by Sax Rohmer
CHAPTER XX
THE NOTE ON THE DOOR
I saw little of Nayland Smith for the remainder of that day.Presumably he was following those "promptings" to which he hadreferred, though I was unable to conjecture whither they were leadinghim. Then, towards dusk he arrived in a perfect whirl, figurativelysweeping me off my feet.
"Get your coat on, Petrie!" he cried; "you forget that we have a mosturgent appointment!"
Beyond doubt I had forgotten that we had any appointment whatever thatevening, and some surprise must have shown upon my face, for--
"Really you are becoming very forgetful!" my friend continued. "Youknow we can no longer trust the 'phone. I have to leave certaininstructions for Weymouth at the rendezvous!"
There was a hidden significance in his manner, and, my memory harkingback to an adventure which we had shared in the past, I suddenlyglimpsed the depths of my own stupidity.
He suspected the presence of an eavesdropper! Yes! incredible thoughit might appear, we were spied upon in the New Louvre; agents of theSi-Fan, of Dr. Fu-Manchu, were actually within the walls of the greathotel!
We hurried out into the corridor, and descended by the lift to thelobby. M. Samarkan, long famous as _maitre d'hotel_ of one of Cairo'sfashionable _khans_, and now principal of the New Louvre, greeted uswith true Greek courtesy. He trusted that we should be present atsome charitable function or other to be held at the hotel on thefollowing evening.
"If possible, M. Samarkan--if possible," said Smith. "We have manydemands upon our time." Then, abruptly, to me: "Come, Petrie, we willwalk as far as Charing Cross and take a cab from the rank there."
"The hall-porter can call you a cab," said M. Samarkan, solicitous forthe comfort of his guests.
"Thanks," snapped Smith; "we prefer to walk a little way."
Passing along the Strand, he took my arm, and speaking close to my ear--
"That place is alive with spies, Petrie," he said; "or if there areonly a few of them they are remarkably efficient!"
Not another word could I get from him, although I was eager enough totalk; since one dearer to me than all else in the world was in thehands of the damnable organization we knew as the Si-Fan; until,arrived at Charing Cross, he walked out to the cab rank, and--
"Jump in!" he snapped.
He opened the door of the first cab on the rank.
"Drive to J---- Street, Kennington," he directed the man.
In something of a mental stupor I entered and found myself seatedbeside Smith. The cab made off towards Trafalgar Square, then swungaround into Whitehall.
"Look behind!" cried Smith, intense excitement expressed in his voice--"look behind!"
I turned and peered through the little square window.
The cab which had stood second upon the rank was closely following us!
"We are tracked!" snapped my companion. "If further evidence werenecessary of the fact that our every movement is watched, here it is!"
I turned to him, momentarily at a loss for words; then--
"Was this the object of our journey?" I said. "Your reference to a'rendezvous' was presumably addressed to a hypothetical spy?
"Partly," he replied. "I have a plan, as you will see in a moment."
I looked again from the window in the rear of the cab. We were nowpassing between the House of Lords and the back of Westminster Abbey ...and fifty yards behind us the pursuing cab was crossing fromWhitehall! A great excitement grew up within me, and a great curiosityrespecting the identity of our pursuer.
"What is the place for which we are bound, Smith?" I said rapidly.
"It is a house which I chanced to notice a few days ago, and I markedit as useful for such a purpose as our present one. You will see whatI mean when we arrive."
On we went, following the course of the river, then turned overVauxhall Bridge and on down Vauxhall Bridge Road into a very drearyneighborhood where gasometers formed the notable feature of thelandscape.
"That's the Oval just beyond," said Smith suddenly, "and--here we are."
In a narrow _cul de sac_ which apparently communicated with theboundary of the famous cricket ground, the cabman pulled up. Smithjumped out and paid the fare.
"Pull back to that court with the iron posts," he directed the man,"and wait there for me." Then: "Come on, Petrie!" he snapped.
