1 files changed, 6681 insertions, 0 deletions

diff --git a/2126-0.txt b/2126-0.txt
new file mode 100644
index 0000000..6439bd7
--- /dev/null
+++ b/2126-0.txt
@@ -0,0 +1,6681 @@
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 2126 ***
+
+
+
+
+The Quest of the Sacred Slipper
+
+by Sax Rohmer
+
+
+
+
+CONTENTS
+
+ CHAPTER I. THE PHANTOM SCIMITAR.
+ CHAPTER II. THE GIRL WITH THE VIOLET EYES
+ CHAPTER III. "HASSAN OF ALEPPO"
+ CHAPTER IV. THE OBLONG BOX
+ CHAPTER V. THE OCCUPANT OF THE BOX
+ CHAPTER VI. THE RING OF THE PROPHET
+ CHAPTER VII. FIRST ATTEMPT ON THE SAFE
+ CHAPTER VIII. THE VIOLET EYES AGAIN
+ CHAPTER IX. SECOND ATTEMPT ON THE SAFE
+ CHAPTER X. AT THE BRITISH ANTIQUARIAN MUSEUM
+ CHAPTER XI. THE HOLE IN THE BLIND
+ CHAPTER XII. THE HASHISHIN WATCH
+ CHAPTER XIII. THE WHITE BEAM
+ CHAPTER XIV. A SCREAM IN THE NIGHT
+ CHAPTER XV. A SHRIVELLED HAND
+ CHAPTER XVI. THE DWARF
+ CHAPTER XVII. THE WOMAN WITH THE BASKET
+ CHAPTER XVIII. WHAT CAME THROUGH THE WINDOW
+ CHAPTER XIX. A RAPPING AT MIDNIGHT
+ CHAPTER XX. THE GOLDEN PAVILION
+ CHAPTER XXI. THE BLACK TUBE
+ CHAPTER XXII. THE LIGHT OF EL-MEDINEH
+ CHAPTER XXIII. THE THREE MESSAGES
+ CHAPTER XXIV. I KEEP THE APPOINTMENT
+ CHAPTER XXV. THE WATCHER IN BANK CHAMBERS
+ CHAPTER XXVI. THE STRONG-ROOM
+ CHAPTER XXVII. THE SLIPPER
+ CHAPTER XXVIII. CARNETA
+ CHAPTER XXIX. WE MEET MR. ISAACS
+ CHAPTER XXX. AT THE GATE HOUSE
+ CHAPTER XXXI. THE POOL OF DEATH
+ CHAPTER XXXII. SIX PATCHES
+ CHAPTER XXXIII. HOW WE WERE REENFORCED
+ CHAPTER XXXIV. MY LAST MEETING WITH HASSAN OF ALEPPO
+
+
+
+
+THE QUEST OF THE SACRED SLIPPER
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+THE PHANTOM SCIMITAR
+
+
+I was not the only passenger aboard the S.S. Mandalay who perceived the
+disturbance and wondered what it might portend and from whence proceed.
+A goodly number of passengers were joining the ship at Port Said. I was
+lounging against the rail, pipe in mouth, lazily wondering, with a
+large vagueness.
+
+What a heterogeneous rabble it was!—a brightly coloured rabble, but the
+colours all were dirty, like the town and the canal. Only the sky was
+clean; the sky and the hard, merciless sunlight which spared nothing of
+the uncleanness, and defied one even to think of the term dear to
+tourists, “picturesque.” I was in that kind of mood. All the natives
+appeared to be pockmarked; all the Europeans greasy with perspiration.
+
+But what was the stir about?
+
+I turned to the dark, bespectacled young man who leaned upon the rail
+beside me. From the first I had taken to Mr. Ahmad Ahmadeen.
+
+“There is some kind of undercurrent of excitement among the natives,” I
+said, “a sort of subdued Greek chorus is audible. What’s it all about?”
+
+Mr. Ahmadeen smiled. After a gaunt fashion, he was a handsome man and
+had a pleasant smile.
+
+“Probably,” he replied, “some local celebrity is joining the ship.”
+
+I stared at him curiously.
+
+“Any idea who he is?” (The soul of the copyhunter is a restless soul.)
+
+A group of men dressed in semi-European fashion—that is, in European
+fashion save for their turbans, which were green—passed close to us
+along the deck.
+
+Ahmadeen appeared not to have heard the question.
+
+The disturbance, which could only be defined as a subdued uproar, but
+could be traced to no particular individual or group, grew momentarily
+louder—and died away. It was only when it had completely ceased that
+one realized how pronounced it had been—how altogether peculiar,
+secret; like that incomprehensible murmuring in a bazaar when, unknown
+to the insular visitor, a reputed saint is present.
+
+Then it happened; the inexplicable incident which, though I knew it
+not, heralded the coming of strange things, and the dawn of a new
+power; which should set up its secret standards in England, which
+should flood Europe and the civilized world with wonder.
+
+A shrill scream marked the overture—a scream of fear and of pain, which
+dropped to a groan, and moaned out into the silence of which it was the
+cause.
+
+“My God! what’s that?”
+
+I started forward. There was a general crowding rush, and a darkly
+tanned and bearded man came on board, carrying a brown leather case.
+Behind him surged those who bore the victim.
+
+“It’s one of the lascars!”
+
+“No—an Egyptian!”
+
+“It was a porter—?”
+
+“What is it—?”
+
+“Someone been stabbed!”
+
+“Where’s the doctor?”
+
+“Stand away there, if you please!”
+
+That was a ship’s officer; and the voice of authority served to quell
+the disturbance. Through a lane walled with craning heads they bore the
+insensible man. Ahmadeen was at my elbow.
+
+“A Copt,” he said softly. “Poor devil!” I turned to him. There was a
+queer expression on his lean, clean-shaven, bronze face.
+
+“Good God!” I said. “His hand has been cut off!”
+
+That was the fact of the matter. And no one knew who was responsible
+for the atrocity. And no one knew what had become of the severed hand!
+I wasted not a moment in linking up the story. The pressman within me
+acted automatically.
+
+“The gentleman just come aboard, sir,” said a steward, “is Professor
+Deeping. The poor beggar who was assaulted was carrying some of the
+Professor’s baggage.” The whole incident struck me as most odd. There
+was an idea lurking in my mind that something else—something more—lay
+behind all this. With impatience I awaited the time when the injured
+man, having received medical attention, was conveyed ashore, and
+Professor Deeping reappeared. To the celebrated traveller and Oriental
+scholar I introduced myself.
+
+He was singularly reticent.
+
+“I was unable to see what took place, Mr. Cavanagh,” he said. “The poor
+fellow was behind me, for I had stepped from the boat ahead of him. I
+had just taken a bag from his hand, but he was carrying another,
+heavier one. It is a clean cut, like that of a scimitar. I have seen
+very similar wounds in the cases of men who have suffered the old
+Moslem penalty for theft.”
+
+Nothing further had come to light when the Mandalay left, but I found
+new matter for curiosity in the behaviour of the Moslem party who had
+come on board at Port Said.
+
+In conversation with Mr. Bell, the chief officer, I learned that the
+supposed leader of the party was one, Mr. Azraeel. “Obviously,” said
+Bell, “not his real name or not all it. I don’t suppose they’ll show
+themselves on deck; they’ve got their own servants with them, and seem
+to be people of consequence.”
+
+This conversation was interrupted, but I found my unseen fellow
+voyagers peculiarly interesting and pursued inquiries in other
+directions. I saw members of the distinguished travellers’ retinue
+going about their duties, but never obtained a glimpse of Mr. Azraeel
+nor of any of his green-turbaned companions.
+
+“Who is Mr. Azraeel?” I asked Ahmadeen.
+
+“I cannot say,” replied the Egyptian, and abruptly changed the subject.
+
+Some curious aroma of mystery floated about the ship. Ahmadeen conveyed
+to me the idea that he was concealing something. Then, one night, Mr.
+Bell invited me to step forward with him.
+
+“Listen,” he said.
+
+From somewhere in the fo’c’sle proceeded low chanting.
+
+“Hear it?”
+
+“Yes. What the devil is it?”
+
+“It’s the lascars,” said Bell. “They have been behaving in a most
+unusual manner ever since the mysterious Mr. Azraeel joined us. I may
+be wrong in associating the two things, but I shan’t be sorry to see
+the last of our mysterious passengers.”
+
+The next happening on board the Mandalay which I have to record was the
+attempt to break open the door of Professor Deeping’s stateroom. Except
+when he was actually within, the Professor left his room door
+religiously locked.
+
+He made light of the affair, but later took me aside and told me a
+curious story of an apparition which had appeared to him.
+
+“It was a crescent of light,” he said, “and it glittered through the
+darkness there to the left as I lay in my berth.”
+
+“A reflection from something on the deck?”
+
+Deeping smiled, uneasily.
+
+“Possibly,” he replied; “but it was very sharply defined. Like the
+blade of a scimitar,” he added.
+
+I stared at him, my curiosity keenly aroused. “Does any explanation
+suggest itself to you?” I said.
+
+“Well,” he confessed, “I have a theory, I will admit; but it is rather
+going back to the Middle Ages. You see, I have lived in the East a lot;
+perhaps I have assimilated some of their superstitions.”
+
+He was oddly reticent, as ever. I felt convinced that he was keeping
+something back. I could not stifle the impression that the clue to
+these mysteries lay somewhere around the invisible Mohammedan party.
+
+“Do you know,” said Bell to me, one morning, “this trip’s giving me the
+creeps. I believe the damned ship’s haunted! Three bells in the middle
+watch last night, I’ll swear I saw some black animal crawling along the
+deck, in the direction of the forward companion-way.”
+
+“Cat?” I suggested.
+
+“Nothing like it,” said Mr. Bell. “Mr. Cavanagh, it was some uncanny
+thing! I’m afraid I can’t explain quite what I mean, but it was
+something I wanted to shoot!”
+
+“Where did it go?”
+
+The chief officer shrugged his shoulders. “Just vanished,” he said. “I
+hope I don’t see it again.”
+
+At Tilbury the Mohammedan party went ashore in a body. Among them were
+veiled women. They contrived so to surround a central figure that I
+entirely failed to get a glimpse of the mysterious Mr. Azraeel.
+Ahmadeen was standing close by the companion-way, and I had a momentary
+impression that one of the women slipped something into his hand.
+Certainly, he started; and his dusky face seemed to pale.
+
+Then a deck steward came out of Deeping’s stateroom, carrying the brown
+bag which the Professor had brought aboard at Port Said. Deeping’s
+voice came:
+
+“Hi, my man! Let me take that bag!”
+
+The bag changed hands. Five minutes later, as I was preparing to go
+ashore, arose a horrid scream above the berthing clamour. Those
+passengers yet aboard made in the direction from which the scream had
+proceeded.
+
+A steward—the one to whom Professor Deeping had spoken—lay writhing at
+the foot of the stairs leading to the saloon-deck. His right hand had
+been severed above the wrist!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+THE GIRL WITH THE VIOLET EYES
+
+
+During the next day or two my mind constantly reverted to the incidents
+of the voyage home. I was perfectly convinced that the curtain had been
+partially raised upon some fantasy in which Professor Deeping figured.
+
+But I had seen no more of Deeping nor had I heard from him, when
+abruptly I found myself plunged again into the very vortex of his
+troubled affairs. I was half way through a long article, I remember,
+upon the mystery of the outrage at the docks. The poor steward whose
+hand had been severed lay in a precarious condition, but the police had
+utterly failed to trace the culprit.
+
+I had laid down my pen to relight my pipe (the hour was about ten at
+night) when a faint sound from the direction of the outside door
+attracted my attention. Something had been thrust through the
+letter-box.
+
+“A circular,” I thought, when the bell rang loudly, imperatively.
+
+I went to the door. A square envelope lay upon the mat—a curious
+envelope, pale amethyst in colour. Picking it up, I found it to bear my
+name—written simply—
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh.”
+
+Tearing it open I glanced at the contents. I threw open the door. No
+one was visible upon the landing, but when I leaned over the banister a
+white-clad figure was crossing the hall, below.
+
+Without hesitation, hatless, I raced down the stairs. As I crossed the
+dimly lighted hall and came out into the peaceful twilight of the
+court, my elusive visitor glided under the archway opposite.
+
+Just where the dark and narrow passage opened on to Fleet Street I
+overtook her—a girl closely veiled and wrapped in a long coat of white
+ermine.
+
+“Madam,” I said.
+
+She turned affrightedly.
+
+“Please do not detain me!” Her accent was puzzling, but pleasing. She
+glanced apprehensively about her.
+
+You have seen the moon through a mist?—and known it for what it was in
+spite of its veiling? So, now, through the cloudy folds of the veil, I
+saw the stranger’s eyes, and knew them for the most beautiful eyes I
+had ever seen, had ever dreamt of.
+
+“But you must explain the meaning of your note!”
+
+“I cannot! I cannot! Please do not ask me!”
+
+She was breathless from her flight and seemed to be trembling. From
+behind the cloud her eyes shone brilliantly, mysteriously.
+
+I was sorely puzzled. The whole incident was bizarre—indeed, it had in
+it something of the uncanny. Yet I could not detain the girl against
+her will. That she went in apprehension of something, of someone, was
+evident.
+
+Past the head of the passage surged the noisy realities of Fleet
+Street. There were men there in quest of news; men who would have given
+much for such a story as this in which I was becoming entangled. Yet a
+story more tantalizingly incomplete could not well be imagined.
+
+I knew that I stood upon the margin of an arena wherein strange
+adversaries warred to a strange end. But a mist was over all. Here,
+beside me, was one who could disperse the mist—and would not. Her one
+anxiety seemed to be to escape.
+
+Suddenly she raised her veil; and I looked fully into the only really
+violet eyes I had ever beheld. Mentally, I started. For the face framed
+in the snowy fur was the most bewitchingly lovely imaginable. One
+rebellious lock of wonderful hair swept across the white brow. It was
+brown hair, with an incomprehensible sheen in the high lights that
+suggested the heart of a blood-red rose.
+
+“Oh,” she cried, “promise me that you will never breathe a word to any
+one about my visit!”
+
+“I promise willingly,” I said; “but can you give me no hint?”
+
+“Honestly, truly, I cannot, dare not, say more! Only promise that you
+will do as I ask!”
+
+Since I could perceive no alternative—
+
+“I will do so,” I replied.
+
+“Thank you—oh, thank you!” she said; and dropping her veil again she
+walked rapidly away from me, whispering, “I rely upon you. Do not fail
+me. Good-bye!”
+
+Her conspicuous white figure joined the hurrying throngs upon the
+pavement beyond. My curiosity brooked no restraint. I hurried to the
+end of the courtway. She was crossing the road. From the shadows where
+he had lurked, a man came forward to meet her. A vehicle obstructed the
+view ere I could confirm my impression; and when it had passed, neither
+my lovely visitor nor her companion were anywhere in sight.
+
+But, unless some accident of light and shade had deceived me, the man
+who had waited was Ahmad Ahmadeen!
+
+It seemed that some astral sluice-gate was raised; a dreadful sense of
+foreboding for the first time flooded my mind. Whilst the girl had
+stood before me it had been different—the mysterious charm of her
+personality had swamped all else. But now, the messenger gone, it was
+the purport of her message which assumed supreme significance.
+
+Written in odd, square handwriting upon the pale amethyst paper, this
+was the message—
+
+Prevail upon Professor Deeping to place what he has in the brown case
+in the porch of his house to-night. If he fails to do so, no power on
+earth can save him from the Scimitar of Hassan.
+
+A FRIEND.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+“HASSAN OF ALEPPO”
+
+
+Professor Deeping’s number was in the telephone directory, therefore,
+on returning to my room, where there still lingered the faint perfume
+of my late visitor’s presence, I asked for his number. He proved to be
+at home.
+
+“Strange you should ring me up, Cavanagh,” he said; “for I was about to
+ring you up.”
+
+“First,” I replied, “listen to the contents of an anonymous letter
+which I have received.”
+
+(I remembered, and only just in time, my promise to the veiled
+messenger.)
+
+“To me,” I added, having read him the note, “it seems to mean nothing.
+I take it that you understand better than I do.”
+
+“I understand very well, Cavanagh!” he replied. “You will recall my
+story of the scimitar which flashed before me in the darkness of my
+stateroom on the Mandalay? Well, I have seen it again! I am not an
+imaginative man: I had always believed myself to possess the scientific
+mind; but I can no longer doubt that I am the object of a pursuit which
+commenced in Mecca! The happenings on the steamer prepared me for this,
+in a degree. When the man lost his hand at Port Said I doubted. I had
+supposed the days of such things past. The attempt to break into my
+stateroom even left me still uncertain. But the outrage upon the
+steward at the docks removed all further doubt. I perceived that the
+contents of a certain brown leather case were the objective of the
+crimes.”
+
+I listened in growing wonder.
+
+“It was not necessary in order to further the plan of stealing the bag
+that the hands were severed,” resumed the Professor. “In fact, as was
+rendered evident by the case of the steward, this was a penalty visited
+upon any one who touched it! You are thinking of my own immunity?”
+
+“I am!”
+
+“This is attributable to two things. Those who sought to recover what I
+had in the case feared that my death en route might result in its being
+lost to them for ever. They awaited a suitable opportunity. They had
+designed to take it at Port Said certainly, I think; but the bag was
+too large to be readily concealed, and, after the outrage, might have
+led to the discovery of the culprit. In the second place, they are
+uncertain of my faith. I have long passed for a true Believer in the
+East! As a Moslem I visited Mecca—”
+
+“You visited Mecca!”
+
+“I had just returned from the hadj when I joined the Mandalay at Port
+Said! My death, however, has been determined upon, whether I be Moslem
+or Christian!”
+
+“Why?”
+
+“Because,” came the Professor’s harsh voice over the telephone, “of the
+contents of the brown leather case! I will not divulge to you now the
+nature of these contents; to know might endanger you. But the case is
+locked in my safe here, and the key, together with a full statement of
+the true facts of the matter, is hidden behind the first edition copy
+of my book ‘Assyrian Mythology,’ in the smaller bookcase—”
+
+“Why do you tell me all this?” I interrupted.
+
+He laughed harshly.
+
+“The identity of my pursuer has just dawned upon me,” he said. “I know
+that my life is in real danger. I would give up what is demanded of me,
+but I believe its possession to be my strongest safeguard.”
+
+Mystery upon mystery! I seemed to be getting no nearer to the heart of
+this maze. What in heaven’s name did it all mean? Suddenly an idea
+struck me.
+
+“Is our late fellow passenger, Mr. Ahmadeen, connected with the
+matter?” I asked.
+
+“In no way,” replied Deeping earnestly. “Mr. Ahmadeen is, I believe, a
+person of some consequence in the Moslem world; but I have nothing to
+fear from him.”
+
+“What steps have you taken to protect yourself?”
+
+Again the short laugh reached my ears.
+
+“I’m afraid long residence in the East has rendered me something of a
+fatalist, Cavanagh! Beyond keeping my door locked, I have taken no
+steps whatever. I fear I am quite accessible!”
+
+A while longer we talked; and with every word the conviction was more
+strongly borne in upon me that some uncanny menace threatened the
+peace, perhaps the life, of Professor Deeping.
+
+I had hung up the receiver scarce a moment when, acting upon a sudden
+determination, I called up New Scotland Yard, and asked for
+Detective-Inspector Bristol, whom I knew well. A few words were
+sufficient keenly to arouse his curiosity, and he announced his
+intention of calling upon me immediately. He was in charge of the case
+of the severed hand.
+
+I made no attempt to resume work in the interval preceding his arrival.
+I had not long to wait, however, ere Bristol was ringing my bell; and I
+hurried to the door, only too glad to confide in one so well equipped
+to analyze my doubts and fears. For Bristol is no ordinary policeman,
+but a trained observer, who, when I first made his acquaintance,
+completely upset my ideas upon the mental limitations of the official
+detective force.
+
+In appearance Bristol suggests an Anglo-Indian officer, and at the time
+of which I write he had recently returned from Jamaica and his face was
+as bronzed as a sailor’s. One would never take Bristol for a detective.
+As he seated himself in the armchair, without preamble I plunged into
+my story. He listened gravely.
+
+“What sort of house is Professor Deeping’s?” he asked suddenly.
+
+“I have no idea,” I replied, “beyond the fact that it is somewhere in
+Dulwich.”
+
+“May I use your telephone?”
+
+“Certainly.”
+
+Very quickly Bristol got into communication with the superintendent of
+P Division. A brief delay, and the man came to the telephone whose beat
+included the road wherein Professor Deeping’s house was situated.
+
+“Why!” said Bristol, hanging up the receiver after making a number of
+inquiries, “it’s a sort of rambling cottage in extensive grounds.
+There’s only one servant, a manservant, and he sleeps in a detached
+lodge. If the Professor is really in danger of attack he could not well
+have chosen a more likely residence for the purpose!”
+
+“What shall you do? What do you make of it all?”
+
+“As I see the case,” he said slowly, “it stands something like this:
+Professor Deeping has...”
+
+The telephone bell began to ring.
+
+I took up the receiver.
+
+“Hullo! Hullo.”
+
+“Cavanagh!—is that Cavanagh?”
+
+“Yes! yes! who is that?”
+
+“Deeping! I have rung up the police, and they are sending some one. But
+I wish...”
+
+His voice trailed off. The sound of a confused and singular uproar came
+to me.
+
+“Hullo!” I cried. “Hullo!”
+
+A shriek—a deathful, horrifying cry—and a distant babbling alone
+answered me. There was a crash. Clearly, Deeping had dropped the
+receiver. I suppose my face blanched.
+
+“What is it?” asked Bristol anxiously.
+
+“God knows what it is!” I said. “Deeping has met with some mishap—”
+
+When, over the wires—
+
+“Hassan of Aleppo!” came a dying whisper. “Hassan ... of Aleppo...”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+THE OBLONG BOX
+
+
+“You had better wait for us,” said Bristol to the taxi-man.
+
+“Very good, sir. But I shan’t be able to take you further back than the
+Brixton Garage. You can get another cab there, though.”
+
+A clock chimed out—an old-world chime in keeping with the loneliness,
+the curiously remote loneliness, of the locality. Less than five miles
+from St. Paul’s are spots whereto, with the persistence of Damascus
+attar, clings the aroma of former days. This iron gateway fronting the
+old chapel was such a spot.
+
+Just within stood a plain-clothes man, who saluted my companion
+respectfully.
+
+“Professor Deeping,” I began.
+
+The man, with a simple gesture, conveyed the dreadful news.
+
+“Dead! dead!” I cried incredulously.
+
+He glanced at Bristol.
+
+“The most mysterious case I have ever had anything to do with, sir,” he
+said.
+
+The power of speech seemed to desert me. It was unthinkable that
+Deeping, with whom I had been speaking less than an hour ago, should
+now be no more; that some malign agency should thus murderously have
+thrust him into the great borderland.
+
+In that kind of silence which seems to be peopled with whispering
+spirits we strode forward along the elm avenue. It was very dark where
+the moon failed to penetrate. The house, low and rambling, came into
+view, its facade bathed in silver light. Two of the visible windows
+were illuminated. A sort of loggia ran along one side.
