Kitabı oku: «THE DEVIL DOCTOR», sayfa 4
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 Kâramanèh 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!"
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."
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--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.
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.
Kâramanèh 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 Kâramanèh!
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.
"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?"
Kâramanèh 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 Kâramanèh; 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 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.
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
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