Side by side we entered the wooden gate of a small detached house, ormore properly cottage, and passed up the tiled path towards a sort ofside entrance which apparently gave access to the tiny garden. At thismoment I became aware of two things; the first, that the house was anempty one, and the second, that some one--some one who had quitted thesecond cab (which I had heard pull up at no great distance behind us)was approaching stealthily along the dark and uninviting street,walking upon the opposite pavement and taking advantage of the shadowof a high wooden fence which skirted it for some distance.
Smith pushed the gate open, and I found myself in a narrow passagewayin almost complete darkness. But my friend walked confidently forward,turned the angle of the building and entered the miniature wildernesswhich once had been a garden.
"In here, Petrie!" he whispered.
He seized me by the arm, pushed open a door and thrust me forward downtwo stone steps into absolute darkness.
"Walk straight ahead!" he directed, still in the same intense whisper,"and you will find a locked door having a broken panel. Watch throughthe opening for any one who may enter the room beyond, but see thatyour presence is not detected. Whatever I say or do, don't stir untilI actually rejoin you."
He stepped back across the floor and was gone. One glimpse I had ofhim, silhouetted against the faint light of the open door, then thedoor was gently closed, and I was left alone in the empty house.
Smith's methods frequently surprised me, but always in the past I hadfound that they were dictated by sound reasons. I had no doubt that anemergency unknown to me dictated his present course, but it was withmy mind in a wildly confused condition, that I groped for and foundthe door with the broken panel and that I stood there in the completedarkness of the deserted house listening.
I can well appreciate how the blind develop an unusually keen sense ofhearing; for there, in the blackness, which (at first) was entirelyunrelieved by any speck of light, I became aware of the fact, by dintof tense listening, that Smith was retiring by means of some gatewayat the upper end of the little garden, and I became aware of the factthat a lane or court, with which this gateway communicated, gaveaccess to the main road.
Faintly, I heard our discharged cab backing out from the _cul de sac_;then, from some nearer place, came Smith's voice speaking loudly.
"Come along, Petrie!" he cried; "there is no occasion for us to wait.Weymouth will see the note pinned on the door."
I started--and was about to stumble back across the room, when, as mymind began to work more clearly, I realized that the words had beenspoken as a ruse--a favorite device of Nayland Smith's.
Rigidly I stood there, and continued to listen.
"All right, cabman!" came more distantly now; "back to the New Louvre--jump in, Petrie!"
The cab went rattling away ... as a faint light became perceptible inthe room beyond the broken panel.
Hitherto I had been able to detect the presence of this panel only bymy sense of touch and by means of a faint draught which blew throughit; now it suddenly became clearly perceptible. I found myself lookinginto what was evidently the principal room of the house--a drearyapartment with tatters of paper hanging from the walls and litter ofall sorts lying about upon the floor and in the rusty fireplace.
Some one had partly raised the front window and opened the shutters.A patch of moonlight shone down upon the floor immediately below myhiding-place and furthermore enabled me vaguely to discern the disorderof the room.
A bulky figure showed silhouetted against the dirty panes. It was thatof a man who, leaning upon the window sill, was peering intently in.Silently he had approached, and silently had raise
d the sash andopened the shutters.
For thirty seconds or more he stood so, moving his head from right toleft ... and I watched him through the broken panel, almost holding mybreath with suspense. Then, fully raising the window, the man steppedinto the room, and, first reclosing the shutters, suddenly flashed thelight of an electric lamp all about the place. I was enabled todiscern him more clearly, this mysterious spy who had tracked us fromthe moment that we had left the hotel.
He was a man of portly build wearing a heavy fur-lined overcoat andhaving a soft felt hat, the brim turned down so as to shade the upperpart of his face. Moreover, he wore his fur collar turned up, whichserved further to disguise him, since it concealed the greater partof his chin. But the eyes which now were searching every corner ofthe room, the alert, dark eyes, were strangely familiar. The blackmustache, the clear-cut, aquiline nose, confirmed the impression.
Our follower was M. Samarkan, manager of the New Louvre.
I suppressed a gasp of astonishment. Small wonder that our plans hadleaked out. This was a momentous discovery indeed.
