Emperor Fu-Manchu (26 page)

“First class show, von Wehrner,” Nayland Smith grinned.

“Two things are worrying me,” Tony broke in, staring back at the raging inferno which had been the Soviet research centre. “Why did Matsukata yell for Mahmud and the Master? Was Mahmud the driver of the car Tung saw? In that case, Dr. Fu-Manchu was at the plant when we left! The other thing—who’s driving the truck and where are they going?”

Sir Denis began to fill his pipe before replying. “I think it’s probable that Fu-Manchu may have followed on. These unhappy creatures he has created are very near to jungle beasts. And the jungle becomes strangely disturbed during an electric storm.”

“You think,” von Wehrner asked, “that these living-dead have gone berserk and overcome their controllers?”

“I do. I think that Dr. Fu-Manchu, tonight, has overreached himself. Hitherto, I suppose, he has used these ghastly zombies for solo performances, such as the affair at Lao Tse-Mung’s house, when it has been possible for Matsukata to maintain control. But a party of
necropolites
poses a different problem—particularly in a thunderstorm.”

“Then you
do
believe,” Tony questioned eagerly, “that Fu-Manchu was there tonight in person?”

“I have said that I think it probable. What is certain is that a party of Cold Men—we don’t know how many—has taken charge of the truck and taken Matsukata along with them. I’m worried.”

“Where are they going?” Tony asked, blankly.

“That’s just what disturbs me.”

The drive back was all too long for Tony. Already he was living in the future and paid little attention to a conversation, in low tones, between Sir Denis and von Wehrner. They had carried out their part of the bargain, for they had the cipher manuscript, and if Dr. Fu-Manchu was the man of his word which Nayland Smith believed him to be—they were free.

They could all return to Hong Kong for his wedding.

His pleasant musing had lasted a long time. Von Wehrner had become silent. Nayland Smith’s pipe was smoked. The storm clouds had quite disappeared, and in bright moonlight he saw that they had nearly reached the main gate of General Huan’s house.

“I was afraid of this,” Sir Denis said grimly. “Look!”

The long gray truck stood before the gate.

* * *

“God’s mercy!” Nayland Smith whispered. “Truly, hell’s on the rampage tonight.”

The truck driver lay slumped in his cab. He was dead.

“What’s happened?” Tony cried out. “We must get into the house!”

“I’m afraid the gate is locked,” von Wehrner spoke in a note of despair.

“Wait!”

Nayland Smith was opening the rear door of the truck.

Matsukata lay prone on the floor inside.

“Get him out,” Sir Denis called. “Lend a hand, McKay.” Together they got the limp body out. “Dr. von Wehrner, this is your job. Tell me, is he alive?”

The German biologist bent over the Japanese, examined him briefly, and nodded.

“They are tough, these Japanese. It is extreme nervous exhaustion. Is your flask empty, Sir Denis?”

It wasn’t. And the doctor went to work to revive Matsukata.

“McKay,” Nayland Smith said, supporting the inert body. “There must be some kind of bell, or something, to arouse the gate porter. Tung may know.”

But Tung knew of no bell, so he began to rattle the bars and shout.

“Open the gate! Open the gate!”

He was still shouting when a light sprang up in the lodge, and a door was unlocked. An old man looked out, cautiously.

“Quick. Let us in.”

“It is Dr. Matsukata,” Tony called in Chinese. “We have business with his Excellency.”

The ancient porter came to the gate. “Gladly, for the place is taken over by demons!” He peered about, fearfully. “I saw them, leaping over the wall.”

He opened the heavy gate almost at the moment that Matsukata revived enough to speak.

“They meant to kill me,” he whispered. “They forced the driver to take the truck to the clinic. I was helpless. They can communicate with one another in some way. I knew this. They acted together. They got at the store of
Looma.
They drank it all. Then they forced the driver to come here. I do not know why they compelled me to come. Perhaps to torture me. From the roof of the truck they sprang over into the governor’s garden. All of them, like apes. I know no more, except that the Master…”

Matsukata passed out again.

McKay and Tung carried him into the gate lodge. Then Tung drove the car in and the gate was relocked. Dr. von Wehrner volunteered to look after Matsukata, and Tony and Nayland Smith started off toward the house.

