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Page 69
Whilst I racked my brains for some scheme, the little animal took the
matter out of my hands. Tossing the ring with its jangling contents a
yard or so across the carpet in my direction, it leaped in pursuit,
picked up the ring, whirled it over its head, and then threw a
complete somersault around it. Now it snatched up the keys again, and
holding them close to its ear, rattled them furiously. Finally, with
an incredible spring, it leaped onto the chain supporting the lamp
above my head, and with the garish shade swinging and spinning wildly,
clung there looking down at me like an acrobat on a trapeze. The tiny,
bluish face, completely framed in grotesque whiskers, enhanced the
illusion of an acrobatic comedian. Never for a moment did it release
its hold upon the key-ring.
My suspense now was intolerable. I feared to move, lest, alarming the
marmoset, it should run off again, taking the keys with it. So as I
lay there, looking up at the little creature swinging above me, the
second wonder of the night came to pass.
A voice that I could never forget, strive how I would, a voice that
haunted my dreams by night, and for which by day I was ever listening,
cried out from some adjoining room.
"Ta'ala hina!" it called. "Ta'ala hina, Peko!"
It was Karamaneh!
The effect upon the marmoset was instantaneous. Down came the bunch of
keys upon one side of the shade, almost falling on my head, and down
leaped the ape upon the other. In two leaps it had traversed the room
and had vanished through the curtained doorway.
If ever I had need of coolness it was now; the slightest mistake would
be fatal. The keys had slipped from the mattress of the divan, and now
lay just beyond reach of my fingers. Rapidly I changed my position,
and sought, without undue noise, to move the keys with my foot.
I had actually succeeded in sliding them back on to the mattress,
when, unheralded by any audible footstep, Karamaneh came through the
doorway, holding the marmoset in her arms. She wore a dress of fragile
muslin material, and out from its folds protruded one silk-stockinged
foot, resting in a high-heeled red shoe. . . .
For a moment she stood watching me, with a sort of enforced composure;
then her glance strayed to the keys lying upon the floor. Slowly, and
with her eyes fixed again upon my face, she crossed the room, stooped,
and took up the key-ring.
It was one of the poignant moments of my life; for by that simple act
all my hopes had been shattered!
Any poor lingering doubt that I may have had, left me now. Had the
slightest spark of friendship animated the bosom of Karamaneh most
certainly she would have overlooked the presence of the keys--of the
keys which represented my one hope of escape from the clutches of the
fiendish Chinaman.
There is a silence more eloquent than words. For half a minute or
more, Karamaneh stood watching me--forcing herself to watch me--and I
looked up at her with a concentrated gaze in which rage and reproach
must have been strangely mingled. What eyes she had!--of that blackly
lustrous sort nearly always associated with unusually dark
complexions; but Karamaneh's complexion was peachlike, or rather of an
exquisite and delicate fairness which reminded me of the petal of a
rose. By some I had been accused of raving about this girl's beauty,
but only by those who had not met her; for indeed she was
astonishingly lovely.
At last her eyes fell, the long lashes drooped upon her cheeks. She
turned and walked slowly to the chair in which Fu-Manchu had sat.
Placing the keys upon the table amid the scientific litter, she rested
one dimpled elbow upon the yellow page of the book, and with her chin
in her palm, again directed upon me that enigmatical gaze.
I dared not think of the past, of the past in which this beautiful,
treacherous girl had played a part; yet, watching her, I could not
believe, even now, that she was false! My state was truly a pitiable
one; I could have cried out in sheer anguish. With her long lashes
partly lowered, she watched me awhile, then spoke; and her voice was
music which seemed to mock me; every inflection of that elusive accent
reopened, lancet-like, the ancient wound.
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