+
+On our left, as we made for this, lay a black ocean of shrubbery. It
+intruded, raggedly, upon the weed-grown path, for neglect was the
+keynote of the place.
+
+We entered the cottage, crossed the tiny lobby, and came to the study.
+A man, evidently Deeping’s servant, was sitting in a chair by the door,
+his head sunken in his hands. He looked up, haggard-faced.
+
+“My God! my God!” he groaned. “He was locked in, gentlemen! He was
+locked in; and yet something murdered him!”
+
+“What do you mean?” said Bristol. “Where were you?”
+
+“I was away on an errand, sir. When I returned, the police were
+knocking the door down. He was locked in!”
+
+We passed him, entering the study.
+
+It was a museum-like room, lighted by a lamp on the littered table. At
+first glance it looked as though some wild thing had run amok there.
+The disorder was indescribable.
+
+“Touched nothing, of course?” asked Bristol sharply of the officer on
+duty.
+
+“Nothing, sir. It’s just as we found it when we forced the door.”
+
+“Why did you force the door?”
+
+“He rung us up at the station and said that something or somebody had
+got into the house. It was evident the poor gentleman’s nerve had
+broken down, sir. He said he was locked in his study. When we arrived
+it was all in darkness—but we thought we heard sounds in here.”
+
+“What sort of sounds?”
+
+“Something crawling about!”
+
+Bristol turned.
+
+“Key is in the lock on the inside of the door,” he said. “Is that where
+you found it?”
+
+“Yes, sir!”
+
+He looked across to where the brass knob of a safe gleamed dully.
+
+“Safe locked?”
+
+“Yes, sir.”
+
+Professor Deeping lay half under the table, a spectacle so ghastly that
+I shall not attempt to describe it.
+
+“Merciful heavens!” whispered Bristol. “He’s nearly decapitated!”
+
+I clutched dizzily at the mantelpiece. It was all so utterly,
+incredibly horrible. How had Deeping met his death? The windows both
+were latched and the door had been locked from within!
+
+“You searched for the murderer, of course?” asked Bristol.
+
+“You can see, sir,” replied the officer, “that there isn’t a spot in
+the room where a man could hide! And there was nobody in here when we
+forced the door!”
+
+“Why!” cried my companion suddenly. “The Professor has a chisel in his
+hand!”
+
+“Yes. I think he must have been trying to prise open that box yonder
+when he was attacked.”
+
+Bristol and I looked, together, at an oblong box which lay upon the
+floor near the murdered man. It was a kind of small packing case,
+addressed to Professor Deeping, and evidently had not been opened.
+
+“When did this arrive?” asked Bristol. Lester, the Professor’s man, who
+had entered the room, replied shakily—
+
+“It came by carrier, sir, just before I went out.”
+
+“Was he expecting it?”
+
+“I don’t think so.”
+
+Inspector Bristol and the officer dragged the box fully into the light.
+It was some three feet long by one foot square, and solidly
+constructed.
+
+“It is perfectly evident,” remarked Bristol, “that the murderer stayed
+to search for—”
+
+“The key of the safe!”
+
+“Exactly. If the men really heard sounds here, it would appear that the
+assassin was still searching at that time.”
+
+“I assure you,” the officer interrupted, “that there was no living
+thing in the room when we entered.”
+
+Bristol and I looked at one another in horrified wonder.
+
+“It’s incomprehensible!” he said.
+
+“See if the key is in the place mentioned by the Professor, Mr.
+Cavanagh, whilst I break the box.”
+
+I went to a great, open bookcase, which the frantic searcher seemed to
+have overlooked. Removing the bulky “Assyrian Mythology,” there, behind
+the volume, lay an envelope, containing a key, and a short letter. Not
+caring to approach more closely to the table and to that which lay
+beneath it, I was peering at the small writing, in the semi-gloom by
+the bookcase, when Bristol cried—
+
+“This box is unopenable by ordinary means! I shall have to smash it!”
+
+At his words, I joined him where he knelt on the floor. Mysteriously,
+the chest had defied all his efforts.
+
+“There’s a pick-axe in the garden,” volunteered Lester. “Shall I bring
+it?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+The man ran off.
+
+“I see the key is safe,” said Bristol. “Possibly the letter may throw
+some light upon all this.”
+
+“Let us hope so,” I replied. “You might read it.”
+
+He took the letter from my hand, stepped up to the table, and by the
+light of the lamp read as follows—
+
+
+My Dear Cavanagh,—
+
+It has now become apparent to me that my life is in imminent danger.
+You know of the inexplicable outrages which marked my homeward journey,
+and if this letter come to your hand it will be because these have
+culminated in my death.
+
+The idea of a pursuing scimitar is not new to me. This phenomenon,
+which I have now witnessed three times, is fairly easy of explanation,
+but its significance is singular. It is said to be one of the devices
+whereby the Hashishin warn those whom they have marked down for
+destruction, and is called, in the East, “The Scimitar of Hassan.”
+
+The Hashishin were the members of a Moslem secret society, founded in
+1090 by one Hassan of Khorassan. There is a persistent tradition in
+parts of the Orient that this sect still flourishes in Assyria, under
+the rule of a certain Hassan of Aleppo, the Sheikh-al-jebal, or supreme
+lord of the Hashishin. My careful inquiries, however, at the time that
+I was preparing matter for my “Assyrian Mythology,” failed to discover
+any trace of such a person or such a group.
+
+I accordingly assumed Hassan to be a myth—a first cousin to the ginn. I
+was wrong. He exists. And by my supremely rash act I have incurred his
+vengeance, for Hassan of Aleppo is the self-appointed guardian of the
+traditions and relics of Mohammed. And I have Stolen one of the holy
+slippers of the Prophet!
+
+He, with some of his servants, has followed me from Mecca to England.
+My precautions have enabled me to retain the relic, but you have seen
+what fate befell all those others who even touched the receptacle
+containing it.
+
+If I fall a victim to the Hashishin, I am uncertain how you, as my
+confidant, will fare. Therefore I have locked the slipper in my safe
+and to you entrust the key. I append particulars of the lock
+combination; but I warn you—do not open the safe. If their wrath be
+visited upon you, your possession of the key may prove a safeguard.
+
+Take the copy of “Assyrian Mythology.” You will find in it all that I
+learned respecting the Hashishin. If I am doomed to be assassinated, it
+may aid you; if not in avenging me, in saving others from my fate. I
+fear I shall never see you again. A cloud of horror settles upon me
+like a pall. Do not touch the slipper, nor the case containing it.
+
+
+EDWARD DEEPING.
+
+
+“It is almost incredible!” I said hoarsely.
+
+Bristol returned the letter to me without a word, and turning to
+Lester, who had reentered carrying a heavy pick-axe, he attacked the
+oblong box with savage energy.
+
+Through the house of death the sound of the blows echoed and rang with
+a sort of sacrilegious mockery. The box fell to pieces.
+
+“My God! look, sir!”
+
+Lester was the trembling speaker.
+
+The box, I have said, was but three feet long by one foot square, and
+had clearly defied poor Deeping’s efforts to open it. But a
+crescent-shaped knife, wet with blood, lay within!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+THE OCCUPANT OF THE BOX
+
+
+Dimly to my ears came the ceaseless murmur of London. The night now was
+far advanced, and not a sound disturbed the silence of the court below
+my windows.
+
+Professor Deeping’s “Assyrian Mythology” lay open before me, beside it
+my notebook. A coal dropped from the fire, and I half started up out of
+my chair. My nerves were all awry, and I had more than my horrible
+memories of the murdered man to thank for it. Let me explain what I
+mean.
+
+When, after assisting, or endeavouring to assist, Bristol at his
+elaborate inquiries, I had at last returned to my chambers, I had
+become the victim of a singular delusion—though one common enough in
+the case of persons whose nerves are overwrought. I had thought myself
+followed.
+
+During the latter part of my journey I found myself constantly looking
+from the little window at the rear of the cab. I had an impression that
+some vehicle was tracking us. Then, when I discharged the man and
+walked up the narrow passage to the court, it was fear of a skulking
+form that dodged from shadow to shadow which obsessed me.
+
+Finally, as I entered the hall and mounted the darkened stair, from the
+first landing I glanced down into the black well beneath. Blazing
+yellow eyes, I thought, looked up at me!
+
+I will confess that I leapt up the remaining flight of stairs to my
+door, and, safely within, found myself trembling as if with a palsy.
+
+When I sat down to write (for sleep was an impossible proposition) I
+placed my revolver upon the table beside me. I cannot say why. It
+afforded me some sense of protection, I suppose. My conclusions, thus
+far, amounted to the following—
+
+The apparition of the phantom scimitar was due to the presence of
+someone who, by means of the moonlight, or of artificial light, cast a
+reflection of such a weapon as that found in the oblong chest upon the
+wall of a darkened apartment—as, Deeping’s stateroom on the Mandalay,
+his study, etc.
+
+A group of highly efficient assassins, evidently Moslem fanatics, who
+might or might not be of the ancient order of the Hashishin, had
+pursued the stolen slipper to England. They had severed any hand, other
+than that of a Believer, which had touched the case containing it. (The
+Coptic porter was a Christian.)
+
+Uncertain, possibly, of Deeping’s faith, or fearful of endangering the
+success of their efforts by an outrage upon him en route, they had
+refrained from this until his arrival at his house. He had been warned
+of his impending end by Ahmad Ahmadeen.
+
+Who was Ahmadeen? And who was his beautiful associate? I found myself
+unable, at present, to answer either of those questions. In order to
+gain access to Professor Deeping, who so carefully secluded himself, a
+box had been sent to him by ordinary carrier. (As I sat at my table,
+Scotland Yard was busy endeavouring to trace the sender.) Respecting
+this box we had made an extraordinary discovery.
+
+It was of the kind used by Eastern conjurors for what is generally
+known as “the Box Trick.” That is to say, it could only be opened
+(short of smashing it) from the inside! You will remember what we found
+within it? Consider this with the new fact, above, and to what
+conclusion do you come?
+
+Something (it is not possible to speak of someone in connection with so
+small a box) had been concealed inside, and had killed Professor
+Deeping whilst he was actually engaged in endeavouring to force it
+open. This inconceivable creature had then searched the study for the
+slipper—or for the key of the safe. Interrupted and trapped by the
+arrival of the police, the creature had returned to the box, re-closed
+it, and had actually been there when the study was searched!
+
+For a creature so small as the murderous thing in the box to slip out
+during the confusion, and at some time prior to Bristol’s arrival, was
+no difficult matter. The inspector and I were certain that these were
+the facts.
+
+But what was this creature?
+
+I turned to the chapter in “Assyrian Mythology”—“The Tradition of the
+Hashishin.”
+
+The legends which the late Professor Deeping had collected relative to
+this sect of religious murderers were truly extraordinary. Of the
+cult’s extinction at the time of writing he was clearly certain, but he
+referred to the popular belief, or Moslem legend, that, since Hassan of
+Khorassan, there had always been a Sheikh-al-jebal, and that a dreadful
+being known as Hassan of Aleppo was the present holder of the title.
+
+He referred to the fact that De Sacy has shown the word Assassin to be
+derived from Hashishin, and quoted El-Idrisi to the same end. The
+Hashishin performed their murderous feats under the influence of
+hashish, or Indian hemp; and during the state of ecstasy so induced,
+according to Deeping, they acquired powers almost superhuman. I read
+how they could scale sheer precipices, pass fearlessly along narrow
+ledges which would scarce afford foothold for a rat, cast themselves
+from great heights unscathed, and track one marked for death in such a
+manner as to remain unseen not only by the victim but by others about
+him. At this point of my studies I started, in a sudden nervous panic,
+and laid my hand upon my revolver.
+
+I thought of the eyes which had seemed to look up from the black well
+of the staircase—I thought of the horrible end of this man whose book
+lay upon the table ... and I thought I heard a faint sound outside my
+study door!
+
+The key of Deeping’s safe, and his letter to me, lay close by my hand.
+I slipped them into a drawer and locked it. With every nerve, it
+seemed, strung up almost to snapping point, I mechanically pursued my
+reading.
+
+“At the time of the Crusades,” wrote Deeping, “there was a story
+current of this awful Order which I propose to recount. It is one of
+the most persistent dealing with the Hashishin, and is related to-day
+of the apparently mythical Hassan of Aleppo. I am disposed to believe
+that at one time it had a solid foundation, for a similar practice was
+common in Ancient Egypt and is mentioned by Georg Ebers.”
+
+My door began very slowly to open!
+
+Merciful God! What was coming into the room!
+
+So very slowly, so gently, nay, all but imperceptibly, did it move,
+that had my nerves been less keenly attuned I doubt not I should have
+remained unaware of the happening. Frozen with horror, I sat and
+watched. Yet my mental condition was a singular one.
+
+My direct gaze never quitted the door, but in some strange fashion I
+saw the words of the next paragraph upon the page before me!
+
+“As making peculiarly efficient assassins, when under the influence of
+the drug, and as being capable of concealing themselves where a normal
+man could not fail to be detected—”
+
+(At this moment I remembered that my bathroom window was open, and that
+the waste-pipe passed down the exterior wall.)
+
+“—the Sheikh-al-jebal took young boys of a certain desert tribe, and
+for eight hours of every day, until their puberty, confined them in a
+wooden frame—”
+
+What looked like a reed was slowly inserted through the opening between
+door and doorpost! It was brought gradually around ... until it pointed
+directly toward me!
+
+I seemed to put forth a mighty mental effort, shaking off the icy hand
+of fear which held me inactive in my chair. A saving instinct warned
+me—and I ducked my head.
+
+Something whirred past me and struck the wall behind.
+
+Revolver in hand, I leapt across the room, dashed the door open, and
+fired blindly—again—and again—and again—down the passage.
+
+And in the brief gleams I saw it!
+
+I cannot call it man, but I saw the thing which, I doubt not, had
+killed poor Deeping with the crescent-knife and had propelled a
+poison-dart at me.
+
+It was a tiny dwarf! Neither within nor without a freak exhibition had
+I seen so small a human being! A kind of supernatural dread gripped me
+by the throat at sight of it. As it turned with animal activity and
+bounded into my bathroom, I caught a three-quarter view of the
+creature’s swollen, incredible head—which was nearly as large as that
+of a normal man!
+
+Never while my mind serves me can I forget that yellow, grinning face
+and those canine fangs—the tigerish, blazing eyes—set in the great,
+misshapen head upon the tiny, agile body.
+
+Wildly, I fired again. I hurled myself forward and dashed into the
+room.
+
+Like nothing so much as a cat, the gleaming body (the dwarf was but
+scantily clothed) streaked through the open window!
+
+Certain death, I thought, must be his lot upon the stones of the court
+far below. I ran and looked down, shaking in every limb, my mind filled
+with a loathing terror unlike anything I had ever known.
+
+Brilliant moonlight flooded the pavement beneath; for twenty yards to
+left and right every stone was visible.
+
+The court was empty!
+
+Human, homely London moved and wrought intimately about me; but there,
+at sight of the empty court below, a great loneliness swept down like a
+mantle—a clammy mantle of the fabric of dread. I stood remote from my
+fellows, in an evil world peopled with the creatures of Hassan of
+Aleppo.
+
+Moved by some instinct, as that of a frightened child, I dropped to my
+knees and buried my face in trembling hands.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+THE RING OF THE PROPHET
+
+
+“There is no doubt,” said Mr. Rawson, “that great personal danger
+attaches to any contact with this relic. It is the first time I have
+been concerned with anything of the kind.”
+
+Mr. Bristol, of Scotland Yard, standing stiffly military by the window,
+looked across at the gray-haired solicitor. We were all silent for a
+few moments.
+
+“My late client’s wishes,” continued Mr. Rawson, “are explicit. His
+last instructions, evidently written but a short time prior to his
+death, advise me that the holy slipper of the Prophet is contained in
+the locked safe at his house in Dulwich. He was clearly of opinion that
+you, Mr. Cavanagh, would incur risk—great risk—from your possession of
+the key. Since attempts have been made upon you, murderous attempts,
+the late Professor Deeping, my unfortunate client, evidently was not in
+error.”
+
+“Mysterious outrages,” said Bristol, “have marked the progress of the
+stolen slipper from Mecca almost to London.”
+
+“I understand,” interrupted the solicitor, “that a fanatic known as
+Hassan of Aleppo seeks to restore the relic to its former
+resting-place.”
+
+“That is so.”
+
+“Exactly; and it accounts for the Professor’s wish that the safe should
+not be touched by any one but a Believer—and for his instructions that
+its removal to the Antiquarian Museum and the placing of the slipper
+within that institution be undertaken by a Moslem or Moslems.”
+
+Bristol frowned.
+
+“Any one who has touched the receptacle containing the thing,” he said,
+“has either been mutilated or murdered. I want to apprehend the authors
+of those outrages, but I fail to see why the slipper should be put on
+exhibition. Other crimes are sure to follow.”
+
+“I can only pursue my instructions,” said Mr. Rawson dryly. “They are,
+that the work be done in such a manner as to expose all concerned to a
+minimum of risk from these mysterious people; that if possible a Moslem
+be employed for the purpose; and that Mr. Cavanagh, here, shall always
+hold the key or keys to the case in the museum containing the slipper.
+Will you undertake to look for some—Eastern workmen, Mr. Bristol? In
+the course of your inquiries you may possibly come across such a
+person.”
+
+“I can try,” replied Bristol. “Meanwhile, I take it, the safe must
+remain at Dulwich?”
+
+“Certainly. It should be guarded.”
+
+“We are guarding it and shall guard it,” Bristol assured him. “I only
+hope we catch someone trying to get at it!”
+
+Shortly afterward Bristol and I left the office, and, his duties taking
+him to Scotland Yard, I returned to my chambers to survey the position
+in which I now found myself. Indeed, it was a strange one enough,
+showing how great things have small beginnings; for, as a result of a
+steamer acquaintance I found myself involved in a dark business worthy
+of the Middle Ages. That Professor Deeping should have stolen one of
+the holy slippers of Mohammed was no affair of mine, and that an awful
+being known as Hassan of Aleppo should have pursued it did not properly
+enter into my concerns; yet now, with a group of Eastern fanatics at
+large in England, I was become, in a sense, the custodian of the relic.
+Moreover, I perceived that I had been chosen that I might safeguard
+myself. What I knew of the matter might imperil me, but whilst I held
+the key to the reliquary, and held it fast, I might hope to remain
+immune though I must expect to be subjected to attempts. It would be my
+affair to come to terms.
+
+Contemplating these things I sat, in a world of dark dreams,
+unconscious of the comings and goings in the court below, unconscious
+of the hum which told of busy Fleet Street so near to me. The weather,
+as is its uncomfortable habit in England, had suddenly grown tropically
+hot, plunging London into the vapours of an African spring, and the sun
+was streaming through my open window fully upon the table.
+
+I mopped my clammy forehead, glancing with distaste at the pile of work
+which lay before me. Then my eyes turned to an open quarto book. It was
+the late Professor Deeping’s “Assyrian Mythology,” and embodied the
+result of his researches into the history of the Hashishin, the
+religious murderers of whose existence he had been so skeptical. To the
+Chief of the Order, the terrible Sheikh Hassan of Aleppo, he referred
+as a “fabled being”; yet it was at the hands of this “fabled being”
+that he had met his end! How incredible it all seemed. But I knew full
+well how worthy of credence it was.
+
+Then upon my gloomy musings a sound intruded—the ringing of my door
+bell. I rose from my chair with a weary sigh, went to the door, and
+opened it. An aged Oriental stood without. He was tall and straight,
+had a snow-white beard and clear-cut, handsome features. He wore
+well-cut European garments and a green turban. As I stood staring he
+saluted me gravely.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh?” he asked, speaking in faultless English.
+
+“I am he.”
+
+“I learn that the services of a Moslem workman are required.”
+
+“Quite correct, sir; but you should apply at the offices of Messrs.
+Rawson & Rawson, Chancery Lane.”
+
+The old man bowed, smiling.
+
+“Many thanks; I understood so much. But, my position being a peculiar
+one, I wished to speak with you—as a friend of the late Professor.”
+
+I hesitated. The old man looked harmless enough, but there was an air
+of mystery about the matter which put me on my guard.
+
+“You will pardon me,” I said, “but the work is scarcely of a kind—”
+
+He raised his thin hand.
+
+“I am not undertaking it myself. I wished to explain to you the
+conditions under which I could arrange to furnish suitable porters.”
+
+His patient explanation disposed me to believe that he was merely some
+kind of small contractor, and in any event I had nothing to fear from
+this frail old man.
+
+“Step in, sir,” I said, repenting of my brusquerie—and stood aside for
+him.
+
+He entered, with that Oriental meekness in which there is something
+majestic. I placed a chair for him in the study, and reseated myself at
+the table. The old man, who from the first had kept his eyes lowered
+deferentially, turned to me with a gentle gesture, as if to apologize
+for opening the conversation.
+
+“From the papers, Mr. Cavanagh,” he began, “I have learned of the
+circumstances attending the death of Professor Deeping. Your papers”—he
+smiled, and I thought I had never seen a smile of such sweetness—“your
+papers know all! Now I understand why a Moslem is required, and I
+understand what is required of him. But remembering that the object of
+his labours would be to place a holy relic on exhibition for the
+amusement of unbelievers, can you reasonably expect to obtain the
+services of one?”
+
+His point of view was fair enough.
+
+“Perhaps not,” I replied. “For my own part I should wish to see the
+slipper back in Mecca, or wherever it came from. But Professor
+Deeping—”
+
+“Professor Deeping was a thorn in the flesh of the Faithful!”
+
+My visitor’s voice was gravely reproachful.
+
+“Nevertheless his wishes must be considered,” I said, “and the methods
+adopted by those who seek to recover the relic are such as to alienate
+all sympathy.”
+
+“You speak of the Hashishin?” asked the old man. “Mr. Cavanagh, in your
+own faith you have had those who spilled the blood of infidels as
+freely!”
+
+“My good sir, the existence of such an organization cannot be tolerated
+today! This survival of the dark ages must be stamped out. However just
+a cause may be, secret murder is not permissible, as you, a man of
+culture, a Believer, and”—I glanced at his unusual turban—“a descendant
+of the Prophet, must admit.”
+
+“I can admit nothing against the Guardian of the Tradition, Mr.
+Cavanagh! The Prophet taught that we should smite the Infidel. I ask
+you—have you the courage of your convictions?”
+
+“Perhaps; I trust so.”
+
+“Then assist me to rid England of what you have called a survival of
+the dark ages. I will furnish porters to remove and carry the safe, if
+you will deliver to me the key!”
+
+I sprang to my feet.
+
+“That is madness!” I cried. “In the first place I should be
+compromising with my conscience, and in the second place I should be
+defenceless against those who might—”
+
+“I have with me a written promise from one highly placed—one to whose
+will Hassan of Aleppo bows!”
+
+My mind greatly disturbed, I watched the venerable speaker. I had
+determined now that he was some religious leader of Islam in England,
+who had been deputed to approach me; and, let me add, I was sorely
+tempted to accede to his proposal, for nothing would be gained by any
+one if the slipper remained for ever at the museum, whereas by
+conniving at its recovery by those who, after all, were its rightful
+owners I should be ridding England of a weird and undesirable visitant.
