by Sax Rohmer
“We have no clue to the person who tampered with the stationery at Weaver’s Farm,” Hepburn’s monotonous voice broke in.
“At the moment, none.”
Nayland Smith moved restlessly in the direction of one of the windows.
“Somewhere below there,” he went on, shooting out a pointing forefinger, “somewhere among those millions of lights, perhaps in sight from this very spot — Orwin Prescott is hidden!”
“I think you are right,” said Mark Hepburn, quietly.
“I am all but certain! New York, and not Washington, would be Dr. Fu-Manchu’s selection as a base. He has been operating here, through chosen agents, for some months past. Others are flocking to him. I had news from Scotland Yard only this morning of one formidable old ruffian who has slipped through their nets for the twentieth time and is believed to be here. And Prescott will have been brought to the Doctor’s headquarters. God knows what ordeal faces him — what choice he will be called upon to make! It is possible even that he may be given no choice!”
Nayland Smith clenched his fists and shook them desperately in the direction of the myriad dancing lights of New York City.
“Look!” he cried. “Do you see? The mist has lifted. There is the Statue of Liberty! Do you realize, Hepburn” — he turned, a man all but imperturbable moved now by the immensity of his task— “do you realize what that figure will become if we fail?”
The wild light died from his eyes. He replaced his pipe and audibly gripped the stem between his small, even white teeth.
“We are not going to fail, Sir Denis,” Hepburn replied in dry unmusical tones.
“Thank you,” snapped Nayland Smith, and gripped his shoulder. “Dr. Fu-Manchu being a Chinaman, in which quarter of the city should you think it most unlikely he should establish a base?”
“Chinatown.”
Nayland Smith laughed gleefully.
“That is exactly how he will argue.”
* * * *
In a small room, amber-lighted through high windows, a man worked patiently upon a clay model of a Chinese head. A distant bell sounded, and the room became plunged in darkness. Only the glowing end of a cigarette showed through this darkness. A high-pitched, guttural voice spoke.
“Give me the latest Report from the Number responsible for cohering Federal Officer 56 in New York.”
“Only one other report to hand,” the modeler replied immediately; “received at eight forty-five. Federal Officer 56 is occupying an apartment in the Regal-Athenian Tower. Federal Officer Captain Mark Hepburn is also located there, and engaged upon chemical experiments. A few minutes after eight o’clock, Federal Officer 56 left by the service door and engaged one of the Lotus cabs. The driver notified the Number covering Lexington exits. A protection car was instructed, but 56 gave them the slip on the corner of Forty-eighth and reached Centre Street at eight thirty-five. Report concluded as follows: ‘Presume he is still at police headquarters as no notification that he has left is to hand.’”
Following a few moments of silence:
“Inform me,” the guttural voice continued, “directly any report is received from Number 38, now proceeding from Cleveland to New York City.”
The distant bell rang again and amber light prevailed once more in the small, domed room. The white-haired intellectual sculptor blinked slightly as though this sudden illumination hurt his eyes. Then, taking up tortoise-shell rimmed spectacles which he had laid down at the moment that the light had become extinguished, he dropped the stump of an Egyptian cigarette in an ash tray, having ignited another from the burning end. Taking up a modeling tool he returned to his eternal task…
CHAPTER EIGHT. THE BLACK HAT
A Lotus cab, conspicuous by reason of its cream body-work and pink line, drew up at the corner of Mulberry and Bayard Streets. The passenger got out; a small man, very graceful of movement, dark, sleek, wearing a gray waterproof overcoat and a soft black hat. He stood for a moment beside the driver as he paid his fare, glancing back along the route they had followed.
His fare paid, he crossed Pell Street and began to walk east.
The driver turned his cab, but then made a detour, crossing Mott Street. He pulled up before Wu King’s Bar and went in. He came out again inside three minutes and drove away.