Tony saw that every window in the lodge building was lighted.

“What’s this?” he muttered.

“My guess is that the Cold Men are inside. Looting.” Nayland Smith spoke rapidly. “By the way, hide your radio.”

He began to run. So did Tony.

A gong hung on the flower-draped terrace before the main door. Nayland Smith struck it a blow with the butt of his revolver.

Before the vibration had died away, the big, heavy door was thrown open, and a terrifying figure stood before them; a lean, muscular figure of a man wearing a shirt of chain mail, baggy trousers and some kind of metal helmet. He held a heavy sword having a curved blade from which certain stains had been imperfectly removed!

“You are welcome, gentlemen.”

It was General Huan Tsung-Chao!

As the door was reclosed, Tony glanced around the lighted lobby with its exquisite tapestries, trophies, and arms, from one of which, he guessed, General Huan had taken his queer equipment. Nayland Smith was staring at the general in an odd way.

“I can assure you, Sir Denis,” the old soldier said in his excellent English, “that I have not taken leave of my senses. But my house was invaded some time ago by creatures not of this world. My steward, an excellent and faithful servant, detecting one of them entering through a window, shot him. The thing ignored the wound, sprang on my steward, and strangled him!”

“The Cold Men,” Nayland Smith commented. “What did you do?”

“I ordered the resident staff to lock themselves in their quarters, and took the same precautions with my guests, Dr. Cameron-Gordon and his daughter. I locked the door of their apartment.”

“Thank God for that!” Tony breathed with relief.

“Some of the creatures,” General Huan went on in unruffled calm, “had obtained knives. Hence this.” He tapped the shirt of mail. “It was worn by an ancestor many centuries ago. I called for aid from Chia-Ting and was interrupted by one of the gray horrors, who attacked me with a dagger. They are apparently immune to bullets, but I am a saber expert and I struck the thing’s head off without difficulty.”

Tony recalled with horror the same feat performed by the executioner in the prison yard at Chia-Ting.

“Listen,” Nayland Smith snapped.

A faint sound of maniacal laughter sent an icy chill down Tony’s spine.

“Some of them are upstairs,” General Huan declared. “They move like shadows. I beheaded another in the wine cellar. The creature was pouring a rare Château d’Yquem down his throat. But there are more to be accounted for. This imbecile laughter—”

A stifled shriek checked him.

“Moon Flower!” Tony shouted. “Lead me to her!”

But that strange figure of a medieval Chinese warrior already led the way. Before a door carved in fanciful geometrical designs, he halted and took a key from a pocket in his baggy trousers. He threw the door open.

It was as if he had opened a refrigerator. Through a window with a balcony outside Tony saw the starry sky, and knew immediately how the Cold Men had got in. The room was a scene of crazy disorder. Dr. Cameron-Gordon lay face down by the window.

A
necropolite
—a gray, corpselike figure—was forcing Moon Flower back onto a divan; his lean left arm locked around her. She was past speech, but her feeble moans stung Tony to fighting madness. With his right hand the Cold Man stripped the clothing from her shoulders, pressing his loathsome lips to the soft curves he found.

Tony leapt forward and pumped three bullets into the Cold Man’s sinewy gray shoulder. The creature uttered no cry of pain, but its left arm relaxed and then fell limply. Moon Flower staggered back, collapsing on the cushioned divan.

As Nayland Smith sprang forward, the Cold Man turned, a murderous grin on its face.

“Oblige me by stepping aside, gentlemen,” General Huan cried in a tone of command.

Both twisted around, astounded by the words and the manner.

General Huan thrust himself before them. The
necropolite
plucked a knife from his loincloth. And at that same moment the long, curved blade of the great sword whistled through the air—and the grinning head rolled on the rug-covered floor. The trunk collapsed slowly, then slumped over.

“See,” General Huan held up the blade. “No more blood than if one carved a fish. The creatures are not human.”

* * *

Cameron-Gordon had been stunned by a blow on his skull from the Cold Man who had silently entered through the window. Tony knelt beside the divan whispering soothing words to Moon Flower. Her experience with a
necropolite
had brought her to the verge of hysteria, a feminine weakness which she despised.