+
+I think I should have agreed, when I remembered that the Hashishin had
+murdered Professor Deeping and had mutilated others wholly innocent of
+offence. I looked across at the old man. He had drawn himself up to his
+great height, and for the first time fully raising the lids, had fixed
+upon me the piercing gaze of a pair of eagle eyes. I started, for the
+aspect of this majestic figure was entirely different from that of the
+old stranger who had stood suppliant before me a moment ago.
+
+“It is impossible,” I said. “I can come to no terms with those who
+shield murderers.”
+
+He regarded me fixedly, but did not move.
+
+“Es-selam ’aleykum!” I added (“Peace be on you!”) closing the interview
+in the Eastern manner.
+
+The old man lowered his eyes, and saluted me with graceful gravity.
+
+“Wa-’aleykum!” he said (“And on you!”). I conducted him to the door and
+closed it upon his exit. In his last salute I had noticed the flashing
+of a ring which he wore upon his left hand, and he was gone scarce ten
+seconds ere my heart began to beat furiously. I snatched up “Assyrian
+Mythology” and with trembling fingers turned to a certain page.
+
+There I read—
+
+Each Sheikh of the Assassins is said to be invested with the “Ring of
+the Prophet.” It bears a green stone, shaped in the form of a scimitar
+or crescent.
+
+My dreadful suspicion was confirmed. I knew who my visitor had been.
+
+“God in heaven!” I whispered. “It was Hassan of Aleppo!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+FIRST ATTEMPT ON THE SAFE
+
+
+On the following morning I was awakened by the arrival of Bristol. I
+hastened to admit him.
+
+“Your visitor of yesterday,” he began, “has wasted no time!”
+
+“What has happened?”
+
+He tugged irritably at his moustache. “I don’t know!” he replied. “Of
+course it was no surprise to find that there isn’t a Mohammedan who’ll
+lay his little finger on Professor Deeping’s safe! There’s no doubt in
+my mind that every lascar at the docks knows Hassan of Aleppo to be in
+England. Some other arrangement will have to be arrived at, if the
+thing is ever to be taken to the Antiquarian Museum. Meanwhile we stand
+to lose it. Last night—”
+
+He accepted a cigarette, and lighted it carefully.
+
+“Last night,” he resumed, “a member of P Division was on point duty
+outside the late Professor’s house, and two C.I.D. men were actually in
+the room where the safe is. Result—someone has put in at least an
+hour’s work on the lock, but it proved too tough a job!”
+
+I stared at him amazedly.
+
+“Someone has been at the lock!” I cried. “But that is impossible, with
+two men in the room—unless—”
+
+“They were both knocked on the head!”
+
+“Both! But by whom! My God! They are not—”
+
+“Oh, no! It was done artistically. They both came round about four
+o’clock this morning.”
+
+“And who attacked them?”
+
+“They had no idea. Neither of them saw a thing!”
+
+My amazement grew by leaps and bounds. “But, Bristol, one of them must
+have seen the other succumb!”
+
+“Both did! Their statements tally exactly!”
+
+“I quite fail to follow you.”
+
+“That’s not surprising. Listen: When I got on the scene about five
+o’clock, Marden and West, the two C.I.D. men, had quite recovered their
+senses, though they were badly shaken, and one had a cracked skull. The
+constable was conscious again, too.”
+
+“What! Was he attacked?”
+
+“In exactly the same way! I’ll give you Marden’s story, as he gave it
+to me a few minutes after the surgeon had done with him. He said that
+they were sitting in the study, smoking, and with both windows wide
+open. It was a fearfully hot night.”
+
+“Did they have lights?”
+
+“No. West sat in an armchair near the writing-table; Marden sat by the
+window next to the door. I had arranged that every hour one of them
+should go out to the gate and take the constable’s report. It was just
+after Marden had been out at one o’clock that it happened.
+
+“They were sitting as I tell you when Marden thought he heard a curious
+sort of noise from the gate. West appeared to have heard nothing; but I
+have no doubt that it was the sound of the constable’s fall. West’s
+pipe had gone out, and he struck a match to relight it. As he did so,
+Marden saw him drop the match, clench both fists, and with eyes glaring
+in the moonlight and his teeth coming together with a snap, drop from
+his chair.
+
+“Marden says that he was half up from his seat when something struck
+him on the back of the head with fearful force. He remembered nothing
+more until he awoke, with the dawn creeping into the room, and heard
+West groaning somewhere beside him. They both had badly damaged skulls
+with great bruises behind the ear. It is instructive to note that their
+wounds corresponded almost to a fraction of an inch. They had been
+stunned by someone who thoroughly understood his business, and with
+some heavy, blunt weapon. A few minutes later came the man to relieve
+the constable; and the constable was found to have been treated in
+exactly the same way!”
+
+“But if Marden’s account is true—”
+
+“West, as he lost consciousness, saw Marden go in exactly the same
+way.”
+
+“Marden was seated by the open window, but I cannot conjecture how any
+one can have got at West, who sat by the table!”
+
+“The case of Marden is little less than remarkable; he was some
+distance from the window. No one could possibly have reached him from
+outside.”
+
+“And the constable?”
+
+“The constable can give us no clue. He was suddenly struck down, as the
+others were. I examined the safe, of course, but didn’t touch it,
+according to instructions. Someone had been at work on the lock, but it
+had defied their efforts. I’m fully expecting though that they’ll be
+back to-night, with different tools!”
+
+“The place is watched during the day, of course?”
+
+“Of course. But it’s unlikely that anything will be attempted in
+daylight. Tonight I am going down myself.”
+
+“Could you arrange that I join you?”
+
+“I could, but you can see the danger for yourself?”
+
+“It is extraordinarily mysterious.”
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh, it’s uncanny!” said Bristol. “I can understand that one
+of these Hashishin could easily have got up behind the man on duty out
+in the open. I know, and so do you, that they’re past masters of that
+kind of thing; but unless they possess the power to render themselves
+invisible, it’s not evident how they can have got behind West whilst he
+sat at the table, with Marden actually watching him!”
+
+“We must lay a trap for them to-night.”
+
+“Rely upon me to do so. My only fear is that they may anticipate it and
+change their tactics. Hassan of Aleppo apparently knows as much of our
+plans as we do ourselves.”
+
+Inspector Bristol, though a man of considerable culture, clearly was
+infected with a species of supernatural dread.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+THE VIOLET EYES AGAIN
+
+
+At four o’clock in the afternoon I had heard nothing further from
+Bristol, but I did not doubt that he would advise me of his
+arrangements in good time. I sought by hard work to forget for a time
+the extraordinary business of the stolen slipper; but it persistently
+intruded upon my mind. Particularly, my thoughts turned to the night of
+Professor Deeping’s murder, and to the bewitchingly pretty woman who
+had warned me of the impending tragedy. She had bound me to secrecy—a
+secrecy which had proved irksome, for it had since appeared to me that
+she must have been an accomplice of Hassan of Aleppo. At the time I had
+been at a loss to define her peculiar accent, now it seemed evidently
+enough to have been Oriental.
+
+I threw down my pen in despair, for work was impossible, went
+downstairs, and walked out under the arch into Fleet Street. Quite
+mechanically I turned to the left, and, still engaged with idle
+conjectures, strolled along westward.
+
+Passing the entrance to one of the big hotels, I was abruptly recalled
+to the realities—by a woman’s voice.
+
+“Wait for me here,” came musically to my ears.
+
+I stopped, and turned. A woman who had just quitted a taxi-cab was
+entering the hotel. The day was hot and thunderously oppressive, and
+this woman with the musical voice wore a delicate costume of flimsiest
+white. A few steps upward she paused and glanced back. I had a view of
+a Greek profile, and for one magnetic instant looked into eyes of the
+deepest and most wonderful violet.
+
+Then, shaking off inaction, I ran up the steps and overtook the lady in
+white as a porter swung open the door to admit her. We entered
+together.
+
+“Madame,” I said in a low tone, “I must detain you for a moment. There
+is something I have to ask.”
+
+She turned, exhibiting the most perfect composure, lowered her lashes
+and raised them again, the gaze of the violet eyes sweeping me from
+head to foot with a sort of frigid scorn.
+
+“I fear you have made a mistake, sir. We have never met before!”
+
+Her voice betrayed no trace of any foreign accent!
+
+“But,” I began—and paused.
+
+I felt myself flush; for this encounter in the foyer of an hotel, with
+many curious onlookers, was like to prove embarrassing if my beautiful
+acquaintance persisted in her attitude. I fully realized what
+construction would be put upon my presence there, and foresaw that
+forcible and ignominious ejection must be my lot if I failed to
+establish my right to address her.
+
+She turned away, and crossed in the direction of the staircase. A
+sunbeam sought out a lock of hair that strayed across her brow, and
+kissed it to a sudden glow like that which lurks in the heart of a
+blush rose.
+
+That wonderful sheen, which I had never met with elsewhere in nature,
+but which no artifice could lend, served to remove my last frail doubt
+which had survived the evidence of the violet eyes. I had been deceived
+by no strange resemblance; this was indeed the woman who had been the
+harbinger of Professor Deeping’s death. In three strides I was beside
+her again. Curious glances were set upon me, and I saw a servant
+evidently contemplating approach; but I ignored all save my own fixed
+purpose.
+
+“You must listen to what I have to say!” I whispered. “If you decline,
+I shall have no alternative but to call in the detective who holds a
+warrant for your arrest!”
+
+She stood quite still, watching me coolly. “I suppose you would wish to
+avoid a scene?” I added.
+
+“You have already made me the object of much undesirable attention,”
+she replied scornfully. “I do not need your assurance that you would
+disgrace me utterly! You are talking nonsense, as you must be
+aware—unless you are insane. But if your object be to force your
+acquaintance upon me, your methods are novel, and, under the
+circumstances, effective. Come, sir, you may talk to me—for three
+minutes!”
+
+The musical voice had lost nothing of its imperiousness, but for one
+instant the lips parted, affording a fleeting glimpse of pearl beyond
+the coral.
+
+Her sudden change of front was bewildering. Now, she entered the lift
+and I followed her. As we ascended side by side I found it impossible
+to believe that this dainty white figure was that of an associate of
+the Hashishin, that of a creature of the terrible Hassan of Aleppo. Yet
+that she was the same girl who, a few days after my return from the
+East, had shown herself conversant with the plans of the murderous
+fanatics was beyond doubt. Her accent on that occasion clearly had been
+assumed, with what object I could not imagine. Then, as we quitted the
+lift and entered a cosy lounge, my companion seated herself upon a
+Chesterfield, signing to me to sit beside her.
+
+As I did so she lay back smiling, and regarding me from beneath her
+black lashes. Thus, half veiled, her great violet eyes were most
+wonderful.
+
+“Now, sir,” she said softly, “explain yourself.”
+
+“Then you persist in pretending that we have not met before?”
+
+“There is no occasion for pretence,” she replied lightly; and I found
+myself comparing her voice with her figure, her figure with her face,
+and vainly endeavouring to compute her age. Frankly, she was
+bewildering—this lovely girl who seemed so wholly a woman of the world.
+
+“This fencing is useless.”
+
+“It is quite useless! Come, I know New York, London, and I know Paris,
+Vienna, Budapest. Therefore I know mankind! You thought I was pretty, I
+suppose? I may be; others have thought so. And you thought you would
+like to make my acquaintance without troubling about the usual
+formalities? You adopted a singularly brutal method of achieving your
+object, but I love such insolence in a man. Therefore I forgave you.
+What have you to say to me?”
+
+I perceive that I had to deal with a bold adventuress, with a
+consummate actress, who, finding herself in a dangerous situation, had
+adopted this daring line of defence, and now by her personal charm
+sought to lure me from my purpose.
+
+But with the scimitar of Hassan of Aleppo stretched over me, with the
+dangers of the night before me, I was in no mood for a veiled duel of
+words, for an interchange of glances in thrust and parry, however
+delightful such warfare might have been with so pretty an adversary.
+
+For a long time I looked sternly into her eyes; but their violet
+mystery defied, whilst her red-lipped smile taunted me.
+
+“Unfortunately,” I said, with slow emphasis, “you are protected by my
+promise, made on the occasion of our previous meeting. But murder has
+been done, so that honour scarcely demands that I respect my promise
+further—”
+
+She raised her eyebrows slightly.
+
+“Surely that depends upon the quality of the honour!” she said.
+
+“I believe you to be a member of a murderous organization, and unless
+you can convince me that I am wrong, I shall act accordingly.”
+
+At that she leaned toward me, laying her hand on my arm.
+
+“Please do not be so cruel,” she whispered, “as to drag me into a
+matter with which truly I have no concern. Believe me, you are utterly
+mistaken. Wait one moment, and I will prove it.”
+
+She rose, and before I could make move to detain her, quitted the room;
+but the door scarcely had closed ere I was afoot. The corridor beyond
+was empty. I ran on. The lift had just descended. A dark man whom I
+recognized stood near the closed gate.
+
+“Quick!” I said, “I am Cavanagh of the Report! Did you see a lady enter
+the lift?”
+
+“I did, Mr. Cavanagh,” answered the hotel detective; for this was he.
+
+In such a giant inn as this I knew full well that one could come and go
+almost with impunity, though one had no right to the hospitality of the
+establishment; and it was with a premonition respecting what his answer
+would be, that I asked the man—
+
+“Is she staying here?”
+
+“She is not. I have never seen her before!”
+
+The girl with the violet eyes had escaped, taking all her secrets with
+her!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+SECOND ATTEMPT ON THE SAFE
+
+
+“You see,” said Bristol, “the Hashishin must know that the safe won’t
+remain here unopened much longer. They will therefore probably make
+another attempt to-night.”
+
+“It seems likely,” I replied; and was silent. Outside the open windows
+whispered the shrubbery, as a soft breeze stole through the bushes.
+Beyond, the moon made play in the dim avenue. From the old chapel hard
+by the sweet-toned bell proclaimed midnight. Our vigil was begun. In
+this room it was that Professor Deeping had met death at the hands of
+the murderous Easterns; here it was that Marden and West had
+mysteriously been struck down the night before.
+
+To-night was every whit as hot, and Bristol and I had the windows
+widely opened. My companion was seated where the detective, Marden, had
+sat, in a chair near the westerly window, and I lay back in the
+armchair that had been occupied by West.
+
+I may repeat here that the house of the late Professor Deeping was more
+properly a cottage, surrounded by a fairly large piece of ground, for
+the most part run wild. The room used as a study was on the ground
+floor, and had windows on the west and on the south. Those on the west
+(French windows) opened on a loggia; those on the south opened right
+into the dense tangle of a neglected shrubbery. The place possessed an
+oppressive atmosphere of loneliness, for which in some measure its
+history may have been responsible.
+
+The silence, seemingly intensified by each whisper that sped through
+the elms and crept about the shrubbery, grew to such a stillness that I
+told myself I had experienced nothing like it since crossing with a
+caravan I had slept in the desert. Yet noisy, whirling London was
+within gunshot of us; and this, though hard enough to believe, was a
+reflection oddly comforting. Only one train of thought was possible,
+and this I pursued at random.
+
+By what means were Marden and West struck down? In thus exposing
+ourselves, in order that we might trap the author or authors of the
+outrage, did we act wisely?
+
+“Bristol,” I said suddenly, “it was someone who came through the open
+window.”
+
+“No one,” he replied, “came through the windows. West saw absolutely
+nothing. But if any one comes that way to-night, we have him!”
+
+“West may have seen nothing; but how else could any one enter?”
+
+Bristol offered no reply; and I plunged again into a maze of
+speculation.
+
+Powerful mantraps were set in such a way that any one or anything,
+ignorant of their positions, coming up to the windows must unavoidably
+be snared. These had been placed in position with much secrecy after
+dusk, and the man on duty at the gate stood with his back to the wall.
+No one could approach him except from the front. My thoughts took a new
+turn.
+
+Was the girl with the violet eyes an ally of the Hashishin? Thus far,
+although she so palpably had tricked me, I had found myself unable to
+speak of her to Bristol; for the idea had entered my mind that she
+might have learned of the plan to murder Deeping without directly being
+implicated. Now came yet another explanation. The publicity given to
+that sensational case might have interested some third party in the
+fate of the stolen slipper! Could it be that others, in no way
+connected with the dreadful Hassan of Aleppo, were in quest of the
+slipper?
+
+Scotland Yard had taken care to ensure that the general public be kept
+in ignorance of the existence of such an organization as the Hashishin,
+but I must assume that this hypothetical third party were well aware
+that they had Hassan, as well as the authorities, to count with.
+Granting the existence of such a party, my beautiful acquaintance might
+be classified as one of its members. I spoke again.
+
+“Bristol,” I said, “has it occurred to you that there may be others, as
+well as Hassan of Aleppo, seeking to gain possession of the sacred
+slipper?”
+
+“It has not,” he replied. “In the strictest sense of the expression,
+they would be out for trouble! What gave you the idea?”
+
+“I hardly know,” I returned evasively, for even now I was loath to
+betray the mysterious girl with the wonderful eyes.
+
+The chapel bell sounding the half-hour, Bristol rose with a sigh that
+might have been one of relief, and went out to take the report of the
+man on duty at the gate. As his footsteps died away along the elm
+avenue, it came to me how, in the darkness about, menace lurked; and I
+felt myself succumbing to the greatest dread experienced by man—the
+dread of the unknown.
+
+All that I knew of the weird group of fanatics—survivals of a dim and
+evil past—who must now be watching this cottage as bloodlustful
+devotees watch a shrine violated, burst upon my mind. I peopled the
+still blackness with lurking assassins, armed with the murderous
+knowledge of by-gone centuries, armed with invisible weapons which
+struck down from afar, supernaturally.
+
+I glanced toward the corner of the room where the safe stood, reliquary
+of a worthless thing for which much blood had been spilled.
+
+Then sounded footsteps along the avenue, and my fear whispered that
+they were not those of Bristol but of one who had murdered him, and who
+came guilefully, to murder me!
+
+I snatched the revolver from my pocket and crossed the darkened room.
+Just to the right of one of the French windows I stood looking out
+across the loggia to the end of the avenue. The night was a bright one,
+and the room was flooded with a reflected mystic light, but outside the
+moon paved the avenue with pearl, and through the trees I saw a figure
+approaching.
+
+Was it Bristol? It had his build, it had his gait; but my fears
+remained. Then the figure crossed the patch of shrubbery and stepped on
+to the loggia.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh!”
+
+I laughed dryly at my own cowardice, but my heart was still beating
+abnormally.
+
+“Here I am, Bristol, in a ghastly funk!”
+
+“I don’t wonder! They may be on us any time now. All’s well at the
+gate, but Morris says he heard, or thought he heard something at the
+side of the chapel opposite, a while ago.”
+
+“Wind in the bushes?”
+
+“It may have been; but he says there was no breeze at the time.”
+
+We resumed our seats.
+
+“Bristol,” I said, “now that the danger grows imminent, doesn’t it seem
+to you foolhardy for us thus to expose ourselves?”
+
+“Perhaps it is,” he agreed; “but how otherwise are we likely to learn
+what happened to Marden and West?”
+
+“The enemy may adopt different measures to-night.”
+
+“I think not. Our dispositions are the same, and I credit them with
+cunning enough to know it. At the same time I credit ourselves with
+having kept the existence of the steel traps completely secret. They
+will assume (so I’ve reasoned) that we intend to rely entirely upon our
+superior vigilance, therefore they will try the same game as last
+night.”
+
+Silence fell.
+
+The moon rays, creeping around from the right of the avenue, crossing
+the shrubbery and encroaching upon the low wall of the loggia, now
+flooded its floor. Against the silvern light, Bristol appeared to me in
+black silhouette. The breeze, too, seemed now to blow from a slightly
+different direction. It came through the windows on my right, beyond
+which lay the unkempt bushes which extended on that side to the wall of
+the grounds.
+
+So we sat, until the moonlight poured fully in upon Bristol’s back. So
+we sat when the clock chimed the hour of one.
+
+Bristol arose and once more went out to the gate. He had arranged to
+visit Morris’s post every half-hour. Again I experienced the nervous
+dread that he would be attacked in the avenue; but again he returned
+unscathed.
+
+“All’s well,” he said.
+
+But from his tones I knew that he had not forgotten that it was at this
+hour Marden and West had suffered mysterious attack.
+
+Neither of us, I think, was disposed to talk. We both were unwilling to
+break the silence, wherein, with all our ears, we listened for the
+slightest disturbance.
+
+And now my attention turned anew to the course of the slowly creeping
+moon rays. In my mind an idea was struggling for definition. There was
+something significant in the lunar lighting of the room. Why, I asked
+myself, had the attack been made at one o’clock? Did the time signify
+anything? If so, what? I looked toward Bristol.
+
+His figure, the chair upon which he sat, were sharply outlined by the
+cold light. The wall behind me, and to my left, was illuminated
+brilliantly; but no light fell directly upon me.
+
+The idea was taking shape. From the loggia and the avenue Bristol, I
+reasoned, must be clearly visible. From the shrubbery on the south,
+through the other windows could I be seen? Yes, silhouetted against the
+moonlight!
+
+A faint sound, quite indescribable, came to my ears from somewhere
+outside-beyond.
+
+“My God!” whispered Bristol. “Did you hear it?”
+
+“Yes! What?”
+
+“It must have been Morris!—”
+
+Bristol was half standing, one hand upon the arm of the chair, the
+other concealed, but grasping his revolver as I well knew. I, too, had
+my revolver in my hand, and as I twisted in my seat, preparatory to
+rising, in sheer nervousness I dropped the weapon upon the carpet.
+
+With an exclamation of dismay, I stooped quickly to recover it.
+
+As I did so something whistled past my ear, so closely as almost to
+touch it—and struck with a dull thud upon the wall beyond!
+
+“Bristol!” I whispered.
+
+But as I raised my eyes to him he seemed to crumple up, and fell
+loosely forward into the patch of moonlight spread upon the floor! “God
+in heaven!” I said aloud.
+
+In a cold sweat of fear I crouched there, for it had become evident to
+me that, as I bent, I was entirely in shadow.
+
+There was a rustling in the bushes on the left; but before I could turn
+in that direction, my attention was claimed elsewhere. Over into the
+loggia leapt an almost naked brown figure!
+
+It was that of a small but strongly built man, who carried a short,
+exceedingly thick bamboo rod in his hand. My fear was too great to
+admit of my accurately observing anything at that time, but I noticed
+that some kind of leather thong or loop was attached to the end of the
+squat cane.
+
+The panic fear of the supernatural was strongly upon me, and I was
+unable to realize that this Eastern apparition was a creature of flesh
+and blood. With my nerves strung up to snapping point, I crouched
+watching him. He entered the room, bending over the body of Bristol.
+
+A hot breath fanned my cheek!
+
+At that my overwrought nerves betrayed me. I uttered a stifled cry,
+looking upward ... and into a pair of gleaming eyes which looked down
+into mine!
+
+A second brown man (who must have entered by one of the windows
+overlooking the shrubbery) was bending over me!
+
+Scarce knowing what I did, I raised my revolver and blazed straight
+into the dimly-seen face. Down upon me silently dropped a naked body,
+and something warm came flowing over my hand. But, knowing my foes to
+be of flesh and blood, feeling myself at handgrips now with a palpable
+enemy, I threw off the body, leapt up and fired, though blindly, at the
+flying shape that flashed across the loggia—and was lost in the shadow
+pools under the elms.