Meanwhile, the man in the black hat continued to walk east. A trickle of rain was falling, and a bleak wind searched the Chinese quarter. He increased his pace. Bright lights shone out from stores and restaurants, but the inclement weather had driven the Asiatic population under cover. In those pedestrians who passed him in the drizzle the man in the black hat seemed to take no interest whatever. He walked on with an easy, swinging stride as one confident that no harm would come to him in Chinatown.
When he passed an open door, to his nostrils came a whiff of that queer commingling of incense and spice which distinguishes the quarter. The Chinaman is a law-abiding citizen. His laws may be different from those of the Western world, but to his own codes he conforms religiously. Only a country cousin on a sight-seeing expedition could have detected anything mysterious about the streets through which the man in the black hat hurried. Even Deputy Inspector Gregory of the branch accountable for the good behavior of Chinatown had observed nothing mysterious in his patrol of the public resorts and private byways.
Except for a curious hush when he had stopped in at Wu King’s Bar for a chat with the genial proprietor and a look around for a certain Celestial there was nothing in the slightest degree suspicious in the behavior of the people of the Asiatic quarter. This impression of a hush which had fallen at the moment of his entrance he had been unable to confirm — it might have been imaginary. In any event Wu King’s was the headquarters of the Hip Sing Tong, and if it meant anything it probably meant a brewing disturbance between rival Chinese societies.
He was still considering the impression which this hush, real or imaginary, had made upon his mind when, turning a corner, he all but bumped into the man with the black hat.
The black hat was lowered against the keen wind; the detective, wind behind him, was walking very upright. Then, in a flash, the black-hatted man had gone. Momentarily the idea crossed the detective’s mind that he had not seen the man’s face — it might have been the face of a Chinaman, and he was anxious to meet a certain Chinaman.
He turned for a moment, looking back.
The man in the black hat had disappeared.
It was a particularly foul night, and Gregory had more than carried out his instructions. He trudged on through the icy drizzle to make his report. Secret orders had been received from headquarters calling upon all officers to look out for a very old Chinaman known in London as Sam Pak, and now believed to be posing as a residing alien. His description was vividly etched upon the detective’s mind. The man in the black hat could not possibly fill the part, for this Sam Pak was very old. What this very old man could be wanted for was not clear to the deputy inspector. Nevertheless, that momentary instinct would have served him well had he obeyed it…
The man whose features he had failed to see turned the first corner behind the police officer. When Gregory looked back the man was watching. Seeing Gregory walk on, he pursued his way. This led him past the corner occupied by Wu King’s Bar and right to the end of the block. Here the man in the black hat paused in shelter of a dark doorway, lighting a cigarette and shielding the light with an upraised hand. He then consulted a type-written sheet which he drew from his raincoat pocket. Evidently satisfied that he had not misunderstood his instructions, he replaced the lighter and glanced swiftly right and left along the street. This inspection assured him that none of the few pedestrians in sight was Gregory (whom he had recognized for a police officer). He groped along the wall on his right, found and pressed a bell.
Then again he looked out cautiously. Only one traveler, a small, furtive Asiatic figure, was approaching in his direction. A slight sound told the man in the black hat that a door had opened. He turned, stepped forward a
nd paused, seeking now with his left hand. He found a switch and depressed it. He heard the door close behind him. A moment more he waited, then, fumbling again in the darkness, he discovered a second switch, and light sprang up in the narrow passage in which he stood. The door which had opened to admit him was now shut. Another closed door was at the end of the passage. There was a bell-push beside it. He pressed the bell seven times — slowly…
* * * *
Deputy Inspector Gregory had not quite reached the end of the block, when heading towards him through the mist and rain he saw a tall, gaunt figure, that of a Salvation Army captain, gray-moustached and bespectacled. He would have passed on, for the presence of Salvation Army officials in unlikely quarters and the most inclement weather was a sight familiar enough. But the tall man pulled up directly in his path, and:
“Excuse me if I am wrong,” he said, speaking slowly and harshly, “but I think you are a police officer?”
Gregory glanced the speaker over and nodded. “That’s right,” he replied. “What can I do for you?”
