by Sax Rohmer
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE. CURARI
“Nothing here!” declared Nayland Smith.
They had searched every foot of the deserted mews.
“A sort of cache?” suggested Sir Bertram Morgan, who had accompanied them, now keenly interested in their quest. “No doubt they kept a car here.”
“There’s evidence that they did,” said Gallaho. “And we’ll know more about it tomorrow. But in the meantime,” he turned to Sir Denis, “what’s the next move, sir?”
Rowan House had proved to be a mere shell, a mockery: the greater part of it unfurnished. The library in Rowan House in which Dr. Fu-Manchu had received Sir Bertram, and the corridor leading to it from the Assyrian hall, were the only properly furnished parts of the place. There was a small writing-room on the other side of the house, the glass in the French window of which had been smashed, containing a number of bookshelves, a bureau and one or two other odds and ends. But with the exception of fragmentary belongings of the former tenant, the eccentric Sir Lionel Barton, the place was unfurnished from floor to attic — nor was there a soul in it, although the police had searched it foot by foot.
The property had been sold by Sir Lionel Barton, but the last tenant had left nearly a year before. The books and some of the ornaments in the two furnished rooms, unreadable volumes in Sanskrit, Chinese and Persian, had been left behind by the out-going tenant as they had been left behind by Sir Lionel. The Chinese library, with its sliding doors and lacquer fittings, had been a feature of Rowan House during the time that Barton had occupied it. The place had been baited for the evening; a mouse-trap. The caretaker had vanished.
“They’ve got Sterling!” groaned Nayland Smith. “God knows why they’ve taken him — but they’ve got him!”
Sir Bertram was now keenly interested, tuned up for the hunt; his sentiments in regard to Madame Ingomar had undergone a definite change, yet he knew in his heart, although he could not doubt the assurance of the ex-Assistant Commissioner, that if she beckoned to him again — he would follow...
He wondered how far he would go, to what extent he would fall under the influence of those magnetic eyes, that compelling voice. He shuddered. Perhaps he had had a nearer escape than he realized. But the gold had been... gold.
The raiding party returned to the depot in the Yard car, and Sir Denis and Chief Detective-inspector Gallaho accepted a lift home in Sir Bertram Morgan’s Rolls.
Fog met them in the London suburbs...
It was at some hour not far removed from that when dawn should have been breaking over London, that Nayland Smith prepared a whisky and soda for Gallaho and passing it to him raised his glass silently.
“I know sir,” said Gallaho; “it’s been a very bad show for us tonight.”
“A bad show all along,” snapped Sir Denis. “Cramped, trammeled, cut off from his resources, Fu-Manchu is still powerful. First, he gets Petrie’s daughter, a wonderful hostage, by one of the most amazing tricks in my experience. He smuggles her into England. And now...”
“That’s the devil of it, sir.”
“The devil indeed. He’s got Sterling.”
“Dead or alive?”
“Since he is a friend and a first-class type of man (I have worked with him in the past) I prefer to think, Inspector — alive. I doubt if Dr. Fu-Manchu would burden himself with—”
“A corpse?”
“A corpse, yes.”
Nayland Smith’s gaze became abstracted, and plucking at his ear, he crossed the room and pulled a heavy curtain aside, gazing out upon the foggy Embankment.
There came a rap on the door.
“Come in!”
Fey entered, despite the approach of dawn, immaculate and unperturbed. Nayland Smith was still holding the heavy curtain aside, and:
“Have you noticed the window, sir?” Fey asked.
“No.”
Nayland Smith turned, and examined the window.
“By gad!” he rapped.
There was a neat, but slightly jagged hole an inch in circumference in one of the panes! He closed the curtains, and faced Fey. Gallaho, glass in hand, was staring from man to man.
“While I was walking up and down, sir,” Fey went on coolly, “as you told me to do, earlier tonight, or rather, last night, sir, this came through the window — missed me by no more than an inch.”
He handed a small feathered dart to Nayland Smith.
The latter stepped to a lamp and examined it closely.
