by Sax Rohmer
“I’ve found him, sir,” he reported, “and by great good luck, got him on the ‘phone.”
CHAPTER
12
LONDON RIVER
A constable patrolling the Embankment pulled up and stared suspiciously at a pair of dangerous-looking loafers, possibly sailors, of a type rarely seen in the Westminster area; very dark-skinned fellows wearing greasy caps and smoking cigarettes. To that lurching walk that belongs to the sea, a certain furtive quality seemed to have been added. Some of these foreign sailormen had other jobs when they were ashore, and the officer didn’t like the way in which this pair kept staring up towards a certain lighted window in a block of expensive residential flats.
A strong westerly breeze had sprung up, driving banks of fog before it, so that in certain areas, temporarily, the night was clear enough. Such a lucidity prevailed now in this part of Westminster. The face of Big Ben was clearly visible, no great distance away, and the many lighted windows of New Scotland Yard. But whereas most of the windows in the block of flats were shaded, that one which seemed to interest the pair of watchers, a large, bay window, had neither curtains nor blinds drawn.
From time to time a man, apparently tall and thin, who might have been in evening dress, appeared in this window. One would have supposed that he was pacing up and down the room to which it belonged. He was smoking a pipe.
Yes, the officer was certain, it was this window or this man, or both, that the loafers were watching. He determined upon action. Quickly retracing his steps:
“What are you two up to?” He demanded, gruffly.
The shorter of the pair started and turned. He had deep-set, very bright eyes, and a truculence of manner which the constable regarded as suspicious. His companion grasped his arm, and:
“Leitak sa’ida,” he said.
The officer could not be expected to know. that the man had wished him good-night in Arabic.
The pair moved off slouchingly.
“Don’t hang about here,” the constable continued, following them up. “Gei a move on.”
“Khatrak!” replied the taller man.
The constable watched them lurching away, unaware that the word meant “good-bye”. They did not loiter again, but went on their way. The officer, retracing his steps, glanced up at the lighted window. The tall man smoking a pipe became visible for a moment, then turned and disappeared.
As the two foreign sailormen whose language was presumably Arabic proceeded on their way:—
“Comedy interlude with policeman?” snapped the taller. “Do you think Fay looks the part?”
“I should never have suspected it wasn’t you up there, Sir Denis,” the other replied. “But, except the constable, did you notice anyone watching?”
“Yes.”
“What?”
“A man apparently asleep on the stone steps nearly opposite my window, with a tray of matches on the pavement before him.”
“Good God! Are you sure?”
“Quite sure.”
“Then we’ve thrown them off this time?”
“I think so, Sterling. We must be careful how we join Gallaho and Forester. This is a case where a return of the fog would be welcome. Is there anyone behind?”
Sterling glanced back.
“No, not near enough to count.”
“Good. This way, then.”
He gripped Sterling suddenly, pulling him aside.
“Duck under here! Now, over the wall!”
A moment later they stood at the foot of some stone steps. A dinghy lay there, occupied by one rower, a man who wore the uniform of the River Police. As the pair appeared:
“Careful how you come aboard, sir,” he said; “those lower steps are very slimy.”
However, they embarked without accident, and ten minutes later were inside the dingy little office of the River Police depot. Chief Detective-inspector Gallaho was leaning against the mantelpiece chewing phantom gum, his bowler worn at that angle made famous by Earl Beatty in the Navy. Forester, a thick-set man who looked more like a Mercantile skipper than a police officer, stood up as the hang-dog couple entered.
“Do you think you’ve covered your tracks, sir?” he asked, addressing Sir Denis.
“I hope so,” snapped the latter. “But anyway, we have to go on now. Too much valuable time has been wasted already.”
Big Ben chimed the hour. A high pall of fog still overhung the city, and the booming notes of the big clock seemed to come from almost directly overhead.
“Eleven o’clock. Is it fairly clear down-river, Inspector?”
