The Island of Fu Manchu

“Where was he?”

“In an armchair in the sitting-room, completely unconscious, with that glass beside him.”

“And?”

“Yes!We have lost our hostage, Kerrigan. The marmoset has gone.”

“But, Smith!” I cried, desperately, “it doesn’t seem humanly possible!”

“Anything is possible when one is dealing with Dr. Fu Manchu. The fact which we have to face is that it has happened. Two men, fully capable of taking care of themselves, fully on the alert, are drugged. Someone, unseen by anybody in the hotel, gains access to these rooms, removes the cage containing the marmoset and lowers it out of the sitting-room window, which I found open, to someone else waiting in the garden below. At that late hour the garden would be deserted. In short, the rest of the matter is simple.”

“Thank God, old Barton has survived,” I said. “But heaven help us all—we are fighting a phantom . . . . Ardatha!”

Smith leaned across the bed on which the unconscious man lay and grasped my shoulder.

“Fu Manchu has recovered her. It may be an odd thing to say, when speaking of the greatest power for evil living in the world today, but for my part I would rather think of her with the Doctor than with—”

“Lou Cabot? Yes, I agree.”

“In taking no part in your conversation, gentlemen,” said Dr. Andrews, “I am actuated by a very simple motive. I don’t know what you are talking about. That there is or was someone called Dr. Fu Manchu I seem to have heard, certainly. In what way he is associated with my two patients I do not know. But regarding Lou Cabot—I presume you refer to the proprietor of The Passion Fruit Tree—you touch upon familiar territory. I have had the doubtful honour of attending this man on more than one occasion.”

“You will attend him no more,” said Smith.

“What is that?”

“He’s dead,” I began.

Smith flashed a silent, urgent message to me, and: “He died tonight, doctor, up at Santurce,” he explained, “under mysterious circumstances.”

“Good riddance!” murmuredDr. Andrews. “A more cunning villain never contrived to plant himself in the Canal Zone. The fellow was an agent for some foreign government. Doctors must not tell, but I heard strange things when he was delirious on one occasion.”

“Foreign government,” murmured Smith, staring shrewdly at the speaker. “Perhaps a foreign power, doctor, but not a government—yet.”

* * *

Several hours elapsed before Barton became capable of coherent speech. The man drugged with hashish cigarettes was causing Dr. Andrews some anxiety. Lying back in an armchair, visibly pale in spite of a sun-tan on a naturally florid skin, Barton stared at us. It was dawn, and to me a wretched one.

No clue, not even the most slender, as to the whereabouts of Ardatha had been picked up. Flammario had forced a confession from the hunchback Paulo. The agents of the Si-Fan had intercepted him as he had returned with the news for which she was seeking. In this way, by less than twenty minutes, the Si-Fan ‘ had anticipated our visit to the villa occupied by Lou Cabot, the circumstances of whose death the authorities had agreed to hush up in the interest of the vastly more important inquiry being carried out by Nayland Smith.

“I must be getting old,” said Barton weakly. “At any rate, I feel damned sick. Definitely, I refuse to drink any more coffee.”

“Very well,” said Smith, “but whisky is taboo until tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow! It’s tomorrow already,” growled Barton. His blue eyes were rapidly regaining their normal fire. “Naturally you want to know how I came to make such an infernal ass of myself. Well, I can’t tell you.”

“What do you mean, you can’t tell us?”

“I mean I don’t know. I had just mixed myself a final and was going out to make sure that the police officer you were kind enough to allot to me (whose presence I had discovered earlier) was awake, when I thought I heard that damned padding sound.”

“You mean the soft footsteps we have heard before?”

“Yes. Now let me give you the exact facts. I assure you they are peculiar. I had been to take a look at that blasted marmoset. He was asleep. I opened the door of my own room on to the main corridor, and glanced along to see if the police officer was awake. He was. He sang out, and I wished him good-night; but he is a garrulous fellow and he held me in conversation for some time.”

“Your door remaining open?” suggested Smith. “Yes—that’s the point.”

“Was the sergeant smoking?”

“He smoked all the time.”

“Was his manner normal?”

‘“Undoubtedly. Never stopped talking.”

“And you heard no unusual sound?”

“None whatever. I came in, sat down, lighted a pipe and was about to take a drink—when I saw something. I want to make it clear. Smith, that I saw this before I took the drink and I want to add that it was not a delusion and that I was very wide awake.”

“What did you see?” Barton stared truculently at Smith as he replied: saw a green hand”

“A green hand!” I echoed.

Smith began to pace up and down restlessly, tugging at the lobe of his left ear.

“I saw a human hand floating in space—no arm, no body. It was sea green in colour. It was visible for no more than a matter of ten seconds; then it vanished. It was over by the door, there—’

“What did you do?” snapped Smith.

“I ran to the spot. I searched everywhere. I began to wonder if there was anything wrong with me. This prompted me idea of a drink, so I sat down and took one. The last thing I remember thinking is that this hotel sells the world’s worst whisky.”

“You mean that you fell asleep?”

“No doubt about it.”

Smith kept up that restless promenade.

“A green hand,” he muttered, “And those padding footsteps! What is it? What in heaven’s name is it?”

“I don’t know what it is,” growled Barton, “but I thank God I’m alive. It’s Fu Manchu—of that I am certain. But there’s no love lost between us. Why didn’t he finish me?”

“That I think I can answer,” Smith replied. “Several days have yet to elapse before his First Notice or ultimatum expires. The Doctor has a nice sense of decorum.”

“I gather that he has recaptured the girl Ardatha. You have my very sincere sympathy, Kerrigan. I don’t know what to say.I, alone, am responsible and I lost your hostage.”

I bent down and shook his hand, as he lay back in the armchair.

“Not a word. Barton,” I said, “on that subject.Our enemy uses mysterious weapons which neither you nor I know how to counter.”

“Death by The Snapping Fingers,” murmured Smith. “The green hand and the Shadow which comes and goes, but which no one ever sees. How did Fu Manchu get here? Where did he hide? How does he travel and where has he gone?” He pulled up in front of me. “You have to make a quick decision, Kerrigan. As you know, my plans are fixed. Tomorrow we leave for Port au Prince.”

“I know,” I groaned; “and I know that it would be useless for me to remain behind.”

CHAPTER XXVI

SECOND NOTICE

Only my knowledge that in war-scarred Europe many thousands suffered just as I was suffering held me up during the next few days. Although I know I dreamed of her every night, resolutely in the waking hours I strove to banish all thought of Ardatha from my mind. As I saw the matter, we had lost every trick so far. In a mood of