“I am looking,” the harsh voice continued, “for a defaulter, a wayward brother who has fallen into sin. I saw him not five minutes ago, but lost him on the corner of Pell Street. As you were coming from that direction it is possible that you passed him.”
“What’s he like to look at?”
“He is a small man wearing a gray topcoat and a black soft hat. It is not our intention to charge him with his offense, but it is my duty to endeavor to overtake him.”
“He passed me less than two minutes ago,” Gregory replied sharply. “What’s he listed for?”
“Converting money to his own uses; but no soul is beyond redemption.”
The harsh, gloomy voice held that queer note of exaltation which Inspector Gregory had heard so often without being able to determine whether it indicated genuine piety or affection.
“I’ll step back with you,” he said tersely. “I know the corner he went round, and I know who lives in every house on that street. We’d better hurry!”
He turned and hurried back against the biting wind, the tall Salvation Army official striding along beside him silently. They came to the corner on which Wu King’s Bar was situated — the resort which Gregory had so recently visited; turning around it, they were temporarily sheltered from the icy blast.
“He may have gone into Wu’s,” said Gregory, as they looked along a deserted street, at one or two points of which lights shone out on the rain-drenched sidewalk. “Just stay here, and I’ll check up.”
He pushed open the door of the restaurant. To the nostrils of the Salvation Army official who stood outside was wafted a breath of that characteristic odor which belongs to every Chinatown in the world. In less than a minute the detective was out again.
“Not been in Wu’s,” he reported. “He must have gone in somewhere farther along, otherwise there wouldn’t be any object in going that way; unless he’s out for a walk. There’s no other joint open back there. Do you know of any connections he has in this quarter?”
“Probably many,” the harsh voice replied, and there was sadness in the tone. “He’s attached to our Chinatown branch. I’m obliged to you but will trouble you no further, except to ask that if ever you see this man, you will detain him.”
Gregory nodded, turned, and started off.
“No trouble,” he said. “Hope you find the guy.”
The Salvation Army official walked to the end of the street, gloomily scrutinizing closed doors to right and left, seeming to note the names over the shops, the numbers, the Chinese signs. Then turning to the right again at the end of the block, he walked on through the rain for a considerable distance and finally entered an elevated railroad station…
Salvation Army delegates from all over the United States were assembled in New York that week, and a group of the senior officials had been accommodated at the Regal-Athenian Hotel. Therefore, no one in the vast marble-pillared lobby of that palatial establishment was surprised to see the tall and gloomy captain walk in. No confrère was visible in the public rooms through which he passed: the last had retired fully an hour earlier. Entering a tower elevator:
“Thirty-three,” he announced gloomily.
He stepped out on the thirty-third floor, where two deputies from neighboring states were sharing an apartment. He did not go to their apartment, however. He opened a door at the end of the long carpeted corridor and began to mount a stair. He met no one on his way, but at the fortieth floor he opened a door and peered out into another deserted carpeted corridor…
Captain Mark Hepburn, pacing restlessly from room to room of the suite at the top of the tower, sometimes looking out of the window at rain-drenched New York below him, sometimes listening to the whine of the elevator, and sometimes exchanging glances with the equally restless Fey, Nayland Smith’s man, who also wandered disconsolately about, suddenly paused in the little vestibule. He had heard quick footsteps.
A moment later the door opened, and a gloomy Salvation Army captain entered.
“Thank God! Sir Denis,” said Hepburn and tried to repress the emotion he felt. “I was getting really worried.”
The Salvation Army captain removed his cap, his spectacles, and, very gingerly, his gray moustache, revealing the gaunt, eager features of Nayland Smith.
“Thanks, Hepburn,” he snapped. “I am sorry to have bothered you. But I was right.”
“What!”
Fey appeared silently, his stoic face a mask.
“A whisky and soda, sir?” he suggested.
“Thanks, Fey; a stiff one.”
A triumphant light danced in Smith’s steely eyes, and:
“It looks as though you had some news,” said Hepburn.