“Gallaho,” he said, “I should say that this thing had been fired from an air gun. But examine the point.”
The Scotland Yard man came forward, eagerly bending over the table.
“It seems to be covered in gum.”
“I won’t say curari, but a very brief analysis will settle the point. The cornered rat is showing his teeth... and they are poisoned teeth.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX. DR. FU-MANCHU
Alan Sterling looked around the cellar in which he lay.
It was brick-paved; its roof was formed by half an arch. There was a very stout looking door in the corner opposite that in which he found himself. An unshaded electric bulb hung on a piece of flexible cable from the roof. He could trace the cable down the sloping brickwork to a roughly hollowed gap through which it disappeared.
There was no furniture of any kind in the cellar, but the place was singularly hot, and it seemed to be informed by a ceaseless buzzing which, however, presently he identified with his own skull.
He had an agonizing headache. Raising his hand, he found a great lump immediately above his left ear.
The first idea which flashed through his bemused mind was a message of thanksgiving. He must have had a very narrow escape from death. Then came memories — chaotic, torturing.
He had had Fleurette in his arms: then, something had happened.
What had happened?
It was beyond him. He could recall nothing but the fact that she had screamed unnaturally, that he had struggled with her. Then there was a gap, and now... where was this place in which he found himself? Where had he been when he had struggled with Fleurette?
He clutched his throbbing skull, trying to force thought. Memories began to return to him in fragments; then, as a complete story.
He tried to stand up. The effort was too much for his strength. He dropped back again upon the stone pavement. By God! He had had a devil of a whack! Gingerly he touched the swelling on his skull, leaning back against the wall and still trying to think.
Fleurette was alive — thank God for that! But in some way, she had changed towards him. He was not quite clear about it. But for this he must be thankful: that she, whom he had thought was dead — was alive. The minor difficulty, no doubt, would resolve itself.
Nayland Smith! Of course! He had been with Nayland Smith!... and Gallaho? What had become of Gallaho?
Above all — where was he? Where was this unfurnished cellar located? He made another attempt to stand up; but it was not entirely successful. He was anxious to find out if that heavy door was locked, or bolted. But the journey, one of four paces, was too much for him.
He sank down on to the floor again, leaning back against the wall. The throbbing in his head was all but unendurable, and the heat was stifling — unless, like the buzzing, due to internal conditions.
Separate now from that buzzing which he knew to belong to his injured skull, Sterling became aware of a muted roaring sound. It was somewhere beneath his feet. It was uncanny; when first he accepted the reality of its existence, he was dismayed; for what could it be? From where could it come?
He was about to make a third attempt to stand up, when the heavy door opened.
A very tall, gaunt man stood in the opening, looking at him. He wore a long, white linen coat, linen trousers, and white rubber-soled shoes. The coat, tunic fashion, was buttoned to his neck — a lean, sinewy neck supporting a head which might have been that of Dante.
The brow was even finer than the traditional portraits of Shak
espeare, crowned with scanty, neutral colored hair. The face of the white-clad man was a wonderful face, and might once have been beautiful. It was that of a man of indeterminable age, heavily lined, but lighted by a pair of such long, narrow, brilliant green eyes that one’s thoughts flashed to Satan — Lucifer, Son of the Morning: an angel, but a fallen angel. His slender hands, with long, polished nails, were clasped before him. Although no trace of expression crossed that extraordinary face, perhaps a close observer watching the green eyes might have said that the man motionless in the doorway was surprised.
Alan Sterling succeeded in his third attempt to stand up. He was very unsteady, but by means of supporting himself against the wall with his left hand, he succeeded in remaining upright.
So standing, he faced Dr. Fu-Manchu.
“The fact that you are alive—” the words came sibilantly from thin lips which scarcely seemed to move— “surprises me.”
Sterling stared at the speaker. Every instinct in his mind, his body, his soul, prompted: “Kill him! Kill him!” But Sterling knew something of Dr. Fu-Manchu, and he knew that he must temporize.
