E. Hoffmann Price's Pierre d'Artois: Occult Detective & Associates

by E. Hoffmann Price

  Farrell again regarded the swarthy, black-mustached features of the dead, then glanced in the direction of the Arab’s last gesture. Something glittered in the obscurity. Farrell picked it up.

  It was half of the image of a peacock with its tail fanned out. Complete, it would have been only a trifle too large to be an acceptable watch charm. Farrell was certain that there must be another portion. The sawed surface had been vertically grooved to form a dove-tail joint so that a correspondingly mortised half would fit and thus complete the image.

  Farrell’s features lengthened, and he stroked the long white scar that seamed his cheek. He recognized that sinister token from far-off Asia; and he knew now what king the dying man had tried to name.

  “Malik Tawus!”

  Farrell’s steel-gray eyes narrowed as he pronounced the words aloud. Though his posture did not perceptibly change, he seemed for a moment as alert as a tiger stalking through the jungle.

  His glance flashed searchingly into the dimness of Pirate’s Alley.

  Malik Tawus—Lord Peacock—was the name by which Satan is worshiped in the Sinjar Hills of Kurdistan. Malik Tawus was the devil-god of the Yezidees, whose true name, Shaytan, no man may pronounce in the presence of his followers and live.

  More than death lurked in the French Quarter. The music from the studio party had become an overture of doom. The Lord Peacock had invaded New Orleans; and the testimony of his presence was half of his golden image, and an Arab lying in a pool of blood.

  The shrilling siren of a patrol car coming down Chartres Street told Farrell that his hostess had notified the authorities. He thought for a moment that a radio car might still intercept the mysterious woman who had vanished save for a lingering trace of her perfume. Then he realized that few indeed would recognize it.

  The scent was one in a thousand. Farrell had once sampled its fragrance in the bazaar of perfumers in Damascus; and this was the first time in a dozen years that he had encountered that costly essence. And to find it here!

  “But even so, we might trace her that way,” he reflected, thinking of his old friend, John Healy, chief of detectives. Then, adding to the slender thread of evidence: “The peacock belongs to the Arab. Some one stabbed him, fumbled it, and was frightened away before he could recover it. I popped out of the doorway just in time to alarm that girl. She stuck around until she saw me approach the body.”

  He scrutinized the golden amulet, held it to his nose.

  The strange, heavy sweetness clung to it. Farrell could no longer doubt that the fleeting figure which had eluded him was involved in the death of the unknown Arab. That was certain.

  Farrell slipped the peacock into his vest pocket, then knelt to scratch a cross on the paving where it had lain.

  “Against the rules,” he admitted as he closed his penknife. “But I think I can do more with this than the police.”

  He smiled in grim reminiscence as he thought of his encounter with the followers of the peacock god in Kurdistan. Farrell’s vigilance for a moment relaxed. The approach of the police had lulled his momentary alarm. Only for an instant—but that was too long.

  He whirled, sensing peril anew, and saw the cold flash of steel in the hand of a man who was leaping from the doorway but two paces distant. Yet, though taken off guard, Farrell’s panther-swiftness saved him from instant death. Instead of sinking into his back, the curved knife raked his side from shoulder to hip as he turned. But before he could collect himself to repel the attack, he was thrown off balance by the frenzied rush of the assassin, and crashed heavily to the paving, jarring the wind from him.

  Farrell was dazed by the impact against the slate flags. He was conscious, but without any command of his strength. As from a great distance came a siren note. The dark features and feral eyes of the enemy were grim and relentless during that instant before the long, curved blade began its downward drive.

  Farrell knew that with but a split second of respite he could snatch the enemy’s wrist, and deflect the thrust. He knew that at any moment he would hear the gritting of brakes and the heavy tread of the police; but he also knew that they would arrive too late, and that the slayer would escape through the door from which he had emerged. That could not be avoided.

  But the blade did not flash down. The enemy, sensing Farrell’s helplessness, seemed to remember a more important mission. The keen, deadly Persian dagger tinkled to the tiles and long, eager fingers probed Farrell’s pockets.