“It was clearing when I came up, sir,” Forester replied. “A lot of shipping is on the move, now. Some of them have been locked up for twenty-four hours. But I’m told it’s still very thick in the Channel.”
“Sam Pak’s I take it, does not close early?”
Inspector Forester laughed.
“To the best of my knowledge it never closes,” he replied. “Cigarettes and drinks, of a sort, can be had there all night by anyone in the know.”
“Habitual law-breakers?” Nayland Smith suggested.
Exactly, sir. But he’s a safety-valve.”
“I quite understand. No news from Fletcher?”
“No, sir. I have been expecting it for the last half-hour.”
Nayland Smith glanced at a gun-metal watch strapped to his wrist, and:
“I’ll give him five minutes,” he said, rapidly. “Then, we’ll start. The fog may develop at any moment if this breeze drops. You can arrange for any news to be passed down?”
“Certainly, sir.”
At which moment, the ‘phone bell rang.
“Hello!” the Inspector’s voice was eager. “Yes, speaking. He’s here—hold on.” He turned. “Fletcher on the line, sir.”
Nayland Smith took the instrument from the Inspector’s hand, and:
“Hello, that you, Fletcher?” he asked.
“Fletcher speaking, sir, and it’s like old times to hear your voice. I’ve been out of touch with Limehouse for some years, but I was really glad of to-night’s job. I dropped into this man’s place to buy a packet of cigarettes, and managed to stay long enough to get a glimpse of the old boy.”
“Well?”
“You’re right, sir. It’s John Ki, formerly keeper of the Joy Shop, now known as Sam Pak.”
“Good.” Nayland Smith’s eyes shone like burnished steel in the mulatto mask of his face. “You didn’t arouse his suspicions, of course?”
“Certainly not, sir. I didn’t even speak to him—and he couldn’t be expected to remember me.”
“Good enough, Fletcher. You can go home now. I’ll get in touch with you to-morrow.”
He replaced the receiver and turned.
“That seems to clinch it,” growled Gallaho. “With any luck we ought to make a capture to-night.”
Nayland Smith was walking up and down the linoleum covered floor, twitching at the lobe of his left ear.
“Give me some brief idea of your arrangements, Gallaho,” he snapped.
“Well . . .” Gallaho closed one eye and cocked the other in the direction of the ceiling: “Inspector Forester, here, has got a cutter tucked away within easy call, with a crew of six. They’re watching the place from the river side. Nobody can get out that way. I sent eight men, picked them myself, who are used to this sort of work. You won’t see a sign of them when you arrive, but they’ll see you, sir.”
“Anybody inside?” snapped Nayland Smith.
“Yes,” said Gallaho, grinning. “Detective-sergeant Murphy. Fast asleep in the ‘club-room’. He’s the most wonderful ‘drunk’ in the C.I.D.”
“Good. It’s time we started.”
chaptee 13 A TONGUE OF FIRE
the port of london had suddenly come to life. A big liner, fogbound for a day and a night, was bellowing her warning to all whom it might concern as she crept slowly from her dock into the stream. Tugs towing strings of barges congested the waterway. The shipping area
was a blaze of light, humming with human activity. That narrow stretch of waterfront behind which lies the ever-dwindling area of Chinatown, alone seemed to remain undisturbed under these new conditions.
Here, a lazy tide lapped muddily at ancient piles upholding pier and wharf and other crazy structures of a sort long since condemned and demolished in more up-to-date districts. The River Police launch lay just outside a moored barge. From this point of vantage the look-out had a nearly unobstructed view of a sort of wooden excrescence which jutted out from a neighbouring building.
It overhung a patch of mud, covered at high tide, into which it seemed to threaten at any moment to fall. It boasted two windows: one looking straight across the river to the Surrey bank and the other facing up-stream. There was a light in this latter window, and the River Police were watching it, curiously.
From time to time a bent figure moved past it—a queer, shuffling figure. For fully ten minutes, however, this figure had not re-appeared.