+
+Upon the din of my shooting fell silence like a cloak. A moment I
+listened, tense, still; then I turned to the table and lighted the
+lamp.
+
+In its light I saw Bristol lying like a dead man. Close beside him was
+a big and heavy lump of clay. It had been shaped as a ball, but now it
+was flattened out curiously. Bending over my unfortunate companion and
+learning that, though unconscious, he lived, I learnt, too, how the
+Hashishin contrived to strike men insensible without approaching them;
+I learnt that the one whom I had shot, who lay in his blood almost on
+the spot where Professor Deeping once had lain, was an expert slinger.
+
+The contrivance which he carried, as did the other who had escaped, was
+a sling, of the ancient Persian type. In place of stones, heavy lumps
+of clay were used, which operated much the same as a sand-bag, whilst
+enabling the operator to work from a considerable distance.
+
+Hidden, over by the ancient chapel it might be, one of this evil twain
+had struck down Morris, the constable; from the shelter of the trees,
+from many yards away, they had shot their singular missiles through the
+open windows at Bristol and myself. Bristol had succumbed, and now,
+with a redness showing through his close-cut hair immediately behind
+the right ear, lay wholly unconscious at my feet.
+
+It had been a divine accident which had caused me to drop my revolver,
+and, stooping to recover it, unknowingly to frustrate the design of the
+second slinger upon myself. The light of the lamp fell upon the face of
+the dead Hashishin. He lay forward upon his hands, crouching almost,
+but with his face, his dreadful, featureless face, twisted up at me
+from under his left shoulder.
+
+God knows he deserved his end; but that mutilated face is often
+grinning, bloodily, in my dreams.
+
+And then as I stood, between that horrid exultation which is born of
+killing and the panic which threatened me out of the darkness, I saw
+something advancing ... slowly ... slowly ... from the elmen shades
+toward the loggia.
+
+It was a shape—it was a shadow. Silent it came—on—and on. Where the
+dusk lay deepest it paused, undefined; for I could give it no name of
+man or spirit. But a horror seemed to proceed from it as light from a
+lamp.
+
+I groped about the table near to me, never taking my eyes from that
+sinister form outside. As my fingers closed upon the telephone, distant
+voices and the sound of running footsteps (of those who had heard the
+shots) came welcome to my ears.
+
+The form stirred, seeming to raise phantom arms in execration, and a
+stray moonbeam pierced the darkness shrouding it. For a fleeting
+instant something flashed venomously.
+
+The sounds grew nearer. I could tell that the newcomers had found
+Morris lying at the gate. Yet still I stood, frozen with uncanny fear,
+and watching—watching the spot to which that stray beam had pierced;
+the spot where I had seen the moon gleam upon the ring of the Prophet!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+AT THE BRITISH ANTIQUARIAN MUSEUM
+
+
+A little group of interested spectators stood at the head of the square
+glass case in the centre of the lofty apartment in the British
+Antiquarian Museum known as the Burton Room (by reason of the fact that
+a fine painting of Sir Richard Burton faces you as you enter). A few
+other people looked on curiously from the lower end of the case. It
+contained but one exhibit—a dirty and dilapidated markoob—or slipper of
+morocco leather that had once been red.
+
+“Our latest acquisition, gentlemen,” said Mr. Mostyn, the curator,
+speaking in a low tone to the distinguished Oriental scholars around
+him. “It has been left to the Institution by the late Professor
+Deeping. He describes it in a document furnished by his solicitor as
+one of the slippers worn by the Prophet Mohammed, but gives us no
+further particulars. I myself cannot quite place the relic.”
+
+“Nor I,” interrupted one of the group. “It is not mentioned by any of
+the Arabian historians to my knowledge—that is, if it comes from Mecca,
+as I understand it does.”
+
+“I cannot possibly assert that it comes from Mecca, Dr. Nicholson,”
+Mostyn replied. “The Professor may have taken it from
+Al-Madinah—perhaps from the mysterious inner passage of the baldaquin
+where the treasures of the place lie. But I can assure you that what
+little we do know of its history is sufficiently unsavoury.”
+
+I fancied that the curator’s tired cultured voice faltered as he spoke;
+and now, without apparent reason, he moved a step to the right and
+glanced oddly along the room. I followed the direction of his glance,
+and saw a tall man in conventional morning dress, irreproachable in
+every detail, whose head was instantly bent upon his catalogue. But
+before his eyes fell I knew that their long almond shape, as well as
+the peculiar burnt pallor of his countenance, were undoubtedly those of
+an Oriental.
+
+“There have been mysterious outrages committed, I believe, upon many of
+those who have come in contact with the slipper?” asked one of the
+savants.
+
+“Exactly. Professor Deeping was undoubtedly among the victims. His
+instructions were explicit that the relic should be brought here by a
+Moslem, but for a long time we failed to discover any Moslem who would
+undertake the task; and, as you are aware, while the slipper remained
+at the Professor’s house attempts were made to steal it.”
+
+He ceased uneasily, and glanced at the tall Eastern figure. It had
+edged a little nearer; the head was still bowed and the fine yellow
+waxen fingers of the hand from which he had removed his glove fumbled
+with the catalogue’s leaves. It may well have been that in those days I
+read menace in every eye, yet I felt assured that the yellow visitor
+was eavesdropping—was malignantly attentive to the conversation.
+
+The curator spoke lower than ever now; no one beyond the circle could
+possibly hear him as he proceeded—
+
+“We discovered an Alexandrian Greek who, for personal reasons, not
+unconnected with matrimony, had turned Moslem! He carried the slipper
+here, strongly escorted, and placed it where you now see it. No other
+hand has touched it.” (The speaker’s voice was raised ever so
+slightly.) “You will note that there is a rail around the case, to
+prevent visitors from touching even the glass.”
+
+“Ah,” said Dr. Nicholson quizzically, “And has anything untoward
+happened to our Graeco-Moslem friend?”
+
+“Perhaps Inspector Bristol can tell,” replied the curator.
+
+The straight, military figure of the well-known Scotland Yard man was
+conspicuous among the group of distinguished—and mostly
+round-shouldered—scholars.
+
+“Sorry, gentlemen,” he said, smiling, “but Mr. Acepulos has vanished
+from his tobacco shop in Soho. I am not apprehensive that he had been
+kidnapped or anything of that kind. I think rather that the date of his
+disappearance tallies with that on which he cashed his cheque for
+service rendered! His present wife is getting most unbeautifully fat,
+too.”
+
+“What precautions,” someone asked, “are being taken to guard the
+slipper?”
+
+“Well,” Mostyn answered, “though we have only the bare word of the late
+Professor Deeping that the slipper was actually worn by Mohammed, it
+has certainly an enormous value according to Moslem ideas. There can be
+no doubt that a group of fanatics known as Hashishin are in London
+engaged in an extraordinary endeavour to recover it.”
+
+Mostyn’s voice sank to an impressive whisper. My gaze sought again the
+tall Eastern visitor and was held fascinated by the baffled straining
+in those velvet eyes. But the lids fell as I looked; and the effect was
+that of a fire suddenly extinguished. I determined to draw Bristol’s
+attention to the man.
+
+“Accordingly,” Mostyn continued, “we have placed it in this room, from
+which I fancy it would puzzle the most accomplished thief to remove
+it.”
+
+The party, myself included, stared about the place, as he went on to
+explain—
+
+“We have four large windows here; as you see. The Burton Room occupies
+the end of a wing; there is only one door; it communicates with the
+next room, which in turn opens into the main building by another door
+on the landing. We are on the first floor; these two east windows
+afford a view of the lawn before the main entrance; those two west ones
+face Orpington Square; all are heavily barred as you see. During the
+day there is a man always on duty in these two rooms. At night that
+communicating door is locked. Short of erecting a ladder in full view
+either of the Square or of Great Orchard Street, filing through four
+iron bars and breaking the window and the case, I fail to see how
+anybody can get at the slipper here.”
+
+“If a duplicate key to the safe—” another voice struck in; I knew it
+afterward for that of Professor Rhys-Jenkyns.
+
+“Impossible to procure one, Professor,” cried Mostyn, his eyes
+sparkling with an almost boyish interest. “Mr. Cavanagh here holds the
+keys of the case, under the will of the late Professor Deeping. They
+are of foreign workmanship and more than a little complicated.”
+
+The eyes of the savants were turned now in my direction.
+
+“I suppose you have them in a place of safety?” said Dr. Nicholson.
+
+“They are at my bankers,” I replied.
+
+“Then I venture to predict,” said the celebrated Orientalist, “that the
+slipper of the Prophet will rest here undisturbed.”
+
+He linked his arm into that of a brother scholar and the little group
+straggled away, Mostyn accompanying them to the main entrance.
+
+But I saw Inspector Bristol scratching his chin; he looked very much as
+if he doubted the accuracy of the doctor’s prediction. He had already
+had some experience of the implacable devotion of the Moslem group to
+this treasure of the Faithful.
+
+“The real danger begins,” I suggested to him, “when the general public
+is admitted—after to-day, is it not?”
+
+“Yes. All to-day’s people are specially invited, or are using special
+invitation cards,” he replied. “The people who received them often give
+their tickets away to those who will be likely really to appreciate the
+opportunity.”
+
+I looked around for the tall Oriental. He seemed to have vanished, and
+for some reason I hesitated to speak of him to Bristol; for my gaze
+fell upon an excessively thin, keen-faced man whose curiously wide-open
+eyes met mine smilingly, whose gray suit spoke Stein-Bloch, whose felt
+was a Boss raw-edge unmistakably of a kind that only Philadelphia can
+produce. At the height of the season such visitors are not rare, but
+this one had an odd personality, and moreover his keen gaze was raking
+the place from ceiling to floor.
+
+Where had I met him before? To the best of my recollection I had never
+set eyes upon the man prior to that moment; and since he was so
+palpably an American I had no reason for assuming him to be associated
+with the Hashishin. But I remembered—indeed, I could never forget—how,
+in the recent past, I had met with an apparent associate of the Moslems
+as evidently European as this curiously alert visitor was American.
+Moreover ... there was something tauntingly familiar, yet elusive,
+about that gaunt face.
+
+Was it not upon the eve of the death of Professor Deeping that the girl
+with the violet eyes had first intruded her fascinating personality
+into my tangled affairs? Patently, she had then been seeking the holy
+slipper, and by craft had endeavoured to bend me to her will. Then had
+I not encountered her again, meeting the glance of her unforgettable
+violet eyes outside a Strand hotel? The encounter had presaged a
+further attempt upon the slipper! Certainly she acted on behalf of
+someone interested in it; and since neither Bristol nor I could
+conceive of any one seeking to possess the bloodstained thing except
+the mysterious leader of the Hashishin—Hassan of Aleppo—as a creature
+of that awful fanatic being I had written her down.
+
+Why, then, if the mysterious Eastern employed a European girl, should
+he not also employ an American man? It might well be that the relic, in
+entering the doors of the impregnable Antiquarian Museum, had passed
+where the diabolical arts of the Hashishin had no power to reach
+it—where the beauty of Western women and the craft of Eastern man were
+equally useless weapons. Perhaps Hassan’s campaign was entering upon a
+new phase.
+
+Was it a shirking of plain duty on my part that wish—that ever-present
+hope—that the murderous company of fanatics who had pursued the stolen
+slipper from its ancient resting-place to London, should succeed in
+recovering it? I leave you to judge.
+
+The crescent of Islam fades to-day and grows pale, but there are yet
+fierce Believers, a lust for the blood of the infidel. In such as these
+a faith dies the death of an adder, and is more venomous in its
+death-throes than in the full pulse of life. The ghastly indiscretion
+of Professor Deeping, in rifling a Moslem Sacristy, had led to the
+mutilation of many who, unwittingly, had touched the looted relic, had
+brought about his own end, had established a league of fantastic
+assassins in the heart of the metropolis.
+
+Only once had I seen the venerable Hassan of Aleppo—a stately, gentle
+old man; but I knew that the velvet eyes could blaze into a passionate
+fury that seemed to scorch whom it fell upon. I knew that the saintly
+Hassan was Sheikh of the Hashishin. And familiarity with that dreadful
+organization had by no means bred contempt. I was the holder of the
+key, and my fear of the fanatics grew like a magic mango, darkened the
+sunlight of each day, and filled the night with indefinable dread.
+
+You, who have not read poor Deeping’s “Assyrian Mythology”, cannot
+picture a creature with a huge, distorted head, and a tiny, dwarfed
+body—a thing inhuman, yet human—a man stunted and malformed by the
+cruel arts of brother men—a thing obnoxious to life, with but one
+passion, the passion to kill. You cannot conceive of the years of agony
+spent by that creature strapped to a wooden frame—in order to prevent
+his growth! You cannot conceive of his fierce hatred of all humanity,
+inflamed to madness by the Eastern drug, hashish, and directed against
+the enemies of Islam—the holders of the slipper—by the wonderful power
+of Hassan of Aleppo.
+
+But I had not only read of such beings, I had encountered one!
+
+And he was but one of the many instruments of the Hashishin. Perhaps
+the girl with the violet eyes was another. What else to be dreaded
+Hassan might hold in store for us I could not conjecture.
+
+Do you wonder that I feared? Do you wonder that I hoped (I confess it),
+hoped that the slipper might be recovered without further bloodshed?
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+THE HOLE IN THE BLIND
+
+
+I stepped over to the door, where a constable stood on duty.
+
+“You observed a tall Eastern gentleman in the room a while ago,
+officer?”
+
+“I did, sir.”
+
+“How long is he gone?”
+
+The man started and began to peer about anxiously.
+
+“That’s a funny thing, sir,” he said. “I was keeping my eyes specially
+upon him. I noticed him hovering around while Mr. Mostyn was speaking;
+but although I could have sworn he hadn’t passed out, he’s gone!”
+
+“You didn’t notice his departure, then?”
+
+“I’m sorry to say I didn’t, sir.”
+
+The man clearly was perplexed, but I found small matter for wonder in
+the episode. I had more than suspected the stranger to be a spy of
+Hassan’s, and members of that strange company were elusive as
+will-o’-the-wisps.
+
+Bristol, at the far end of the room, was signalling to me. I walked
+back and joined him.
+
+“Come over here,” he said, in a low voice, “and pretend to examine
+these things.”
+
+He glanced significantly to his left. Following the glance, my eyes
+fell upon the lean American; he was peering into the receptacle which
+held the holy slipper.
+
+Bristol led me across the room, and we both faced the wall and bent
+over a glass case. Some yellow newspaper cuttings describing its
+contents hung above it, and these we pretended to read.
+
+“Did you notice that man I glanced at?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Well, that’s Earl Dexter, the first crook in America! Ssh! Only goes
+in on very big things. We had word at the Yard he was in town; but we
+can’t touch him—we can only keep our eyes on him. He usually travels
+openly and in his own name, but this time he seems to have slipped over
+quietly. He always dresses the same and has just given me ‘good day!’
+They call him The Stetson Man. We heard this morning that he had booked
+two first-class sailings in the Oceanic, leaving for New York three
+weeks hence. Now, Mr. Cavanagh, what is his game?”
+
+“It has occurred to me before, Bristol,” I replied, “and you may
+remember that I mentioned the idea to you, that there might be a third
+party interested in the slipper. Why shouldn’t Earl Dexter be that
+third party?”
+
+“Because he isn’t a fool,” rapped Bristol shortly. “Earl Dexter isn’t a
+man to gather up trouble for himself. More likely if his visit has
+anything really to do with the slipper he’s retained by Hassan and
+Company. Museum-breaking may be a bit out of the line of Hashishin!”
+
+This latter suggestion dovetailed with my own ideas, and oddly enough
+there was something positively wholesome in the notion of the
+straightforward crookedness of a mere swell cracksman.
+
+Then happened a singular thing, and one that effectually concluded our
+whispered colloquy. From the top end of the room, beyond the case
+containing the slipper, one of the yellow blinds came down with a run.
+
+Bristol turned in a flash. It was not a remarkable accident, and might
+portend no more than a loose cord; but when, having walked rapidly up
+the room, we stood before the lowered blind, it appeared that this was
+no accident at all.
+
+Some four feet from the bottom of the blind (or five feet from the
+floor) a piece of linen a foot square had been neatly slashed out!
+
+I glanced around the room. Several fashionably dressed visitors were
+looking idly in our direction, but I could fasten upon no one of them
+as a likely perpetrator.
+
+Bristol stared at me in perplexity.
+
+“Who on earth did it,” he muttered, “and what the blazes for?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+THE HASHISHIN WATCH
+
+
+“The American gentleman has just gone out, sir,” said the sergeant at
+the door.
+
+I nodded grimly and raced down the steps. Despite my half-formed desire
+that the slipper should be recovered by those to whom properly it
+belonged, I experienced at times a curious interest in its welfare. I
+cannot explain this. Across the hall in front of me I saw Earl Dexter
+passing out of the Museum. I followed him through into Kingsway and
+thence to Fleet Street. He sauntered easily along, a nonchalant gray
+figure. I had begun to think that he was bound for his hotel and that I
+was wasting my time when he turned sharply into quiet Salisbury Square;
+it was almost deserted.
+
+My heart leapt into my mouth with a presentiment of what was coming as
+I saw an elegant and beautifully dressed woman sauntering along in
+front of us on the far side.
+
+Was it that I detected something familiar in her carriage, in the poise
+of her head—something that reminded me of former unforgettable
+encounters; encounters which without exception had presaged attempts
+upon the slipper of the Prophet? Or was it that I recollected how
+Dexter had booked two passages to America? I cannot say, but I felt my
+heart leap; I knew beyond any possibility of doubt that this meeting in
+Salisbury Square marked the opening of a new chapter in the history of
+the slipper.
+
+Dexter slipped his arm within that of the girl in front of him and they
+paced slowly forward in earnest conversation. I suppose my action was
+very amateurish and very poor detective work; but regardless of
+discovery I crossed the road and passed close by the pair.
+
+I am certain that Dexter was speaking as I came up, but, well out of
+earshot, his voice was suddenly arrested. His companion turned and
+looked at me.
+
+I was prepared for it, yet was thrilled electrically by the flashing
+glance of the violet eyes—for it was she—the beautiful harbinger of
+calamities!
+
+My brain was in a whirl; complication piled itself upon complication;
+yet in the heart of all this bewilderment I thought I could detect the
+key of the labyrinth, but at the time my ideas were in disorder, for
+the violet eyes were not lowered but fixed upon me in cold scorn.
+
+I knew myself helpless, and bending my head with conscious
+embarrassment I passed on hurriedly.
+
+I had work to do in plenty, but I could not apply my mind to it; and
+now, although the obvious and sensible thing was to go about my
+business, I wandered on aimlessly, my brain employed with a hundred
+idle conjectures and the query, “Where have I seen The Stetson Man?”
+seeming to beat, like a tattoo, in my brain. There was something
+magnetic about the accursed slipper, for without knowing by what route
+I had arrived there, I found myself in Great Orchard Street and close
+under the walls of the British Antiquarian Museum. Then I was
+effectually aroused from my reverie.
+
+Two men, both tall, stood in the shadow of a doorway on the Opposite
+side of the street, staring intently up at the Museum windows. It was a
+tropically hot afternoon and they stood in deepest shadow. No one else
+was in Orchard Street—that odd little backwater—at the time, and they
+stood gazing upward intently and gave me not even a passing glance.
+
+But I knew one for the Oriental visitor of the morning, and despite
+broad noonday and the hum of busy London about me, my blood seemed to
+turn to water. I stood rooted to the spot, held there by a most
+surprising horror.
+
+For the gray-bearded figure of the other watcher was one I could never
+forget; its benignity was associated with the most horrible hours of my
+life, with deeds so dreadful that recollection to this day sometimes
+breaks my sleep, arousing me in the still watches, bathed in a cold
+sweat of fear.
+
+It was Hassan of Aleppo!
+
+If he saw me, if either of them saw me, I cannot say. What I should
+have done, what I might have done it is useless to speak of here—for I
+did nothing. Inert, thralled by the presence of that eerie, dreadful
+being, I watched them leave the shadow of the doorway and pace slowly
+on with their dignified Eastern gait.
+
+Then, knowing how I had failed in my plain duty to my fellow-men—how,
+finding a serpent in my path, I had hesitated to crush it, had weakly
+succumbed to its uncanny fascination—I made my way round to the door of
+the Museum.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+THE WHITE BEAM
+
+
+That night the deviltry began. Mr. Mostyn found himself wholly unable
+to sleep. Many relics have curious histories, and the experienced
+archaeologist becomes callous to that uncanniness which seems to attach
+to some gruesome curios. But the slipper of the Prophet was different.
+No mere ghostly menace threatened its holders; an avenging scimitar
+followed those who came in contact with it; gruesome tragedies,
+mutilations, murders, had marked its progress throughout.
+
+The night was still—as still as a London night can be; for there is
+always a vague murmuring in the metropolis as though the sleeping city
+breathed gently and sometimes stirred in its sleep.
+
+Then, distinct amid these usual nocturnal noises, rose another,
+unaccountable sound, a muffled crash followed by a musical tinkling.
+
+Mostyn sprang up in bed, drew on a dressing-gown, and took from the
+small safe at his bed-head the Museum keys and a loaded revolver. A
+somewhat dishevelled figure, pale and wild-eyed, he made his way
+through the private door and into the ghostly precincts of the Museum.
+He did not hesitate, but ascended the stairs and unlocked the door of
+the Assyrian gallery.
+
+Along its ghostly aisles he passed, and before the door which gave
+admittance to the Burton Room paused, fumbling a moment for the key.
+
+Inside the room something was moving!
+
+Mostyn was keenly alarmed; he knew that he must enter at once or never.
+He inserted the key in the lock, swung open the heavy door, stepped
+through and closed it behind him. He was a man of tremendous moral
+courage, for now,—alone in the apartment which harboured the uncanny
+relic, alone in the discharge of his duty, he stood with his back to
+the door trembling slightly, but with the idea of retreat finding no
+place in his mind.
+
+One side of the room lay in blackest darkness; through the furthermost
+window of the other a faint yellowed luminance (the moonlight through
+the blind) spread upon the polished parquet flooring. But that which
+held the curator spell-bound—that which momentarily quickened into life
+the latent superstition, common to all mankind, was a beam of cold
+light which poured its effulgence fully upon the case containing the
+Prophet’s slipper! Where the other exhibits lay either in utter
+darkness or semi-darkness this one it seemed was supernaturally picked
+out by this lunar searchlight!
+
+It was ghostly-unnerving; but, the first dread of it passed, Mostyn
+recalled how during the day a hole inexplicably had been cut in that
+blind; he recalled that it had not been mended, but that the damaged
+blind had merely been rolled up again.
+
+And as a dawning perception of the truth came to him, as falteringly he
+advanced a step toward the mystic beam, he saw that one side of the
+case had been shattered—he saw the broken glass upon the floor; and in
+the dense shadow behind and under the beam of light, vaguely he saw a
+dull red object.
+
+It moved—it seemed to live! It moved away from the case and in the
+direction of the eastern windows.
