The Bride of Fu-Manchu (18 page)

I had one chance, and I didn’t know what it was worth. But given anything like decent luck, I proposed to risk it.

For a minute or more I looked in through the observation window to the small house flooded with synthetic sunshine, where those queer, flesh-like orchids were clambering up from steaming mud around the contorted mango roots. They seemed to be moving slightly, as is the way with such plants, in a manner suggesting the breathing of a sleeping animal.

I moved on to the door which communicated with the first of the range of forcing houses, or the last in the order in which I had inspected them. It was the one containing the pitcher plants and other fly-catching varieties.

It was dimly lighted within, and the door slid open as I pressed the control button. I closed it, adjusted the gauge, then opened the inner door and went in.

The steamy heat of the place attacked me at once. It was like stepping out of a temperate clime into the heart of a jungle. The air was laden with perfumes—pleasant and otherwise; the predominant smell being that of an ineffable rottenness which characterizes swampy vegetation.

I threaded my way along a narrow path. So far, I had met with success—probably all the doors were unfastened.

It proved to be so, nor did I meet a soul on the way.

And when at last I stood in the most imposing house of all, palms towering high above my head, I became conscious of an apprehension against which I must fight... that the note of recall would suddenly sound in my brain.

Yet to discard the metal ring would have been folly.

There was an odd whispering among the dim palm-tops, for the place was but half lighted. It felt and smelled like a tropical forest. Much of the glass comprising the walls was semi-opaque. What lay beyond, I had no means of finding out.

I moved cautiously along until I came to that spiral staircase I had noted. It was situated at no great distance from the doorway through which I had originally entered.

Cautiously I began to ascend, my rubber-soled shoes creating a vague thrumming sound upon the metal steps. I reached the top of the first staircase and saw before me a narrow gangway with a single handrail—not unlike those found in engine rooms.

Palm boles towered above me, and fronds of lower foliage extended across the platform. I advanced, sometimes ducking under them, to where vaguely I had seen a second stair leading higher. I mounted this until I found myself among the tops of wildly unfamiliar trees; narrow galleries branched off in several directions. I selected one which seemed to lead to the glass wall. I saw queer fruit glowing in the crowns of trees unknown. Normally I could not have resisted inspecting it more closely; but tonight my professional enthusiasms must be subdued: a task of intense urgency claimed me.

Then, I had almost come to where one gangway joined another running flat against the glass wall, up very near to the arching roof, when I pulled up, inhaled deeply, and clutched at the hand rail...

Uttering a shrill whistling sound, something swung from a golden crest on my right, perched for a moment on the rail, not a yard from where I stood, chattered up at me and sprang into bright green foliage of an overhanging palm!

My heart was beating rapidly—but I tried to laugh at myself.

It was Fu-Manchu’s marmoset!

I had begun to move on again when once more I pulled up. Surely it was not the doctor’s custom to allow his pet to roam at large in these houses? It had presumably escaped from its usual quarters, and sooner or later the doctor, or someone else, would see it.

I stood still, listening. I could hear nothing save the faint whispering of the leaves.

Moving on to the side gallery, I saw ahead of me through glass windows a rugged slope topped by a ruined wall, and beyond the wall an ancient building. Stepping slightly to the right, I could see more of the place—a narrow street descending in cobbled steps, and another more modern building, from the arched entrance of which light shone out upon the cobbles. Looking higher, I saw a cloudless sky gemmed with stars.

This, beyond doubt, was the back of Ste Claire, and these huge forcing houses were built against the slope which ran down from it to the sea.

In other words, as I stood, the sea was behind me. I must seek an exit in that direction. I walked back along the gangways to the head of the spiral staircase, seeing nothing of Peko, the marmoset, on my way.

I descended, proceeded along the second gallery to the lower stair, and so reached the rubber-covered floor again.

Instantly, I noticed something which pulled me up dead in my tracks... an unmistakable smell of opium!

I turned slowly, fists clenched, looking towards those doors which I knew to communicate with the study of Dr. Fu-Manchu.

Both doors, the inner and the outer, were open!

From where I stood I could see the farther wall of the room—I could see a silk lantern suspended from the ceiling; some of the books in their barbaric bindings; the thick carpet; and even that Chinese stool upon which I had sat.

Not a sound reached me.

Something, perhaps a natural cowardice, was urging me to go back—to go back—but I conquered it, and went forward, very cautiously.

I believe I had rarely done anything so truly praiseworthy as when I crossed the space between those two doors, and, craning forward inch by inch, peeped into the study.

CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

I
withdrew my head with hare-like rapidity and clenched my teeth so sharply, stifling an exclamation, that I heard the click as they came together.

Dr. Fu-Manchu was seated in the big throne-like chair behind the writing table.

One glimpse only I had of him in profile, but it had wrecked my optimism—reduced me to a state of helpless despair.

I stood now on the threshold, not daring to move, scarce daring to breathe. He was seated, I had seen in that lightning glimpse, his head resting against the back of the padded chair, bolt upright, his yellow taloned hands clutching the arms. It was like a vision of a Pharoah dead upon his throne.

The open doors were explained: he had heard me approaching. He was waiting for me!... What explanation could I offer?

So much more than my own life was at stake, that I stood there, aware that a cold perspiration had broken out upon my skin, fighting for composure, demanding of my dull brain some answer to the inquisition to which at any moment I expected to be submitted.

