competent Japanese surgeon gave an injection—and I was a living man again!”
“But,” I said breathlessly, “after that—what happened?”
John Marriot Doughty finished his whisky and soda and stood up.
“No time to tell you, now. I have been sent to take you to a second interview with the Doctor.”
“Why? Does this mean that I have to make a decision—at once?”
“My dear Kerrigan, only the Doctor knows that.” Once more I walked along a tiled, palm-bordered path across the big quadrangle; once more Marriot Doughty rang a bell. This time, for it was a different door Hassan the Nubian opened, I was conducted straight to the room of Dr. Fu Manchu.
He sat behind the big desk, and through half-closed eyes watched me.
“Be seated, Mr. Kerrigan.”
I was fighting for self mastery. Some great ordeal pended: I knew that its outcome meant compromise—or extinction.
“You have had an opportunity to glance over some of the work being done here. I would not hurry you. Clearly, you apprehend that my design is to force a decision. Mr. Kerrigan, you must correct your perspective. You are not of sufficient value to the Si-Fan to justify your extravagant egoism. I could bind you to me now, if I wished; I- could kill you by merely depressing a switch. Search your memory.”
That hard guttural voice was mastering me, as always it had mastered me.
“What do you wish me to remember?”
“Two things. The first, that I have never broken my word; the second, that I promised to restore Ardatha to complete freedom.”
And as he spoke a sort of violet haze seemed to obstruct my vision—a haze which resembled in colour Ardatha’s eyes. I saw the pit yawning before me, the trap set for my feet. I knew that when I chose the path— death, or service toDr. Fu Manchu—I should make no free choice. He pressed a button. A door opened, silently. Ardatha came in.
* * *
“The part played by Ardatha in my organization,” said Dr. Fu Manchu, “is an important one. She is the successor to some of the most beautiful women who have decorated the world. I employ beauty, Mr. Kerrigan, as a swordsman employs a rapier. Now, she has gone the way of her predecessors. I accept the fact because you have twice succeeded in transmuting the base metal of feminine caprice into the gold of love.”
Ardatha stood motionless, watching me. In the subdued light of Fu Manchu’s study she looked like a lovely phantom; her eyes seemed to hold some message which I could not read. Dr. Fu Manchu opened his jade snuff- box.
“I said”—he spoke softly—”that I would restore her: there is, as you know, a blind spot in her memory, which I shall presently correct.” He raised a pinch of snuff; Ardatha did not move. “You have had an opportunity of meeting members of my staff, of glancing over some of the results which we have achieved. There has been, for the second time within ten years, an attempt, and an attempt from the same quarter, to disturb my authority. Ardatha was one of the enemy’s prizes. I recovered her.”
He took up a sycamore box from the desk and opened it.
“This attempt shall be the last.”
His long nails scratched unpleasantly on the surface. He took out a small telescopic rod attached to a metal base, and set it on the desk before him. From a projecting arm at the top of the rod an object which resembled a large black diamond hung suspended upon what seemed to be two strands of silk.
“A form of lignite—known to commerce as jet; a remarkably fine specimen from an ancient British barrow of the Bronze Age.”
Fu Manchu turned the fragment of mineral between his long fingers until the suspended strands were knotted. His gaze became fixed upon me.
“You have my word,” he said softly, “that I design no harm to Ardatha. I merely propose to correct that blind spot in her memory to which I have referred.”
He turned to Ardatha, who stood less than two paces from the ebony chair in which he was seated.
“Come forward!” She obeyed, moving like an automaton. “Bend down, and watch closely.”
He released the piece of cut jet and it began to spin.
“Tell me what you see. Speak!”
“A spot of bright light,” Ardatha whispered.“It grows larger . . . it is a gleaming mirror . . . a picture is forming in it.”
“Describe the picture.”
“It is of myself. I am going into a hut on a river bank: I am seeking for something . . . Ah! a man is hiding there! He stands between me and the door—”
“Who is the man?”
“It is too misty to see.”
Ardatha was describing our second meeting!It had taken place in an eel-fisher’s hut on a Norfolk river.
“Go on.”
“I talk with him.” There was a subtle change in the tone of her voice which hastened my heart beats. “I trick him . . . . I escape.”
“Do you wish to escape?”
“No—I wish to stay.”
“Follow this man and tell me his name.”
And as I watched Ardatha bending over the spinning lignite, the light of the globular lamp striking sparks from her hair, she described every one of our meetings, in London, in Venice, in Paris. The jet became stationary, but she went on without a pause, her voice that of one speaking in a trance. At last: “Name this man,”Dr. Fu Manchu said softly.
“It is Bart—Bart Kerrigan!”
“Do you love him?”
An instant’s pause, and then: “Yes,” she whispered.
But she remained there, bending forward even when Fu Manchu raised his eyes—brilliant green in concentration—and addressed me.
“A device which we owe to the Arabs. It stimulates the subconscious mind.” He clapped his hands sharply. “Return Ardatha. Is this the man you desire?”
Ardatha stood upright, sighed, and looked about her as one suddenly awakened; then, as her gaze rested on me, she grew so suddenly pale that I thought she was about to collapse. But, as I watched her hungrily, a wave of crimson swept to her pale cheeks and a glory came into her eyes which was heaven.
“Bart!” she sobbed. “Oh, my darling, where have you been?”
Momentarily, that sinister figure in the ebony chair seemed to have ceased to exist for her. She ran to me with a joyous cry and threw herself into my arms.
CHAPTER XXXVI
THE VORTLAND LAMP
“You observe,” saidDr. Fu Manchu, “that residence here is not without its attractions.”
Ardatha he had sent away in charge of Hassan, whom he had summoned. As I last glimpsed her, those beautiful eyes were radiant. His sibilant tones brought me down to realities. Love can raise some natures to great heights. I faced him more fearlessly than I had supposed ever to be possible.
“I owe you my gratitude. But what do you ask in return?”
He began to toy with the jade snuff-box.
“I am not a hunter, Mr. Kerrigan. It lies in my power to do with you as I please. Let us suppose that I give you leave to go.”
“It would not be real freedom. Ardatha is bound to you by a tie she cannot break—and live.”
“So? In what I may, perhaps, term your second romance, she confided this to you? Here I perceive, is some deep affinity. You must certainly marry. The progeny of such a union could not fail to be interesting.”
His voice remained low, sibilant. Was he mocking me?