“I am surprised, too,” he said.
His voice shook, and he hated his weakness.
The green eyes watched him hypnotically. Sterling, leaning against the wall, wrenched his gaze away.
“It is not my custom,” the harsh voice continued, “to employ coarse methods. You were, to put it bluntly, bludgeoned in Rowan House. Your constitution, Alan Sterling, must resemble that of a weasel. I had intended to incinerate your body. I am not displeased to find that life survives.”
“Nor am I,” said Sterling, calculating his chances of a swift spring, and a blow over the heart of this Chinese fiend whom he knew to be of incalculable age; then a hook to that angular jaw — and a way to freedom would be open.
With the instinct of a boxer he had been watching the green eyes whilst these thoughts had flashed through his mind, and now:
“You could not strike me over the heart,” said Dr. Fu-Manchu; “I am trained in more subtle arts than the crudities of boxing have ever appreciated. As to your second blow, aimed, I believe, at my jaw, this would not occur — you would be disabled.”
For a moment, a long moment, Alan Sterling hesitated; in fact, until the uncanny quality of these words had penetrated to his brain. Then he realized, as others had realized before him, that Dr. Fu-Manchu had been reading his thoughts. He stood quite still; he was recovering from the effects of the assault which had terminated his memories of Rowan House, and now was capable of standing unsupported.
“There is a monastery in Thibet,” the cold voice proceeded; “it is called Rache Churin. Those who have studied under the masters of Rache Churin have nothing to fear from Western violence. Forget your projects. Rejoice only that you live — if you value life.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN. THE PIT AND THE FURNACE
Alan Sterling stood upon a wooden platform, clutching a rusty iron rail and looking down upon a scene which reminded him of nothing so much as an illustration of Dante’s Inferno.
Dim figures, inhuman, strangely muffled like animated Egyptian mummies, moved far below. Sometimes they were revealed when the door of some kind of furnace was opened, to disappear again like phantom forms of a nightmare, when the door was closed. A stifling heat rose from the pit.
“The simile of a mummy has occurred to you,” said the voice of Dr. Fu-Manchu out of the darkness, that strange voice which stressed gutturals and lent to sibilants a quality rarely heard in the voice of an English speaker. “You are ignorant of Ancient Egyptian ritual, or other images would occur to you. In point of fact, these workers are protected against the poisonous fumes generated at certain points in the experiment now taking place below. These gases do not reach us here. They are consumed by a simple process and dispersed by means of a ventilation shaft. Pray continue to descend.”
Sterling, clutching the rusty iron rail, went down more wooden steps.
To some degree he was regaining mastery of himself, but his brain failed to suggest any plan of action other than to accept the orders of the uncanny being into whose power, once again, he had fallen. Something which Nayland Smith had said, long, long ago — he was quite unable to recall when — came buzzing through his brain like a sort of refrain:
“Behind a house which we have passed a hundred times, over a hill which we have looked at every morning for months together, on the roof of a building in which we have lived, beneath a pavement upon which we walk daily, there are secret things which we don’t even suspect. Dr. Fu-Manchu has made it his business to seek out these secret things...”
Here was the theory demonstrated! He was in a trap: he hadn’t the remotest idea where he was. This ghastly place might be anywhere within a fifty mile radius of the house in Surrey. He must wait for a suitable opening; try to plan ahead.
He went on down the steps; the heat grew greater and greater. Dr. Fu-Manchu followed him.
“Stop!” the harsh voice directed.
And Sterling stopped.
One thing there was which gave him power to control his emotion, which gave him strength to temporize, patience to wait: Fleurette was alive!
Some wizardry of the Chinese physician had perverted her outlook. He, Sterling, had seen such cases before in households belonging to Dr. Fu-Manchu. The man’s knowledge was stupendous — he could play upon the strongest personality as a musician plays upon an instrument in an orchestra.
“You will presently observe something phenomenal,” the high voice continued, “something which has not occurred for several centuries. The mating of the elements. At the moment of transmutation, the fumes to which I have referred escape to a certain extent from the furnace.”
