by Sax Rohmer
“Like a green lake!” I burst in, “which swallowed you up! I know. I know!”
“How do you know?” Petrie asked sharply. “When did you derive that curious impression?”
He was studying me keenly: and at once I grasped the significance of my words. They echoed some submerged memory of the hiatus! But, in the moment of uttering them, that memory slipped back again into the limbo of the subconscious.
“No good, Doctor,” I said, shaking my head. “You were right — but it’s gone! Go on, Rima.”
Rima, who seemed intuitively to have seized upon the purpose underlying Petrie’s question, looked at me pathetically, and then:
“I know you know, Shan dear,” she went on. “But you can’t remember — nor can I. Because I woke in a gloomy stone chamber, lighted by a round green lamp—”
“The King’s Chamber, Greville,” Petrie interpolated. “Rima had never seen it before, it seems.”
“Dr. Fu-Manchu was sitting by a small table, and there was a big stone sarcophagus just behind him. I was standing in front of him. There was no one else there; and the silence was dreadful.
“‘Behind this coffer,’ he said, and pointed with an incredibly long finger, ‘you will find a mattress and cushions. Lie there, whatever happens, and make no sign — until I clap my hands. Then stand up. Shan Greville’s life depends upon you. This is your part of the bargain.’
“I heard a gong — somewhere a long way off.
“‘To your place,’ said Dr. Fu-Manchu in that voice which seems to make every word sound like a command, ‘and remember, when I clap my hands…’
“What happened after that, Shan, you know.”
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE. ORDERED HOME
On the following night Rima returned to Cairo. I remember, as Sir Lionel and I sat in the lounge waiting for her to join us for dinner, that my mind was more nearly at ease than it had been for many days. When presently Rima appeared, although she looked perhaps rather more than normally pale, she had nevertheless contrived to efface any signs of her recent ordeal.
“In the absence of Dr. Petrie,” I said, “I prescribe a champagne cocktail.”
The patient approved of the prescription.
“What about you, Chief?”
“Whisky and soda,” Sir Lionel growled, staring towards the entrance door. “Where the devil’s Petrie?”
“A busy medical man,” I replied, summoning a waiter, “is always excused social appointments. Isn’t he, Chief?”
“Has to be, I suppose.”
As I gave the order I found myself thinking about the doctor’s earlier days, when, a struggling suburban practitioner in London, he had first found himself involved in the web of Dr. Fu-Manchu. His published journals of those singular experiences which he had shared with Sir Denis, had created such world-wide interest that today, as I knew, he was independent of the proceeds of his profession. But he was, as someone had said of him, a born healer; and he had the most extensive practice of any English physician in Cairo. Evidently my thoughts were reflected upon my face; for:
“What are you grinning about?” the chief demanded.
“I was wondering,” I replied, “if Sir Denis will allow me to publish an account of the story of the Masked Prophet.”
“You published an account, as you term it,” Rima interrupted, “of what happened in the Tomb of the Black Ape and afterwards. I didn’t think it was too flattering to me, but I know you made a lot of money out of it. I don’t really think, Uncle—” turning and snuggling up against Sir Lionel— “that it’s quite fair, do you? Shouldn’t we have a share?”
“Yes.” The chief stared at me with smothered ferocity. “You’ve written me up in a painfully frank way, Greville, now I come to think about it… Ah! Here’s Petrie!”
As he spoke, I saw the doctor come in from the terrace at a brisk pace. There was urgency in his manner, and when, sighting us, he hurried forward I realised that he was ill at ease.
His first thought, however, was for his patient; and dropping into a chair beside Rima, he looked at her in that encompassing manner which comes to a man who for many years has practised as a physician.
“Quite restored, I see,” he said, and glanced critically at the cocktail. “Only one, Rima. Excitants are not desirable… yet.”
Seeing me about to call a waiter:
“As I’m rather late, Greville,” he went on, “let’s go in to dinner; if possible, find a quiet table, as there’s something I have to tell you.”
“Knew it!” said the chief loudly, watching the speaker. “Got something on your mind, Petrie. What is it?”
