No good could come of denying what was palpably true.
“Yes,” I said. “I did get a telegram.”
“You fetch him, yes? Fetch him now.”
I ground my teeth, but what could I do. I ran upstairs again. As I did so, I thought of confiding in Mrs. Pearson, at any rate as far as Cinderella’s disappearance went. She was on the landing, but close behind her was the little maidservant, and I hesitated. If she was a spy—the words of the note danced before my eyes: “… she will suffer …” I passed into the sitting room without speaking.
I took up the telegram and was about to pass out again when an idea struck me. Could I not leave some sign which would mean nothing to my enemies but which Poirot himself would find significant. I hurried across to the bookcase and tumbled out four books onto the floor. No fear of Poirot’s not seeing them. They would outrage his eyes immediately—and coming on top of his little lecture, surely he would find them unusual. Next I put a shovelful of coal on the fire and managed to spill four knobs into the grate. I had done all I could—pray Heaven Poirot would read the sign aright.
I hurried down again. The Chinaman took the telegram from me, read it, then placed it in his pocket and with a nod beckoned me to follow him.
It was a long weary march that he led me. Once we took a bus and once we went for some considerable way in a tram, and always our route led us steadily eastward. We went through strange districts, whose existence I had never dreamed of. We were down by the docks now, I knew, and I realized that I was being taken into the heart of Chinatown.
In spite of myself I shivered. Still my guide plodded on, turning and twisting through mean streets and byways, until at last he stopped at a dilapidated house and rapped four times upon the door.
It was opened immediately by another Chinaman who stood aside to let us pass in. The clanging to of the door behind me was the knell of my last hopes. I was indeed in the hands of the enemy.
I was now handed over to the second Chinaman. He led me down some rickety stairs and into a cellar which was filled with bales and casks and which exhaled a pungent odour, as of Eastern spices. I felt wrapped all round with the atmosphere of the East, tortuous, cunning, sinister—
Suddenly my guide rolled aside two of the casks, and I saw a low tunnellike opening in the wall. He motioned me to go ahead. The tunnel was of some length, and it was too low for me to stand upright. At last, however, it broadened out into a passage, and a few minutes later we stood in another cellar.
My Chinaman went forward, and rapped four times on one of the walls. A whole section of the wall swung out, leaving a narrow doorway. I passed through, and to my utter astonishment found myself in a kind of Arabian Nights’ palace. A low long subterranean chamber hung with rich oriental silks, brilliantly lighted and fragrant with perfumes and spices. There were five or six silk-covered divans, and exquisite carpets of Chinese workmanship covered the ground. At the end of the room was a curtained recess. From behind these curtains came a voice.
“You have brought our honoured guest?”
“Excellency, he is here,” replied my guide.
“Let our guest enter,” was the answer.
At the same moment, the curtains were drawn aside by an unseen hand, and I was facing an immense cushioned divan on which sat a tall thin Oriental dressed in wonderfully embroidered robes, and clearly, by the length of his fingernails, a great man.
“Be seated, I pray you. Captain Hastings,” he said, with a wave of his hand. “You acceded to my request to come immediately, I am glad to see.”
“Who are you?” I asked. “Li Chang Yen?”
“Indeed no, I am but the humblest of the master’s servants. I carry out his behests, that is all—as do other of his servants in other countries—in South America, for instance.”
I advanced a step.
“Where is she? What have you done with her out there?”
“She is in a place of safety—where none will find her. As yet, she is unharmed. You observe that I say—as yet!”
Cold shivers ran down my spine as I confronted this smiling devil.
“What do you want?” I cried. “Money?”
“My dear Captain Hastings. We have no designs on your small savings, I can assure you. Not—pardon me—a very intelligent suggestion on your part. Your colleague would not have made it, I fancy.”
“I suppose,” I said heavily, “you wanted to get me into your toils. Well, you have succeeded. I have come here with my eyes open. Do what you like with me, and let her go. She knows nothing, and she can be no possible use to you. You’ve used her to get hold of me—you’ve got me all right, and that settles it.”
The smiling Oriental caressed his smooth cheek, watching me obliquely out of his narrow eyes.
“You go too fast,” he said purringly. “That does not quite—settle it. In fact, to ‘get hold of you’ as you express it, is not really our objective. But through you, we hope to get hold of your friend, M. Hercule Poirot.”
“I’m afraid you won’t do that,” I said, with a short laugh.
“What I suggest is this,” continued the other, his words running on as though he had not heard me. “You will write M. Hercule Poirot a letter, such a letter as will induce him to hasten thither and join you.”
“I shall do no such thing,” I said angrily.
“The consequences of refusal will be disagreeable.”
“Damn your consequences.”
“The alternative might be death!”
A nasty shiver ran down my spine, but I endeavoured to put a bold face upon it.
“It’s no good threatening me, and bullying me. Keep your threats for Chinese cowards.”
“My threats are very real ones. Captain Hastings. I ask
