from my hands with a certain irritation,
and tried to fit it on the dead detective.

"Too small by inches!" he jerked. "And look how it's padded in
the crown. This thing was made for a most abnormal head."

He threw it down, and fell to pacing the room again.

"Where did you find him-exactly?" he asked.

"Limehouse Reach-under Commercial Dock Pier-exactly an hour
ago."

"And you last saw him at eight o'clock last night?"-to
Weymouth.

"Eight to a quarter past."

"You think he has been dead nearly twenty-four hours,
Petrie?"

"Roughly, twenty-four hours," I replied.

"Then, we know that he was on the track of the Fu-Manchu group,
that he followed up some clew which led him to the neighborhood of
old Ratcliff Highway, and that he died the same night. You are sure
that is where he was going?"

"Yes," said Weymouth; "He was jealous of giving anything away,
poor chap; it meant a big lift for him if he pulled the case off.
But he gave me to understand that he expected to spend last night
in that district. He left the Yard about eight, as I've said, to go
to his rooms, and dress for the job."

"Did he keep any record of his cases?"

"Of course! He was most particular. Cadby was a man with
ambitions, sir! You'll want to see his book. Wait while I get his
address; it's somewhere in Brixton."

He went to the telephone, and Inspector Ryman covered up the
dead man's face.

Nayland Smith was palpably excited.

"He almost succeeded where we have failed, Petrie," he said.
"There is no doubt in my mind that he was hot on the track of
Fu-Manchu! Poor Mason had probably blundered on the scent, too, and
he met with a similar fate. Without other evidence, the fact that
they both died in the same way as the dacoit would be conclusive,
for we know that Fu-Manchu killed the dacoit!"

"What is the meaning of the mutilated hands, Smith?"

"God knows! Cadby's death was from drowning, you say?"

"There are no other marks of violence."

"But he was a very strong swimmer, Doctor," interrupted
Inspector Ryman. "Why, he pulled off the quarter-mile championship
at the Crystal Palace last year! Cadby wasn't a man easy to drown.
And as for Mason, he was an R.N.R., and like a fish in the
water!"

Smith shrugged his shoulders helplessly.

"Let us hope that one day we shall know how they died," he said
simply.

Weymouth returned from the telephone.

"The address is No.-Cold Harbor Lane," he reported. "I shall not
be able to come along, but you can't miss it; it's close by the
Brixton Police Station. There's no family, fortunately; he was
quite alone in the world. His case-book isn't in the American desk,
which you'll find in his sitting-room; it's in the cupboard in the
corner-top shelf. Here are his keys, all intact. I think this is
the cupboard key."

Smith nodded.

"Come on, Petrie," he said. "We haven't a second to waste."

Our cab was waiting, and in a few seconds we were speeding along
Wapping High Street. We had gone no more than a few hundred yards,
I think, when Smith suddenly slapped his open hand down on his
knee.

"That pigtail!" he cried. "I have left it behind! We must have
it, Petrie! Stop! Stop!"

The cab was pulled up, and Smith alighted.

"Don't wait for me," he directed hurriedly. "Here, take
Weymouth's card. Remember where he said the book was? It's all we
want. Come straight on to Scotland Yard and meet me there."

"But Smith," I protested, "a few minutes can make no
difference!"

"Can't it!" he snapped. "Do you suppose Fu-Manchu is going to
leave evidence like that lying about? It's a thousand to one he has
it already, but there is just a bare chance."

It was a new aspect of the situation and one that afforded no
room for comment; and so lost in thought did I become that the cab
was outside the house for which I was bound ere I realized that we
had quitted the purlieus of Wapping. Yet I had had leisure to
review the whole troop of events which had crowded my life since
the return of Nayland Smith from Burma. Mentally, I had looked
again upon the dead Sir Crichton Davey, and with Smith had waited
in the dark for the dreadful thing that had killed him. Now, with
those remorseless memories jostling in my mind, I was entering the
house of Fu-Manchu's last victim, and the shadow of that giant evil
seemed to be upon it like a palpable cloud.

Cadby's old landlady greeted me with a queer mixture of fear and
embarrassment in her manner.

"I am Dr. Petrie," I said, "and I regret that I bring bad news
respecting Mr. Cadby."

"Oh, sir!" she cried. "Don't tell me that anything has happened
to him!" And divining something of the mission on which I was come,
for such sad duty often falls to the lot of the medical man: "Oh,
the poor, brave lad!"