Sterling paused, looking down into the hot darkness.
“My facilities here are limited,” Dr. Fu-Manchu continued, “and I am using primitive methods. I am cut off from my once great resources — to a certain extent by the activities of your friend—” he stressed the word, speaking it upon a very high note— “Sir Denis Nayland Smith. But it is possible to light a fire by rubbing two pieces of wood together, if your burning glass is absent or if one has no matches. The work is about to complete itself—” his voice rose to a key which Sterling had thought, before, indicated that Nayland Smith was right when he had declared Dr. Fu-Manchu to be a brilliant madman. “Note the fires of union!”
The heat of the place as they descended nearer and nearer to the furnace was becoming almost unendurable. But now came a loud and vicious crackling, the clang of metal, and the furnace door was thrown open.
A blaze of light from the white-hot fire poured across the floor below. Mummy-like figures moved in it to approach that miniature hell, now extending instruments resembling long narrow tongs.
From the white heat of the furnace they grabbed what looked like a ball of light, and lowered it to the floor.
The furnace doors were reclosed by two more mummy-like figures which appeared out of the shadows.
The scene became more and more fantastic. The incandescent globe was shattered. Where it had been, Sterling saw a number of objects resembling streaks of molten metal; their glow grew dim and more dim.
“This work,” said Dr. Fu-Manchu, “will engage your attention in the immediate future. You have grossly interfered with my plans in the past, and I might justly and perhaps wisely, kill you. Unfortunately, I am short of labor at the moment, and you are a physically strong man—”
“You mean,” asked Sterling, “that you are going to make me work down in that hell?”
“I fear it must be so—” the speaker’s voice was very sibilant. “Continue to the base of the stairs.”
And Sterling, descending, found himself at the bottom of the huge black shaft. The furnace was closed — the Inferno dimly lighted. Not one of the mummy-wrapped figures was to be seen. But the heat —
A tunnel sloped away on his right. Far down it, a solitary lantern appeared, as if to indicate its cl
ammy extent — for, as he could see, this tunnel dripped with moisture and its floor was flooded in places. A grateful coolness was perceptible at the entrance to this unwholesome looking burrow.
“You will observe,” said Dr. Fu-Manchu — who invariably spoke as if addressing a class of students— “that the temperature is lower here than on the stairs. We are actually a hundred and twenty feet below the surface... We will return.”
The authority behind Dr. Fu-Manchu’s orders had a quality which created awe, without making for resentment. Sterling had experienced in the past this imposition of the Chinaman’s gigantic will. The power of Fu-Manchu’s commands lay in his acceptance of the fact that they would never be questioned.
He passed the Chinaman, stepped on to the narrow stair, and clutching the iron rail proceeded upwards.
“It may interest you to learn,” came the harsh voice from behind him, “that human flesh is excellent fuel in relation to this particular experiment...”
Sterling made no reply... the implication was one he did not care to dwell upon. He remembered that Dr. Fu-Manchu had said, “I had intended to incinerate your body.”
These stairs with their rusty hand-rails, seemed all but interminable. Descent had been bad enough, but this return journey, following on the spectacle below, was worse. Vague gleams from the pit fitfully lighted the darkness. From behind, Dr. Fu-Manchu directed a light upon the crude wooden steps...
Sterling found himself back again in a curiously high, narrow, brick corridor which led to the vault in which he had first awakened. He had just passed a low door, deep sunken in brickwork, when:
“Stop,” the imperious voice directed.
There came a sound of rapping on the door — that of a bolt shot free — a faint creaking.
“Step back a pace, lower your head, and go in.”
Sterling obeyed. He knew that the alternative was suicide. This place, he began to realize, in addition to its heat, had a vague but ghastly charnel-house odor...
He went ahead along a narrow passage; someone who had opened the door stood aside to allow him to pass. He found himself in a small, square brick chamber illuminated by one unshaded bulb hanging on a length of cable. He heard the outer door being bolted.