+
+“My God!” whispered Mostyn; “it’s the Prophet’s slipper!”
+
+And wildly, blindly, he fired down the room. Later he knew that he had
+fired in panic, for nothing human was or could be in the place; yet his
+shot was not without effect. In the instant of its flash, something
+struck sharply against the dimly seen blind of one of the east windows;
+he heard the crash of broken glass.
+
+He leapt to the switch and flooded the room with light. A fear of what
+it might hold possessed him, and he turned instantly.
+
+Hard by the fragments of broken glass upon the floor and midway between
+the case and the first easterly window lay the slipper. A bell was
+ringing somewhere. His shot probably had aroused the attention of the
+policeman. Someone was clamouring upon the door of the Museum, too.
+Mostyn raced forward and raised the blind—that toward which the slipper
+had seemed to move.
+
+The lower pane of the window was smashed. Blood was trickling down upon
+the floor from the jagged edges of the glass.
+
+“Hullo there! Open the door! Open the door!”
+
+Bells were going all over the place now; sounds of running footsteps
+came from below; but Mostyn stood staring at the broken window and at
+the solid iron bars which protected it without, which were intact,
+substantial—which showed him that nothing human could possibly have
+entered.
+
+Yet the case was shattered, the holy slipper lay close beside him upon
+the floor, and from the broken window-pane blood was
+falling—drip-drip-drip...
+
+That was the story as I heard it half an hour later. For Inspector
+Bristol, apprised of the happening, was promptly on the scene; and
+knowing how keen was my interest in the matter, he rang me up
+immediately. I arrived soon after Bristol and found a perplexed group
+surrounding the uncanny slipper of the Prophet. No one had dared to
+touch it; the dread vengeance of Hassan of Aleppo would visit any
+unbeliever who ventured to lay hand upon the holy, bloody thing. Well
+we knew it, and as though it had been a venomous scorpion we, a company
+of up-to-date, prosaic men of affairs, stood around that dilapidated
+markoob, and kept a respectful distance.
+
+Mostyn, an odd figure in pyjamas and dressing-gown, turned his pale,
+intellectual face to me as I entered.
+
+“It will have to be put back ... secretly,” he said.
+
+His voice was very unsteady. Bristol nodded grimly and glanced at the
+two constables, who, with a plain-clothes man unknown to me, made up
+that midnight company.
+
+“I’ll do it, sir,” said one of the constables suddenly.
+
+“One moment”—Mostyn raised his hand!
+
+In the ensuing silence I could hear the heavy breathing of those around
+me. We were all looking at the slipper, I think.
+
+“Do you understand, fully,” the curator continued, “the risk you run?”
+
+“I think so, sir,” answered the constable; “but I’m prepared to chance
+it.”
+
+“The hands,” resumed Mostyn slowly, “of those who hitherto have
+ventured to touch it have been”—he hesitated—“cut off.”
+
+“Your career in the Force would be finished if it happened to you, my
+lad,” said Bristol shortly.
+
+“I suppose they’d look after me,” said the man, with grim humour.
+
+“They would if you met with—an accident, in the discharge of your
+duty,” replied the inspector; “but I haven’t ordered you to do it, and
+I’m not going to.”
+
+“All right, sir,” said the man, with a sort of studied truculence,
+“I’ll take my chance.”
+
+I tried to stop him; Mostyn, too, stepped forward, and Bristol swore
+frankly. But it was all of no avail.
+
+A sort of chill seemed to claim my very soul when I saw the constable
+stoop, unconcernedly pick up the slipper, and replace it in the broken
+case.
+
+It was out of a silence cathedral-like, awesome, that he spoke.
+
+“All you want is a new pane of glass, sir,” he said—“and the thing’s
+done.”
+
+I anticipate in mentioning it here; but since Constable Hughes has no
+further place in these records I may perhaps be excused for dismissing
+him at this point.
+
+He was picked up outside the section house on the following evening
+with his right hand severed just above the wrist.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+A SCREAM IN THE NIGHT
+
+
+The day that followed was one of the hottest which we experienced
+during the heat wave. It was a day crowded with happenings. The Burton
+Room was closed to the public, whilst a glazier worked upon the broken
+east window and a new blind was fitted to the west. Behind the workmen,
+guarded by a watchful commissionaire, yawned the shattered case
+containing the slipper.
+
+I wondered if the visitors to the other rooms of the Museum realized,
+as I realized, that despite the blazing sunlight of tropical London,
+the shadow of Hassan of Aleppo lay starkly on that haunted building?
+
+At about eleven o’clock, as I hurried along the Strand, I almost
+collided with the girl of the violet eyes! She turned and ran like the
+wind down Arundel Street, whilst I stood at the corner staring after
+her in blank amazement, as did other passers-by; for a man cannot with
+dignity race headlong after a pretty woman down a public thoroughfare!
+
+My mystification grew hourly deeper; and Bristol wallowed in
+perplexities.
+
+“It’s the most horrible and confusing case,” he said to me when I
+joined him at the Museum, “that the Yard has ever had to handle. It
+bristles with outrages and murders. God knows where it will all end.
+I’ve had London scoured for a clue to the whereabouts of Hassan and
+Company and drawn absolutely blank! Then there’s Earl Dexter. Where
+does he come in? For once in a way he’s living in hiding. I can’t find
+his headquarters. I’ve been thinking—”
+
+He drew me aside into the small gallery which runs parallel with the
+Assyrian Room.
+
+“Dexter has booked two passages in the Oceanic. Who is his companion?”
+
+I wondered, I had wondered more than once, if his companion were my
+beautiful violet-eyed acquaintance. A scruple—perhaps an absurd
+scruple—hitherto had kept me silent respecting her, but now I
+determined to take Bristol fully into my confidence. A conviction was
+growing upon me that she and Earl Dexter together represented that
+third party whose existence we had long suspected. Whether they
+operated separately or on behalf of the Moslems (of which arrangement I
+could not conceive) remained to be seen. I was about to voice my doubts
+and suspicions when Bristol went on hurriedly—
+
+“I have thoroughly examined the Burton Room, and considering that the
+windows are thirty feet from the ground, that there is no sign of a
+ladder having stood upon the lawn, and that the iron bars are quite
+intact, it doesn’t look humanly possible for any one to have been in
+the room last night prior to Mostyn’s arrival!”
+
+“One of the dwarfs—”
+
+“Not even one of the dwarfs,” said Bristol, “could have passed between
+those iron bars!”
+
+“But there was blood on the window!”
+
+“I know there was, and human blood. It’s been examined!”
+
+He stared at me fixedly. The thing was unspeakably uncanny.
+
+“To-night,” he went on, “I am remaining in here”—nodding toward the
+Assyrian Room—“and I have so arranged it that no mortal being can
+possibly know I am here. Mostyn is staying, and you can stay, too, if
+you care to. Owing to Professor Deeping’s will you are badly involved
+in the beastly business, and I have no doubt you are keen to see it
+through.”
+
+“I am,” I admitted, “and the end I look for and hope for is the
+recovery of the slipper by its murderous owners!”
+
+“I am with you,” said Bristol. “It’s just a point of honour; but I
+should be glad to make them a present of it. We’re ostentatiously
+placing a constable on duty in the hallway to-night—largely as a blind.
+It will appear that we’re taking no other additional precautions.”
+
+He hurried off to make arrangements for my joining him in his watch,
+and thus again I lost my opportunity of confiding in him regarding the
+mysterious girl.
+
+I half anticipated, though I cannot imagine why, that Earl Dexter would
+put in an appearance, during the day. He did not do so, however, for
+Bristol had put a constable on the door who was well acquainted with
+the appearance of The Stetson Man. The inspector, in the course of his
+investigations, had come upon what might have been a clue, but what was
+at best a confusing one. Close by the wall of the curator’s house and
+lying on the gravel path he had found a part of a gold cuff link. It
+was of American manufacture.
+
+Upon such slender evidence we could not justly assume that it pointed
+to the presence of Dexter on the night of the attempted robbery, but it
+served to complicate a matter already sufficiently involved.
+
+In pursuance of Bristol’s plan, I concealed myself that evening just
+before the closing of the Museum doors, in a recess behind a heavy
+piece of Babylonian sculpture. Bristol was similarly concealed in
+another part of the room, and Mostyn joined us later.
+
+The Museum was closed; and so far as evidence went the authorities had
+relied again upon the bolts and bars hitherto considered impregnable,
+and upon the constable in the hall. The broken window was mended, the
+cut blind replaced, and within, in its shattered case, reposed the
+slipper of the Prophet.
+
+All the blinds being lowered, the Assyrian Room was a place of gloom,
+yellowed on the western side by the moonlight through the blind. The
+door communicating with the Burton Room was closed but not fastened.
+
+“They operated last night,” Bristol whispered to me, “at the exact time
+when the moonlight shone through the hole in the westerly blind on to
+the case. If they come to-night, and I am quite expecting them, they
+will have to dispense with that assistance; but they know by experience
+where to reach the case.”
+
+“Despite our precautions,” I said, “they will almost certainly know
+that a watch is being kept.”
+
+“They may or they may not,” replied Bristol. “Either way I’m disposed
+to think there will be another attempt. Their mysterious method is so
+rapid that they can afford to take chances.”
+
+This was not my first night vigil since I had become in a sense the
+custodian of the relic, but it was quite the most dreary. Amid the
+tomb-like objects about us we seemed two puny mortals toying with
+stupendous things. We could not smoke and must converse only in
+whispers; and so the night wore on until I began to think that our
+watch would be dully uneventful.
+
+“Our big chance,” whispered Mostyn, “is in the fact that any day may
+change the conditions. They can’t afford to wait.”
+
+He ceased abruptly, grasping my arm. From somewhere, somewhere outside
+the building, we all three had heard a soft whistle. A moment of tense
+listening followed.
+
+“If only we could have had the place surrounded,” whispered
+Bristol—“but it was impossible, of course.”
+
+A faint grating noise echoed through the lofty Burton Room. Bristol
+slipped past me in the semi-gloom, and gently opened the communicating
+door a few inches.
+
+A-tiptoe, I joined him, and craning across his shoulder saw a strange
+and wonderful thing.
+
+The newly glazed east window again was shattered with a booming crash!
+The yellow blind was thrust aside. A long something reached out toward
+the broken case. There was a sort of fumbling sound, and paralyzed with
+the wonder of it—for the window, remember, was thirty feet from the
+ground—I stood frozen to my post.
+
+Not so Bristol. As the weird tentacle (or more exactly it reminded me
+of a gigantic crab’s claw) touched the case, the Inspector leapt
+forward. A white beam from his electric torch cut through to the broken
+cabinet.
+
+The thing was withdrawn ... and with it went the slipper of the
+Prophet.
+
+“Raise the blinds!” cried Bristol. “Mr. Cavanagh! Mr. Mostyn! We must
+not let them give us the slip!”
+
+I got up the blind of the nearer window as Bristol raised the other.
+Not a living thing was in sight from either!
+
+Mostyn was beside me, his hand resting on my shoulder. I noted how he
+trembled. Bristol turned and looked back at us. The light from his
+pocket torch flashed upon the curator’s face; and I have never seen
+such an expression of horrified amazement as that which it wore.
+Faintly, I could hear the constable racing up the steps from the hall.
+
+Ideas of the supernatural came to us all, I know; when, with a
+scuffling sound not unlike that of a rat in a ceiling, something moved
+above us!
+
+“Damn my thick head!” roared Bristol, furiously. “He’s on the roof!
+It’s flat as a floor and there’s enough ivy alongside the water-spout
+on your house adjoining, Mr. Mostyn, to afford foothold to an invading
+army!”
+
+He plunged off toward the open door, and I heard him racing down the
+Assyrian Room.
+
+“He had a short rope ladder fixed from the gutter!” he cried back at
+us. “Graham! Graham!” (the constable on duty in the hall)—“Get the
+front door open! Get...” His voice died away as he leapt down the
+stairs.
+
+From the direction of Orpington Square came a horrid, choking scream.
+It rose hideously; it fell, rose again—and died.
+
+The thief escaped. We saw the traces upon the ivy where he had hastened
+down. Bristol ascended by the same route, and found where the
+ladder-hooks had twice been attached to the gutterway. Constable
+Graham, who was first actually to leave the building, declared that he
+heard the whirr of a re-started motor lower down Great Orchard Street.
+
+Bristol’s theory, later to be dreadfully substantiated, was that the
+thief had broken the glass and reached into the case with an
+arrangement similar to that employed for pruning trees, having a clutch
+at the end, worked with a cord.
+
+“Hassan has been too clever for us!” said the inspector. “But—what in
+God’s name did that awful screaming mean?”
+
+I had a theory, but I did not advance it then.
+
+It was not until nearly dawn that my theory, and Bristol’s, regarding
+the clutch arrangement, both were confirmed. For close under the
+railings which abut on Orpington Square, in a pool of blood we found
+just such an instrument as Bristol had described.
+
+And still clutching it was a pallid and ghastly shrunken hand that had
+been severed from above the wrist!
+
+“Merciful God!” whispered the inspector—“look at the opal ring on the
+finger! Look at the bandage where he cut himself on the broken
+window-glass that first night, when Mr. Mostyn disturbed him. It wasn’t
+the Hashishin who stole the thing.... It’s Earl Dexter’s hand!”
+
+No one spoke for a moment. Then—
+
+“Which of them has—” began Mostyn huskily.
+
+“The slipper of the Prophet?” interrupted Bristol. “I wonder if we
+shall ever know?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+A SHRIVELLED HAND
+
+
+Around a large square table in a room at New Scotland Yard stood a
+group of men, all of whom looked more or less continuously at something
+that lay upon the polished deal. One of the party, none other than the
+Commissioner himself, had just finished speaking, and in silence now we
+stood about the gruesome object which had furnished him with the text
+of his very terse address.
+
+I knew myself privileged in being admitted to such a conference at the
+C.I.D. headquarters and owed my admission partly to Inspector Bristol,
+and partly to the fact that under the will of the late Professor
+Deeping I was concerned in the uncanny business we were met to discuss.
+
+Novelty has a charm for every one; and to find oneself immersed in a
+maelstrom of Eastern devilry, with a group of scientific murderers in
+pursuit of a holy Moslem relic, and unexpectedly to be made a trustee
+of that dangerous curiosity, makes a certain appeal to the adventurous.
+But to read of such things and to participate in them are widely
+different matters. The slipper of the Prophet and the dreadful crimes
+connected with it, the mutilations, murders, the uncanny mysteries
+which made up its history, were filling my world with horror.
+
+Now, in silence we stood around that table at New Scotland Yard and
+watched, as though we expected it to move, the ghastly “clue” which lay
+there. It was a shrivelled human hand, and about the thumb and
+forefinger there still dryly hung a fragment of lint which had bandaged
+a jagged wound. On one of the shrunken fingers was a ring set with a
+large opal.
+
+Inspector Bristol broke the oppressive silence.
+
+“You see, sir,” he said, addressing the Commissioner, “this marks a new
+complication in the case. Up to this week although, unfortunately, we
+had made next to no progress, the thing was straightforward enough. A
+band of Eastern murderers, working along lines quite novel to Europe,
+were concealed somewhere in London. We knew that much. They murdered
+Professor Deeping, but failed to recover the slipper. They mutilated
+everyone who touched it mysteriously. The best men in the department,
+working night and day, failed to effect a single arrest. In spite of
+the mysterious activity of Hassan of Aleppo the slipper was safely
+lodged in the British Antiquarian Museum.”
+
+The Commissioner nodded thoughtfully.
+
+“There is no doubt,” continued Bristol, “that the Hashishin were
+watching the Museum. Mr. Cavanagh, here”—he nodded in my direction—“saw
+Hassan himself lurking in the neighbourhood. We took every precaution,
+observed the greatest secrecy; but in spite of it all a constable who
+touched the accursed thing lost his right hand. Then the slipper was
+taken.”
+
+He stopped, and all eyes again were turned to the table.
+
+“The Yard,” resumed Bristol slowly, “had information that Earl Dexter,
+the cleverest crook in America, was in England. He was seen in the
+Museum, and the night following the slipper was stolen. Then outside
+the place I found—that!”
+
+He pointed to the severed hand. No one spoke for a moment. Then—
+
+“The new problem,” said the Commissioner, “is this: who took the
+slipper, Dexter or Hassan of Aleppo?”
+
+“That’s it, sir,” agreed Bristol. “Dexter had two passages booked in
+the Oceanic: but he didn’t sail with her, and—that’s his hand!”
+
+“You say he has not been traced?” asked the Commissioner.
+
+“No doctor known to the Medical Association,” replied Bristol, “is
+attending him! He’s not in any of the hospitals. He has completely
+vanished. The conclusion is obvious!”
+
+“The evident deduction,” I said, “is that Dexter stole the slipper from
+the Museum—God knows with what purpose—and that Hassan of Aleppo
+recovered it from him.”
+
+“You think we shall next hear of Earl Dexter from the river police?”
+suggested Bristol.
+
+“Personally,” replied the Commissioner, “I agree with Mr. Cavanagh. I
+think Dexter is dead, and it is very probable that Hassan and Company
+are already homeward bound with the slipper of the Prophet.”
+
+With all my heart I hoped that he might be right, but an intuition was
+with me crying that he was wrong, that many bloody deeds would be, ere
+the sacred slipper should return to the East.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+THE DWARF
+
+
+The manner in which we next heard of the whereabouts of the Prophet’s
+slipper was utterly unforeseen, wildly dramatic. That the Hashishin
+were aware that I, though its legal trustee, no longer had charge of
+the relic nor knowledge of its resting-place, was sufficiently evident
+from the immunity which I enjoyed at this time from that ceaseless
+haunting by members of the uncanny organization ruled by Hassan. I had
+begun to feel more secure in my chambers, and no longer worked with a
+loaded revolver upon the table beside me. But the slightest unusual
+noise in the night still sufficed to arouse me and set me listening
+intently, to chill me with dread of what it might portend. In short, my
+nerves were by no means recovered from the ceaseless strain of the
+events connected with and arising out of the death of my poor friend,
+Professor Deeping.
+
+One evening as I sat at work in my chambers, with the throb of busy
+Fleet Street and its thousand familiar sounds floating in to me through
+the open windows, my phone bell rang.
+
+Even as I turned to take up the receiver a foreboding possessed me that
+my trusteeship was no longer to be a sinecure. It was Bristol who had
+rung me up, and upon very strange business.
+
+“A development at last!” he said; “but at present I don’t know what to
+make of it. Can you come down now?”
+
+“Where are you speaking from?”
+
+“From the Waterloo Road—a delightful neighbourhood. I shall be glad if
+you can meet me at the entrance to Wyatt’s Buildings in half an hour.”
+
+“What is it? Have you found Dexter?”
+
+“No, unfortunately. But it’s murder!”
+
+I knew as I hung up the receiver that my brief period of peace was
+ended; that the lists of assassination were reopened. I hurried out
+through the court into Fleet Street, thinking of the key of the now
+empty case at the Museum which reposed at my bankers, thinking of the
+devils who pursued the slipper, thinking of the hundred and one things,
+strange and terrible, which went to make up the history of that
+gruesome relic.
+
+Wyatt’s Buildings, Waterloo Road, are a gloomy and forbidding block of
+dwellings which seem to frown sullenly upon the high road, from which
+they are divided by a dark and dirty courtyard. Passing an iron
+gateway, you enter, by way of an arch, into this sinister place of
+uncleanness. Male residents in their shirt sleeves lounge against the
+several entrances. Bedraggled women nurse dirty infants and sit in
+groups upon the stone steps, rendering them almost impassable. But
+to-night a thing had happened in Wyatt’s Buildings which had awakened
+in the inhabitants, hardened to sordid crime, a sort of torpid
+interest.
+
+Faces peered from most of the windows which commanded a view of the
+courtyard, looking like pallid blotches against the darkness; but a
+number of police confined the loungers within their several doorways,
+so that the yard itself was comparatively clear.
+
+I had had some difficulty in forcing a way through the crowd which
+thronged the entrance, but finally I found myself standing beside
+Inspector Bristol and looking down upon that which had brought us both
+to Wyatt’s Buildings.
+
+There was no moon that night, and only the light of the lamp in the
+archway, with some faint glimmers from the stairways surrounding the
+court, reached the dirty paving. Bristol directed the light of a
+pocket-lamp upon the hunched-up figure which lay in the dust, and I saw
+it to be that of a dwarfish creature, yellow skinned and wearing only a
+dark loin cloth. He had a malformed and disproportionate head, a head
+that had been too large even for a big man. I knew after first glance
+that this was one of the horrible dwarfs employed by the Hashishin in
+their murderous business. It might even be the one who had killed
+Deeping; but this was impossible to determine by reason of the fact
+that the hideous, swollen head, together with the features, was
+completely crushed. I shall not describe the creature’s appearance in
+further detail.
+
+Having given me an opportunity to examine the dead dwarf, Bristol
+returned the electric lamp to his pocket and stood looking at me in the
+semi-gloom. A constable stood on duty quite near to us, and others
+guarded the archway and the doors to the dwellings. The murmur of
+subdued voices echoed hollowly in the wells of the staircases, and a
+constant excited murmur proceeded from the crowd at the entrance. No
+pressmen had yet been admitted, though numbers of them were at the
+gates.
+
+“It happened less than an hour ago,” said Bristol. “The place was much
+as you see it now, and from what I can gather there came the sound of a
+shot and several people saw the dwarf fall through the air and drop
+where he lies!”
+
+The light was insufficient to show the expression upon the speaker’s
+face, but his voice told of a great wonder.
+
+“It is a bit like an Indian conjuring trick,” I said, looking up to the
+sky above us; “who fired the shot?”
+
+“So far,” replied Bristol, “I have failed to find out; but there’s a
+bullet in the thing’s head. He was dead before he reached the
+pavement.”
+
+“Did no one see the flash of the pistol?”
+
+“No one that I have got hold of yet. Of course this kind of evidence is
+very unreliable; these people regularly go out of their way to mislead
+the police.”
+
+“You think the body may have been carried here from somewhere else?”
+
+“Oh, no; this is where it fell, right enough. You can see where his
+head struck the stones.”
+
+“He has not been moved at all?”
+
+“No; I shall not move him until I’ve worked out where in heaven’s name
+he can have fallen from! You and I have seen some mysterious things
+happen, Mr. Cavanagh, since the slipper of the Prophet came to England
+and brought these people”—he nodded toward the thing at our feet—“in
+its train; but this is the most inexplicable incident to date. I don’t
+know what to make of it at all. Quite apart from the question of where
+the dwarf fell from, who shot at him and why?”
+
+“Have you no theory?” I asked. “The incident to my mind points directly
+to one thing. We know that this uncanny creature belonged to the
+organization of Hassan of Aleppo. We know that Hassan implacably
+pursues one object—the slipper. In pursuit of the slipper, then, the
+dwarf came here. Bristol!”—I laid my hand upon his arm, glancing about
+me with a very real apprehension—“the slipper must be somewhere near!”
+
+Bristol turned to the constable standing hard by.
+
+“Remain here,” he ordered. Then to me: “I should like you to come up on
+to the roof. From there we can survey the ground and perhaps arrive at
+some explanation of how the dwarf came to fall upon that spot.”