“You’re right,” Petrie admitted, smiling slightly. “I don’t quite know what to make of it.”
“Nor do I,” Sir Lionel replied, “unless you tell me what it is.”
“A long message from Smith in Damascus. It was relayed over the telephone. That’s what detained me. But don’t let us talk about it now.”
We stood up and walked along the corridor, which is a miniature jewel bazaar, to the dining room. I had arranged for a quiet table at the farther end, and presently, when we were all seated and the chief, who was host, had given his orders:
“This message is disturbing, in a way,” said Petrie. “There’s a Dutch steamer of the Rotterdam Lloyd Line, the Indramatra, leaving Port Said tomorrow night for Southampton; and Smith insists that, baggage or no baggage, you must all leave in her!”
“What!” Sir Lionel cried so loudly that many heads were turned in our direction. “He must be mad. I won’t budge an inch — not one inch — until Ali Mahmoud arrives with the gear.”
Dr. Petrie looked grave.
“I have the message here,” he continued; “and when I have read it to you, possibly you may change your mind… Dr. Fu-Manchu has been in Damascus. He has disappeared. Smith has every reason to believe that he is on his way here — to Cairo. His mission, Barton is to see you!”
CHAPTER THIRTY-SIX. NAYLAND SMITH COMES ABOARD
The Indramatra lay off the pontoon, opposite the Custom House at Port Said; and it was a night sailing. Ali Mahmoud had arrived in the nick of time; I could see him now from where I stood, supervising the shipment of the heavy baggage.
That curious sustained murmur, a minor chord made up of human voices, audible whenever cargo is being worked in this odd portal of the East, came to my ears, as I craned out watching the pontoon. I had left Rima, a stewardess, and two coolies busily unpacking trunks; for Rima had something of her uncle’s gift for making people work enthusiastically in her interests. Part other personal baggage had been deposited in her cabin, and, having explored the first of her trunks:
There isn’t a thing that’s fit to wear!” she had declared…
I had considered it prudent to join the chief.
That experienced old traveller had secured a suite with bath, at the Cairo office. Admittedly, the ship was not full, but, nevertheless, someone else had been pencilled in for this accommodation ahead of him. The someone else (a Member of Parliament, he turned out to be) was reduced to an ordinary double cabin, and the purser was having a bad quarter of an hour.
Sir Lionel, armed with a whisky and soda, was sprawling on the little sofa in his sitting room, his feet resting upon a stout wooden chest. He reminded me of an old buccaneer, gloating over ill-gotten treasure; and:
“Has Smith arrived?” he demanded.
“No. I’m just going up to make inquiries, chief…”
And so, now, I found myself craning out and watching the pontoon. It would be nearly an hour before the Indramatra sailed, but I could not imagine, since Sir Denis had missed us in Cairo, how he hoped to reach Port Said before we left. Nevertheless, he had advised us to expect him.
I glanced down at Ali Mahmoud, patiently checking the items of our baggage destined for the hold, and experienced a pang of regret in parting from him. Then again I stared towards the shore. I saw the headlights of a car which was being driven rapidly along the waterfront. I saw
it pull up just short of the Custom House.
No other steamer was leaving that night, and although, admittedly, this might have been a belated passenger, something told me that it was Nayland Smith.
I was right.
Above the clatter of machinery and minor drone of human voices, with the complementary note of water lapping at the ship’s side, a clamour reached me from the shore. There was urgency in the sound. And as I watched, I saw a police launch which had been lying just off the pontoon, run in, in response to a signal. A few moments later, and the little red craft was describing a flattened arc as she headed out rapidly for the Indramatra.
One glimpse I had in a momentary glare of the searchlight, of a man seated in the stern, and then I was hurrying down to the lower deck. I had no more than reached the head of the ladder when Nayland Smith came bounding up. As I greeted him:
“Quick!” he snapped and grasped my arm. “The purser’s office — where is it? I don’t know this ship.”
“This way, Sir Denis.”
