Daughter of Fu Manchu
Page 19
"Shan! Shan!" she cried. "What is he going to do to me?"
Dr. Fu Manchu beat upon the floor again and spoke one harsh word. The Nubian and the Dyak stood still. No sergeant of the Guards ever had more complete control of men.
"Miss Barton," he said, his voice altering uncannily between the sibilant and the guttural and seeming to be produced with difficulty, "your safety is assured. I wish to be alone with Sir Denis and Mr. Greville. For your greater ease, Sir Denis will tell you that my word is my bond."
He turned those sunken filmed eyes in the direction of the big arm-chair and:
"You needn't worry, Rima," said Nayland Smith. "Dr. Fu Manchu guarantees your safety."
I was amazed beyond reason. Even so fortified, Rima's eyes were dark with terror. A swift flow of words brought the Dyak sharply about to take his instructions. Then he and the Nubian escorted Rima from the room.
I tugged, groaning, at the cords which held me. I stared at Nayland Smith. Was he holding a candle to the devil? How could a sane man accept the assurances of such a proven criminal?
But, as though my ideas had been spoken aloud:
"Do not misjudge Sir Denis," came the harsh voice. "He knows that in warfare I am remorseless. But he knows also that no mandarin of my order has ever willingly broken his promise."
The Nubian had closed the door leading to the lobby. Dr. Fu Manchu had closed that of the false cabinet as he came into the room. No sound entered the arena where this menace to white supremacy and the man whose defences had defied him confronted one another.
5
"It is a strange fact." said Dr. Fu Manchu, "that only the circumstance of your being a prisoner allows of our present conversation."
He paused, watching, watching Nayland Smith with those physically weak but spiritu- ally powerful eyes. The Chinaman's force was incredible. It was as though a great lamp burned in that frail, angular body.
"Yet, now, by a paradox, we stand together."
Resting on his ebony stick, he drew himself up so that his thin frame assumed something of its former height.
"My methods are not your methods. Perhaps I have laughed at your British scru- ples. Perhaps a day may come, Sir Denis, when you will join in my laughter. But, as much as I have hated you, I have always admired your clarity of mind and your tenacity. You were instrumental in defeating me, when I had planned to readjust the centre of world power. No doubt you thought me mad--a megalomaniac. You were wrong."
He spoke the last three words in a low voice--almost a whisper.
"I worked for my country. I saw China misruled, falling into decay; with all her vast resources, becoming prey for carrion. I hoped to give China that place in the world to which her intellect, her industry, and her ideals entitle her. I hoped to awaken China. My methods. Sir Denis, were bad. My motive was good."
His voice rose. He raised one gaunt hand in a gesture of defiance. Nayland Smith spoke no word. And I watched this wraith of terror as one watches a creature uncreated, who figures hideously in some disordered dream. His sincerity was unmistakable; his power of intellect enormous. When I realized what he defended, what he stood for--and that I, Shan Greville, was listening to him in a house somewhere in London, I felt like laughing hysterically.
"Your long reign. Sir Denis, is ending. A blacker tragedy than any I had dreamt of will end your Empire. It is Fate that both of us must now look on. I thank my gods that the consummation will not be seen by me.
"The woman you know as Fah Lo Suee-- it was her pet name in nursery days--is my child by a Russian mother. In her, Sir Denis, I share the sorrow of Shakespeare's King Lear.... She has reawakened a power which I had buried. I cannot condemn her. She is my flesh. But in China we expect, and exact, obedience. The Si Fan is a society older than Buddhism and more flexible. Its ruler wields a sword none can withstand. For many years Si Fan has slumbered. Fah Lo Suee has dared to awaken it!"
He turned his dreadful eyes on me for the first time since he had begun to speak.
"Mr. Greville, you cannot know what control of that organisation means! Misdirected, at such a crisis of history as this, it could only mean another world war! I dragged myself from retirement"--he looked again at Nayland Smith--"to check the madness of Fah Lo Suee. Some harm she has done. But I have succeeded. To-night, again, I am lord of the Si Fan!"
Quivering, he rested on his stick.
"I had never dreamt," said Nayland Smith, "that I should live to applaud your success."
Dr. Fu Manchu turned and walked to the lacquer door. Reaching it:
"If you were free," he replied, "it would be your duty to detain me. My plans are made. Fah Lo Suee will trouble you no more. Overtake me if you wish--and if you can. I am indifferent to the issue, sir Denis, but I leave England to-night. Si Fan will sleep again. The balance of world power will be readjusted--but not as she had planned.
"In half an hour I will cause Superinten- dent Weymouth-- whom I esteem--to be informed that you are here. Miss Barton, during that period, must remain locked in a room above. Greeting and goodbye. Sir Denis. Greeting and goodbye, Mr. Greville."
He went out and closed the door....
6
Nearly a year has passed since that night when for the first, and I pray for the last, time I found myself face to face with Dr. Fu Manchu--the world's greatest criminal, perhaps the world's supreme genius--and a man of his word.
Unable to credit the facts, a few minutes after his disappearance, I shouted Rima's name.
She replied--her voice reaching me dimly from some higher room. She was safe, but locked in....
And an hour later, Weymouth arrived--to find Nayland Smith at last disentangled from the cunning knots of the Sea-Dyak! "It was possible, after all, Greville! But a damned long business!"
I write these concluding notes before my tent in Sir Lionel Barton's camp on the site of ancient Nineveh. Sunset draws near, and I can see Rima, a camera slung over her shoulder, coming down the slope.
We are to be married on our return to London.
Of Dr. Fu Manchu, Fah Lo Suee, and their terrible escort, no trace was ever discovered!
Even the body ofKi King Su was spirited away. Six months of intense and world-wide activity, directed by Nayland Smith, resulted in... nothing! "My plans are made," that great and evil man had said.
Sometimes I doubt if it ever happened. Sometimes I wonder if it is really finished. Before me, on the box which is my extempo- rised writing-desk, lies a big emerald set in an antique silver ring. It reached me only a month ago in a package posted from Hong Kong. There was no note inside....
The End
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