by Sax Rohmer
The zones disappeared. The map disappeared.
“I’m further instructed,” my unpleasant guide continued, “to explain to you the death of the man Hans Pfal. He died in your friend’s car on the way back to Baden. Will you please follow me very carefully. There are several danger spots in this part of the laboratory.”
He moved away, chewing industriously; and I followed. The floor was slippery, being composed of what looked like green glass. The walls also were green and glistening; the ceiling was dull gray. Right and left of the path along which he led me stood glass tables bearing incomprehensible apparatus.
I shrank from touching anything, following my white-clad guide, who wore rubber-soled shoes, as one follows the light of salvation.
We passed from one end to the other of the lofty, silent room.
Dr. Nestor stopped before a sort of gigantic index which occupied nearly the whole of one wall. It consisted of hundreds of columns of figures, running from tens into thousands, irregularly arranged. In some respects it resembled the time table of trains used at railway termini. At its base was set a long, shallow desk.
“Here,” said Dr. Nestor, smiling, “are the Brothers of Anubis—each bearing a number.”
He pulled back a white sleeve, revealing a disk chained to his arm. I saw it to be identical with that worn by the man who had died in Max’s car.
“363,” he explained, “is my own number.”
Reversing the disk, he glanced at me. It bore an Egyptian figure which I recognized.
“Only the first grade of initiates understand the significance of these amulets, or badges, which every member of the order must wear—I may add, under penalty of death. As a matter of fact, they’re tuned in to this keyboard. Distance doesn’t count. Melbourne’s as near as Berlin. I’ll show you what I mean and then you can draw your own conclusions as to how Hans Pfal died.”
He moved one of many levers upon the desk. A round spot of white light mounted a column of figures. Immediately over a number it stopped.
“Note!” said the demonstrator—“my own number: 363!”
Again he displayed the disk upon his wrist.
“It’s only necessary now, Mr. Woodville, to move a certain switch and I should die instantly and painlessly. Nor would my body bear any mark of violence. This was how Hans Pfal died. And this, you see, is how we assure secrecy.”
He reversed the lever. The spot of light descended and disappeared.
“You’re surely privileged,” Dr. Nestor declared. “Only chosen members of the order are ever admitted to this laboratory.”
The queer, X-ray light of the place faltered momentarily.
“Chief chemist!” Nestor exclaimed. “This ends my watch, Mr. Woodville. I now go to change. Don’t think I’m discourteous: I’m just obeying orders. The Chief will be with you in a moment. Stay right where you are ... and don’t touch anything! Good-bye, sir!” I watched Dr. Nestor’s white-clad figure receding among mazes of apparatus. He walked silently.
Came an interval. It was ended by a sound which I knew—that of an ascending elevator. I turned. Right at my elbow, beside the huge indicator, a panel opened.
Mme. Yburg stepped out!
2
Moments come in everybody’s life which, because they are so numbing, leave no definite impression whatever. This was one of them.
I saw that she wore a long white jacket of the kind affected by surgeons. Beneath it, her silk-clad legs struck an incongruous note. But I observed, my first shock of amazement over, that she had substituted rubber-soled slippers for the chic shoes which I associated with those slim, delicately arched feet.
“You look frightfully surprised!”
She was regarding me amusedly. The elevator panel had closed, the whine had died away.
“I am!”
“Why? Your brilliant friend, Mr. Lonergan, has told you of my association with the Hartford mystery. And that fascinating Frenchman, Gaston Max, assured you, did he not, that I was in the Pyrenees on a certain occasion? You must surely know I am a woman with a mission!”
She was mocking me—or so I thought; holding her head proudly erect and watching, under half-lowered lids, with those calm, slightly oblique eyes. One slender, psychic hand rested on her hip. . . .
It fascinated me—that hand. I found myself wondering why it was so white, and not sunburned . . . the poise of the body, the pose of the head . . .
She smiled, a red-lipped smile which at once irritated and caressed.
“Well? What are you thinking about? You say nothing.”
“I’m thinking about Apollonius of Tyana.” She ceased to smile. “That great philosopher declared that ‘loquacity has many pitfalls—but silence, none.’”
Her level gaze caught and held my own.
“You are not so clever as John Lonergan,” she said quietly, “and you have none of the subtlety of Gaston Max. But although I never liked the English, I think I like you”
“A somewhat equivocal compliment!”
Mme. Yburg laughed outright. She pressed her hand lightly on my shoulder and as lightly withdrew it.
“Anubis never makes mistakes. I understand why, of three, he has selected you to make the choice.”
“But I want to know-”
She checked me.
“Kindly ask no questions which Fm unable to answer. Ask any you like about the laboratory.”
Her calm eyes held an unspoken warning.
“Sorry,” I returned.
I forced myself back to a state of passivity. I washed my hands of speculations, and determined from now on to behave like a visitor being shown around an explosive factory. The feat was one of mental acrobatics. But I achieved it.
“Very well. I’ve had personal and unpleasant experience of the sound zones. Their principle defeats me. But I’m curious to know how an intruder is spotted. I ask for this reason: Your third barrage or zone wasn’t laid down when Lonergan and myself recently penetrated to the woods. You trapped us with it. How did you know we were there?”
Mme. Yburg smiled again.
“I can explain very easily, my friend. Follow me closely. Touch nothing. Be careful.”
Her solicitude was real. In this it differed from the sentiments of Dr. Nestor. Plainly, the latter disliked me. Yet, whilst I recognized Mme. Yburg’s friendship, I knew unmistakably that sex had no place in it. All the time she was weighing me up, calmly. I wondered why.
Following her, fearful of stumbling on the slippery floor, of brushing against any one of the strange mechanisms right and left, I watched the lithe, swaying figure and tried in vain to pin down a memory which taunted me. . . .
She led me through intricate ways to a place roughly centre of the laboratory, where a magnified green lampshade overhung a low, circular table. The top was covered with that same sort of opaque glass upon which I had seen the map of the sound zones.
Some change was made in the lighting. I gave a start of amazement.
As if from an airplane, I looked down upon the castle of Felsenweir!
I saw the woods which hemmed it in, the old military road winding through them. Every detail was sharp, clear, as if bathed in sunlight. I saw other roads surrounding the crag; the very spot at which I had been captured by that nude inhuman Thing! I saw the path down to the abandoned village. . . .
“Whoever is on duty here is responsible, you see. I don’t know if Dr. Nestor showed you the insulated path ? . . . Well, there is such a path through all three barrages. Hans Pfal, returning from the town, meant to use this. But our clever French friend overpowered him. . . .
“This mechanism operates in moonlight also. Dr. Nestor saw John Lonergan and yourself enter the woods. He was on duty at the time. He laid down the second barrage. Then the third.
“Frankly, you defeated us on that occasion. Dr. Nestor is frightfully sore! . . . Pfal, by the way, was one of our engine room staff. By the time communication was established with Anubis, other measures were useless. He ordered the poor Pfal
to be silenced. Look! There’s a man driving a cart along the highroad.”
I looked. Crystal clear, I saw the horse, the vehicle, the driver, moving along a road below the castle. I judged it all of a mile distant.
That wondrous panorama vanished. The green light in the laboratory flickered—and became steady again.
“Anubis is ready to see you,” said Mme. Yburg.
3
In complete darkness, I found myself speeding upward. This was my longest journey by elevator, and I decided that I was ascending the ancient watch tower by the only available route. The staircase I knew to be ruinous.
A panel opened as the elevator stopped. I saw a small, square lobby, dimly lighted with an amber light. I heard the elevator descend, knew that the panel had closed behind me, that I was alone with—what?
Immediately before me hung a curtain of bright and barbaric colouring, ancient Egyptian in scheme. Over it upon a ledge projected a figure of the god Anubis. I closed my eyes tightly for a moment. Silently I told myself, “You are Brian Woodville. You are in the Black Forest of Germany. Remember this—and fight! Fight!”
I opened my eyes. I stared at the gaudy curtain, when:
“Please come in, Woodville,” said the Voice.
I walked to the curtain, drew it aside, and stepped through. . . .
Quite still I stood, and looked. I had been tricked or had deceived myself. This was not the summit of the watch tower. I was in a very large room, so large that I thought it must have been the banqueting hall of the old fortress. Part of it was queerly illuminated from no visible source by a light resembling moonlight. Walls and ceiling were masked in shadow, so that I could only guess at its dimensions. I stood in darkness. Before me, in a deep, carved chair, a figure sat.
I had never seen a more magnificent head. The great domed brow, which appeared to be quite hairless, displayed a tremendous frontal development. The hawklike but pallid face was lighted by a pair of such beautiful eyes as I had never met with in man or beast. They were phenomenally large and golden; they seemed to be inspired by an inner fire of genius —or of madness.
They were watching me, those wonderful eyes. And I knew instinctively that, masked though I was in shadow, they could see me clearly. . . .
Grotesquely supporting that terrible, wonderful head was a tiny, black-clad body, slender, feeble, and seated cross-legged in the great chair. Talonlike hands rested upon the knees.
I heard the curtain’s rustle as it dropped behind me. There was no other sound.
The carved chair I saw now to be raised from the floor upon a sort of dais or platform. This platform was richly carpeted and bore two singular decorations: a pair of life-sized kneeling figures.
That right of the chair was wrought in ebony, surely by a great master: the figure of a Nubian girl, hands crossed upon her breast; her head, upon which appeared a close-wrapped turban of gold, lowered; upon one arm a golden bangle. The corresponding figure left of the chair was identical in every way, except that it seemed to be carved in ivory. Gold turban and armlet appeared again.
I had never seen such exquisite pieces of statuary. Yet, whilst I visualized these wonders, not once did I wholly withdraw my gaze from amber eyes looking out at me searchingly from beneath that great brow.
I was in the presence of Anubis. . . .
And Anubis was a dwarf!
CHAPTER XVIII - SLAVES OF FELSENWEIR
1
“We meet at last, Woodville!”
Anubis spoke. And I knew the Voice!
“Please come and talk to me. We have much to say to one another.,,
Those beautiful, dreadful eyes never moved in their regard. I came out of the shadow into blue light and at last stood less than a pace from the chair.
“Your work is familiar to me, Woodville.” Thin lips under a hawklike nose scarcely seemed to move. ‘“We shall understand one another presently.”
He raised one of the talonish hands and snapped his fingers.
I abandoned speculation again and became a detached watcher. I was in a world where ordinary laws had ceased to operate. ... In some way I had strayed over the border line.
The ebony statue stood up.
With a sense of amazement such as I cannot hope to convey, I realized that the figure lived! She disappeared into shadow but almost immediately returned carrying a low, tapestried stool.
In barefooted silence she approached, placed the seat for me, and returned to her place on the dais, resuming that pose in which I had first seen her. . . .
“Mizmun surprises you?” Anubis suggested. “She is a Nubian Arab, Woodville, and was born just outside Assouan. I procured her at the age of four. Is she not a beauty? Her companion”—with one talon hand he indicated the motionless ivory figure—“Isa, is a Georgian, as no doubt you had guessed from the texture of her skin.”
He snapped his fingers and spoke rapidly in a tongue which sounded unfamiliar. The ivory statue stood upright. Raising white arms, she turned slowly, dreamily, like a mannequin. I was conscious of definite embarrassment,and I suppose I showed it,for: “Pray do not consider the feelings of my attendants,” said Anubis. “They have none.”
He snapped his fingers again. Isa resumed her former pose.
“That unpleasant quality which women are fond of referring to as their soul is absent in Isa, Mizmun, and the others. Twelve in all, Woodville, and as nearly perfect as Nature will permit Science to rear a human being. The members of my Corps of Pages approximate as closely to the houris of Mohammed’s paradise as one could reasonably expect to approach.” He went on to tell me in his cold, cynical voice how he had procured these results—a mixture of surgery and dietetics which sickened me as I listened. My horror grew and grew—and my gorge rose against him.