Pushing past groups of passengers, mostly planters and officials from the Dutch East Indies, we went racing across to the purser’s office. As I had expected, a number of people were waiting to interview that harassed official, but the curtain was drawn over his door, and I could hear an excited voice within. Sir Denis never hesitated for a moment. He rapped loudly, jerked the curtain aside, and:
“Mr. Purser!” he said, “I regret that I don’t know your name — my apologies. But it is vitally urgent that I should see you for a few moments.”
The purser, a Sumatra-born Dutchman, stout and normally good-humoured, I judged, at the moment was not in an amiable mood. Mr. John Kennington, M.P., a fussy little man resembling Tweedledee in spectacles, was literally dancing about in his room.
“I say it’s an outrage, sir,” he was exclaiming, “an outrage. This fellow, Sir Lionel Barton, this travelling mountebank, has almost literally thrown me out of a cabin which I reserved in Cairo. As a British Member of Parliament, I wish to state—”
“I don’t know your name, sir,” said the purser, looking up wearily at Sir Denis — he spoke excellent English, for the Dutch are first-class linguists; “mine is Voorden: but you can see that I am very much engaged.”
“Such a state of affairs,” Mr. Kennington continued, extending his rotund person in the manner of a frog about to burst, “such a state of affairs would not be tolerated for a moment in the P. & O.”
That, of course, was a slip, and put the purser on our side at once. His growing distaste for the angry passenger was reflected upon normally placid features.
“The P. & O., sir,” said Nayland Smith, “is an admirable line, to which I can give you a personal introduction ensuring excellent accommodation.”
Mr. Kennington paused, turned, and looked up at the grim face of the speaker; then:
“Possibly, sir, you may know that Members of Parliament, travelling officially, are afforded certain facilities—”
“I do know it, and I feel sure that your complaint is a just one. But since you are a Member of Parliament, you will naturally do everything in your power to assist me. A matter of national urgency demands that I should have two minutes’ private conversation with Mr. Voorden.”
Mr. Kennington blew himself up again.
“My dear sir,” he replied, “I must take this opportunity of pointing out to you that I have certain rights here.”
Sir Denis’s temper, never of the best, was growing dangerously frayed.
“Mr. Voorden,” he said quietly, “I don’t know this gentleman’s name, but have I your permission to place him in the alleyway until our very urgent business is concluded?”
The purser’s broad face broke into a smile. It was a suggestion after his own heart; and:
“May I ask you, Mr Kennington,” he said, addressing the outraged M.P., whose features were now assuming a hectic florid hue, “to allow me two minutes with this gentleman? His business, I think, is important.”
“Important!” the other exploded. “Important! By heavens, sir, Rotterdam shall hear of you — Rotterdam shall hear of you!”
He expelled himself from the cabin.
“Here is my card, Mr. Voorden,” said Sir Denis, laying a card upon the purser’s table: “but in order to save your time and my own, I called upon the Dutch consul on my way to the docks. He was unable to accompany me, but he sends this note.”
He laid upon the table a sheet of paper bearing the letterhead of the Dutch consulate in Port Said. The purser put on a pair of hornrimmed glasses and read the note. Mr Kennington, not far away, might be heard demanding an interview with the captain.
“Sir Denis Nayland Smith,” said the purser, standing up, “I am at your service. What can I do for you?”
“Thank you,” said Sir Denis, and shook his hand. “Your passenger list, if you please. I want the name of everyone joining the ship at this port.”
“Certainly! that is very simple. You will also wish to know, of course, what accommodation they have reserved?”
“Exactly”
A moment later Nayland Smith was bending over a plan of the ship, in close consultation with the purser. I moved to the curtain, drew it aside, and stepped into the alleyway. Mr. Kennington had discovered the second steward and was insisting that that official should conduct him to the captain. I had it in mind to endeavour to pacify the infuriated little man, when the matter was taken out of my hands.
“Sir Lionel Barton is the person’s name,” shouted Mr. Kennnigton— “who the devil may I ask is Sir Lionel Barton?”
Unfortunately for Mr. Kennington, at that moment Sir Lionel appeared on the scene.
“Does anybody want me?” he inquired in his deep gruff voice.
