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Page 101
The room was stripped, dismantled. Had Fu-Manchu fled?
The silence assumed a new significance. His dacoits and kindred
ministers of death all must have fled, too.
"You have let him escape us!" I said rapidly.
"You promised to aid us to capture him--to send us a message--
and you have delayed until--"
"No," she said; "no!" and clutched at my arm again.
"Oh! is he not reviving slowly? Are you sure you have
made no mistake?"
Her thoughts were all for the boy; and her solicitude touched me.
I again examined Aziz, the most remarkable patient of my
busy professional career.
As I counted the strengthening pulse, he opened his dark eyes--
which were so like the eyes of Karamaneh--and, with the girl's
eager arms tightly about him, sat up, looking wonderingly around.
Karamaneh pressed her cheek to his, whispering loving words in that softly
spoken Arabic which had first betrayed her nationality to Nayland Smith.
I handed her my flask, which I had filled with wine.
"My promise is fulfilled!" I said. "You are free!
Now for Fu-Manchu! But first let us admit the police to this house;
there is something uncanny in its stillness."
"No," she replied. "First let my brother be taken out and placed in safety.
Will you carry him?"
She raised her face to that of Inspector Weymouth, upon which was written
awe and wonder.
The burly detective lifted the boy as tenderly as a woman, passed through
the shadows to the stairway, ascended, and was swallowed up in the gloom.
Nayland Smith's eyes gleamed feverishly. He turned to Karamaneh.
"You are not playing with us?" he said harshly. "We have done our part;
it remains for you to do yours."
"Do not speak so loudly," the girl begged. "HE is near us--
and, oh, God, I fear him so!"
"Where is he?" persisted my friend.
Karamaneh's eyes were glassy with fear now.
"You must not touch him until the police are here," she said--
but from the direction of her quick, agitated glances I knew that,
her brother safe now, she feared for me, and for me alone.
Those glances sent my blood dancing; for Karamaneh was
an Eastern jewel which any man of flesh and blood must
have coveted had he known it to lie within his reach.
Her eyes were twin lakes of mystery which, more than once,
I had known the desire to explore.
"Look--beyond that curtain"--her voice was barely audible--"but do not enter.
Even as he is, I fear him."
Her voice, her palpable agitation, prepared us for something extraordinary.
Tragedy and Fu-Manchu were never far apart. Though we were two, and help
was so near, we were in the abode of the most cunning murderer who ever came
out of the East.
It was with strangely mingled emotions that I crossed the thick carpet,
Nayland Smith beside me, and drew aside the draperies concealing a door,
to which Karamaneh had pointed. Then, upon looking into the dim place beyond,
all else save what it held was forgotten.
We looked upon a small, square room, the walls draped with fantastic
Chinese tapestry, the floor strewn with cushions; and reclining
in a corner, where the faint, blue light from a lamp, placed upon
a low table, painted grotesque shadows about the cavernous face--
was Dr. Fu-Manchu!
At sight of him my heart leaped--and seemed to suspend its functions,
so intense was the horror which this man's presence inspired in me.
My hand clutching the curtain, I stood watching him. The lids
veiled the malignant green eyes, but the thin lips seemed to smile.
Then Smith silently pointed to the hand which held a little pipe.
A sickly perfume assailed my nostrils, and the explanation
of the hushed silence, and the ease with which we had thus far
executed our plan, came to me. The cunning mind was torpid--
lost in a brutish world of dreams.
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