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Page 78
A woman in an elegant, flame-colored opera cloak was crossing the floor
and coming in the direction of the spot where we were concealed.
She wore a soft silk scarf about her head, a fold partly draped across
her face. A momentary view I had of her--and wildly incongruous
she looked in that place--and she had disappeared from sight,
having approached someone invisible who sat upon the divan immediately
beneath our point of vantage.
From the way in which the company gazed towards her, I divined that she
was no habitue of the place, but that her presence there was as greatly
surprising to those in the room as it was to me.
Whom could she be, this elegant lady who visited such a haunt--
who, it would seem, was so anxious to disguise her identity,
but who was dressed for a society function rather than for a
midnight expedition of so unusual a character?
I began a whispered question, but Smith tugged at my arm to silence me.
His excitement was intense. Had his keener powers enabled him
to recognize the unknown?
A faint but most peculiar perfume stole to my nostrils, a perfume
which seemed to contain the very soul of Eastern mystery.
Only one woman known to me used that perfume--Karamaneh.
Then it was she!
At last my friend's vigilance had been rewarded. Eagerly I bent forward.
Smith literally quivered in anticipation of a discovery. Again the strange
perfume was wafted to our hiding-place; and, glancing neither to right
nor left, I saw Karamaneh--for that it was she I no longer doubted--
recross the room and disappear.
"The man she spoke to," hissed Smith. "We must see him!
We must have him!"
He pulled the mat aside and stepped out into the anteroom.
It was empty. Down the passage he led, and we were almost come
to the door of the big room when it was thrown open and a man came
rapidly out, opened the street door before Smith could reach him,
and was gone, slamming it fast.
I can swear that we were not four seconds behind him, but when we gained
the street it was empty. Our quarry had disappeared as if by magic.
A big car was just turning the corner towards Leicester Square.
"That is the girl," rapped Smith; "but where in Heaven's
name is the man to whom she brought the message?
I would give a hundred pounds to know what business is afoot.
To think that we have had such an opportunity and have
thrown it away!"
Angry and nonplused he stood at the corner, looking in the direction
of the crowded thoroughfare into which the car had been driven, tugging at
the lobe of his ear, as was his habit in such moments of perplexity,
and sharply clicking his teeth together. I, too, was very thoughtful.
Clews were few enough in those days of our war with that giant antagonist.
The mere thought that our trifling error of judgment tonight in tarrying
a moment too long might mean the victory of Fu-Manchu, might mean the turning
of the balance which a wise providence had adjusted between the white
and yellow races, was appalling.
To Smith and me, who knew something of the secret influences
at work to overthrow the Indian Empire, to place, it might be,
the whole of Europe and America beneath an Eastern rule,
it seemed that a great yellow hand was stretched out over London.
Doctor Fu-Manchu was a menace to the civilized world.
Yet his very existence remained unsuspected by the millions
whose fate he sought to command.
"Into what dark scheme have we had a glimpse?" said Smith.
"What State secret is to be filched? What faithful servant
of the British Raj to be spirited away? Upon whom now has
Fu-Manchu set his death seal?"
"Karamaneh on this occasion may not have been acting as an emissary
of the Doctor's."
"I feel assured that she was, Petrie. Of the many whom this yellow
cloud may at any moment envelop, to which one did her message refer?
The man's instructions were urgent. Witness his hasty departure.
Curse it!" He dashed his right clenched fist into the palm of his
left hand. "I never had a glimpse of his face, first to last.
To think of the hours I have spent in that place, in anticipation
of just such a meeting--only to bungle the opportunity when it arose!"
Scarce heeding what course we followed, we had come now to Piccadilly
Circus, and had walked out into the heart of the night's traffic.
I just dragged Smith aside in time to save him from the off-front
wheel of a big Mercedes. Then the traffic was blocked, and we found
ourselves dangerously penned in amidst the press of vehicles.
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