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Page 63
"No!" snapped Smith. "Murders!"
There was a brief silence.
"From what I recall of the cases," said Guthrie, "that seems impossible.
In several instances the victims threw themselves from the windows
of locked rooms--and the windows were quite inaccessible."
"Exactly," replied Smith; and in the dim light his revolver
gleamed dully, as he placed it on the small table beside the bed.
"Except that your door is unlocked, the conditions to-night
are identical. Silence, please, I hear a clock striking."
It was Big Ben. It struck the half-hour, leaving the stillness complete.
In that room, high above the activity which yet prevailed below,
high above the supping crowds in the hotel, high above the starving
crowds on the Embankment, a curious chill of isolation swept about me.
Again I realized how, in the very heart of the great metropolis, a man
may be as far from aid as in the heart of a desert. I was glad that I
was not alone in that room--marked with the death-mark of Fu-Manchu;
and I am certain that Graham Guthrie welcomed his unexpected company.
I may have mentioned the fact before, but on this occasion it became
so peculiarly evident to me that I am constrained to record it here--
I refer to the sense of impending danger which invariably preceded a
visit from Fu-Manchu. Even had I not known that an attempt was to be
made that night, I should have realized it, as, strung to high tension,
I waited in the darkness. Some invisible herald went ahead of the
dreadful Chinaman, proclaiming his coming to every nerve in one's body.
It was like a breath of astral incense, announcing the presence
of the priests of death.
A wail, low but singularly penetrating, falling in minor cadences
to a new silence, came from somewhere close at hand.
"My God!" hissed Guthrie, "what was that?"
"The Call of Siva," whispered Smith.
"Don't stir, for your life!"
Guthrie was breathing hard.
I knew that we were three; that the hotel detective was within hail;
that there was a telephone in the room; that the traffic of
the Embankment moved almost beneath us; but I knew, and am not
ashamed to confess, that King Fear had icy fingers about my heart.
It was awful--that tense waiting--for--what?
Three taps sounded--very distinctly upon the window.
Graham Guthrie started so as to shake the bed.
"It's supernatural!" he muttered--all that was Celtic in his blood
recoiling from the omen. "Nothing human can reach that window!"
"S-sh!" from Smith. "Don't stir."
The tapping was repeated.
Smith softly crossed the room. My heart was beating painfully.
He threw open the window. Further inaction was impossible.
I joined him; and we looked out into the empty air.
"Don't come too near, Petrie!" he warned over his shoulder.
One on either side of the open window, we stood and looked down
at the moving Embankment lights, at the glitter of the Thames,
at the silhouetted buildings on the farther bank, with the Shot
Tower starting above them all.
Three taps sounded on the panes above us.
In all my dealings with Dr. Fu-Manchu I had had to face nothing so uncanny
as this. What Burmese ghoul had he loosed? Was it outside, in the air?
Was it actually in the room?
"Don't let me go, Petrie!" whispered Smith suddenly.
"Get a tight hold on me!"
That was the last straw; for I thought that some dreadful
fascination was impelling my friend to hurl himself out!
Wildly I threw my arms about him, and Guthrie leaped
forward to help.
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