+
+Passing the constable on duty at one of the doorways and making our way
+through the group of loiterers there, we ascended amid conflicting
+odours to the topmost floor. A ladder was fixed against the wall
+communicating with a trap in the ceiling. Several individuals in their
+shirt sleeves and all smoking clay pipes had followed us up. Bristol
+turned upon them.
+
+“Get downstairs,” he said—“all the lot of you, and stop there!”
+
+With muttered imprecations our audience dispersed, slowly returning by
+the way they had come. Bristol mounted the ladder and opened the trap.
+Through the square opening showed a velvet patch spangled with starry
+points. As he passed up on to the roof and I followed him, the
+comparative cleanness of the air was most refreshing after the varied
+fumes of the staircase.
+
+Side by side we leaned upon the parapet looking down into the dirty
+courtyard which was the theatre of this weird mystery; looking down
+upon the stage, sordidly Western, where a mystic Eastern tragedy had
+been enacted.
+
+I could see the constable standing beside the crushed thing upon the
+stones.
+
+“Now,” said Bristol, with a sort of awe in his voice, “where did he
+fall from?”
+
+And at his words, looking down at the spot where the dwarf lay, and
+noting that he could not possibly have fallen there from any of the
+buildings surrounding the courtyard, an eerie sensation crept over me;
+for I was convinced that the happening was susceptible of no natural
+explanation.
+
+I had heard—who has not heard?—of the Indian rope trick, where a fakir
+throws a rope into the air which remains magically suspended whilst a
+boy climbs upward and upward until he disappears into space. I had
+never credited accounts of the performance; but now I began seriously
+to wonder if the arts of Hassan of Aleppo were not as great or greater
+than the arts of fakir. But the crowning mystery to my mind was that of
+the Hashishin’s death. It would seem that as he had hung suspended in
+space he had been shot!
+
+“You say that someone heard the sound of the shot?” I asked suddenly.
+
+“Several people,” replied Bristol; “but no one knows, or no one will
+say, from what direction it came. I shall go on with the inquiry, of
+course, and cross-examine every soul in Wyatt’s Buildings. Meanwhile,
+I’m open to confess that I am beaten.”
+
+In the velvet sky countless points blazed tropically. The hum of the
+traffic in Waterloo Road reached us only in a muffled way. Sordidness
+lay beneath us, but up there under the heavens we seemed removed from
+it as any Babylonian astronomer communing with the stars.
+
+When, some ten minutes later, I passed out into the noise of Waterloo
+Road, I left behind me an unsolved mystery and took with me a great
+dread; for I knew that the quest of the sacred slipper was not ended, I
+knew that another tragedy was added to its history—and I feared to
+surmise what the future might hold for all of us.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVII
+THE WOMAN WITH THE BASKET
+
+
+Deep in thought respecting the inexplicable nature of this latest
+mystery, I turned in the direction of the bridge, and leaving behind me
+an ever-swelling throng at the gate of Wyatt’s Buildings, proceeded
+westward.
+
+The death of the dwarf had lifted the case into the realms of the
+marvellous, and I noted nothing of the bustle about me, for mentally I
+was still surveying that hunched-up body which had fallen out of empty
+space.
+
+Then in upon my preoccupation burst a woman’s scream!
+
+I aroused myself from reverie, looking about to right and left.
+Evidently I had been walking slowly, for I was less than a hundred
+yards from Wyatt’s Buildings, and hard by the entrance to an uninviting
+alley from which I thought the scream had proceeded.
+
+And as I hesitated, for I had no desire to become involved in a drunken
+brawl, again came the shrill scream: “Help! help!”
+
+I cannot say if I was the only passer-by who heard the cry; certainly I
+was the only one who responded to it. I ran down the narrow street,
+which was practically deserted, and heard windows thrown up as I passed
+for the cries for help continued.
+
+Just beyond a patch of light cast by a street lamp a scene was being
+enacted strange enough at any time and in any place, but doubly
+singular at that hour of the night, or early morning, in a lane off the
+Waterloo Road.
+
+An old woman, from whose hand a basket of provisions had fallen, was
+struggling in the grasp of a tall Oriental! He was evidently trying to
+stifle her screams and at the same time to pinion her arms behind her!
+
+I perceived that there was more in this scene than met the eye.
+Oriental footpads are rarities in the purlieus of Waterloo Road. So
+much was evident; and since I carried a short, sharp argument in my
+pocket, I hastened to advance it.
+
+At the sight of the gleaming revolver barrel the man, who was dressed
+in dark clothes and wore a turban, turned and ran swiftly off. I had
+scarce a glimpse of his pallid brown face ere he was gone, nor did the
+thought of pursuit enter my mind. I turned to the old woman, who was
+dressed in shabby black and who was rearranging her thick veil in an
+oddly composed manner, considering the nature of the adventure that had
+befallen her.
+
+She picked up her basket, and turned away. Needless to say I was rather
+shocked at her callous ingratitude, for she offered no word of thanks,
+did not even glance in my direction, but made off hurriedly toward
+Waterloo Road.
+
+I had been on the point of inquiring if she had sustained any injury,
+but I checked the words and stood looking after her in blank
+wonderment. Then my ideas were diverted into a new channel. I
+perceived, as she passed under an adjacent lamp, that her basket
+contained provisions such as a woman of her appearance would scarcely
+be expected to purchase. I noted a bottle of wine, a chicken, and a
+large melon.
+
+The nationality of the assailant from the first had marked the affair
+for no ordinary one, and now a hazy notion of what lay behind all this
+began to come to me.
+
+Keeping well in the shadows on the opposite side of the way, I followed
+the woman with the basket. The lane was quite deserted; for, the
+disturbance over, those few residents who had raised their windows had
+promptly lowered them again. She came out into Waterloo Road, crossed
+over, and stood waiting by a stopping-place for electric cars. I saw
+her arranging a cloth over her basket in such a way as effectually to
+conceal the contents. A strong mental excitement possessed me. The
+detective fever claims us all at one time or another, I think, and I
+had good reason for pursuing any inquiry that promised to lead to the
+elucidation of the slipper mystery. A theory, covering all the facts of
+the assault incident, now presented itself, and I stood back in the
+shadow, watchful; in a degree, exultant.
+
+A Greenwich-bound car was hailed by the woman with the basket. I could
+not be mistaken, I felt sure, in my belief that she cast furtive
+glances about her as she mounted the steps. But, having seen her
+actually aboard, my attention became elsewhere engaged.
+
+All now depended upon securing a cab before the tram car had passed
+from view!
+
+I counted it an act of Providence that a disengaged taxi appeared at
+that moment, evidently bound for Waterloo Station. I ran out into the
+road with cane upraised.
+
+As the man drew up—
+
+“Quick!” I cried. “You see that Greenwich car—nearly at the Ophthalmic
+Hospital? Follow it. Don’t get too near. I will give you further
+instructions through the tube.” I leapt in. We were off!
+
+The rocking car ahead was rounding the bend now toward St. George’s
+Circus. As it passed the clock and entered South London Road it
+stopped. I raised the tube.
+
+“Pass it slowly!”
+
+We skirted the clock tower, and bore around to the right. Then I drew
+well back in the corner of the cab.
+
+The woman with the basket was descending! “Pull up a few yards beyond!”
+I directed. As the car re-started, and passed us, the taxi became
+stationary. I peered out of the little window at the back.
+
+The woman was returning in the direction of Waterloo Road!
+
+“Drive slowly back along Waterloo Road,” was my next order. “Pretend
+you are looking for a fare; I will keep out of sight.”
+
+The man nodded. It was unlikely that any one would notice the fact that
+the cab was engaged.
+
+I was borne back again upon my course. The woman kept to the right,
+and, once we were entered into the straight road which leads to the
+bridge, I again raised the speaking-tube.
+
+“Pull up,” I said. “On the right-hand side is an old woman carrying a
+basket, fifty yards ahead. Do you see her? Keep well behind, but don’t
+lose sight of her.”
+
+The man drew up again and sat watching the figure with the basket until
+it was almost lost from sight. Then slowly we resumed our way. I would
+have continued the pursuit afoot now, but I feared that my quarry might
+again enter a vehicle. She did not do so, however, but coming abreast
+of the turning in which the mysterious assault had taken place, she
+crossed the road and disappeared from view.
+
+I leapt out of the cab, thrust half a crown into the man’s hand, and
+ran on to the corner. The night was now far advanced, and I knew that
+the chances of detection were thereby increased. But the woman seemed
+to have abandoned her fears, and I saw her just ahead of me walking
+resolutely past the lamp beyond which a short time earlier she had met
+with a dangerous adventure.
+
+Since the opposite side of the street was comparatively in darkness, I
+slipped across, and in a state of high nervous tension pursued this
+strange work of espionage. I was convinced that I had forestalled
+Bristol and that I was hot upon the track of those who could explain
+the mystery of the dead dwarf.
+
+The woman entered the gate of the block of dwellings even more
+forbidding in appearance than those which that night had staged a
+dreadful drama.
+
+As the figure with the basket was lost from view I crept on, and in
+turn entered the evil-smelling hallway. I stepped cautiously, and
+standing beneath a gaslight protected by a wire frame, I congratulated
+myself upon having reached that point of vantage as silently as any
+Sioux stalker.
+
+Footsteps were receding up the stone stairs. Craning my neck, I peered
+up the well of the staircase. I could not see the woman, but from the
+sound of her tread it was possible to count the landings which she
+passed. When she had reached the fourth, and I heard her step upon yet
+another flight, I knew that she must be bound for the topmost floor;
+and observing every precaution, almost holding my breath in a nervous
+endeavour to make not the slightest sound, rapidly I mounted the
+stairs.
+
+I was come to the third landing in this secret fashion when quite
+distinctly I heard the grating of a key in a lock!
+
+Since four doors opened upon each of the landings, at all costs, I
+thought, I must learn by which door she entered.
+
+Throwing caution to the winds I raced up the remaining flights ... and
+there at the top the woman confronted me, with blazing eyes!—with eyes
+that thrilled every nerve; for they were violet eyes, the only truly
+violet eyes I have ever seen! They were the eyes of the woman who like
+a charming, mocking will-o’-the-wisp had danced through this tragic
+scene from the time that poor Professor Deeping had brought the
+Prophet’s slipper to London up to this present hour!
+
+There at the head of those stone steps in that common dwelling-house I
+knew her—and in the violet eyes it was written that she knew, and
+feared, me!
+
+“What do you want? Why are you following me?”
+
+She made no endeavour to disguise her voice. Almost, I think, she spoke
+the words involuntarily.
+
+I stood beside her. Quickly as she had turned from the door at my
+ascent, I had noted that it was that numbered forty-eight which she had
+been about to open.
+
+“You waste words,” I said grimly. “Who lives there?”
+
+I nodded in the direction of the doorway. The violet eyes watched me
+with an expression in their depths which I find myself wholly unable to
+describe. Fear predominated, but there was anger, too, and with it a
+sort of entreaty which almost made me regret that I had taken this task
+upon myself. From beneath the shabby black hat escaped an errant lock
+of wavy hair wholly inconsistent with the assumed appearance of the
+woman. The flickering gaslight on the landing sought out in that
+wonderful hair shades which seemed to glow with the soft light seen in
+the heart of a rose. The thick veil was raised now and all attempts at
+deception abandoned. At bay she faced me, this secret woman whom I knew
+to hold the key to some of the darkest places which we sought to
+explore.
+
+“I live there,” she said slowly. “What do you want with me?”
+
+“I want to know,” I replied, “for whom are those provisions in your
+basket?”
+
+She watched me fixedly.
+
+“And I want to know,” I continued, “something that only you can tell
+me. We have met before, madam, but you have always eluded me. This time
+you shall not do so. There’s much I have to ask of you, but
+particularly I want to know who killed the Hashishin who lies dead at
+no great distance from here!”
+
+“How can I tell you that? Of what are you speaking?”
+
+Her voice was low and musical; that of a cultured woman. She evidently
+recognized the futility of further subterfuge in this respect.
+
+“You know quite well of what I am speaking! You know that you can tell
+me if any one can! The fact that you go disguised alone condemns you!
+Why should I remind you of our previous meetings—of the links which
+bind you to the history of the Prophet’s slipper?” She shuddered and
+closed her eyes. “Your present attitude is a sufficient admission!”
+
+She stood silent before me, with something pitiful in her pose—a
+wonderfully pretty woman, whose disarranged hair and dilapidated hat
+could not mar her beauty; whose clumsy, ill-fitting garments could not
+conceal her lithe grace.
+
+Our altercation had not thus far served to arouse any of the
+inhabitants and on that stuffy landing, beneath the flickering
+gaslight, we stood alone, a group of two which epitomized strange
+things.
+
+Then, with that quietly dramatic note which marks real life entrances
+and differentiates them from the loudly acclaimed episodes of the
+stage, a third actor took up his cue.
+
+“Both hands, Mr. Cavanagh!” directed an American voice.
+
+Nerves atwitch, I started around in its direction.
+
+From behind the slightly opened door of No. 48 protruded a steel
+barrel, pointed accurately at my head!
+
+I hesitated, glancing from the woman toward the open door.
+
+“Do it quick!” continued the voice incisively. “You are up against a
+desperate man, Mr. Cavanagh. Raise your hands. Carneta, relieve Mr.
+Cavanagh of his gun!”
+
+Instantly the girl, with deft fingers, had obtained possession of my
+revolver.
+
+“Step inside,” said the crisp, strident voice. Knowing myself helpless
+and quite convinced that I was indeed in the clutches of desperate
+people, I entered the doorway, the door being held open from within.
+She whom I had heard called Carneta followed. The door was reclosed;
+and I found myself in a perfectly bare and dim passageway. From behind
+me came the order—
+
+“Go right ahead!”
+
+Into a practically unfurnished room, lighted by one gas jet, I walked.
+Some coarse matting hung before the two windows and a fairly large grip
+stood on the floor against one wall. A gas-ring was in the hearth,
+together with a few cheap cooking utensils.
+
+
+I turned and faced the door. First entered Carneta, carrying the
+basket; then came a man with a revolver in his left hand and his right
+arm strapped across his chest and swathed in bandages. One glance
+revealed the fact that his right hand had been severed—revealed the
+fact, though I knew it already, that my captor was Earl Dexter.
+
+He looked even leaner than when I had last seen him. I had no doubt
+that his ghastly wound had occasioned a tremendous loss of blood. His
+gaunt face was positively emaciated, but the steely gray eyes had lost
+nothing of their brightness. There was a good deal about Mr. Earl
+Dexter, the cracksman, that any man must have admired.
+
+“Shut the door, Carneta,” he said quietly. His companion closed the
+door and Dexter sat down on the grip, regarding me with his oddly
+humorous smile.
+
+“You’re a visitor I did not expect, Mr. Cavanagh,” he said. “I expected
+someone worse. You’ve interfered a bit with my plans but I don’t know
+that I can’t rearrange things satisfactorily. I don’t think I’ll stop
+for supper, though—” He glanced at the girl, who stood silent by the
+door.
+
+“Just pack up the provisions,” he directed, nodding toward the
+basket—“in the next room.”
+
+She departed without a word.
+
+“That’s a noticeable dust coat you’re wearing, Mr. Cavanagh,” said the
+American; “it gives me a great notion. I’m afraid I’ll have to borrow
+it.”
+
+He glanced, smiling, at the revolver in his left hand and back again to
+me. There was nothing of the bully about him, nothing melodramatic; but
+I took off the coat without demur and threw it across to him.
+
+“It will hide this stump,” he said grimly; “and any of the Hashishin
+gentlemen who may be on the look-out—though I rather fancy the road is
+clear at the moment—will mistake me for you. See the idea? Carneta will
+be in a cab and I’ll be in after her and away before they’ve got time
+to so much as whistle.”
+
+Very awkwardly he got into the coat.
+
+“She’s a clever girl, Carneta,” he said. “She’s doctored me all along
+since those devils cut my hand off.”
+
+As he finished speaking Carneta returned.
+
+She had discarded her rags and wore a large travelling coat and a
+fashionable hat.
+
+“Ready?” asked Dexter. “We’ll make a rush for it. We meant to go
+to-night anyway. It’s getting too hot here!” He turned to me.
+
+“Sorry to say,” he drawled, “I’ll have to tie you up and gag you.
+Apologize; but it can’t be helped.”
+
+Carneta nodded and went out of the room again, to return almost
+immediately with a line that looked as though it might have been
+employed for drying washing.
+
+“Hands behind you,” rapped Dexter, toying with the revolver—“and think
+yourself lucky you’ve got two!”
+
+There was no mistaking the manner of man with whom I had to deal, and I
+obeyed; but my mind was busy with a hundred projects. Very neatly the
+girl bound my wrists, and in response to a slight nod from Dexter threw
+the end of the line up over a beam in the sloping ceiling, for the room
+was right under the roof, and drew it up in such a way that, my wrists
+being raised behind me, I became utterly helpless. It was an ingenious
+device indicating considerable experience.
+
+“Just tie his handkerchief around his mouth,” directed Dexter: “that
+will keep him quiet long enough for our purpose. I hope you will be
+released soon, Mr. Cavanagh,” he added. “Greatly regret the necessity.”
+
+Carneta bound the handkerchief over my mouth.
+
+Dexter extinguished the gas.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh,” he said, “I’ve gone through hell and I’ve lost the most
+useful four fingers and a thumb in the United States to get hold of the
+Prophet’s slipper. Any one can have it that’s open to pay for it—but
+I’ve got to retire on the deal, so I’ll drive a hard bargain!
+Good-night!”
+
+There was a sound of retreating footsteps, and I heard the entrance
+door close quietly.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVIII
+WHAT CAME THROUGH THE WINDOW
+
+
+I had not been in my unnatural position for many minutes before I began
+to suffer agonies, agonies not only physical but mental; for standing
+there like some prisoner of the Inquisition, it came to me how this
+dismantled apartment must be the focus of the dreadful forces of Hassan
+of Aleppo!
+
+That Earl Dexter had the slipper of the Prophet I no longer doubted,
+and that he had sustained, in this dwelling beneath the roof, an
+uncanny siege during the days which had passed since the theft from the
+Antiquarian Museum, was equally certain. Helpless, gagged, I pictured
+those hideous creatures, evil products of the secret East, who might,
+nay, who must surround that place! I thought of the horrible little
+yellow man who lay dead in Wyatt’s Buildings; and it became evident to
+me that the house in which I was now imprisoned must overlook the back
+of those unsavoury tenements. The windows, sack-covered now, no doubt
+commanded a view of the roofs of the buildings. One of the mysteries
+that had puzzled us was solved. It was Earl Dexter who had shot the
+yellow dwarf as he was bound for this very room! But how humanly the
+Hashishin had proposed to gain his goal, how he had travelled through
+empty space—for from empty space the shot had brought him down—I could
+not imagine.
+
+I knew something of the almost supernatural attributes of these people.
+From Professor Deeping’s book I knew of the incredible feats which they
+could perform when under the influence of the drug hashish. From
+personal experience also I knew that they had powers wholly abnormal.
+
+The pain in my arms and back momentarily increased. An awesome silence
+ruled. I tortured myself with pictures of murderous yellow men
+possessed of the power claimed by the Mahatmas, of levitation. Mentally
+I could see a distorted half-animal creature carrying a great gleaming
+knife and floating supernaturally toward me through the night!
+
+A soft pattering sound became perceptible on the sloping roof above!
+
+I think I have never known such intense and numbing fear as that which
+now descended upon me. Perhaps I may be forgiven it. A more dreadful
+situation it would be hard to devise. Knowing that I was on the fifth
+story of a house, bound, helpless, I knew, too, that a second mystic
+guardian of the slipper was come to accomplish the task in which the
+first had failed!
+
+I began to pray fervently.
+
+Neither of the windows were closed; and now through the intense
+darkness I heard one of them being raised up—up—up...
+
+The sacking was pulled aside inch by inch.
+
+Silhouetted against the faintly luminous background I saw a hunched,
+unnatural figure. The real was more dreadful even than the
+imaginary—for some stray beam of light touched into cold radiance a
+huge curved knife which the visitant held between his teeth!
+
+My fear became a madness, and I twisted my body violently in a wild
+endeavour to free myself. A dreadful pain shot through my left
+shoulder, and the whole nightmare scene—the thing with the knife at the
+window—the low-ceiled room-began to fade away from me. I seemed to be
+falling into deep water.
+
+A splintering crash and the sound of shouting formed my last
+recollections ere unconsciousness came.
+
+I found myself lying in an armchair with Bristol forcing brandy between
+my lips. My left arm hung limply at my side and the pain in my
+dislocated shoulder was excruciating.
+
+“Thank God you are all right, Mr. Cavanagh!” said the inspector. “I got
+the surprise of my life when we smashed the door in and found you tied
+up here!”
+
+“You came none too soon,” I said feebly. “God knows how Providence
+directed you here.”
+
+“Providence it was,” replied Bristol. “From the roof of Wyatt’s
+Buildings—you know the spot?—I saw the second yellow devil coming. By
+God! They meant to have it to-night! They don’t value their lives a
+brass farthing against that damned slipper!”
+
+“But how—”
+
+“Along the telegraph-wires, Mr. Cavanagh! They cross Wyatt’s Buildings
+and cross this house. It was a moonless night or we should have seen it
+at once! I watched him, saw him drop to this roof—and brought the men
+around to the front.”
+
+“Did he, that awful thing, escape?”
+
+“He dropped full forty feet into a tree—from the tree to the ground,
+and went off like a cat!”
+
+“Earl Dexter has escaped us,” I said, “and he has the slipper!”
+
+“God help him!” replied Bristol. “For by now he has that hell-pack at
+his heels! What a case! Heavens above, it will drive me mad!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIX
+A RAPPING AT MIDNIGHT
+
+
+Inspector Bristol finished his whisky at a gulp and stood up, a tall,
+massive figure, stretching himself and yawning.
+
+“The detective of fiction would be hard at work on this case, now,” he
+said, smiling, “but I don’t even pretend to be. I am at a standstill
+and I don’t care who knows it.”
+
+“You have absolutely no clue to the whereabouts of Earl Dexter?”
+
+“Not the slightest, Mr. Cavanagh. You hear a lot about the machinery of
+the law, but as a matter of fact, looking for a clever man hidden in
+London is a good deal like looking for a needle in a haystack. Then, he
+may have been bluffing when he told you he had the Prophet’s slipper.
+He’s already had his hand cut off through interfering with the beastly
+thing, and I really can’t believe he would take further chances by
+keeping it in his possession. Nevertheless, I should like to find him.”
+
+He leaned back against the mantelpiece, scratching his head
+perplexedly. In this perplexity he had my sympathy. No such pursuit, I
+venture to say, had ever before been required of Scotland Yard as this
+of the slipper of the Prophet. An organization founded in 1090, which
+has made a science of assassination, which through the centuries has
+perfected the malign arts, which, lingering on in a dark spot in Syria,
+has suddenly migrated and established itself in London, is a
+proposition almost unthinkable.
+
+It was hard to believe that even the daring American cracksman should
+have ventured to touch that blood-stained relic of the Prophet, that he
+should have snatched it away from beneath the very eyes of the fanatics
+who fiercely guarded it. What he hoped to gain by his possession of the
+slipper was not evident, but the fact remained that if he could be
+believed, he had it, and provided Scotland Yard’s information was
+accurate, he still lurked in hiding somewhere in London.
