A long corridor showed beyond—so long that the light of our torches was lost in it.
“One man to stand by here,” came the crisp order—”and keep in contact with the man at the top.”
We pressed on. We were now reduced to a party of four. There were several bends in the passage, but its general direction, according to my calculations, was southerly.
“This is amazing,” muttered Nayland Smith. “If it goes on much farther, I shall being to suspect that it is a private entrance to the Casino at Monte Carlo!”
Even as he spoke, another bend unmasked the end of this remarkable passage. Branching sharply down to the right, I saw a further flight of steps—rough wooden steps; and the naked rock was all about us.
“What’s this?”
We must be down to sea level.”
“Fully, I should think.”
Sir Denis turned; and:
“Fall out another man,” he directed; “patrol between here and the end of the passage. Keep in contact with your opposite number, a shot to be the signal of any danger. Come on!”
A party of three, we pressed on down the wooden steps. There was a greater chilliness in the air, and a stale smell as of ancient rottenness. Another landing was reached, wooden planked: roughly hewn rock all about us. More wooden stairs, inclining left again.
These terminated in an arched, crudely octagonal place which bore every indication of being a natural cave. It was floored with planks, and a rugged passage, similarly timbered, led yet farther south—or so I estimated.
“Stay here,” Nayland Smith directed tersely. “Keep in touch with the man at the top.”
And the last of the police party was left behind.
Sir Denis and I hurried on. Fully a hundred yards we went—and came to a yawning gap, which our lights could not penetrate. Moving slowly now, we reached the end of the passage.
“Careful!” warned Sir Denis. “By heavens! what’s this?”
We stood on a narrow wharf!
Tackle lay about; crates, packing cases, coils of rope. And the sea—for I recognized that characteristic smell of the Mediterranean—lapped its edge!
But not a speck of light was visible anywhere. The water was uncannily still. One would not have suspected it to be there.
“Lights out!” snapped Sir Denis.
We extinguished our lamps. Utter darkness blanketed us:
we might have stood in a mine gallery.
“Don’t light up!” came his voice. “I should have foreseen this. But even so, I don’t see how I could have provided against it....My God! what’s that?”
A dull sustained note, resembling that of a muted gong, vibrated eerily through the stillness...In fact, now that he had drawn my attention to it, I believed that it had been perceptible for some time, although hitherto partly drowned by the clatter of our rubber soles upon wooden steps.
For one moment I listened—and knew...
“You were right, Sir Denis,” I said; “this place isn’t deserted. Someone is closing
“Quick! for your life! Back to the stairs!...”
We turned and ran into the wooden-floored tunnel; our feet made a drumming sound upon the planks. The man left on duty at the foot of the stairs was missing. Up we went helter-skelter, neither of us doubting the urgency. We met with no obstruction and, breathing hard, began to race up the higher flight.
Neither patrol was to be seen. I suspected that they had gone back along the corridor to establish contact with the man at the farther end.
In confirmation of my theory came the sound of a shot, curiously muffled and staccato, from some point far ahead.
We pulled up, panting and—staring....
A section door was descending, cutting us off from the corridor! It was no more than three feet from the ground, and falling—falling—inch by inch....
“We daren’t risk it!” groaned Nayland Smith. “If we did, and weren’t crushed, we should be shut in between this and the next.”
I heard shouting in the corridor beyond; a sound of racing feet. But even as I listened and watched, the dull grey metal door was but fifteen inches above floor level, and:
“We must try back again,” I said hoarsely.
“There must be some way out of that place, even if we have to swim for it.”
“There’s no way out,” Sir Denis rapped irritably. “The entrance is below sea level.”
“What!”
“You saw the patches of oil on the wharf?”
“I did. But—”
“Nevertheless, we’ll go back. There may be some gallery communicating with another exit.”
We began to descend again.
I was trying to think, trying to see into the future. An appalling possibility presented itself to my mind: that this might be the end of everything! So tenacious is the will to live in all healthy animals that predominant above every other consideration at the moment towered that of how to escape from this ghastly cavern.
Nayland Smith’s torch—he was leading by a pace—shone upon the oil-stained planking of the wharf.
“Lights out!”
In complete darkness we stood there. That warning note which indicated the closing of the section doors had ceased.
They were closed.
Failing our discovery of another way out, rescue depended upon the forcing of many such obstacles!
Considering what I knew of the equipment of Ste Claire, I realised that the whole of the party within its walls must be cut off one from another in the innumerable sections. Lacking intelligent work on the part of someone outside—and I believed the Chief of Police to be inside—it was a hopeless task to attempt to calculate how long we might have to wait for that rescue.
And now a voice—a voice once heard never to be forgotten—broke the silence: it echoed eerily from wall to wall of the cavern.
“Sir Denis Nayland Smith...”
It was Dr. Fu Manchu speaking!
My heart throbbed painfully, and I choked down an exclamation:
“You are not called upon to answer if it please you to remain silent, but I know that you are there. I may add that you will remain there for a considerable time. Apart from certain personal inconvenience, Sir Denis, do not congratulate yourself upon having altered my plans. Dr. Petrie’s experiments were a menace more serious than any intrusion of yours. The impossibility of adapting my flying army to certain Russian conditions was an obstacle which in any event I had not succeeded in surmounting. However, Dr. Petrie is with me now, and his proven genius in my own special province should be of some service in the future.”
I could hear Nayland Smith breathing hard close beside me, but he spoke no word.
“Mr. Alan Sterling,” the guttural, mocking voice continued, “I have reconstructed your brief romance with Fleurette. It is regrettable. I remain uncertain if I can efface your handiwork....”
I doubted if any man had ever participated in so fantastic a scene; and now, as if to crown its phantasy, Sir Denis spoke out of the darkness beside me.
“Who built your submarine?” he asked in an ordinary conversational tone.
And with that courtesy proper between lifelong enemies Dr. Fu Manchu replied:
“My submersible yacht was designed by Ernst von Ebber, whose ‘death’ some ten years ago you may recall. But it incorporates many new features of Ericksen. It was built at my yard on the Irrawaddy, in your beloved Burma.
“I must leave you. If I do so with a certain reluctance, this is due to the fact that I always pay my gambling debts. My life was at your mercy. Sir Denis—and you held your hand....”