Each warning of the big steamer reached them more faintly. One of the police crew, who had been a ship’s steward, shivered slightly; picturing the warmly lighted cabins, the well-ordered life on board the out-going liner; sniffed in imagination the hot, desert air of Egypt; glimpsed the palm groves of Colombo, and wondered why he had ever joined the police. A tow-boat passed very close to them, creating a temporary swell in which they rocked and rolled violently. The breeze carried some of her smoke across their bows, making them blink and cough. When, suddenly:
“There it is again,” muttered the ex-steward.
“What are you talking about?” growled the officer in charge, heartily fed-up with this monotonous duty.
“That blue light, Sergeant.”
“What blue light?”
“Nearly over the roof of Sam Pak’s. It’s the fourth time I’ve seen it.”
“I can’t see anything.”
“No. It’s just gone again.”
“You’re a bit barmy, aren’t you?”
“I’ve seen it too, Sergeant,” came another voice. “Not tonight for the first time, either.”
“What?”
“I first saw it early last week. I was with the four o’clock boat. It sort of dances in the air, high up over the roof.”
“That’s right,” said the other man.
“Something like a gasworks,” the sergeant suggested facetiously.
“That’s it, Sergeant, only not so bright, and it doesn’t stay long. Just comes and goes.”
The tide lapped and sucked and whispered all around them. The deep voice of the liner moaned down-stream. Metal crashed on metal in the dockyard, and the glare of a million lights created the illusion of a tent stretched overhead; for that high pall still floated above London, angrily, as if waiting to settle again at the first opportunity.
A bent figure moved slowly past the lighted window.
“Tell me if you see it again,” said the sergeant.
Silence fell upon the watchers . . .
“Hello!—who’s this?” the sergeant growled.
The creaking of oars proclaimed itself, growing ever nearer. Hidden in shadows, the River Police watched the approach of a small rowboat. The rower had all the appearance of a typical waterman. He had two passengers.
“What’s this?” muttered the sergeant. “I believe he’s making for Sam Pak’s . . . Ssh! Quiet!”
The crew of six watched eagerly; any break in the monotony of their duty was welcome. The sergeant’s prediction was fulfilled. The boat was pulled in close to rotting piles which at some time had supported a sort of jetty. At the margin of mud and shingle, the two passengers disembarked, making a perilous way along slippery wooden girders until they reached the sloping strand. The crunch of their heavy boots was clearly audible; and as the boatman pulled away, the two mounted a wooden stair and disappeared into a dark opening.
“H’m!” said the sergeant. “Of course, they may not be going to Sam’s. People are often ferried across here. It’s a short cut to the ‘bus route. Hello!”
He stood suddenly upright in the bows of the launch, and might have been seen staring upward at a point high above the roof of Sam Pak’s establishment.
“There you are, Sergeant. . . that’s what I meant!”
A curious, blue light played there against the pall above. At one moment it resembled a serpent’s tongue, or rather, the fiery tongue of a dragon; then it would change and become a number of little, darting tongues; suddenly, it disappeared altogether.
“Well—I’m damned!” said the sergeant. “That’s a very queer thing. Where the devil can it come from?”
CHAPTER 14
AT SAM PAK’S
The exterior of Sam Pak’s presented the appearance of a small and unattractive Chinese restaurant, where also provisions might be purchased and taken away.
As one entered, there was a counter on the left; the air was informed with an odour of Bombay duck and other Chinese delicacies. Tea might be purchased or drunk on the establishment, for there were two or three cane-topped tables on the other side of the shop. Although midnight had come and gone, lights were still burning in this shop, and a very fat woman of incalculable nationality was playing some variety of patience behind the counter, and smoking cigarettes continuously.
A curious, spicy smell, mingling with that of the provisions indicated that joss-sticks might be purchased here; rice, also, and various kinds of cold eatables, suitable for immediate consumption. Excepting the fat lady, there was no one else in the shop at the moment that Nayland Smith and Sterling entered.
They had been well schooled by a detective attached to K Division, and Nayland Smith, taking the lead, leaned on the counter, and:
“Cigarette please, Lucky Strike,” he said, his accent and intonation that of one not very familiar with English.