Silence!

Not a sound came from that study out of which opium fumes floated to my nostrils.

It was possible, it was just possible, that he had not heard my approach. This being so, it was also possible that he did not know the identity of the intruder whom, presumably, he had heard mounting or dismounting the iron staircase.

I might creep back, and if questioned later, brazen the thing out. One objective I must keep in mind—my freedom!

Silence!

The sickly smell of opium mingling with a damp miasma from the palm house. So still it was that I could hear my heart beating, and hear—or thought I could hear—that faint rustling in the tree-tops, that curious communion among tropical leaves which never ceases, day or night.

I began to recover courage.

After all, my duties were of a character which rendered wakefulness difficult. What more natural as a botanist than that I should keep my mind alert by inspecting the unique products of those wonderful houses? Finding these doors open, what more natural than that I should investigate?

Very cautiously, very quietly, I bent forward again, and this time ventured to look long and steadily.

Like Seti the First, Dr. Fu-Manchu sat in his throne-chair. I knew that I had never seen so majestic an outline, nor so wonderful a brow, such tremendous power in any human lineaments. He was motionless, his hands resting upon the dragon chair-arms; he might have been carved from old ivory.

My rubber-soled shoes making no sound, I stepped into the room and stood watching him closely. His eyes were closed. He was asleep, or—

I glanced at the jade-bowled pipe which lay upon the table before him. I sniffed the fumes with which the room was laden.

Drugged!

Here was the explanation which I had been slow to grasp.

Dr. Fu-Manchu was in an opium trance... possibly the only sleep which that restless, super-normal brain ever knew!

I glanced rapidly about the room, wondering if any other man, not enthralled by the Blessing of the Celestial Vision, had ever viewed its strange treasures and lived to tell the world of them.

And now, as I stood there in the presence of that insensible enemy of Western civilization, I asked myself a question: What should I do?

If I could find a way out of this maze I believed I had a fighting chance to escape from Ste Claire. I was in China only in the sense that this place was under the domination of the Chinese doctor. Actually, I was in France; my friends were within easy reach if I could get in touch with them.

Why should I not kill him?

He had killed Petrie—dear old Petrie, one of the best friends I had ever had in life: he had killed, for no conceivable reason, those other poor workers in vineyards and gardens. And, according to Sir Denis, this was but the beginning of the sum of his assassinations!

I stood quite close to him; only the big table divided us. And I studied the majestic, evil mask which was the face of Dr. Fu-Manchu.

He was helpless, and I was a young, vigorous man. Would it be a worthy or an unworthy deed? It is an ethical point which to this day I have never settled satisfactorily.

All I can say in defence of my inaction is that, confronting Dr. Fu-Manchu, helpless and insensible, I knew, although my reason and my Celtic blood rose in revolt against me, that something deep down in my consciousness bade me not to touch him!

Supreme Evil sat enthroned before me, at my mercy—perhaps the nearest approach to Satan incarnate which this troubled world has ever known. And perhaps, for that reason, inviolable.

I dared not lay a finger upon him—and I knew it!

No, I must pursue my original plan—gain my freedom.

The mahogany-arched recess communicated, I knew, with a corridor at the end of which was a stair leading to the rooms with white doors. The door which faced the table opened into the big laboratory called the radio research room.

Which of these should I attempt?

I had decided upon that leading to the laboratory when something occurred to me which produced a chill at my heart.

The opened doors into the palm house!

Who had opened them, since, obviously, Dr. Fu-Manchu had not done so?

I stood quite still for a moment; then turned slowly and looked out into that misty jungle beyond.

Someone had come out of this room during the time that I had been creeping about upon those gangways in the palm-tops. A patrol? A patrol who, having heard me, would now be waiting for me.

I listened; but no sound came from that tropical jungle. And now dawned a second thought. One acquainted with the iron routine of that place would never have left both doors open!

What did it mean?

An urge to escape from this drug-laden room, from the awful still figure in the carven chair, seized me.

I stepped softly towards the archway—only to realize that the control was hidden. I could see no trace of one of those familiar glass buttons, resembling bell pushes, which took the place of door-knobs in this singular household. Perforce, then, I must try my luck in the radio research room.

Beside the door facing Dr. Fu-Manchu I could see the control button which opened it. I turned, pressed that button... and the door slid silently open.

I stepped out into the violet-lighted laboratory.

Looking swiftly right and left I could see no one. The place was empty, as when I had first discovered myself in its vastness. Almost directly at my feet a black line was marked upon the rubber floor.

I inhaled deeply. Could I cross it?

Clenching my teeth, I stepped forward. Nothing happened. I was free of the radio research room!

But now my case was growing desperate. I could not believe myself to be the only person awake in that human anthill. Sooner or later I must be detected and challenged. My only chance was to find another way out of the radio research room. And now it occurred to me that there might be none!

Avoiding those black marks upon the dull grey floor which outlined the settings of certain pieces of mechanism and of tables laden with indefinable instruments, I walked in the direction of the further end of the dimly lighted place, until I came to the glass wall.

A great part of it was occupied by shelves containing stores of all kinds. I knew that the door—if a door existed—must be somewhere in the opening between the shelves.

Desperately I began to search for it.

CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE