CHAPTER XXV
THE PASSING OF PHADRIG
In all London, or, indeed, in any capital of Europe, there were no moreangrily puzzled men than Nicol Hendry and his colleague andsubordinates. He was perfectly certain now that Phadrig Amena held thekey to the conspiracy which had resulted in the disappearance of PrinceZastrow. Oscarovitch had vanished. He had been traced to Copenhagen, andthen absolutely lost sight of. Three agents, all picked experts, hadbeen put on to watch Phadrig and the Pentanas, as they were known tohim, and within a fortnight they had all died. One had fallen downcrossing the north side of Trafalgar Square: the verdict had been heartfailure. Another threw himself into the river from the Tower Bridge; andthe third, a woman who was one of the most skilful spies in the serviceof the International, had made his acquaintance and had dinner with himat the "Monico," and was found dead the next morning with an emptymorphia syringe in her hand and a swollen puncture in her left arm.
Thus four more or less valuable lives had been lost, and not a shred oftangible evidence obtained against the Egyptian. Convinced as he wasthat this man was as responsible for their deaths as he had been forthat of Josephus, neither he nor his colleagues could find the slightestgrounds for applying for a warrant for his arrest, and meanwhile thingswere going from bad to worse in Russia. The Romanoff dynasty wastottering to its fall. The responsible leaders of the Revolution, angryand bewildered by the loss of the man whom they had practically chosento rule over them, were distributing thousands of copies of an unsignedmanifesto which could not have come from any one but "the newSkobeleff." What was left of the army and the navy was rallying to thenameless standard of the still unknown saviour of Russia. Von Kessnerand Captain Vollmar had apparently ceased to exist, and the PrincessHermia was living with her lady-in-waiting in the strictest retirementin Dresden.
"It seems to me that things are at an utter deadlock," said Nicol Hendryto the Chief of the German section, who had come over to London toconfer with him. "Four of our best agents have died in a fortnight, andthe others are getting shy. Really, we can't blame them. This is notlike fighting the ordinary sort of anarchist or regicide, who, afterall, does content himself with physical means. This infernal scoundrel,as I must confess I was warned to begin with, is quite independent ofthe rules of the game. He kills people by their own hands, not his, and,literally, there seems no way of catching him."
"There must be a way, my dear Hendry," replied the German, who was thevery incarnation of mechanical officialism. "You look at these things asconsequences, I regard them only as rather extraordinary coincidences.If this is anything like what you seem to think it, it is supernatural,and I don't believe in that."
"There is a very easy way to convince yourself, my dear Von Hamner,"replied Hendry, with a slight shrug of his shoulders. "Suppose you goand interview this modern Mephistopheles yourself?"
"Will you come with me if I do?" asked the German, with a straight starethrough his spectacles.
"Certainly. In our profession it is necessary to take risks. The thinghas gone far enough. Here we are in my room at New Scotland Yard, thecentre and stronghold of the British police system, and there is thisman or super-man, if you like, making no sign, doing nothing that willgive us a hold upon him, and yet killing our agents as fast as we sendthem to find out what he is working at, and we know just as much to-dayas we did three weeks ago. Now, what is your idea?"
"Just this: if the English law won't touch him, do as we do in Germany,take the law into your own hands. We know where the fellow is to befound down in that slum near the Borough Road. Send a few of yourplain-clothes men there this afternoon, and we will follow in a cab.Bring your bracelets with you, and I shall take my revolver. We don'twant any nonsense this time. If it goes on much longer we shall be thelaughing-stock of the whole force from end to end of Europe, and thatwill not do us any good. Shall it be for this afternoon?"
"It will be better done now. He has worked mischief enough, and if weare going to do it we may as well bring the thing to a head at once, asthey say in the States. Now I will give the instructions, and we will goto lunch. It may be the last that either of us will eat, you know."
"Poof!" exclaimed Von Hamner, who was feeling not a little nettled atthis quiet challenge to test his personal courage. "You are the last manon earth that I should have suspected of superstition, my dear Hendry.But, there, give your orders, and we will go to lunch, and then aboutfour o'clock we may make our call in Candler's Court."
While the two Chiefs of the International were talking, Phadrig wasreading a cypher telegram, of which the meaning was this:
"REVAL.--Professor fell overboard three days ago. Body not recovered. Horus Stone did its work. N. consents. I marry her at Oscarburg. Russia ready. Fool International for a few days and come to Viborg when you have done with them. O."
"That is good news," said Phadrig, in a confidential whisper to himself;"for a man on the lower plane of existence the Prince is wonderfullyclever. This is a master-stroke. If he really has the Queen in his powerall the rest will be easy."
"There's two gentlemen to see you, Mr Amena." The door opened, and hislandlady's dirty little daughter put her towsled head through the littlespace behind the doorpost. "They're down below; shall I send 'em up?"
"Certainly, Jane. Tell the gentlemen that I shall be pleased to seethem."
The dirty face vanished as the door closed. Phadrig shut down the top ofthe big escritoire and locked it. Heavy treads sounded on the ricketystairs. There was a shuffle of feet on the little landing, a sharp knockat the door, and he said in a low tone:
"Come in, gentlemen. I have been expecting you."
The door opened and Nicol Hendry entered, followed by his Germancolleague. Practised as they were in all the arts of their profession,they looked about the mean, miserably appointed room with curious eyes.Phadrig, dressed in the same shabby semi-Oriental costume in which hehad received Isaac Josephus, salaamed, and said:
"Gentlemen, although this is but a poor room to receive you in, I ampleased that you have come. You are officers of the International, if Iam not mistaken."
Then his speech changed to German, and he went on:
"You, sir, are M. Nicol Hendry, and your friend is the Herr von Hamner,Chief of the Berlin Section. What can I do to serve you?"
It was anything but the greeting that they expected. They thought thatthey had tracked the real criminal to his last hiding-place. They hadestablished the identity between Phadrig, the poor seller of curios, andPhadrig Amena, the worker of miracles, whom all the smart set in Londonwas talking about; and here he was in this miserable, shabby room,dressed in clothes that no pawnbroker would advance a couple ofshillings on, smiling and bowing before them as though they were lordsof the earth, and he--the man who had sent three men and a woman totheir deaths by, as it were, a mere word of command--a worm beneaththeir feet. Nicol Hendry managed to keep his self-possession, but VonHamner was already sorry that he had come, and his face showed it.
"We have come to ask you, Mr Amena," said Hendry, thinking it best tocome to the point at once, "why you found it necessary to kill thosepeople. I needn't mention names. You know them as well as we do."
"I did not kill them, gentlemen. They killed themselves, according tothe newspaper reports. And now, may I ask you why you found it necessaryto set these spies of yours to watch my every movement night and day?What have I done to bring myself within the four corners of your Englishlaw?"
"Nothing, unfortunately, that we can get a warrant for," replied Hendry,trying not to look into his eyes, "and so we have taken the law into ourown hands. Come, Mr Amena, the game is up. We know all about your sharein the conspiracy to remove Prince Zastrow in order to make room foryour patron Prince Oscarovitch. We have copies of his manifesto atScotland Yard, and we know that you received a telegram in cypher fromhim to-day."
"Ah!" said Phadrig, in a tone whose smoothness was intensely
aggravating, "that is very interesting. May I ask if you have translatedthe cypher?"
"No, damn you and your Prince!" burst in Von Hamner. "If we had donethat we should know even more about you than we do now--and that oughtto be enough to hang you."
He had spluttered the words out before Hendry had time to stop him. Heexpected a tragedy there and then, but it did not happen. Phadrig tookthe telegram out of his coat pocket, handed it to Von Hamner with agraceful bow, and said:
"Your information is quite correct, gentlemen. That is the telegram, andthis is the meaning of it."
Then as they read the unintelligible jumble of words, he repeated themeaning of them as though they formed the most ordinary message, insteadof a dispatch that might, as they well knew, shake Europe to its socialand political foundations within the next week or so.
"Then this is another of your devilries, I suppose," snarled Von Hamner."So you have killed the great Professor Marmion, the most gifted geniusin the whole world, as you killed the others, to promote your infernalschemes; and you have helped that scoundrel Oscarovitch to abduct hisdaughter. Well, law or no law, this shall be the end of your doings. Youwill come with us as our prisoner, or you will not leave this roomalive."
"Those are hard words, mein Herr," said Phadrig, still speaking inGerman. "I your prisoner! Why? What have I done to make this outrage onEnglish law possible?"
"You will do better to come, Mr Amena," said Hendry, in his quietofficial tone; "it will save a good deal of trouble both to you and us.It must be the same in the end, you know. We have got you, and we don'tmean to let you do any more mischief. You have done quite enoughalready. Now, will you come quietly, or shall we take you? We shallcharge you at Lambeth as a receiver of stolen goods: you will beremanded for a week in custody, and by that time we shall have yourPrince in safe keeping in St Petersburg."
"Will you, really?" asked Phadrig, lifting his eyelids for the firsttime during the interview. "I should have thought that a man of yourEuropean experience would have called the Russian capital by its propername. Surely you know that only newspaper people make that mistake. Itis the city of Peter the Great, not Saint Peter the apostle. Thefortress of Petro-paulovsky is not named after saints--only afterTsars."
There was a sneer in his voice as he made this trivial correction whichroused both Hendry and Von Hamner to anger. The German pulled hisrevolver out of his hip pocket, and Hendry produced a beautiful pair ofpolished handcuffs from his left trouser pocket.
"Ah, I see that you have come prepared, gentlemen!" said Phadrig, with alaughing sneer in his low-voiced whisper. "Those are what you call thebracelets in England, are they not? Well, since you are determined totake the law into your hands--here are mine. Put them on M. Hendry, andthen your friend may not think it necessary to try and shoot me."
He held his hands out. The way in which he said "try and shoot me" didnot sound well in their ears, but Nicol Hendry thought that the work hadto be put through now or not at all. He took a couple of steps towardsPhadrig, and a couple of sharp snaps told Von Hamner that their prisonerwas safe. But the prisoner did not seem to think so. He raised his handsand looked at the handcuffs. He seemed to examine them as though theywere curiosities.
"Are these really what you take criminals to prison with? They don'tseem very strong. I could break them as though they were thread."
"That will do, Mr Amena. You've got them on now, and we don't want anymore of your conjuring tricks. Come along, and take it quietly like asensible man."
Hendry was fast losing patience, and Von Hamner was doing all he couldto keep his finger off the trigger of the revolver.
"Ah yes, conjuring tricks you call them, you ignorants! Now look. Youhave put the handcuffs on to my wrists. Is this a conjuring trick? See!"
He held his arms out towards them, his two hands chained together.
"Mr Hendry, be good enough to take my right hand, and you, Herr vonHamner, my left. So; now shake my hands. You see, there are thehandcuffs on the floor."
It was only a shake of the hands, but the clink of the steel followed asthe bracelets dropped from his wrists. He stooped down, and inside tenseconds they were clipped round Von Hamner's. In the same instant he hadtwitched the revolver out of his hand and pointed it at Hendry's face.
"Now, gentlemen, you were talking about taking the law into your ownhands. I, you see, have taken it into mine. What do you propose to do? Iam quite at your service. Your idea of arresting me on a charge ofreceiving stolen goods is, if you will allow me to say so, absurd. Youcould no more make me guilty of that than you could hang me for thedeaths of those foolish spies of yours. Now, what is it to be? Pardonme, Herr von Hamner: the bracelets inconvenience you. Allow me." He tookthe handcuffs between his finger and thumb, shook the chain, and theydropped into his hand. "You will feel more comfortable now."
"Yes, and I'll make you less comfortable in Hell, where you should havebeen long ago," shouted Von Hamner, jumping at him the moment his handswere free, and snatching the revolver out of his hand. The pistol wentup before Hendry could get hold of his arm, and he fired. Phadrig puthis hand up, and when the smoke had drifted away, he held it out to VonHamner, and said:
"I think that is your bullet, mein Herr."
The bullet was lying in the palm of his hand, a little out of shapethrough passing the rifling, but still the same bullet.