Indeed, I respected the dead man's memory more than ever from
that hour, since the sorrow of the worthy old soul was quite
pathetic, and spoke eloquently for the unhappy cause of it.

"There was a terrible wailing at the back of the house last
night, Doctor, and I heard it again to-night, a second before you
knocked. Poor lad! It was the same when his mother died."

At the moment I paid little attention to her words, for such
beliefs are common, unfortunately; but when she was sufficiently
composed I went on to explain what I thought necessary. And now the
old lady's embarrassment took precedence of her sorrow, and
presently the truth came out:

"There's a-young lady-in his rooms, sir."

I started. This might mean little or might mean much.

"She came and waited for him last night, Doctor-from ten until
half-past-and this morning again. She came the third time about an
hour ago, and has been upstairs since."

"Do you know her, Mrs. Dolan?"

Mrs. Dolan grew embarrassed again.

"Well, Doctor," she said, wiping her eyes the while, "I DO. And
God knows he was a good lad, and I like a mother to him; but she is
not the girl I should have liked a son of mine to take up
with."

At any other time, this would have been amusing; now, it might
be serious. Mrs. Dolan's account of the wailing became suddenly
significant, for perhaps it meant that one of Fu-Manchu's dacoit
followers was watching the house, to give warning of any stranger's
approach! Warning to whom? It was unlikely that I should forget the
dark eyes of another of Fu-Manchu's servants. Was that lure of men
even now in the house, completing her evil work?

"I should never have allowed her in his rooms-" began Mrs. Dolan
again. Then there was an interruption.

A soft rustling reached my ears-intimately feminine. The girl
was stealing down!

I leaped out into the hall, and she turned and fled blindly
before me-back up the stairs! Taking three steps at a time, I
followed her, bounded into the room above almost at her heels, and
stood with my back to the door.

She cowered against the desk by the window, a slim figure in a
clinging silk gown, which alone explained Mrs. Dolan's distrust.
The gaslight was turned very low, and her hat shadowed her face,
but could not hide its startling beauty, could not mar the
brilliancy of the skin, nor dim the wonderful eyes of this modern
Delilah. For it was she!

"So I came in time," I said grimly, and turned the key in the
lock.

"Oh!" she panted at that, and stood facing me, leaning back with
her jewel-laden hands clutching the desk edge.

"Give me whatever you have removed from here," I said sternly,
"and then prepare to accompany me."

She took a step forward, her eyes wide with fear, her lips
parted.

"I have taken nothing," she said. Her breast was heaving
tumultuously. "Oh, let me go! Please, let me go!" And impulsively
she threw herself forward, pressing clasped hands against my
shoulder and looking up into my face with passionate, pleading
eyes.

It is with some shame that I confess how her charm enveloped me
like a magic cloud. Unfamiliar with the complex Oriental
temperament, I had laughed at Nayland Smith when he had spoken of
this girl's infatuation. "Love in the East," he had said, "is like
the conjurer's mango-tree; it is born, grows and flowers at the
touch of a hand." Now, in those pleading eyes I read confirmation
of his words. Her clothes or her hair exhaled a faint perfume. Like
all Fu-Manchu's servants, she was perfectly chosen for her peculiar
duties. Her beauty was wholly intoxicating.

But I thrust her away.

"You have no claim to mercy," I said. "Do not count upon any.
What have you taken from here?"

She grasped the lapels of my coat.

"I will tell you all I can-all I dare," she panted eagerly,
fearfully. "I should know how to deal with your friend, but with
you I am lost! If you could only understand you would not be so
cruel." Her slight accent added charm to the musical voice. "I am
not free, as your English women are. What I do I must do, for it is
the will of my master, and I am only a slave. Ah, you are not a man
if you can give me to the police. You have no heart if you can
forget that I tried to save you once."

I had feared that plea, for, in her own Oriental fashion, she
certainly had tried to save me from a deadly peril once-at the
expense of my friend. But I had feared the plea, for I did not know
how to meet it. How could I give her up, perhaps to stand her trial
for murder? And now I fell silent, and she saw why I was
silent.

"I may deserve no mercy; I may be even as bad as you think; but
what have YOU to do with the police? It is not your work to hound a
woman to death. Could you ever look another woman in the eyes-one
that you loved, and know that she trusted you-if you had done such
a thing? Ah, I have no friend in all the world, or I should not be
here. Do not be my enemy, my judge, and make me worse than I am; be
my friend, and save me-from HIM." The tremulous lips were close to
mine, her breath fanned my cheek. "Have mercy on me."