by Sax Rohmer
At this moment I observed something glittering upon the floor close to the chair occupied by the Algerian. Standing up — for I had determined to depart — I crossed in that direction, stooped and picked up this object which glittered. As my fingers touched it, so did my heart give a great leap.
The object was a golden scorpion!
Forgetful of my dangerous surroundings I stood looking at the golden ornament in my hand … when suddenly and violently it was snatched from me! The Algerian, his brown face convulsed with rage, confronted me.
“Where did you find that charm?” he cried. “It belongs to me.”
“Very well,” I replied— “you have it.”
He glared at me with a ferocity which the incident scarcely seemed to merit and exchanged a significant glance with someone who had approached and who now stood behind me. Turning, I met a second black gaze — that of the quadroon who having restored order had returned from the cafe door and now stood regarding me. “Did you find it on the floor?” asked Miguel suspiciously.
“I did.”
He turned to the Algerian.
“It fell when you kicked the knife from the hand of that pig,” he said. “You should be more careful.”
Again they exchanged significant glances, but the Algerian resumed his seat and Miguel went behind the counter. I left the cafe conscious of the fact that black looks pursued me.
The night was very dark, and as I came out on to the pavement someone touched me on the arm. I turned in a flash.
“Walk on, friend,” said the voice of Jean Sach. “What was it that you picked up from the floor?”
“A golden scorpion,” I answered quickly.
“Ah!” he whispered— “I thought so! It is enough. They shall pay for what they have done to me — those two. Hurry, friend, as I do.”
Before I could say another word or strive to detain him, he turned and ran off along a narrow courtway which at this point branched from the street.
I stood for a moment, nonplussed, staring after him. By good fortune I had learned more in ten minutes than by the exercise of all my ingenuity and the resources of the Service I could have learned in ten months! Par al barbe du prophete the Kismet which dogs the footsteps of malefactors assisted me!
Recollecting the advice of Jean Sach, I set off at a brisk pace along the street, which was dark and deserted and which passed through a district marked red on the Paris crimes-map. Arriving at the corner, above which projected a lamp, I paused and glanced back into the darkness. I could see no one, but I thought I could detect the sound of stealthy footsteps following me.
The suspicion was enough. I quickened my pace, anxious to reach the crowded boulevard upon which this second street opened. I reached it unmolested, but intending to throw any pursuer off the track, I dodged and doubled repeatedly on the way to my flat and arrived there about midnight, convinced that I had eluded pursuit — if indeed I had been pursued.
All my arrangements were made for leaving Paris, and now I telephoned to the assistant on duty in my office, instructing him to take certain steps in regard to the proprietor of the cafe and the Algerian and to find the hiding-place of the man Jean-Sach. I counted it more than ever important that I should go to London at once.
In this belief I was confirmed at the very moment that I boarded the Channel steamer at Boulogne: for as I stepped upon the deck I found myself face to face with a man who was leaning upon the rail and apparently watching the passengers coming on board. He was a man of heavy build, dark and bearded, and his face was strangely familiar.
Turning, as I lighted a cigarette, I glanced back at him in order to obtain a view of his profile. I knew him instantly — for now the scar was visible. It was “Le Balafre” who had been playing cards in Miguel’s cafe on the previous night!
I have sometimes been criticised, especially by my English confreres, for my faith in disguise. I have been told that no disguise is impenetrable to the trained eye. I reply that there are many disguises but few trained eyes! To my faith in disguise I owed the knowledge that a golden scorpion was the token of some sort of gang, society, or criminal group, and to this same faith which an English inspector of police once assured me to be a misplaced one I owed, on boarding the steamer, my escape from detection by this big bearded fellow who was possibly looking out for me!
Yet, I began to wonder if after all I had escaped the shadowy pursuer whose presence I had suspected in the dark street outside the cafe or if he had tracked me and learned my real identity. In any event, the roles were about to be reversed! “Le Balafre” at Folkestone took a seat in a third-class carriage of the London train. I took one in the next compartment.
Arrived at Charing Cross, he stood for a time in the booking-hall, glanced at his watch, and then took up the handbag which he carried and walked out into the station yard. I walked out also.
“Le Balafre” accosted a cabman; and as he did so I passed close behind him and overheard a part of the conversation.
“… Bow Road Station East! It’s too far. What?”
I glanced back. The bearded man was holding up a note — a pound note apparently. I saw the cabman nod. Without an instant’s delay I rushed up to another cabman who had just discharged a passenger.
“To Bow Road Station East!” I said to the man. “Double fare if you are quick!”
It would be a close race. But I counted on the aid of that Fate which dogs the steps of wrong-doers! My cab was off first and the driver had every reason for hurrying. From the moment that we turned out into the Strand until we arrived at our destination I saw no more of “Le Balafre.” My extensive baggage I must hope to recover later.
At Bow Road Station I discovered a telephone box in a dark corner which commanded a view of the street. I entered this box and waited. It was important that I should remain invisible. Unless my bearded friend had been unusually fortunate he could not well have arrived before me.
As it chanced I had nearly six minutes to wait. Then, not ten yards away, I saw “Le Balafre” arrive and dismiss the cabman outside the station.