+
+Meanwhile, no clue offered to his hiding-place, and despite the
+ceaseless vigilance of the men acting under Bristol’s orders, no trace
+could be found of Hassan of Aleppo nor of his fiendish associates.
+
+“My theory is,” said Bristol, lighting a cigarette, “that even Dexter’s
+cleverness has failed to save him. He’s probably a dead man by now,
+which accounts for our failing to find him; and Hassan of Aleppo has
+recovered the slipper and returned to the East, taking his gruesome
+company with him—God knows how! But that accounts for our failing to
+find him.”
+
+I stood up rather wearily. Although poor Deeping had appointed me legal
+guardian of the relic, and although I could render but a poor account
+of my stewardship, let me confess that I was anxious to take that
+comforting theory to my bosom. I would have given much to have known
+beyond any possibility of doubt that the accursed slipper and its
+blood-lustful guardian were far away from England. Had I known so much,
+life would again have had something to offer me besides ceaseless fear,
+endless watchings. I could have slept again, perhaps; without awaking,
+clammy, peering into every shadow, listening, nerves atwitch to each
+slightest sound disturbing the night; without groping beneath the
+pillow for my revolver.
+
+“Then you think,” I said, “that the English phase of the slipper’s
+history is closed? You think that Dexter, minus his right hand, has
+eluded British law—that Hassan and Company have evaded retribution?”
+
+“I do!” said Bristol grimly, “and although that means the biggest
+failure in my professional career, I am glad—damned glad!”
+
+Shortly afterward he took his departure; and I leaned from the window,
+watching him pass along the court below and out under the arch into
+Fleet Street. He was a man whose opinions I valued, and in all
+sincerity I prayed now that he might be right; that the surcease of
+horror which we had recently experienced after the ghastly tragedies
+which had clustered thick about the haunted slipper, might mean what he
+surmised it to mean.
+
+The heat to-night was very oppressive. A sort of steaming mist seemed
+to rise from the court, and no cooling breeze entered my opened
+windows. The clamour of the traffic in Fleet Street came to me but
+remotely. Big Ben began to strike midnight. So far as I could see,
+residents on the other stairs were all abed and a velvet shadow carpet
+lay unbroken across three parts of the court. The sky was tropically
+perfect, cloudless, and jewelled lavishly. Indeed, we were in the midst
+of an Indian summer; it seemed that the uncanny visitants had brought,
+together with an atmosphere of black Eastern deviltry, something, too,
+of the Eastern climate.
+
+The last stroke of the Cathedral bell died away. Other more distant
+bells still were sounding dimly, but save for the ceaseless hum of the
+traffic, no unusual sound now disturbed the archaic peace of the court.
+
+I returned to my table, for during the time that had passed I had badly
+neglected my work and now must often labour far into the night. I was
+just reseated when there came a very soft rapping at the outer door!
+
+No doubt my mood was in part responsible, but I found myself thinking
+of Poe’s weird poem, “The Raven”; and like the character therein I
+found myself hesitating.
+
+I stole quietly into the passage. It was in darkness. How odd it is
+that in moments of doubt instinctively one shuns the dark and seeks the
+light. I pressed the switch lighting the hall lamp, and stood looking
+at the closed door.
+
+Why should this late visitor have rapped in so uncanny a fashion in
+preference to ringing the bell?
+
+I stepped back to my table and slipped a revolver into my pocket.
+
+The muffled rapping was repeated. As I stood in the study doorway I saw
+the flap of the letter-box slowly raised!
+
+Instantly I extinguished both lights. You may brand me as childishly
+timid, but incidents were fresh in my memory which justified all my
+fears.
+
+A faintly luminous slit in the door showed me that the flap was now
+fully raised. It was the dim light on the stairway shining through.
+Then quite silently the flap was lowered. Came the soft rapping again.
+
+“Who’s there?” I cried.
+
+No one answered.
+
+Wondering if I were unduly alarming myself, yet, I confess, strung up
+tensely in anticipation that this was some device of the phantom enemy,
+I stood in doubt.
+
+The silence remained unbroken for thirty seconds or more. Then yet
+again it was disturbed by that ghostly, muffled rapping.
+
+I advanced a step nearer to the door.
+
+“Who’s there?” I cried loudly. “What do you want?”
+
+The flap of the letter box began to move, and I formed a sudden
+determination. Making no sound in my heelless Turkish slippers I crept
+close up to the door and dropped upon my knees.
+
+Thereupon the flap became fully lifted, but from where I crouched
+beneath it I was unable to see who or what was looking in; yet I
+hesitated no longer. I suddenly raised myself and thrust the revolver
+barrel through the opening!
+
+“Who are you?” I cried. “Answer or I fire!”—and along the barrel I
+peered out on to the landing.
+
+Still no one answered. But something impalpable—a powder—a vapour—to
+this hour I do not know what—enveloped me with its nauseating fumes;
+was puffed fully into my face! My eyes, my mouth, my nostrils became
+choked up, it seemed, with a deadly stifling perfume.
+
+Wildly, feeling that everything about me was slipping away, that I was
+sinking into a void, for ought I knew that of dissolution, I pulled the
+trigger once, twice, thrice...
+
+“My God!”—the words choked in my throat and I reeled back into the
+passage—“it’s not loaded!”
+
+I threw up my arms to save myself, lurched, and fell forward into what
+seemed a bottomless pit.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XX
+THE GOLDEN PAVILION
+
+
+When I opened my eyes it was to a conviction that I dreamed. I lay upon
+a cushioned divan in a small apartment which I find myself at a loss
+adequately to describe.
+
+It was a yellow room, then, its four walls being hung with yellow silk,
+its floor being entirely covered by a yellow Persian carpet. One lamp,
+burning in a frame of some lemon coloured wood and having its openings
+filled with green glass, flooded the place with a ghastly illumination.
+The lamp hung by gold chains from the ceiling, which was yellow.
+Several low tables of the same lemon-hued wood as the lamp-frame stood
+around; they were inlaid in fanciful designs with gleaming green
+stones. Turn my eyes where I would, clutch my aching head as I might,
+this dream chamber would not disperse, but remained palpable before
+me—yellow and green and gold.
+
+There was a niche behind the divan upon which I lay framed about with
+yellow wood. In it stood a golden bowl and a tall pot of yellow
+porcelain; I lay amid yellow cushions having golden tassels. Some of
+them were figured with vivid green devices.
+
+To contemplate my surroundings assuredly must be to court madness. No
+door was visible, no window; nothing but silk and luxury, yellow and
+green and gold.
+
+To crown all, the air was heavy with a perfume wholly unmistakable by
+one acquainted with Egypt’s ruling vice. It was the reek of smouldering
+hashish—a stench that seemed to take me by the throat, a vapour
+damnable and unclean. I saw that a little censer, golden in colour and
+inset with emeralds, stood upon the furthermost corner of the yellow
+carpet. From it rose a faint streak of vapour; and I followed the
+course of the sickly scented smoke upward through the still air until
+in oily spirals it lost itself near to the yellow ceiling. As a sick
+man will study the veriest trifle I studied that wisp of smoke,
+pencilled grayly against the silken draperies, the carven tables,
+against the almost terrifying persistency of the yellow and green and
+gold.
+
+I strove to rise, but was overcome by vertigo and sank back again upon
+the yellow cushions. I closed my eyes, which throbbed and burned, and
+rested my head upon my hands. I ceased to conjecture if I dreamed or
+was awake. I knew that I felt weak and ill, that my head throbbed
+agonizingly, that my eyes smarted so as to render it almost impossible
+to keep them open, that a ceaseless humming was in my ears.
+
+For some time I lay endeavouring to regain command of myself, to
+prepare to face again that scene which had something horrifying in its
+yellowness, touched with the green and gold.
+
+And when finally I reopened my eyes, I sat up with a suppressed cry.
+For a tall figure in a yellow robe from beneath which peeped yellow
+slippers, a figure crowned with a green turban, stood in the centre of
+the apartment!
+
+It was that of a majestic old man, white bearded, with aquiline nose,
+and the fierce eagle eyes of a fanatic set upon me sternly,
+reprovingly.
+
+With folded arms he stood watching me, and I drew a sharp breath and
+rose slowly to my feet.
+
+There amid the yellow and green and gold, amid the abominable reek of
+burning hashish I stood and faced Hassan of Aleppo!
+
+No words came to me; I was confounded.
+
+Hassan spoke in that gentle voice which I had heard only once before.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh,” he said, “I have brought you here that I might warn
+you. Your police are seeking me night and day, and I am fully alive to
+my danger whilst I stay in your midst. But for close upon a thousand
+years the Sheikh-al-jebal, Lord of the Hashishin, has guarded the
+traditions and the relics of the Prophet, Salla-’llahu ’ale yhi
+wasellem! I, Hassan of Aleppo, am Sheikh of the Order to-day, and my
+sacred duty has brought me here.”
+
+The piercing gaze never left my face. I was not yet by any means my own
+man and still I made no reply.
+
+“You have been wise,” continued Hassan, “in that you have never touched
+the sacred slipper. Had you lain hands upon it, no secrecy could have
+availed you. The eye of the Hashishin sees all. There is a shaft of
+light which the true Believer perceives at night as he travels toward
+El-Medineh. It is the light which uprises, a spiritual fire, from the
+tomb of the Prophet (Salla-’llahu ’aleyhi wasellem!). The relics also
+are radiant, though in a lesser degree.”
+
+He took a step toward me, spreading out his lean brown hands, palms
+downward.
+
+“A shaft of light,” he said impressively, “shines upward now from
+London. It is the light of the holy slipper.” He gazed intently at the
+yellow drapery at the left of the divan, but as though he were looking
+not at the wall but through it. His features worked convulsively; he
+was a man inspired. “I see it now!” he almost whispered—“that white
+light by which the guardians of the relic may always know its resting
+place!”
+
+I managed to force words to my lips.
+
+“If you know where the slipper is,” I said, more for the sake of
+talking than for anything else, “why do you not recover it?”
+
+Hassan turned his eyes upon me again.
+
+“Because the infidel dog,” he cried loudly, “who has soiled it with his
+unclean touch, defies us—mocks us! He has suffered the loss of the
+offending hand, but the evil ginn protect him; he is inspired by
+efreets! But God is great and Mohammed is His only Prophet! We shall
+triumph; but it is written, oh, daring infidel, that you again shall
+become the guardian of the slipper!”
+
+He spoke like some prophet of old and I stared at him fascinated. I was
+loth to believe his words.
+
+“When again,” he continued, “the slipper shall be in the receptacle of
+which you hold the key, that key must be given to me!”
+
+I thought I saw the drift of his words now; I thought I perceived with
+what object I had been trapped and borne to this mysterious abode for
+whose whereabouts the police vainly were seeking. By the exercise of
+the gift of divination it would seem that Hassan of Aleppo had forecast
+the future history of the accursed slipper or believed that he had done
+so. According to his own words I was doomed once more to become trustee
+of the relic. The key of the case at the Antiquarian Museum, to which
+he had prophesied the slipper’s return, would be the price of my life!
+But—
+
+“In order that these things may be fulfilled,” he continued, “I must
+permit you to return to your house. So it is written, so it shall be.
+Your life is in my hands; beware when it is demanded of you that you
+hesitate not in yielding up the key!”
+
+He raised his hands before him, making a sort of obeisance, I doubt not
+in the direction of Mecca, drew aside one of the yellow hangings behind
+him and disappeared, leaving me alone again in that nightmare apartment
+of yellow and green and gold. A moment I stood watching the swaying
+curtain. Utter silence reigned, and a sort of panic seized me
+infinitely greater than that occasioned by the presence of the weird
+Sheikh. I felt that I must escape from the place or that I should
+become raving mad.
+
+I leapt forward to the curtain which Hassan had raised and jerked it
+aside; it had concealed a door. In this door and about level with my
+eyes was a kind of little barred window through which shone a dim green
+light. I bent forward, peering into the place beyond, but was unable to
+perceive anything save a vague greenness.
+
+And as I peered, half believing that the whole episode was a dreadful,
+fevered dream, the abominable fumes of hashish grew, or seemed to grow,
+quite suddenly insupportable. Through the square opening, from the
+green void beyond, a cloud of oily vapour, pungent, stifling,
+resembling that of burning Indian hemp, poured out and enveloped me!
+
+With a gasping cry I fell back, fighting for breath, for a breath of
+clean air unpolluted with hashish. But every inhalation drew down into
+my lungs the fumes that I sought to escape from. I experienced a
+deathly sickness; I seemed to be sinking into a sea of hashish, amid
+bubbles of yellow and green and gold, and I knew no more until,
+struggling again to my feet, surrounded by utter darkness—I struck my
+head on the corner of my writing-table ... for I lay in my own study!
+
+My revolver, unloaded, was upon the table beside me. The night was very
+still. I think it must have been near to dawn.
+
+“My God!” I whispered, “did I dream it all? Did I dream it all?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXI
+THE BLACK TUBE
+
+
+“There’s no doubt in my mind,” said Inspector Bristol, “that your
+experience was real enough.”
+
+The sun was shining into my room now, but could not wholly disperse the
+cloud of horror which lay upon it. That I had been drugged was
+sufficiently evident from my present condition, and that I had been
+taken away from my chambers Inspector Bristol had satisfactorily proved
+by an examination of the soles of my slippers.
+
+“It was a clever trick,” he said. “God knows what it was they puffed
+into your face through the letter box, but the devilish arts of ten
+centuries, we must remember, are at the command of Hassan of Aleppo!
+The repetition of the trick at the mysterious place you were taken to
+is particularly interesting. I should say you won’t be in a hurry to
+peer through letter boxes and so forth in the future?”
+
+I shook my aching head.
+
+“That accursed yellow room,” I replied, “stank with the fumes of
+hashish. It may have been some preparation of hashish that was used to
+drug me.”
+
+Bristol stood looking thoughtfully from the window.
+
+“It was a nightmare business, Mr. Cavanagh,” he said; “but it doesn’t
+advance our inquiry a little bit. The prophecy of the old man with the
+white beard—whom you assure me to be none other than Hassan of
+Aleppo—is something we cannot very well act upon. He clearly believes
+it himself; for he has released you after having captured you,
+evidently in order that you may be at liberty to take up your duty as
+trustee of the slipper again. If the slipper really comes back to the
+Museum the fact will show Hassan to be something little short of a
+magician. I shan’t envy you then, Mr. Cavanagh, considering that you
+hold the keys of the case!”
+
+“No,” I replied wearily. “Poor Professor Deeping thought that he acted
+in my interests and that my possession of the keys would constitute a
+safeguard. He was wrong. It has plunged me into the very vortex of this
+ghastly affair.”
+
+“It is maddening,” said Bristol, “to know that Hassan and Company are
+snugly located somewhere under our very noses, and that all Scotland
+Yard can find no trace of them. Then to think that Hassan of Aleppo,
+apparently by means of some mystical light, has knowledge of the
+whereabouts of the slipper and consequently of the whereabouts of Earl
+Dexter (another badly wanted man) is extremely discouraging! I feel
+like an amateur; I’m ashamed of myself!”
+
+Bristol departed in a condition of irritable uncertainty.
+
+My head in my hands, I sat for long after his departure, with the
+phantom characters of the ghoulish drama dancing through my brain. The
+distorted yellow dwarfs seemed to gibe apish before me. Severed hands
+clenched and unclenched themselves in my face, and gleaming knives
+flashed across the mental picture. Predominant over all was the stately
+figure of Hassan of Aleppo, that benignant, remorseless being, that
+terrible guardian of the holy relic who directed the murderous
+operations. Earl Dexter, The Stetson Man, with his tightly bandaged
+arm, his gaunt, clean-shaven face and daredevil smile, figured, too, in
+my feverish daydream; nor was that other character missing, the girl
+with the violet eyes whose beautiful presence I had come to dread; for
+like a sybil announcing destruction her appearances in the drama had
+almost invariably presaged fresh tragedies. I recalled my previous
+meetings with this woman of mystery. I recalled my many surmises
+regarding her real identity and association with the case. I wondered
+why in the not very distant past I had promised to keep silent
+respecting her; I wondered why up to that present moment, knowing
+beyond doubt that her activities were inimical to my interests, were
+criminal, I had observed that foolish pledge.
+
+And now my door-bell was ringing—as intuitively I had anticipated. So
+certain was I of the identity of my visitor that as I walked along the
+passage I was endeavouring to make up my mind how I should act, how I
+should receive her.
+
+I opened the door; and there, wearing European garments but a green
+turban ... stood Hassan of Aleppo!
+
+When I say that amazement robbed me of the power to speak, to move,
+almost to think, I doubt not you will credit me. Indeed, I felt that
+modern London was crumbling about me and that I was become involved in
+the fantastic mazes of one of those Oriental intrigues such as figure
+in the Romance of Abu Zeyd, or with which most European readers have
+been rendered familiar by the glowing pages of “The Thousand and One
+Nights.”
+
+“Effendim,” said my visitor, “do not hesitate to act as I direct!”
+
+In his gloved hand he carried what appeared to be an ebony cane. He
+raised and pointed it directly at me. I perceived that it was, in fact,
+a hollow tube.
+
+“Death is in my hand,” he continued; “enter slowly and I will follow
+you.”
+
+Still the sense of unreality held me thralled and my brain refused me
+service. Like an hypnotic subject I walked back to my study, followed
+by my terrible visitor, who reclosed the door behind him.
+
+He sat facing me across my littered table with the mysterious tube held
+loosely in his grasp.
+
+How infinitely more terrifying are perils unknown than those known and
+appreciated! Had a European armed with a pistol attempted a similar act
+of coercion, I cannot doubt that I should have put up some sort of
+fight; had he sat before me now as Hassan of Aleppo sat, with a
+comprehensible weapon thus laid upon his knees, I should have taken my
+chance, should have attacked him with the lamp, with a chair, with
+anything that came to my hand.
+
+But before this awful, mysterious being who was turning my life into
+channels unsuspected, before that black tube with its unknown
+potentialities, I sat in a kind of passive panic which I cannot attempt
+to describe, which I had never experienced before and have never known
+since.
+
+“There is one about to visit you,” he said, “whom you know, whom I
+think you expect. For it is written that she shall come and such events
+cast a shadow before them. I, too, shall be present at your meeting!”
+
+His eagle eyes opened widely; they burned with fanaticism.
+
+“Already she is here!” he resumed suddenly, and bent as one listening.
+“She comes under the archway; she crossed the courtyard—and is upon the
+stair! Admit her, effendim; I shall be close behind you!”
+
+The door-bell rang.
+
+With the consciousness that the black tube was directed toward the back
+of my head, I went and opened the door. My mind was at work again, and
+busy with plans to terminate this impossible situation.
+
+On the landing stood a girl wearing a simple white frock which fitted
+her graceful figure perfectly. A white straw hat, of the New York
+tourist type, with a long veil draped from the back suited her delicate
+beauty very well. The red mouth drooped a little at the corners, but
+the big violet eyes, like lamps of the soul, seemed afire with mystic
+light.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh,” she said, very calmly and deliberately, “there is only
+one way now to end all this trouble. I come from the man who can return
+the slipper to where it belongs; but he wants his price!”
+
+Her quiet speech served completely to restore my mental balance, and I
+noted with admiration that her words were so chosen as to commit her in
+no way. She knew quite well that thus far she might appear in the
+matter with impunity, and she clearly was determined to say nothing
+that could imperil her.
+
+“Will you please come in?” I said quietly—and stood aside to admit her.
+
+Exhibiting wonderful composure, she entered—and there, in the badly
+lighted hallway came face to face with my other visitor!
+
+It was a situation so dramatic as to seem unreal.
+
+Away from that tall figure retreated the girl with the violet eyes—and
+away—until she stood with her back to the wall. Even in the gloom I
+could see that her composure was deserting her; her beautiful face was
+pallid.
+
+“Oh, God!” she whispered, all but inaudible—“You!”
+
+Hassan, grasping the black rod in his hand, signed to her to enter the
+study. She stood quite near to me, with her eyes fixed upon him. I bent
+closer to her.
+
+“My revolver—in left-hand table drawer,” I breathed in her ear. “Get
+it. He is watching me!”
+
+I could not tell if my words had been understood, for, never taking her
+gaze from the Sheikh of the Assassins, she sidled into the study. I
+followed her; and Hassan came last of all. Just within the doorway he
+stood, confronting us.
+
+“You have come,” he said, addressing the girl and speaking in perfect
+English but with a marked accent, “to open your impudent negotiations
+through Mr. Cavanagh for the return of the thrice holy relic to the
+Museum! Your companion, the man, who is inspired by the Evil One, has
+even dared to demand ransom for the slipper from me!”
+
+Hassan was majestic in his wrath; but his eyes were black with venomous
+hatred.
+
+“He has suffered the penalty which the Koran lays down; he has lost his
+right hand. But the lord of all evil protects him, else ere this he had
+lost his life! Move no closer to that table!”
+
+I started. Either Hassan of Aleppo was omniscient or he had overheard
+my whispered words!
+
+“Easily I could slay you where you stand!” he continued. “But to do so
+would profit me nothing. This meeting has been revealed to me. Last
+night I witnessed it as I slept. Also it has been revealed to me by
+Erroohanee, in the mirror of ink, that the slipper of the Prophet,
+Salla-’llahu ’ale yhi wasellem! Shall indeed return to that place
+accursed, that infidel eyes may look upon it! It is the will of Allah,
+whose name be exalted, that I hold my hand, but it is also His will
+that I be here, at whatever danger to my worthless body.”
+
+He turned his blazing eyes upon me.
+
+“To-morrow, ere noon,” he said, “the slipper will again be in the
+Museum from which the man of evil stole it. So it is written; obscure
+are the ways. We met last night, you and I, but at that time much was
+dark to me that now is light. The holy ’Alee spoke to me in a vision,
+saying: ‘There are two keys to the case in which it will be locked.
+Secure one, leaving the other with him who holds it! Let him swear to
+be secret. This shall be the price of his life!’”
+
+The black tube was pointed directly at my forehead.
+
+“Effendim,” concluded the speaker, “place in my hand the key of the
+case in the Antiquarian Museum!”
+
+Hands convulsively clenched, the girl was looking from me to Hassan. My
+throat felt parched, but I forced speech to my lips.
+
+“Your omniscience fails you,” I said. “Both keys are at my bank!”
+
+Blacker grew the fierce eyes—and blacker. I gave myself up for lost; I
+awaited death—death by some awful, unique means—with what courage I
+could muster.
+
+From the court below came the sound of voices, the voices of passers-by
+who so little suspected what was happening near to them that had
+someone told them they certainly had refused to credit it. The noise of
+busy Fleet Street came drumming under the archway, too.
+
+Then, above all, another sound became audible. To this day I find
+myself unable to define it; but it resembled the note of a silver bell.
+
+Clearly it was a signal; for, hearing it, Hassan dropped the tube and
+glanced toward the open window.
+
+In that instant I sprang upon him!
+
+That I had to deal with a fanatic, a dangerous madman, I knew; that it
+was his life or mine, I was fully convinced. I struck out then and
+caught him fairly over the heart. He reeled back, and I made a wild
+clutch for the damnable tube, horrid, unreasoning fear of which thus
+far had held me inert.
