Re-enter Dr Fu Manchu

Dr. Fu Manchu paused, and his eyes seemed to film over;

but soon he went on:

“The plan of the Reds was to ensure that a certain order to the Chiefs of Staff should not be authorized. This you know. It was a desperate plan, and a bad one. I had never intended to carry it out. This also you know. My own plan would have served the same purpose—but gone further. For, with the acceptance of the so-called ‘Hessian Sound Zone’ I should have had access to every important air base, every military objective, from coast to coast. I should have made them invulnerable!” His voice quivered with the enthusiasm of the fanatic. “Then—at last—I could have challenged the power of Communism . . . and broken it!”

Fu Manchu raised clenched hands above his head, then lowered them; spoke softly.

“These are your new orders. ...”

* * *

Brian paced the living-room like a man possessed.

He had been allowed to become party to a conspiracy directed against the United States government by the very people sworn to defend it; used as a tool! He grew hot with indignation. The mystery which had puzzled him all along was a mystery no more. He had been employed solely as a link with his father, and, through his father, with the President.

But it was the part played by Lola which crowned his misery. Peter Wellingham, he knew now, was a Red agent. Beyond doubt he had been right when he thought it was Lola he had seen with Wellingham in Hyde Park. Lola had drawn his attention to The Times advertisement. If any room for doubt had remained, seeing her in the company of the false Nayland Smith would have swept it away. How little either of them could have suspected that their murder plot was known!

Brian groaned in his misery. From first to last he had been in the hands of creatures of Dr. Fu Manchu.

Zoe Montero—Ahmad—all had played him like a hooked fish!

He remembered, bitterly, Lola saying about The Times advertisement, “It read like a job created purposely for you.” It had been created purposely for him, and she knew it!

Fu Manchu or the Reds, whichever of them she worked for, had sent her off to New York to take him over as soon as he arrived. They were naturally anxious to know if he suspected anything. Many other questions about Nayland Smith recurred to him, and he could see their purpose, now. . . . Perhaps little Zoe—alone—had really weakened and tried to help him.

He would have loved to think so.

But Lola . . .

This mood of self-contempt so burned him up that he wanted to curse aloud. It called for a mighty effort to put his own petty troubles aside, to get back to the concrete inescapable fact that he was still involved in a giant conspiracy which might change world history.

He looked at the time. Surely Sir Denis should be back?

And, as he arrived at this conclusion, Sir Denis did come back. He entered quietly, put one finger to his lips, and pointed to the open door of Brian’s room.

They went in, and Nayland Smith closed the door.

“Lucky I was warned that our living-room is wired,” he remarked. “Well—I think I have passed, Merrick. At least, I’m still alive! But those X-ray eyes may have seen more than Fu Manchu thought it diplomatic to give away. He was employed by the Reds—rather reluctantly, I gather—to carry out a certain scheme.”

“He—your double—told me the same thing! That Fu Manchu had been employed to prevent Dr. Hessian’s invention falling into the hands of the United States!”

“That was the story my double sold to the authorities. Remember, he was accepted for myself. Hessian wasn’t doubted. The only dark horse in the stable was you! The F.B.I. rarely let you out of their sight!”

“You mean they suspected me of being a Red spy?” Brian blazed angrily.

“They didn’t know what or whom to suspect, Merrick, until I came on the scene. By the way, they’ll be expecting me to report. But I’m in rather a quandary.”

“IfFu Manchu already knows the secret of this sound cover, what on earth is he doing here?”

Nayland Smith laughed dryly. “What Fu Manchu, himself, described to me as the ‘so-called Hessian Sound Zone’ he really meant to place in the hands of the United States! He had no intention of following his Red instructions. These were designed simply to prevent the President signing an order to Chiefs of Staff which would have upset certain of their plans. It involved an urgent telephone call from the White House, a mouthpiece which ejected an odourless gas, and some other details which Fu Manchu could undoubtedly have provided.”

“But why such an elaborate set-up?”

Nayland Smith began to fill his pipe, glancing aside at Merrick.

“Have you ever thought how hard it would be to get the President of the United States alone? Had the Red plan been carried out, he would have been struck down by what any physician would have diagnosed as a heart attack, and been incapable of transacting any business for a long time!”

“Good God! What a villainous plot!”

“But child’s play for Dr. Fu Manchu. That’s why he was employed.”

“Then the Hessian Sound Zone is just an illusion—a hoax?”

Nayland Smith dropped his pouch back into his pocket;

struck a wooden match.

“Not a bit of it. The Sound Zone is Dr. Fu Manchu’s invention. He’s a scientific genius. The thing is an astounding reality!”

“Astounding’s an understatement.”

“It would give complete immunity from blast. No projectile could penetrate it. The nuclear fall-out would be dispersed over a wide area of the upper atmosphere. This, if such horrible weapons are ever used, is unavoidable. The consequences would depend upon the direction of the wind over which no man, not even Dr. Fu Manchu, has control.”

“Then why not let bygones be bygones, if Fu Manchu has really come clean?”

“Because, to mention one reason, its adoption, whilst making America, and I suppose the other Western allies, immune to direct air attack, would also give the Si-Fan absolute control of the Near and Far East.”

“But if it’s real——”

“Just so, Merrick.” Sir Denis lighted his pipe. “That’s why we have to hold the candle to the devil. That’s why we can’t arrest the two assassins next door, and produce the body which, I suppose, is hidden there. That’s why I don’t know what to report.”

Brian was dumbfounded. “You mean that, after what happened tonight, Fu Manchu will still go ahead with his project?”

Nayland Smith nodded; dropped the match-end in a tray.

“It’s his master-plot. He won’t resign it easily.”

The smell of tobacco-smoke spurred Brian to light a cigarette; to put himself in the background; concentrate on these vast issues at stake.

“This master-plot may be clear to you, Sir Denis, but I can’t get it. Why would the fact (and I accept your word it is a fact), that the West was safe from air attack, help this amazing man to take over the East?”

“Because the Reds, helpless to retaliate, could be blasted into submission, or unconditional surrender. And the vast underground movement throughout the East, which he has developed, would seize power. There’d be no holding him! I assure you, Merrick, that Hitler and Stalin were babes and sucklings compared to Dr. Fu Manchu!”

Nayland Smith continued his usual promenade. Brian was deep in thought.

“His cutting-in with a double for yourself,” he admitted, “wasn’t far short of criminal genius. His preparations to handle the thing if you happened to be alive were masterly.”

“Dragging the son of a prominent Senator and friend of the President into his programme also had elements of talent,” Sir Denis remarked dryly. “Never underestimate Dr. Fu Manchu. If he hadn’t been bitten by the bug called