“Every page, in addition, is mistress of some useful profession or pleasurable art. But perhaps I bore you. You may not share my passion for beauty—my hatred of all that is coarse in humanity, notably its proclivity for multiplying. I am personally unbeautiful. If I showed myself to the world, the world would mock at me. Therefore I hide and accumulate power. I am today, Woodville, the most powerful man living/’ He extended gaunt crooked fingers. “I hold that mocking world in the hollow of my hand!”
He paused, watching me, and I sought for composure—composure to retain the regard of those beautiful, wild-animal eyes.
“Your work in Brazil interested me deeply. Particularly, your account of certain native tribes oil the upper reaches of the Rio Negro suggested possibilities. Later, I shall ask you to mark on a map the exact territory occupied by them. I wish to convince you of the futility of your opposition. I shall then give you ample time to decide—for yourself and for your friends.
“You may all join our company if you wish. Indeed, I have urgent need of you. In your very dissimilar mental developments you are, all three, unique— but useful. I rather think you find our little Marusa attractive ? ”
I clenched my fists and bent forward.
“No melodrama, Woodville, I beg! Directly you have made your decision, I will give her to you with pleasure. . . . But I see you regard this as bribery. I wish your conclusions to be based upon an appreciation of my aims, purely. For this reason, and for no other, you have been permitted to see the laboratory and to interview me in person. Few of my company have enjoyed these privileges.”
He snapped his fingers.
“But let us forget worry and women, and consider wine!”
The girl Isa, in whom I had observed not the slightest indication of life since she had returned to her kneeling pose, stood up and disappeared in shadow. Mizmun followed. A few moments later they returned silently as they had stolen away.
One set a high table at the edge of the dais between myself and Anubis, the other laid a tray upon it. Right and left of the table they stood, the ebony and the ivory statue.
I saw before me a large bowl of fruit, glasses, some very delicate-looking sandwiches, a bottle of Bollinger, a flask of w
hite wine, some pre-war whisky, a syphon, and a plain black box.
Raising my eyes, they were caught and held by the fixed gaze of Anubis. He spoke softly.
“Your suspicions are ... an insult, Woodville» Even the clumsy Borgias disdained drugged wine!” “But . . . !”
“Those were your thoughts! Your suspicion I forgive. That you so gravely misunderstand my powers is disappointing. Would you be good enough to open the black box for me?”
I tore my gaze away from those golden eyes and looked at the box. Standing up, I raised the lid.
For self-possession I had been fighting all the time; but now, in spite of this hard-won control, a cry, a shriek, was torn from me. ... A blinding light shone out of the box, searing my eyes! I was blind! This devil had . . . The cry was cut short upon my lips.
“Obey!” said Anubis.
And suddenly I could see again! . . .
But I was powerless, paralyzed! I tried to raise my eyes from the box to the speaker. It was impossible. I could not move a muscle of my body. I was tongue-tied—a dead man, save for my powers of sight and hearing. Bending over the box I stood rigid, until:
“Look at me,” the Voice commanded.
I looked.
“When Gaston Max and yourself left your room at the Regal to wire to Paris, London, and New York, such a box was brought under the notice of John Lonergan. Since that moment he has been my slave. You understand?”
“I understand.”
I was helpless. This devilish mechanism had robbed me of personality!
“It is my intention, however,” Anubis continued, “that you shall be your own master. Therefore, close the box.”
I obeyed.
“You are free.”
It was so!
A sense of pressure like that of a steel helmet became removed from my brain. Anubis’s talon fingers were delicately skinning a peach.
“I might bind you to me for ever. But I always fulfil my promises. Your part is to choose. John Lonergan enjoys that oblivion which I undertook to impose upon him. He is a mere echo. I can so check corruption of the flesh, Woodville, that a human body would survive for many generations—a condition under which the brain dies slowly. I believe I spoke of a thousand years? Allow me to illustrate what I meant. But first, whilst I can commend the wines, I feel that your choice will fall upon whisky?”