  All in an instant! Farrell felt the searching, nervous touch of the assassin who crouched astride of him; and he realized that it was the peacock rather than his life which the enemy sought in the few moments that remained.

  Farrell had gained the respite that he needed. He mustered all his force, lashed out with his fist, and writhed clear of the overconfident assailant who, realizing his error, snatched frantically at his abandoned dagger. Farrell, crouched and waiting, seized the steel-armed wrist that darted toward him, deflected its deadly sweep, and drove home with a blow that sent the assassin crashing senseless against the door jamb.

  But before Farrell could follow up his advantage, he heard a familiar voice.

  “What the hell you guys think you’re doing?”

  “All done, Duval,” gasped Farrell as he recognized John Healy’s right-hand man. “I got him—just in time.”

  He gestured toward the man who lay sprawled across the threshold. The squad of detectives slowed down to a walk. Farrell advanced to meet them.

  “Where’s that stiff the lady phoned about?” began Duval. “Looks like there’s a field day in the quarter—for cripes’ sake, grab him!”

  As he cried out, the detective’s hand flashed toward his holster. The service .38 crackled. A bullet ricocheted from the masonry. Farrell whirled.

  “Damn it!” he exclaimed in exasperation, and plunged headlong toward the doorway. Two men, reaching from the entrance, were dragging their unconscious comrade to cover. Even as Farrell grabbed at the ankles of his assailant, a final yank from within thwarted his effort. The door closed with well-oiled smoothness, and a latch clicked.

  For an instant Farrell and the detectives regarded each other with disgust.

  “Right under our noses!” growled Duval. “And I couldn’t risk a second shot.”

  He turned to his assistants.

  “Surround the building. Bust down the door and get those birds!”

  Duval’s whistle shrilled the alarm. The detectives charged the stout barrier. Its heavy, iron-studded panels resisted the attack, but the latch tore loose from its seat, and then it was short work.

  Duval detained Farrell as he advanced to join the rush.

  “Nothing stirring. You keep out of there—we don’t want any civilians croaked in that mess.”

  “Aw, nuts!” protested Farrell.

  “It’s not your hide so much,” amended Duval. “But Healy’d raise hell if you didn’t live long enough to tell us about this jam.”

  “Guess you’re right,” agreed Farrell. Then, listening to the advance of the detectives: “Damn little you’ll get out of there.”

  There were no shots, no outcries, no sounds of combat. Farrell and the detective regarded each other for a moment, nodded, and grinned sourly.

  “Slick customers, Duval,” said Farrell finally. “I’d like to hear what Healy says when you report that they made a clean get-away.”

  CHAPTER II

  Farrell, disheveled and battered by his vain struggle with his assailant, made his apologies to his hostess and explained that he would have to confer with the chief of detectives. On his way to his car, he paused for a word with the patrolman on guard at the door through which the detectives had charged in their hot pursuit of the assassin.

  “What luck?” he inquired.

  “Devil a bit. Not a sign of ’em. And you had better keep an eye open.”

 
“I’ll be looking,” countered Farrell as he took the wheel of the big Hispano and headed it uptown.

  Farrell would have considered the affair in Pirate’s Alley fantasy from beginning to end, had it not been for the ache of his battered head, the long grazing cut that seamed his ribs, and the golden amulet in his vest pocket. The Oriental colony of New Orleans is a quiet, law-abiding handful of Syrians and Armenians; traders, tobacconists, and restaurant keepers catering to their countrymen and to tourists. The symbol of the peacock god, however, lent a sinister touch to the death of the unknown Arab, and betokened the presence of a crew of fanatics in the cosmopolitan French Quarter. Farrell knew that the police would efficiently cover the routine of homicide investigation; but he realized that they might well miss the point of evidence significant only to one who had spent years in the Orient. He therefore persisted in his impulse to study the fatal amulet instead of immediately surrendering it to John Healy.

  Farrell knew well the peril of his course. He knew beyond all doubt that he was marked.

