Re-enter Dr Fu Manchu

His next impulse was to call Michel’s. But Lola had been so insistent on this point all along that he hesitated. After all, even now he wasn’t sure that the girl with Wellingham had been Lola. And Lola had told him that “Madame” simply wouldn’t tolerate personal calls to members of her staff.

All his old distrust of Wellingham had swept over him again like an avalanche. Of Lola he hardly dared to think, except that he flogged his memory of the girl in the Park in search of something different about her to prove that she was not Lola.

In any case, he was committed to go to Egypt. He couldn’t allow his personal doubts and frustrations to make him break faith with Sir Denis. . . .

An Oxford friend invited Brian to dine with him, which revived his drooping spirits. He managed that evening to forget his problems for an hour of two, had a few drinks and felt better. He returned fairly early, remembering his four o’clock appointment and tried to hypnotize himself to sleep by conjuring up mental pictures of Cairo. But, somehow, Lola always got into the pictures. ...

Chapter

3

Cairo, from the air, whilst not so breath-taking as Damascus seen from above, proved exciting enough all the same to Brian. His urge to visit the Near East had been gratified. But every human blessing has a string to it. The string in this case was one he had knotted himself—Lola.

He had left a letter at the reception desk for her, but not the letter he had been writing in the Park. The second one had been even harder to write than the first; for although he had no positive proof that it was she he had seen with Wellingham, he remained obstinately convinced that it had been no one else.

The terms of The Times advertisement, the fact that Lola had drawn his attention to it, her words—”It read like a job created purposely for you”—added up to a dark, a horrible suspicion. Had it been created purposely for him? Was it a new variety of the old confidence trick? Until he actually met Nayland Smith he couldn’t be sure that it wasn’t.

But its purpose? The money in his wallet was real enough. His fare had been paid to Cairo. Why? Could it be a case of abduction—a plot to bring about his disappearance? His father was a wealthy man. . . But the idea was too preposterous. He had to laugh it off.

In fact, he was really trying all the time to convince himself that there was nothing wrong in the business. If Lola was really Peter Wellingham’s girl friend and had merely been fooling with him, well—she wasn’t the only pretty girl who enjoyed the attentions of more than one man.

He would get over it. Anyway, he must wait and see. . . .

Accommodation had been reserved for him, and an Egyptian wearing hotel uniform was standing by when the plane taxied to a stop on the runway. This experienced courier brushed him through the Customs as if by magic, and in no time Brian found himself speeding along a lebbekh-lined avenue into the ancient city. The colourful crowds, the palm trees, the unfamiliar buildings, and the queer smell which peculiarly belongs to Cairo all came up to expectations.

His apartment had a balcony overlooking a busy street and the Esbekiyeh Gardens. The ruins of Shepheard’s Hotel, near by, which the driver pointed out, struck a warning note, recalling his father’s advice, but it wasn’t sufficient to depress him. Whilst he was having a shower and brush-up, a boy brought him a message. It was neatly typed on paper headed with an address in Sharia Abdin and a phone number. It said:

Dear Mr. Merrick: I shall give myself the pleasure of calling upon you in the morning. Probably you are tired after your long journey; but if you want to do any sightseeing, please don’t go out without a reliable dragoman. Sir Denis is expected to arrive at any moment.

Yours obediently, A.J. Ahmad.

This suited Brian well enough. He was certainly tired, and beyond perhaps a stroll in the surrounding streets he had no wish to go sightseeing. He planned to hit the hay soon after dinner; which programme he carried out and turned in by ten o’clock. ...

He was at breakfast when Mr. Ahmad arrived.

Mr. Ahmad, correctly dressed in European clothes, proved to be a good-looking Egyptian with a marked resemblance to Egypt’s Prime Minister. He spoke perfect English, but his phrasing was French.

“The cause of Sir Denis’s delay,” he told Brian, “is unknown. But his movements are always unpredictable. We expect him hourly. He appears like the djinn. There is a draught of air. A door opens. And Sir Denis Nayland Smith is with us!”

“That’s good fun for the staff!” Brian grinned. “I suppose the moment he appears I’m expected to report?”

Mr. Ahmad shrugged slightly. “Of course as soon as possible.”

“Of course. I mean he wouldn’t want me to hang around the hotel?”

“Most certainly not. You know him. Judge for yourself.

Provided you don’t leave Cairo, so that I can find you at short notice—it is sufficient. But, a word of warning. If you are disposed to wander in the older parts of the city——”

“Take a dragoman? Now listen, Mr Ahmad: Is that an order from Sir Denis?”

“But certainly not! It is merely a suggestion.”

“Meaning I can do as I like? You see, I don’t favour the idea of being taken in tow by a guide. I like to find my own way, go where I please and stay as long as I want to.”

Mr Ahmad smiled a dazzling smile.

“The true sentiments of your freedom-loving country! Please yourself.”

“Thank you.”

“But take care. European and American travellers are not too popular in certain districts. If any trouble should start, take cover. .. .”

When, later, Brian set out, brushing off the beggars, the guides, and the vendors of scarabs and amulets, and trying to brush off the flies, he looked up to a fleckless sky and found, paradoxically, that he was no longer unhappy.

He wondered if the atmosphere of Cairo had some magical soothing quality; for he seemed, now, to be prepared for whatever lay in store for him. He had suddenly become a fatalist. If he had been made the victim of some mysterious plot it didn’t matter. The plotters had gained nothing so far, and he was living in luxury. If Lola didn’t answer his letter, never mind. He had had a good time with her in London. He wondered if the mood would last, or if later there would be a sharp reaction.

Sauntering across the Esbekiyeh, he was deeply interested in all he saw, and went on into a street bisected by a maze of narrower streets, all teeming with noisy humanity. He was in the Muski, artery of many bazaars. Beggars, sellers of bead necklaces, scarabs and what-not buzzed around him like flies around a honey-pot. But he smilingly ignored them, which the head hall-porter had told him was the best method. From passers-by who wore European dress and therefore might speak English, he inquired the way to the Khan Khalil where (the same authority had informed him) swords, daggers, silk robes, amber mouthpieces and other colourful native products were on view.

And presently he found it. The hall-porter had advised him, if he wished to make any purchases, to consult a certain Achmed es-Salah whose shop anyone would point out. (“He sells very good cigarettes.”) It proved to resemble nothing so much as an artificial cave. The venerable Achmed sat in the entrance smoking, and at sight of a card which Brian had brought along, waved him to a chair and offered coffee and cigarettes.

Brian had a low opinion of the syrupy Arab coffee, but found the Egyptian cigarettes, with their unfamiliar aroma, a pleasant change from the American variety. He asked if he could buy some.

Achmed reached behind him, opened a drawer and produced a flat tin box containing a hundred. Smilingly he began to explain that only from him could these cigarettes be obtained. But Achmed had lost his customer’s attention. Farther back in the shadows of the shop a female figure was vaguely visible to Brian—a girl who held a veil around the lower part of her face. She appeared to be watching him. He glanced away again. Dimly understanding what Achmed had been saying:

“I’ll take the cigarettes,” he told him. “If I want more I’ll write and send dollars as you suggest.”

“I supply them to many American gentlemen,” Achmed declared, accepting the ten dollars which he claimed to be their price.