And as I watched the portly Greek who was not only one of the mostcelebrated _maitres d'hotel_ in Europe, but also a creature of Dr.Fu-Manchu, he cast the light of his electric lamp upon a note attachedby means of a drawing-pin to the inside of the room door. Iimmediately divined that my friend must have pinned the note in itsplace earlier in the day; even at that distance I recognized Smith'sneat, illegible writing.
Samarkan quickly scanned the message scribbled upon the white page;then, exhibiting an agility uncommon in a man of his bulk, he threwopen the shutters again, having first replaced his lamp in his pocket,climbed out into the little front garden, reclosed the window, anddisappeared!
A moment I stood, lost to my surroundings, plunged in a sea ofwonderment concerning the damnable organization which, its tentaclesextending I knew not whither, since new and unexpected limbs were evercoming to light, sought no less a goal than Yellow dominion of theworld! I reflected how one man--Nayland Smith--alone stood betweenthis powerful group and the realization of their project ... when Iwas aroused by a hand grasping my arm in the darkness!
I uttered a short cry, of which I was instantly ashamed, for NaylandSmith's voice came:--
"I startled you, eh, Petrie?"
"Smith," I said, "how long have you been standing there?"
"I only returned in time to see our Fenimore Cooper friend retreatingthrough the window," he replied; "but no doubt you had a good look athim?"
"I had!" I answered eagerly. "It was Samarkan!"
"I thought so! I have suspected as much for a long time."
"Was this the object of our visit here?"
"It was one of the objects," admitted Nayland Smith evasively.
From some place not far distant came the sound of a restarted engine.
"The other," he added, "was this: to enable M. Samarkan to read thenote which I had pinned upon the door!"
CHAPTER XXI
THE SECOND MESSAGE
"Here you are, Petrie," said Nayland Smith--and he tossed across thetable the folded copy of a morning paper. "This may assist you in yourstudy of the first Zagazig message."
I set down my cup and turned my attention to the "Personal" column onthe front page of the journal. A paragraph appeared therein conceivedas follows:--
ZAGAZIG-_Z_-a-g-_a_;-z:-I:-_g_;z-a,g;- A-,_z_;_i_:_G_,-z:_a_;_g_-A,z-_i_;-gz _A_;_g_aZ-_i_;_g_-:a z i g
I stared across at my friend in extreme bewilderment.
"But, Smith!" I cried, "these messages are utterly meaningless!"
"Not at all," he rapped back. "Scotland Yard thought they weremeaningless at first, and I must admit that they suggested nothing tome for a long time; but the dead dacoit was the clue to the first,Petrie, and the note pinned upon the door of the house near the Ovalis the clue to the second."
Stupidly I continued to stare at him until he broke into a grim smile.
"Surely you understand?" he said. "You remember where the dead Burmanwas found?"
"Perfectly."
"You know the street along which, ordinarily, one would approach thewharf?"
"Three Colt Street?"
"Three Colt Street, exactly. Well, on the night that the Burman methis end I had an appointment in Three Colt Street with Weymouth. Theappointment was made by 'phone, from the New Louvre! My cab broke downand I never arrived. I discovered later that Weymouth had received atelegram purporting to come from me, putting off the engagement."
"I am aware of all this!"
Nayland Smith burst into a loud laugh.
"But _still_ you are fogged!" he cried. "Then I'm hanged if I'll pilotyou any farther! You have all the facts before you. There lies thefirst Zagazig message; here is the second; and you know the context ofthe note pinned upon the door? It read, if you remember, 'Removepatrol from Joy-Shop neighborhood. Have a theory. Wish to visit placealone on Monday night after one o'clock.'"
"Smith," I said dully, "I have a heavy stake upon this murderous game."
His manner changed instantly; the tanned face grew grim and hard, butthe steely eyes softened strangely. He bent over me, clapping his handsupon my shoulders.
"I know it, old man," he replied; "and because it may serve to keepyour mind busy during hours when otherwise it would be engaged withprofitless sorrows, I invite you to puzzle out this business foryourself. You have nothing else to do until late to-night, and you canwork undisturbed, here, at any rate!"
His words referred to the fact that, without surrendering our suite atthe New Louvre Hotel, we had gone upon a visit, of indefinite duration,to a mythical friend; and now were quartered in furnished chambersadjoining Fleet Street.
We had remained at the New Louvre long enough to secure confirmationof our belief that a creature of Fu-Manchu spied upon us there; andnow we only awaited the termination of the night's affair to takesuch steps as Smith might consider politic in regard to the sardonicGreek who presided over London's newest and most palatial hotel.
Smith setting out for New Scotland Yard in order to make certain finalarrangements in connection with the business of the night, I beganclosely to study the mysterious Zagazig messages, determined not to bebeaten, and remembering the words of Edgar Allan Poe--the strangegenius to whom we are indebted for the first workable system ofdeciphering cryptograms: "It may well be doubted whether humaningenuity can construct an enigma of the kind which human ingenuitymay not, by proper application, resolve."
The first conclusion to which I was borne was this: that the letterscomprising the word "Zagazig" were designed merely to confuse thereader, and might be neglected; since, occurring as they did in regularsequence, they could possess no significance. I became quite excitedupon making the discovery that the _punctuation marks_ varied inalmost every case!
I immediately assumed that these constituted the cipher; and, seekingfor my key-letter, _e_ (that which most frequently occurs in theEnglish language), I found the sign of a full-stop to appear morefrequently than any other in the first message, namely ten times,although it only occurred thrice in the second. Nevertheless, I washopeful ... until I discovered that in two cases it appeared threetimes _in succession!_
There is no word in English, nor, so far as I am aware, in any language,where this occurs, either in regard to _e_ or any other letter!
That unfortunate discovery seemed so wholly to destroy the very theoryupon which I relied, that I almost abandoned my investigation thereand then. Indeed, I doubt if I ever should have proceeded were it notthat by a piece of pure guesswork I blundered on to a clue.
I observed that certain letters, at irregularly occurring intervals,were set in capital, and I divided up the message into correspondingsections, in the hope that th capitals might indicate thecommencements of words. This accomplished, I set out upon a seriesof guesses, basing these upon Smith's assurance that the death of thedacoit afforded a clue to the first message and the note which he(Smith) had pinned upon the door a clue to the seco
nd.
Such being my system--if I can honor my random attempts with thetitle--I take little credit to myself for the fortunate result. Inshort, I determined (although _e_ twice occurred where _r_ should havebeen!) that the first message from the thirteenth letter, onwards tothe twenty-seventh (_id est:_ _I;_g:-zagAz;i-;_g_;_-Z_,-a;-_g_azi;-)read:--
_"Three Colt Street."_
Endeavoring, now, to eliminate the _e_ where _r_ should appear, I madeanother discovery. The presence of a letter in _italics_ altered thevalue of the sign which followed it!
From that point onward the task became child's-play, and I shouldmerely render this account tedious if I entered into further details.Both messages commenced with the name "Smith" as I early perceived,and half an hour of close study gave me the complete sentences, thus:--
1. _Smith passing Three Colt Street twelve-thirty Wednesday._
2. _Smith going Joy-Shop after one Monday._
The word "Zagazig" was completed, always, and did not necessarilyterminate with the last letter occurring in the cryptographic message.A subsequent inspection of this curious code has enabled NaylandSmith, by a process of simple deduction, to compile the entire alphabetemployed by Dr. Fu-Manchu's agent, Samarkan, in communicating with hisawful superior. With a little patience, any one of my readers my achievethe same result (and I should be pleased to hear from those who succeed!).
This, then was the outcome of my labors; and although it enlightened meto some extent, I realized that I still had much to learn.
The dacoit, apparently, had met his death at the very hour when NaylandSmith should have been passing along Three Colt Street--a thoroughfarewith an unsavory reputation. Who had killed him?
To-night, Samarkan advised the Chinese doctor, Smith would again be inthe same dangerous neighborhood. A strange thrill of excitement sweptthrough me. I glanced at my watch. Yes! It was time for me to repair,secretly, to my post. For I, too, had business on the borders ofChinatown to-night.