  “That girl probably didn’t kill the Arab,” he reasoned, thinking again of the rare, exotic fragrance that had lingered about the scene of the crime. “But she knows something about it!”

  A short, wiry, leather-faced man admitted Farrell to the colonial house which he was occupying for the first time in seven or eight years or more.

  “Business is picking up, Bronson,” said Farrell to his salaried comrade at arms. “Shake up a drink, and I’ll tell you about it.”

  Bronson was Farrell’s former first sergeant. In the years following the War they had covered the so-called uncivilized continents in search of trouble. And in view of Farrell’s welcome to New Orleans, he had already begun to think that the domestic crop was easily equal to the imported variety.

  He followed Bronson to the library in the left wing, settled into his favorite chair, then took the golden amulet from his pocket. Farrell marveled anew at its exquisite workmanship, and turned it over to scrutinize the inscription on the bottom of the half of the six-sided pedestal on which the bird’s right foot rested. The characters, which were finely engraved in elaborate Persian script, were all done exactly in reverse.

  “When both halves of the image are joined,” he decided, “it’s a signet.”

  He took from his desk a stick of sealing wax and with a match melted enough to make a pool the size of a fifty-cent piece on a sheet of paper. Even though the imprint of the engraved base would form but half of the inscription, it might nevertheless afford some hint as to the origin of the image.

  “Holy smoke!” exclaimed Farrell as he read the fragmentary inscription. It was beyond doubt the symbol of the peacock god. He sniffed again the perfume that lingered about the golden amulet, and shook his head.

  “And Satan’s little sister just missed getting it.”

  One avenue of investigation was already open. He could prowl around in the French Quarter, go to Aswad’s Syrian restaurant as a native, sip uncounted cups of sticky-sweet Turkish coffee, and bit by bit accumulate morsels of gossip and rumor that no detective could hope to get.

  Bronson, entering with a frosted shaker, regarded Farrell with narrowed eyes as he poured a Sazerac into a stemmed glass.

  “We’re in for it,” concluded Farrell, after summing up the evening’s events. “Whoever wants this wants it bad.”

  Bronson nodded and slid a Colt .45 across the teak table.

  “And I think we might as well lock Mr. Peacock in the wall safe until I can hand it to Healy.”

  “Got something doped out?”

  “Nothing definite, yet. To-morrow I’ll work on the boys at Aswad’s.”

  The ringing of the doorbell halted Bronson before he reached the safe. He glanced inquiringly at Farrell.

  “Leave it here, and see who’s giving us a buzz.”

  Farrell’s fingers closed about the butt of the .45 as Bronson left the room to answer the insistent summons of the bell.

  A moment later, however, his hand retracted from the weapon, which he had instinctively grasped. He heard the soft, modulated voice of a woman who almost succeeded in suppressing the anxiety that prompted her late visit. She was apologizing for her intrusion. Farrell noted the faint, indefinable blur of accent that betokened one who spoke several languages with equal fluency. And then, wafted in on the draft that followed the opening of the front door, Farrell caught a breath of the perfume whose heavy sweetness had lingered in the alley.

  “Fast work,” was his thought as he hunched forward in his chair.

  “Miss Matar,” Bronson announced as he admitted the visitor.

  She was uncommonly lovely, and her long-lashed eyes were an untroubled blackness. But her nervous fingering of the clasps of her hand bag belied her otherwise faultless poise and calm. Farrell rose, bowed, and indicated a chair.

  “Ah—this is a pleasure, Miss Matar. Bronson, how about some coffee?”

  He marveled at her audacity, and wondered what prompted her visit. With that damning aura of foreign sweetness, no second thought was necessary to link her with the net of doom which the peacock god had cast over the French Quarter.

  “Azizah Matar,” she supplemented as with serpentine grace she settled back into the chair which Farrell had indicated. Her smile was a slow, crimson sorcery that revealed nothing but her fascination.

  Farrell eyed her narrowly, seeking to look through and beyond the poise that served her as a mask. He saw the appeal that lurked in her dark eyes, and sensed the tension that pervaded her supple, graciously curved figure.