Mr. Kennington turned and looked up into that sun-baked, truculent mask. He tried bravely to sustain the glare of deep-set eyes beneath tufted brows. But when he spoke, it was with a notable lack of confidence.
“Are you Sir Lionel Barton?”
“I am. Did you want me?”
The second steward escaped, leaving Mr. Kennington to fight his battle alone.
“There seems to be some misunderstanding about our cabins,” he said in a tone of gentle melancholy…
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN. THE RELICS OF THE PROPHET
There was some pretty straight talking in the chief’s room five minutes later. Rima was not present.
“I have the outline of the thing complete, Barton,” said Nayland Smith, puffing furiously at his pipe. “For God’s sake, don’t interrupt. Just listen. My time is brief. The man Amir Khan blundered onto the location of Mokanna’s tomb in some way and up to the time of his disappearance, was undoubtedly acting on his own. I take it you paid him well for his information.”
“I did.”
Sir Denis nodded.
“He did not belong to that obscure sect, an offshoot of true Mohammedanism, which still holds the tradition of the New Koran. But he knew more than they do, because he knew where the prophet was buried. He was a thug; you always knew this. And he deserted because he was recalled by his immediate chief. The laws of thuggee (which I don’t profess to understand) are very binding upon devotees. His chief learned what had happened; and his chief—”
“Was one of the Fu-Manchu group!” Sir Lionel interrupted. “And so…”
“And so the news reached the doctor. Where he was at the time, we shall probably never know — but he acted swiftly. The possibilities were tremendous. Islam is at least as divided as Christianity. A religious revival is long overdue. The man and the occasion, only, were wanted. Here was the occasion. Dr. Fu-Manchu found the man.”
“Whom did he find?”
“I don’t know. Listen, and I will tell you all I know. In every religion there are secret sects. I have maintained for many years, in the face of much opposition from learned sources — and from you — that the organisation known as the Si-Fan embodies the greater part of these dissentients—”
“Ro
t!”
“Such a movement, reinforced by the backing of the Si-Fan, would almost certainly have tipped the scale. This was what Dr. Fu-Manchu saw. The arising of the prophet was staged for him when you blew up that lonely tomb in Khorassan. This he acted upon with the results which we know. Interested parties in the Moslem world were only too ready to receive the new prophet. His material qualities they were prepared to overlook. But it happens — and a memory of Greville’s gave me the clue to the truth — that a certain fanatical sect, having representatives at Damascus and also at Mecca, possess or claim to possess copies of the New Koran.”
“That’s true,” said the chief, shifting his feet uneasily, for he was sprawling upon the settee. “I’ve seen ’em. I knew what I was up against, Smith.”
Nayland Smith looked at Sir Lionel with a sort of reluctant admiration.
“You’re a remarkable man, Barton,” he admitted. “If a modicum of discretion had been added to your outfit, much of this trouble might have been avoided.”
“What trouble?” the chief shouted. He kicked at the wooden chest. “Where’s the trouble? I’ve tricked every damned fool among them. And, by heaven! I’ve tricked Dr. Fu-Manchu himself. You all wondered why I hung on so long in Ispahan—”
He began to laugh loudly; but:
“I know now,” said Nayland Smith.
And he spoke the words so coldly that the chief’s laughter was checked.
“I thought,” he went on, “that you were bluffing in Cairo. I know your schoolboy sense of humour. It was a dramatic surprise to me, although I may not have shown it, when your old suitcase was opened before Mr. Aden and I saw the sword, the mask, and the gold plates.”
He jumped out of his chair and began to move from foot to foot, since there was no room for him to promenade.
“I carried out my contract with Dr. Fu-Manchu — Rima’s life being the price at stake — in what I believed to be all honesty. Don’t speak. Barton — let me finish. Dr. Fu-Manchu is the most ghastly menace to our present civilisation which has appeared since Attila the Hun. He is an old man, but, by some miracle which I can only ascribe to his gigantic power, he is as forceful today as he was in the first hour that I ever set eyes on him in a forest of Burma. That’s agreed. He has one virtue. According to his admittedly peculiar code — he is a man of honour.”