The lady behind the counter hesitated for a moment, and then put another card in place. Laying down those which she still held in her hand, she reached back, abstracted a packet of the desired cigarettes from a shelf, and tossed it down before the customer, without so much as glancing at him.
He laid a ten shilling note near to her hand.
“Damn thirsty,” he continued; “got a good drink?”
Piercing black eyes were raised instantaneously. Both men recognized that at that moment they were being submitted to a scrutiny as searching as an X ray examination. Those gimlet eyes were lowered again. The woman took the note, dropping it into a wooden bowl, and from the bowl extracted silver change.
“Who says you get a drink here?” she muttered.
“All sailors know Sam Pak keeps good beer,” Nayland Smith replied rapidly, in that Shanghai vernacular which sometimes passes for Chinese.
The woman smiled; her entire expression changed. She looked up, replying in English.
“How you know Chinese?” she asked.
“Live for ten years in Shanghai.”
“You want beer or whisky?”
“Beer.”
The woman pushed a little paper pad forward across the counter, and handed the speaker a pencil.
The paper was headed “Sailors’ Club.”
“Please, your name here,” she said; then, glancing at Sterling, “your friend too.”
Nayland Smith shrugged his shoulders as if helplessly, and then, laboriously traced out some characters to which no expert alive could possibly have attached any significance or meaning.
“Name of ship, please, here.”
A stubby finger, with a very dirty nail, rested upon a dotted line on the form. They had come prepared for this, and Nayland Smith wrote, using block letters in the wrong place “s.s. Pelican”.
“Now you, please.”
The beady eyes were fixed on Sterling. He wrote what looked like “John Lubba” and put two pencil dots under Smith’s inscription—s.s. Pelican.
“One shilling each,” said the woman, extracting a two shilling piece from the change and dropping the coin into the wooden bowl. “You
members now for one week.”
She pressed a bell-button which stood upon the counter near to her hand, and a door at the end of the little shop was opened.
Nayland Smith, carefully counting his change, replaced it in a pocket of his greasy trousers, and turned as a very slender Chinese boy who walked with so marked a stoop as to appear deformed, came into the shop. He wore an ill-fitting suit and a red muffler, but, incongruously, a small, black Chinese cap upon his head. Perhaps, however, the most sin gular item of his make-up, and that which first struck one’s attention, was an eye-patch which obscured his left eye, lending his small, pale yellow features a strangely sinister appearance. To this odd figure the stout receptionist, tearing off the form from the top of the block, passed the credentials of the two new members, saying rapidly in Chinese:
“For the files.”
Sterling did not understand, but Nayland Smith did; and he was satisfied. They were accepted.
The one-eyed Chinese boy signalled that they should follow, and they proceeded along a short, narrow passage to the “club”. This was a fair-sized room, the atmosphere of which was all but suffocating. Ventilation there was none. A velvet-covered divan, indescribably greasy and filthy, ran along the whole of one wall, tables being set before it at intervals. At the farther end of the place was a bar, and, on the left, cheap wicker chairs and tables. The centre of the floor was moderately clear. It was uncarpeted and some pretence had been made, at some time, to polish the deal planks.
The company present was not without interest.
At a side table, two Chinamen were playing Mah jong, a game harmless enough, but interdict in Limehouse. At another table, a party, one of whom was a white girl, played fan-tan, also illegal in the Chinese quarter. The players spoke little, being absorbed in their games.
Although the fog had cleared from the streets of Limehouse and from the river, one might have supposed that this stuffy room had succeeded in capturing a considerable section of it. Visibility was poor. Tobacco smoke predominated in the “club”, but with it other scents were mingled. Half a dozen nondescripts were drinking and talking—mostly, they drank beer. One visitor seated alone at the end of the divan, elbows resting on the table before him, glared sullenly into space. He had a shock of dark hair, and his complexion was carrot-coloured. His prominent nose was particularly eloquent.