There was nothing furtive in his manner; he was evidently satisfied that no one pursued him; and he stood in the station entrance almost outside my box and lighted a cigar!
Placing his bag upon the floor, he lingered, looking to left and right, when suddenly a big closed car painted dull yellow drew up beside the pavement. It was driven by a brown-faced chauffeur whose nationality I found difficulty in placing, for he wore large goggles. But before I could determine upon my plan of action, “Le Balafre” crossed the pavement and entered the car — and the car glided smoothly away, going East. A passing lorry obstructed my view and I even failed to obtain a glimpse of the number on the plate.
But I had seen something which had repaid me for my trouble. As the man of the scar had walked up to the car, had exhibited to the brown-skinned chauffeur some object which he held in the palm of his hand … an object which glittered like gold!
II. “LE BALAFRE”
CHAPTER I
I BECOME CHARLES MALET
Behold me established in rooms in Battersea and living retired during the day while I permitted my beard to grow. I had recognized that my mystery of “The Scorpion” was the biggest case which had ever engaged the attention of the Service de Surete, and I was prepared, if necessary, to devote my whole time for twelve months to its solution. I had placed myself in touch with Paris, and had had certain papers and licenses forwarded to me. A daily bulletin reached me, and one of these bulletins was sensational.
The body of Jean Sach had been recovered from the Seine. The man had been stabbed to the heart. Surveillance of Miguel and his associates continued unceasingly, but I had directed that no raids or arrests were to be made without direct orders from me.
I was now possessed of a French motor license and also that of a Paris taxi-driver, together with all the other documents necessary to establish the identity of one Charles Malet. Everything was in order. I presente
d myself — now handsomely bearded — at New Scotland Yard and applied for a license. The “knowledge of London” and other tests I passed successfully and emerged a fully-fledged cabman!
Already I had opened negotiations for the purchase of a dilapidated but seviceable cab which belonged to a small proprietor who had obtained a car of more up-to-date pattern to replace this obsolete one. I completed these negotiations by paying down a certain sum and arranged to garage my cab in the disused stable of a house near my rooms in Battersea.
Thus I now found myself in a position to appear anywhere at any time without exciting suspicion, enabled swiftly to proceed from point to point and to pursue anyone either walking or driving whom it might please me to pursue. It was a modus operandi which had served me well in Paris and which had led to one of my biggest successes (the capture of the French desperado known as “Mr. Q.”) in New York.
I had obtained, via Paris, particulars of the recent death of Sir Frank Narcombe, and the circumstances attendant upon his end were so similar to those which had characterized the fate of the Grand Duke, of Van Rembold and the others, that I could not for a moment believe them to be due to mere coincidence. Acting upon my advice Paris advised Scotland Yard to press for a post mortem examination of the body, but the influence of Sir Frank’s family was exercised to prevent this being carried out — and exercised successfully.
Meanwhile, I hovered around the houses, flats, clubs and offices of everyone who had been associated with the late surgeon, noting to what addresses they directed me to drive and who lived at those address. In this way I obtained evidence sufficient to secure three judicial separations, but not a single clue leading to “The Scorpion”! No matter.
At every available opportunity I haunted the East-End streets, hoping for a glimpse of the big car and the brown-skinned chauffeur or of my scarred man from Paris. I frequented all sorts of public bars and eating-houses used by foreign and Asiatics. By day and by night I roamed about the dismal thoroughfares of that depressing district, usually with my flag down to imply that I was engaged.
Such diligence never goes long unrewarded. One evening, having discharged a passenger, a mercantile officer, at the East India Docks, as I was drifting, watchfully, back through Limehouse, I saw a large car pull up just ahead of me in the dark. A man got out and the car was driven off.
Two courses presented themselves. I was not sure that this was the car for which I sought, but it strangely resembled it. Should I follow the car or the man? A rapid decision was called for. I followed the man.
That I had not been mistaken in the identity of the car shortly appeared. The man took out a cigar and standing on the corner opposite the Town Hall, lighted it. I was close to him at the time, and by the light of the match, which he sheltered with his hands, I saw the scarred and bearded face! Triomphe! it was he!
Having lighted his cigar, he crossed the road and entered the saloon of a neighbourhood public-house. Locking my cab I, also, entered that saloon. I ordered a glass of bitter beer and glanced around at the object of my interest. He had obtained a glass of brandy and was contorting his hideous face as he sipped the beverage. I laughed.
“Have they tried to poison you, mister!” I said.
“Ah,pardieu! poison — yes!” he replied.
“You want to have it out of a bottle,” I continued confidentially— “Martell’s Three Stars.”
He stared at me uncomprehendingly.
“I don’t know,” he said haltingly. “I have very little English.”
“Oh, that’s it!” I cried, speaking French with a barbarous accent. “You only speak French?”
“Yes, yes,” he replied eagerly. “It is so difficult to make oneself understood. This spirit is not cognac, it is some kind of petrol!”
Finishing my bitter, I ordered two glasses of good brandy and placed one before “Le Balafre.”
“Try that,” I said, continuing to speak in French, “You will find it is better.”