The icy remains of her attacker, in two parts, had been removed before she recovered from the faint, and General Huan had gone to call those male members of his staff who slept in the servants’ annex to assist in the search for the Cold Men still at large.

Assured by Cameron-Gordon that he had suffered no physical injury, Nayland Smith jumped up and glanced quizzically at Tony.

“Come on, McKay,” he called. “Jeanie will be all right now with her father. We’ve got to get downstairs.”

“Close those shutters,” Tony called to Cameron-Gordon as he started, “and lock the door after us.”

Their assistance proved to be unnecessary, however. Matsukata, fully restored, and Dr. von Wehrner, on their way to the house, had almost stumbled over several Cold Men lying in a state of coma induced by a surfeit of looted food and wine. Another, making his exit in the same way from an upstairs window, had fallen on his head and lay unconscious on a tiled path.

Matsukata’s manner was furtive. From the way in which he glanced at von Wehrner, Tony knew that there were questions he wanted to ask, and from the way he avoided meeting Nayland Smith’s eyes, that there were inquiries he didn’t want to answer. In fact, he seemed to be half dazed.

* * *

In the light of early morning, Nayland Smith and Tony sat in Huan Tsung-Chao’s study, the room with the large lacquered desk. General Huan was seated behind the desk.

“Isn’t it remarkable, General,” Sir Denis asked, “that Dr. Fu-Manchu should have chosen last night for an attempt on the Soviet station? I had supposed the return of the manuscript before you to be of paramount interest.” General Huan rested his hand on the parchment-bound Si-Fan Register.

“It is of great interest to me, also, Sir Denis. But the Master accepted your word that it would be restored as you accepted his that you and your friends should be free to leave. His reason for moving last night was that he feared the replacement of Dr. von Wehrner might result in more stringent precautions being taken.”

“You tell me you have no news of him. This I don’t understand.”

The lined, remarkable old face relaxed in a smile.

“There are many things, Sir Denis, concerning your own part in the affair which I do not understand. The Cold Men, in three parties, were instructed, hypnotically, to obey Mahmud—a former sergeant-major of the French-Algerian infantry. Contrary to my advice, the Master—aware that these awful creatures are strangely affected by electric storms—set out shortly after Dr. Matsukata and Mahmud to take personal charge.”

He paused, and very deliberately took a pinch of snuff.

“Dr. Matsukata tells me that the third party, whom he held in reserve, revolted. You are aware of what occurred later. You have scrupulously carried out your undertaking, Sir Denis, and I have arranged suitable transport for all of you, as the Master authorized me to do. I have included Dr. von Wehrner, whose presence in your party is one of the things I do not understand.” He smiled again, a sly smile. “If you should call at Lung Chang, please give my best wishes to a mutual friend there. You will be provided with papers ensuring your free passage.”

Many hours later, in Lao Tse-Mung’s library, a setting sun gleamed on the many bound volumes, cabinets, and rare porcelain. Moon Flower was curled up on a cushioned settee; Tony’s glance lingered on her adoringly. Their courteous host had personally conducted his old friend, Cameron-Gordon, and the unexpected guest, von Wehrner, to their apartments, and Nayland Smith lay back in a big rest chair, relighting his pipe and looking gloriously at ease.

“Is it possible, Sir Denis, that Dr. Fu-Manchu is dead?” Tony asked suddenly.

Nayland Smith looked up at him, match in hand. “Judging from long experience, highly improbable.”

“Because, it would be rather a pity, in view of something I have here.” He pulled out the long envelope containing the translation of the cipher manuscript. “The lama advised me not to show it to you until we were out of danger.”

“What the devil is it?” Sir Denis questioned, and took the envelope from Tony.

“It’s the lama’s deciphering of the manuscript.”

“What!”
Nayland Smith blew the match out in the nick of time, leapt to his feet. “This is incredible.”

“A list, the lama told me, of every Si-Fan lodge master in China—some of them prominent persons—including General Huan!”

Nayland Smith dropped back in his chair.

“I said, McKay, when you recovered the thing from André Skobolov, that I believed it to be the most powerful weapon against Fu-Manchu which I ever held in my hands. An understatement. It will shatter his dream empire!”