The German's face turned a reddish-grey, and Nicol Hendry, with all hiscourage, was not feeling particularly well. As a matter of fact, he was,for the first time in his life, absolutely frightened. A man who coulddeal with handcuffs as though they were made of cotton, and catch abullet in his hands, was not the sort of criminal he had been trained tohunt. As for Von Hamner, he was in a state of utter collapse. He droppedupon a chair, a pitiable spectacle of craven fear, looking about halfhis real size so physically shrunken did he seem.
"Let the devil go, Hendry," he mumbled. "He is more than man. What isthe use? If you cannot shoot him, you cannot hang him, and if handcuffswon't hold him, prison doors won't. Let us go and leave the devil tohimself. I've had enough of it."
"But perhaps the devil has not," said Phadrig, with a politeness whichwas infuriating in its mildness. "You gentlemen will understand that Ido not wish to have this espionage going on any longer. If you cannotpromise that it shall stop at once I shall, for my own protection, haveto suggest to you that you shall remove yourselves, as the others havedone."
"No, no, not that, man, not that!" shouted Von Hamner, springing fromhis seat and making for the door. "I have done with the whole business,curse it! Let me go, let me go! Hendry, do as you like, but do it alone.I have finished."
Before Hendry could reply, or before Von Hamner could reach it, the doorwas flung open, and Franklin Marmion strode into the room. Von Hamnercrawled back to his chair. He did not like the look of a dead man whohad come to life again. Nicol Hendry held out his hand, and said:
"And is it really you, Professor? Mr Amena here has just had news thatyou were dead--'fallen overboard in the Baltic from Prince Oscarovitch'syacht. Body not recovered,' is what the telegram says."
"The body is here right enough, M. Hendry. I did not fall overboard. Iwas bound hand and foot, had a mass of iron tied to my feet, and wasthrown out of a port-hole by the Prince and his captain. Of course, Igot rid of the rope and the iron even more easily than this man got ridof your handcuffs a short time ago, and after keeping myself afloat forhalf an hour or so, I was picked up by a fishing-boat which took me toStralsund. I got a change of clothes there, and came home _via_ Hamburgand Ostend. My daughter has gone on in the yacht to Oscarburg, wherethe Prince expects to make her his wife, and where she will make a veryconsiderable fool of him. That is all, and now I suppose I had betterdeal with this man."
"Mercy, mercy, Thou Who Knowest! Pity, pity!"
Phadrig raised his hands above his head, turned round thrice slowly, andsank in a heap on the floor.
"Thou who wast once High Priest in the House of Ptah: thou who has
t heldthe Doctrine: thou darest to ask for mercy, knowing well that there isno forgiveness of sins: thou hast taken innocent lives, believingthyself above human law. A wasted life is behind thee: see that thoudoest better for thy soul's sake in the next. Die now! The High Godshave spoken, and the penalty of sin is death--and the life beyond. Die!"
And Phadrig died. His eyes glazed and his flesh withered; his lips andhis gums dried up and shrivelled away from his jaws. His clothes fellaway from his body in rotting shreds, and before Nicol Hendry and VonHamner had quite grasped the full meaning of the horror that washappening before their eyes, all that was left of him was a little heapof yellow bones with a few fragments of cloth clinging to them.
"Gentlemen," said Franklin Marmion, "there are some things which cannotbe told. I think you will agree with me that this is one of them. MrAmena has left the world for the present. Those bones will be dust in afew minutes. It will only be another mysterious disappearance, and Idon't think that any one except the Pentanas and Prince Oscarovitch willtrouble much about him. The Pentanas are now deprived of all power forharm, and the Prince will probably be a harmless lunatic when he comesback into the world. I should sweep that dust up and put it into thefireplace, if I were you. In that desk you will find documents givingthe whole history of the Affaire Zastrow. They will be useful to you.You will have to excuse me now. Europe is on the brink of war, and Imust go and remove the cause. I rely upon your discretion as to theevents of this afternoon. Au revoir. I shall have the pleasure of seeingyou again shortly."
The door closed, and they were left to their somewhat gruesome task.
The Mummy and Miss Nitocris: A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension Page 26