He sipped from his glass and agreed that I was right. We chatted together for ten minutes and had another drink, after which my dangerous-looking acquaintance wished me good-night and went out. The car had come from the West, and I strongly suspected that my man either lived in the neighbourhood or had come there to keep an appointment. Leaving my cab outside the public-house, I followed him on foot, down Three Colt Street to Ropemaker Street, where he turned into a narrow alley leading to the riverside. It was straight and deserted, and I dared not follow further until he had reached the corner. I heard his footsteps pass right to the end. Then the sound died away. I ran to the corner. The back of a wharf building — a high blank wall — faced a row of ramshackle tenements, some of them built of wood; but not a soul was in sight.
I reluctantly returned to the spot at which I had left the cab — and found a constable there who wanted to know what I meant by leaving a vehicle in the street unattended. I managed to enlist his sympathy by telling him that I had been in pursuit of a “fare” who had swindled me with a bad half-crown. The ruse succeeded.
“Which street did he go down, mate?” asked the constable.
I described the street and described the scarred man. The constable shook his head.
“Sounds like one o’ them foreign sailormen,” he said. “But I don’t know what he can have gone down there for. It’s nearly all Chinese, that part.”
His words came as a revelation; they changed the whole complexion of the case. It dawned upon me even as he spoke the word “Chinese” that the golden scorpion which I had seen in the Paris cafe was of Chinese workmanship! I started my engine and drove slowly to that street in which I had lost the track of “Le Balafre.” I turned the cab so that I should be ready to drive off at a moment’s notice, and sat there wondering what my next move should be. How long I had been there I cannot say, when suddenly it began to rain in torrents.
What I might have done or what I had hoped to do is of no importance; for as I sat there staring out at the dismal rain-swept street, a man came along, saw the head-lamps of the cab and stopped, peering in my direction. Evidently perceiving that I drove a cab and not a private car, he came towards me.
“Are you disengaged?” he asked.
Whether it was that I sympathized with him — he had no topcoat or umbrella — or whether I was guided by Fate I know not, but as he spoke I determined to give up my dreary vigil for that night. Pardieu! but certainly it was Fate again!
“Well, I suppose I am, sir,” I said, and asked him where he wanted to go.
He gave an address not five hundred yards from my own rooms! I thought this so curious that I hesitated no longer.
“Jump in,” I said; and still seeking in my mind for a link between the scorpion case and China, I drove off, and in less than half an hour, for the streets were nearly empty, arrived at my destination.
The passenger, whose name was Dr. Keppel Stuart, very kindly suggested a glass of hot grog, and I did not refuse his proferred hospitality. When I came out of his house again, the rain had almost ceased, and just as I stooped to crank the car I thought I saw a shadowy figure moving near the end of a lane which led to the tradesmen’s entrance of Dr. Stuart’s house. A sudden suspicion laid hold upon me — a horrible doubt.
Having driven some twenty yards along the road, I leaned from my seat and looked back. A big man wearing a black waterproof overall was standing looking after me!
Remembering how cleverly I had been trailed from Miguel’s cafe to my flat, in Paris (for I no longer doubted that someone had followed me on that occasion), I now perceived that I might again be the object of the same expert’s attention. Stopping my engine half-way along the next road, I jumped out and ran back, hiding in the bushes which grew beside the gate of a large empty house. I had only a few seconds to wait.
A big closed car, running almost silently, passed before me … and “Le Balafre” was leaning out of the window!
At last I saw my chance of finding the headquarters of “The Scorpion.
” Alas! The man of the scar was as swift to recognize that possibility as I. A moment after he had passed my stationary cab, and found it to be deserted, his big car was off like the wind, and even before I could step out from the bushes the roar of the powerful engine was growing dim in the distance!
I was detected. I had to deal with dangerously clever people.
CHAPTER II
BAITING THE TRAP
The following morning I spent at home, in my modest rooms, reviewing my position and endeavouring to adjust my plans in accordance with the latest development. “The Scorpion” had scored a point. What had aroused the suspicions “Le Balafre,” I knew not; but I was inclined to think that he had been looking from some window or peep-hole in the narrow street with the wooden houses when I had, injudiciously, followed him there.
On the other hand, the leakage might be in Paris — or in my correspondence system. The man of the scar might have been looking for me as I was looking for him. That he was looking for someone on the cross-channel boat I had not doubted.
He was aware, then that Charles Malet, cabman, was watching him. But was he aware that Charles Malet was Gaston Max? And did he know where I lived? Also — did he perchance think that my meeting with Dr. Stuart in Limehouse had been prearranged? Clearly he had seen Dr. Stuart enter my cab, for he had pursued us to Battersea.
This course of reflection presently led me to a plan. It was a dangerous plan, but I doubted if I should ever find myself in greater danger than I was already. Nom d’un nom! I had not forgotten the poor Jean Sach!
That night, well knowing that I carried my life in my hands, I drove again to Limehouse Town Hall, and again leaving my cab outside went into the bar where I had preciously me “Le Balafre.” If I had doubted that my movements were watched I must now have had such doubts dispelled; for two minutes later the man with the scar came in and greeted me affably!