“I have.” Nayland Smith extracted pipe and pouch from the pocket of his uniform jacket. “My guess was right — a pure guess, Hepburn, no more; but I was right. Can you imagine whom I saw down there in Chinatown tonight?”
“Not—”
“No — my luck didn’t go as far as that. But just as I was turning out of Mott Street, right in the light from a restaurant, I saw our friend James Richet — Abbot Donegal’s ex-secretary!”
“Richet?”
“Exactly; one of the key men. Luck was with me. Then, suddenly it turned. Of all the unimaginable things, Hepburn… a real Salvation Army officer came up to me! Following a brief conversation he challenged me to establish my identity, and I was forced to do so.”
He pulled back the top of his tunic, revealing, the gold badge of a federal agent.
“A clumsy business, Hepburn. But what could I do? In the meantime, I had lost my man. I met a detective officer as I went racing around the corner. He was unmistakable. I know a policeman, to whatever country he belongs, a quarter of a mile away. He had passed my man and he did his best. I have memorized all the possible places into which he may have gone. But one thing is established, Hepburn — Dr. Fu-Manchu has a Chinatown base…”
CHAPTER NINE. THE SEVEN-EYED GODDESS
James Richet, known to the organization of which he was a member as Number 38, stepped through a doorway — the fifth he had counted — and knew he must be below sea level. This door immediately closed behind him.
He found himself in a lobby with stone-faced walls. A silk-shaded lantern hung from an iron bracket. Immediately facing him was another arched doorway, curtained. Above the curtain-rod glowed a dim semi-circle of light. This place smelled like a joss house. The only other item of furniture was a narrow cushioned divan, and upon this, a very old Chinaman was squatting. He wore a garment resembling a blue smock; he crouched forward on the divan, his veinous, clawlike hands resting upon his knees. He was a man of incalculable age: an intricate network of wrinkles mapped the whole of his face. His eyes were mere slits in the yellow skin. He might have been a chryselephantine statue, wrought by the cunning hand of a Chinese master.
A movement ever so slight of the bowed head indicated to Richet that the man on the divan was l
ooking at him. He raised the left lapel of his topcoat. A small badge, apparently made of gold and ivory, not unlike one of the chips used at the Monte Carlo gaming tables, was revealed. It bore the number 38.
“James Richet,” he said.
One of the talon hands moved back to the wall — and, in some place beyond a bell rang, dimly. A clawish finger indicated the curtained doorway. James Richet crossed the lobby, drew the curtain aside and entered.
The night out of which he had come was wet and icily cold, but the moisture which he wiped now from his forehead was not entirely due to the rain. He had removed his hat and stood looking about him. This was a rectangular apartment, also stone-faced; the floor was of polished stone upon which several rugs were spread. There were seven doors, two in each of the long walls, two in that ahead of him, and the one by which he had entered. Above each of them, on an iron bracket, a lantern was hung, shaded with amber silk. All the openings were draped, and the drapery of each was of a different color. There were cushioned seats all around the walls, set between the seven openings.
There was no other furniture except a huge square block of black granite, set in the center of the stone floor and supporting a grotesque figure which only an ultra-modern sculptor could have produced: a goddess possessing seven green eyes, so that one of her eyes watched each of the openings. There was the same perfume in the place as of stale incense, but nevertheless unlike the more characteristic odor of Chinatown. The place was silent, very silent. In contrast to the bitter weather prevailing up above, it seemed to be tropically hot. There was no one visible.
Richet looked about him uneasily. Then, as if the proximity even of the mummy-like Chinaman in the lobby afforded some sense of human companionship, he sat down just right of the opening by which he had entered placing his black hat upon the cushions beside him.
He tried to think. This place was a miracle of cunning — Chinese cunning. As one descended from the secret street door (and this, alone, was difficult to find) a second, masked door gave access to a considerable room. There was no other visible exit from this room. He realized that a police raid would almost certainly end there. Yet there were three more hidden doors — probably steel — and three short flights of stone steps before one reached this temple of the seven-eyed goddess. These doors had been opened from beyond as he had descended.