  “Azizah,” he repeated. “Appropriate. Though appearances are deceptive.”

  Farrell’s play on her name, which in Arabic signifies “beloved,” told her that she was dealing with one who was not an entire stranger to the Orient, where a pun is the highest form of wit. She came to the point at once.

  “I came for the peacock of Najd.”

  Farrell was taken aback by frankness where he had expected evasion and trickery to take the place of force.

  “You’re certainly not wasting words,” he countered. “Though Najd seems to me to be an odd place for it to come from.”

  Azizah’s eyes narrowed as though she had from that last observation received a new light on Farrell. She made as if to speak, but smiled cryptically instead.

  “Damn it, I’ve spilled the beans now!” was his unspoken exclamation. To the girl he said: “You might at least tell me about it.”

  But Farrell knew that he had betrayed his ignorance, and that Azizah would not relinquish her advantage. He saw the flash of confidence in her smile as she resumed: “Let’s not go into that, please. I saw you pick it up.”

  The dark eyes flashed a glance of recognition at the seal impressed on the sheet of paper that lay on his desk. Farrell grinned and shook his head.

  “Oh, all right, I have it. But I’m keeping it.”

  “Surely you wouldn’t do that, Mr. Farrell. Not if you know what it means to me. Do let me have it, please.”

  “Not until you tell me why one of your playmates came within an ace of killing me for it,” he countered grimly. Fascinating as she was, Azizah was nevertheless an enemy; and Farrell settled down to match his wits against the messenger of the peacock god.

  “You, killed?” Her surprise was genuine. Azizah glanced over her shoulder, then settled back against the Shemaka cushions as Bronson entered the room with a tray of hammered brass and a bell-mouthed Syrian coffeepot of similar workmanship.

  “Stand by, Bronson,” directed Farrell as he poured the foam-topped Turkish coffee into tiny cups. “Now, Miss Matar, suppose you tell me a few things. I came uncomfortably close to being knifed, which naturally makes me suspicious of any one interested in peacocks.”

  Azizah regarded him somberly. Her dark eyes were brooding, and her lovely features were thoughtful. She spoke, finally, as tho
ugh she were thinking aloud rather than addressing Farrell.

  “Maybe I can get there in time. But if he escaped, they’ll be waiting.”

  “What’s it all about?” Farrell reiterated.

  “You must know,” she countered, “or else you’d not have kept it from the police. And that’s what puzzles me. Who are you, anyway?”

  Farrell regarded her fixedly. He dared not risk a word, lest he betray further ignorance and defeat his design to unravel the tangle. She avoided his hard gaze and twisted the heavy emerald-set ring that sparkled on her finger.

  “Are you a friend of Hussayn? He had friends in this country,” she began, in a tone that expressed her hope of an affirmative answer.

  Farrell’s face was set in a poker mask. He had learned his lesson.

  “But you must be!” she exclaimed vehemently. “Or else you’d not have taken the peacock and then fought them.”

  “You’d be surprised if you knew who I am,” evaded Farrell, taking his cue from her bewilderment. “And I’ll give you the peacock if you’ll prove your good faith.”

  “And how must I do that?”

  “Very easy,” assured Farrell as he reached for the telephone. “I’ll call the detective bureau and we’ll go into this scenario.”

  “Oh, no!” cried Azizah, laying a detaining hand on Farrell’s arm. “That would be—”

  “I thought so,” interrupted Farrell grimly. “It would be embarrassing.”

  She met his stern gaze unflinchingly, shook her head.

  “No, it’s not what you think,” she protested. “If a word of this leaks out, the entire Moslem world will be shaken from end to end. I hate to think what might happen.” Farrell knew that her contention was plausible. All of India had once burst into a flame of red revolt because cartridges were greased with suet. And that golden symbol of the peacock god might set half of Asia into an uproar.

  “It might be political,” he admitted, eying her narrowly. “But we’re not interested in that. We are—”

  “We?”

  “Yes. The chief of detectives and I.”

  She regarded him with alarm.