+
+I heard the girl scream affrightedly, and I knew, and felt my heart
+chill to know, that the tube had been wrenched from my hand! Hassan of
+Aleppo, old man that he appeared, had the strength of a tiger. He
+recovered himself and hurled me from him so that I came to the floor
+crashingly half under my writing-table!
+
+Something he cried back at me, furiously—and like an enraged animal,
+his teeth gleaming out from his beard, he darted from the room. The
+front door banged loudly.
+
+Shaken and quivering, I got upon my feet. On the threshold, in a state
+of pitiable hesitancy, stood the pale, beautiful accomplice of Earl
+Dexter. One quick glance she flashed at me, then turned and ran!
+
+Again the door slammed. I ran to the window, looking out into the
+court. The girl came hurrying down the steps, and with never a backward
+glance ran on and was lost to view in one of the passages opening
+riverward.
+
+Out under the arch, statelily passed a tall figure—and Inspector
+Bristol was entering! I saw the detective glance aside as the two all
+but met. He stood still, and looked back!
+
+“Bristol!” I cried, and waved my arms frantically.
+
+“Stop him! Stop him! It’s Hassan of Aleppo!”
+
+Bristol was not the only one to hear my wild cry—not the only one to
+dash back under the arch and out into Fleet Street.
+
+But Hassan of Aleppo was gone!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXII
+THE LIGHT OF EL-MEDINEH
+
+
+Bristol and I walked slowly in the direction of the entrance of the
+British Antiquarian Museum. It was the day following upon the
+sensational scene in my chambers.
+
+“There’s very little doubt,” said Bristol, “that Earl Dexter has the
+slipper and that Hassan of Aleppo knows where Dexter is in hiding. I
+don’t know which of the two is more elusive. Hassan apparently melted
+into thin air yesterday; and although The Stetson Man has never within
+my experience employed disguises, no one has set eyes upon him since
+the night that he vanished from his lodgings off the Waterloo Road.
+It’s always possible for a man to baffle the police by remaining
+closely within doors, but during all the time that has elapsed Dexter
+must have taken a little exercise occasionally, and the missing hand
+should have betrayed him.”
+
+“The wonder to me is,” I replied, “that he has escaped death at the
+hands of the Hashishin. He is a supremely daring man, for I should
+think that he must be carrying the slipper of the Prophet about with
+him!”
+
+“I would rather he did it than I!” commented Bristol. “For sheer
+audacity commend me to The Stetson Man! His idea no doubt was to use
+you as intermediary in his negotiations with the Museum authorities,
+but that plan failing, he has written them direct, thoughtfully
+omitting his address, of course!”
+
+We were, in fact, at that moment bound for the Museum to inspect this
+latest piece of evidence.
+
+“The crowning example of the man’s audacity and cleverness,” added my
+companion, “is his having actually approached Hassan of Aleppo with a
+similar proposition! How did he get in touch with him? All Scotland
+Yard has failed to find any trace of that weird character!”
+
+“Birds of a feather—” I suggested.
+
+“But they are not birds of a feather!” cried Bristol. “On your own
+showing, Hassan of Aleppo is simply waiting his opportunity to balance
+Dexter’s account forever! I always knew Dexter was a clever man; I
+begin to think he’s the most daring genius alive!”
+
+We mounted the steps of the Museum. In the hallway Mostyn, the curator,
+awaited us. Having greeted Bristol and myself he led the way to his
+private office, and from a pigeon-hole in his desk took out a letter
+typewritten upon a sheet of quarto paper.
+
+Bristol spread it out upon the blotting pad and we bent over it
+curiously.
+
+SIR—
+
+
+I believe I can supply information concerning the whereabouts of the
+missing slipper of Mohammed. As any inquiry of this nature must be
+extremely perilous to the inquirer and as the relic is a priceless one,
+my fee would be 10,000 pounds. The fanatics who seek to restore the
+slipper to the East must not know of any negotiations, therefore I omit
+my address, but will communicate further if you care to insert
+instructions in the agony column of Times.
+
+Faithfully,
+EARL DEXTER
+
+
+Bristol laughed grimly.
+
+“It’s a daring game,” he said; “a piece of barefaced impudence quite
+characteristic.
+
+“He’s posing as a sort of private detective now, and is prepared for a
+trifling consideration to return the slipper which he stole himself! He
+must know, though, that we have his severed hand at the Yard to be used
+in evidence against him.”
+
+“Is the Burton Room open to the public again?” I asked Mostyn.
+
+“It is open, yes,” he replied, “and a quite unusual number of visitors
+come daily to gaze at the empty case which once held the slipper of the
+Prophet.”
+
+“Has the case been mended?”
+
+“Yes; it is quite intact again; only the exhibit is missing.”
+
+We ascended the stairs, passed along the Assyrian Room, which seemed to
+be unusually crowded, and entered the lofty apartment known as the
+Burton Room. The sunblinds were drawn, and a sort of dim, religious
+light prevailed therein. A group of visitors stood around an empty case
+at the farther end of the apartment.
+
+“You see,” said Mostyn, pointing, “that empty case has a greater
+attraction than all the other full ones!”
+
+But I scarcely heeded his words, for I was intently watching the
+movements of one of the group about the empty case. I have said that
+the room was but dimly illuminated, and this fact, together no doubt
+with some effect of reflected light, enhanced by my imagination,
+perhaps produced the phenomenon which was occasioning me so much
+amazement.
+
+Remember that my mind was filled with memories of weird things, that I
+often found myself thinking of that mystic light which Hassan of Aleppo
+had called the light of El-Medineh—that light whereby, undeterred by
+distance, he claimed to be able to trace the whereabouts of any of the
+relics of the Prophet.
+
+Bristol and Mostyn walked on then; but I stood just within the doorway,
+intently, breathlessly watching an old man wearing an out-of-date
+Inverness coat and a soft felt hat. He had a gray beard and moustache,
+and long, untidy hair, walked with a stoop, and in short was no unusual
+type of Visitor to that institution.
+
+But it seemed to me, and the closer I watched him the more convinced I
+became, that this was no optical illusion, that a faint luminosity, a
+sort of elfin light, played eerily about his head!
+
+As Bristol and Mostyn approached the case the old man began to walk
+toward me and in the direction of the door. The idea flashed through my
+mind that it might be Hassan of Aleppo himself, Hassan who had
+predicted that the stolen slipper should that day be returned to the
+Museum!
+
+Then he came abreast of me, passed me, and I felt that my surmise had
+been wrong. I saw Bristol, from farther up the room, turn and look
+back. Something attracted his trained eye, I suppose, which was not
+perceptible to me. But he suddenly came striding along. Obviously he
+was pursuing the old man, who was just about to leave the apartment.
+Seeing that the latter had reached the doorway, Bristol began to run.
+
+The old man turned; and amid a chorus of exclamations from the
+astonished spectators, Bristol sprang upon him!
+
+How it all came about I cannot say, cannot hope to describe; but there
+was a short, sharp scuffle, the crack of a well-directed blow ... and
+Bristol was rolling on his back, the old man, hatless, was racing up
+the Assyrian Room, and everyone in the place seemed to be shouting at
+once!
+
+Bristol, with blood streaming from his face, staggered to his feet,
+clutching at me for support.
+
+“After him, Mr. Cavanagh!” he cried hoarsely. “It’s your turn to-day!
+After him! That’s Earl Dexter!”
+
+Mostyn waited for no more, but went running quickly through the
+Assyrian Room. I may mention here that at the head of the stairs he
+found the caped Inverness which had served to conceal Dexter’s
+mutilated arm, and later, behind a piece of statuary, a wig and a very
+ingenious false beard and moustache were discovered. But of The Stetson
+Man there was no trace. His brief start had enabled him to make good
+his escape.
+
+As Mostyn went off, and a group of visitors flocked in our direction,
+Bristol, who had been badly shaken by the blow, turned to them.
+
+“You will please all leave the Burton Room immediately,” he said.
+
+Looks of surprise greeted his words; but with his handkerchief raised
+to his face, he peremptorily repeated them. The official note in his
+voice was readily to be detected; and the wonder-stricken group
+departed with many a backward glance.
+
+As the last left the Burton Room, Bristol pointed, with a rather shaky
+finger, at the soft felt hat which lay at his feet. It had formed part
+of Dexter’s disguise. Close beside it lay another object which had
+evidently fallen from the hat—a dull red thing lying on the polished
+parquet flooring.
+
+“For God’s sake don’t go near it!” whispered Bristol. “The room must be
+closed for the present. And now I’m off after that man. Step clear of
+it.”
+
+His words were unnecessary; I shunned it as a leprous thing.
+
+It was the slipper of the Prophet!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIII
+THE THREE MESSAGES
+
+
+I stood in the foyer of the Astoria Hotel. About me was the pulsing
+stir of transatlantic life, for the tourist season was now at its
+height, and I counted myself fortunate in that I had been able to
+secure a room at this establishment, always so popular with American
+visitors. Chatting groups surrounded me and I became acquainted with
+numberless projects for visiting the Tower of London, the National
+Gallery, the British Museum, Windsor Castle, Kew Gardens, and the other
+sights dear to the heart of our visiting cousins. Loaded lifts ascended
+and descended. Bradshaws were in great evidence everywhere; all was
+hustle and glad animation.
+
+The tall military-looking man who stood beside me glanced about him
+with a rather grim smile.
+
+“You ought to be safe enough here, Mr. Cavanagh!” he said.
+
+“I ought to be safe enough in my own chambers,” I replied wearily. “How
+many of these pleasure-seeking folk would believe that a man can be as
+greatly in peril of his life in Fleet Street as in the most uncivilized
+spot upon the world map? Do you think if I told that prosperous New
+Yorker who is buying a cigar yonder, for instance, that I had been
+driven from my chambers by a band of Eastern assassins founded some
+time in the eleventh century, he would believe it?”
+
+“I am certain he wouldn’t!” replied Bristol. “I should not have
+credited it myself before I was put in charge of this damnable case.”
+
+My position at that hour was in truth an incredible one. The sacred
+slipper of Mohammed lay once more in the glass case at the Antiquarian
+Museum from which Earl Dexter had stolen it. Now, with apish yellow
+faces haunting my dreams, with ghostly menaces dogging me day and
+night, I was outcast from my own rooms and compelled, in self-defence,
+to live amid the bustle of the Astoria. So wholly nonplussed were the
+police authorities that they could afford me no protection. They knew
+that a group of scientific murderers lay hidden in or near to London;
+they knew that Earl Dexter, the foremost crook of his day, was also in
+the metropolis—and they could make no move, were helpless; indeed, as
+Bristol had confessed, were hopeless!
+
+Bristol, on the previous day, had unearthed the Greek cigar merchant,
+Acepulos, who had replaced the slipper in its case (for a monetary
+consideration). He had performed a similar service when the
+bloodstained thing had first been put upon exhibition at the Museum,
+and for a considerable period had disappeared. We had feared that his
+religious pretensions had not saved him from the avenging scimitar of
+Hassan; but quite recently he had returned again to his Soho shop, and
+in time thus to earn a second cheque.
+
+As Bristol and I stood glancing about the foyer of the hotel, a
+plain-clothes officer whom I knew by sight came in and approached my
+companion. I could not divine the fact, of course, but I was about to
+hear news of the money-loving and greatly daring Graeco-Moslem.
+
+The detective whispered something to Bristol, and the latter started,
+and paled. He turned to me.
+
+“They haven’t overlooked him this time, Mr. Cavanagh,” he said.
+“Acepulos has been found dead in his room, nearly decapitated!”
+
+I shuddered involuntarily. Even there, amid the chatter and laughter of
+those light-hearted tourists, the shadow of Hassan of Aleppo was
+falling upon me.
+
+Bristol started immediately for Soho and I parted from him in the
+Strand, he proceeding west and I eastward, for I had occasion that
+morning to call at my bank. It was the time of the year when London is
+full of foreigners, and as I proceeded in the direction of Fleet Street
+I encountered more than one Oriental. To my excited imagination they
+all seemed to glance at me furtively, with menacing eyes, but in any
+event I knew that I had little to fear whilst I contrived to keep to
+the crowded thoroughfares. Solitude I dreaded and with good reason.
+
+Then at the door of the bank I found fresh matter for reflection. The
+assistant manager, Mr. Colby, was escorting a lady to the door. As I
+stood aside, he walked with her to a handsome car which waited, and
+handed her in with marks of great deference. She was heavily veiled and
+I had no more than a glimpse of her, but she appeared to be of middle
+age and had gray hair and a very stately manner.
+
+I told myself that I was unduly suspicious, suspicious of everyone and
+of everything; yet as I entered the bank I found myself wondering where
+I had seen that dignified, grayhaired figure before. I even thought of
+asking the manager the name of his distinguished customer, but did not
+do so, for in the circumstances such an inquiry must have appeared
+impertinent.
+
+My business transacted, I came out again by the side entrance which
+opens on the little courtyard, for this branch of the London County and
+Provincial Bank occupies a corner site.
+
+A ragged urchin who was apparently waiting for me handed me a note. I
+looked at him inquiringly.
+
+“For me?” I said.
+
+“Yes, sir. A dark gentleman pointed you out as you was goin’ into the
+bank.”
+
+The note was written upon a half sheet of paper and, doubting if it was
+really intended for me, I unfolded it and read the following—
+
+Mr. Cavanagh, take the keys of the case containing the holy slipper to
+your hotel this evening without fail.
+HASSAN.
+
+
+“Who gave you this, boy?” I asked sharply.
+
+“A foreign gentleman, sir, very dark—like an Indian.”
+
+“Where is he?”
+
+“He went off in a cab, sir, after he give me the note.”
+
+I handed the boy sixpence and slowly pursued my way. An idea was
+forming in my mind to trap the enemy by seeming acquiescent. I wondered
+if my movements were being watched at that moment. Since it was more
+than probable, I returned to the bank, entered, and made some trivial
+inquiry of a cashier, and then came out again and walked on as far as
+the Report office.
+
+I had not been in the office more than five minutes before I received a
+telegram from Inspector Bristol. It had been handed in at Soho, and the
+message was an odd one.
+
+CAVANAGH, Report, London.
+Plot afoot to steal keys. Get them from bank and join me 11 o’clock at
+Astoria. Have planned trap.
+
+BRISTOL.
+
+
+This was very mysterious in view of the note so recently received by
+me, but I concluded that Bristol had hit upon a similar plan to that
+which was forming in my own mind. It seemed unnecessarily hazardous,
+though, actually to withdraw the keys from their place of safety.
+
+Pondering deeply upon the perplexities of this maddening case, I
+shortly afterward found myself again at the bank. With the manager I
+descended to the strong-room, and the safe was unlocked which contained
+the much-sought-for keys of the case at the Antiquarian Museum.
+
+“There are the keys, quite safe!—and by the way, this is my second
+visit here this morning, Mr. Cavanagh,” said the manager, with whom I
+was upon rather intimate terms. “A foreign lady who has recently become
+a customer of the bank deposited some valuable jewels here this
+morning—less than an hour ago, in fact.”
+
+“Indeed,” I said, and my mind was working rapidly. “The lady who came
+in the large blue car, a gray-haired lady?”
+
+“Yes,” was the reply, “did you notice her, then?”
+
+I nodded and said no more, for in truth I had no more to say. I had
+good reason to respect the uncanny powers of Hassan of Aleppo, but I
+doubted if even his omniscience could tell him (since I had actually
+gone down into the strong-room) whether when I emerged I had the keys,
+or whether my visit and seeming acceptance of his orders had been no
+more than a subterfuge!
+
+That the Hashishin had some means of communicating with me at the
+Astoria was evident from the contents of the note which I had received,
+and as I walked in the direction of the hotel my mind was filled with
+all sorts of misgivings. I was playing with fire! Had I done rightly or
+should I have acted otherwise? I sighed wearily. The dark future would
+resolve all my doubts.
+
+When I reached the Astoria, Bristol had not arrived. I lighted a
+cigarette and sat down in the lounge to await his coming. Presently a
+boy approached, handing me a message which had been taken down from the
+telephone by the clerk. It was as follows—
+
+Tell Mr. Cavanagh, who is waiting in the hotel, to take what I am
+expecting to his chambers, and say that I will join him there in twenty
+minutes.
+
+INSPECTOR BRISTOL.
+
+
+Again I doubted the wisdom of Bristol’s plan. Had I not fled to the
+Astoria to escape from the dangerous solitude of my rooms? That he was
+laying some trap for the Hashishin was sufficiently evident, and whilst
+I could not justly suspect him of making a pawn of me I was quite
+unable to find any other explanation of this latest move.
+
+I was torn between conflicting doubts. I glanced at my watch. Yes!
+There was just time for me to revisit the bank ere joining Bristol at
+my chambers! I hesitated. After all, in what possible way could it
+jeopardize his plans for me merely to pretend to bring the keys?
+
+“Hang it all!” I said, and jumped to my feet. “These maddening
+conjectures will turn my brain! I’ll let matters stand as they are, and
+risk the consequences!”
+
+I hesitated no longer, but passed out from the hotel and once more
+directed my steps in the direction of Fleet Street.
+
+As I passed in under the arch through which streamed many busy workers,
+I told myself that to dread entering my own chambers at high noon was
+utterly childish. Yet I did dread doing so! And as I mounted the stair
+and came to the landing, which was always more or less dark, I paused
+for quite a long time before putting the key in the lock.
+
+The affair of the accursed slipper was playing havoc with my nerves,
+and I laughed dryly to note that my hand was not quite steady as I
+turned the key, opened my door, and slipped into the dim hallway.
+
+As I closed it behind me, something, probably a slight noise, but
+possibly something more subtle—an instinct—made me turn rapidly.
+
+There facing me stood Hassan of Aleppo.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIV
+I KEEP THE APPOINTMENT
+
+
+That moment was pungent with drama. In the intense hush of the next
+five seconds I could fancy that the world had slipped away from me and
+that I was become an unsubstantial thing of dreams. I was in no sense
+master of myself; the effect of the presence of this white-bearded
+fanatic was of a kind which I am entirely unable to describe. About
+Hassan of Aleppo was an aroma of evil, yet of majesty, which marked him
+strangely different from other men—from any other that I have ever
+known. In his venerable presence, remembering how he was Sheikh of the
+Assassins, and recalling his bloody history, I was always conscious of
+a weakness, physical and mental. He appalled me; and now, with my back
+to the door, I stood watching him and watching the ominous black tube
+which he held in his hand. It was a weapon unknown to Europe and
+therefore more fearful than the most up-to-date of death-dealing
+instruments.
+
+Hassan of Aleppo pointed it toward me.
+
+“The keys, effendim,” he said; “hand me the keys!”
+
+He advanced a step; his manner was imperious. The black tube was less
+than a foot removed from my face. That I had my revolver in my pocket
+could avail me nothing, for in my pocket it must remain, since I dared
+to make no move to reach it under cover of that unfamiliar, terrible
+weapon.
+
+The black eyes of Hassan glared insanely into mine.
+
+“You will have placed them in your pocketcase,” he said. “Take it out;
+hand it to me!”
+
+I obeyed, for what else could I do? Taking the case from my pocket, I
+placed it in his lean brown hand.
+
+An expression of wild exultation crossed his features; the eagle eyes
+seemed to be burning into my brain. A puff of hot vapour struck me in
+the face—something which was expelled from the mysterious black tube.
+And with memories crowding to my mind of similar experiences at the
+hands of the Hashishin, I fell back, clutching at my throat, fighting
+for my life against the deadly, vaporous thing that like a palpable
+cloud surrounded me. I tried to cry out, but the words died upon my
+tongue. Hassan of Aleppo seemed to grow huge before my eyes like some
+ginn of Eastern lore. Then a curtain of darkness descended. I
+experienced a violent blow upon the forehead (I suppose I had pitched
+forward), and for the time resigned my part in the drama of the sacred
+slipper.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXV
+THE WATCHER IN BANK CHAMBERS
+
+
+At about five o’clock that afternoon Inspector Bristol, who had spent
+several hours in Soho upon the scene of the murder of the Greek, was
+walking along Fleet Street, bound for the offices of the Report. As he
+passed the court, on the corner of which stands a branch of the London
+County and Provincial Bank, his eye was attracted by a curious
+phenomenon.
+
+There are reflectors above the bank windows which face the court, and
+it appeared to Bristol that there was a hole in one of these, the
+furthermost from the corner. A tiny beam of light shone from the bank
+window on to the reflector, or from the reflector on to the window,
+which circumstance in itself was not curious. But above the reflector,
+at an acute angle, this mysterious beam was seemingly projected upward.
+Walking a little way up the court he saw that it shone through, and
+cast a disc of light upon the ceiling of an office on the first floor
+of Bank Chambers above.
+
+It is every detective’s business to be observant, and although many
+thousands of passersby must have cast their eyes in the same direction
+that day, there is small matter for wonder in the fact that Bristol
+alone took the trouble to inquire into the mystery—for his trained eye
+told him that there was a mystery here.
+
+Possibly he was in that passive frame of mind when the brain is
+particularly receptive of trivial impressions; for after a futile
+search of the Soho cigar store for anything resembling a clue, he was
+quite resigned to the idea of failure in the case of Hassan and
+Company. He walked down the court and into the entrance of Bank
+Chambers. An Inspection of the board upon the wall showed him that the
+first floor apparently was occupied by three firms, two of them legal,
+for this is the neighbourhood of the law courts, and the third a press
+agency. He stepped up to the first floor. Past the doors bearing the
+names of the solicitors and past that belonging to the press agent he
+proceeded to a fourth suite of offices. Here, pinned upon the door
+frame, appeared a card which bore the legend—
+
+THE CONGO FIBRE COMPANY
+
+Evidently the Congo Fibre Company had so recently taken possession of
+the offices that there had been no time to inscribe their title either
+upon the doors or upon the board in the hall.
+
+Inspector Bristol was much impressed, for into one of the rooms
+occupied by the Fibre Company shone that curious disc of light which
+first had drawn his attention to Bank Chambers. He rapped on the door,
+turned the handle, and entered. The sole furniture of the office in
+which he found himself apparently consisted of one desk and an office
+stool, which stool was occupied by an office boy. The windows opened on
+the court, and a door marked “Private” evidently communicated with an
+inner office whose windows likewise must open on the court. It was the
+ceiling of this inner office, unless the detective’s calculation erred,
+which he was anxious to inspect.
+
+“Yes, sir?” said the boy tentatively.
+
+Bristol produced a card which bore the uncompromising legend: John
+Henry Smith.
+
+“Take my card to Mr. Boulter, boy,” he said tersely. The boy stared.
+
+“Mr. Boulter, sir? There isn’t any one of that name here.”
+
+“Oh!” said Bristol, looking around him in apparent surprise: “how long
+is he gone?”
+
+“I don’t know, sir. I’ve only been here three weeks, and Mr. Knowlson
+only took the offices a month ago.”
+
+“Oh,” commented Bristol, “then take my card to Mr. Knowlson; he will
+probably be able to give me Mr. Boulter’s present address.”
+
+The boy hesitated. The detective had that authoritative manner which
+awes the youthful mind.
+
+“He’s out, sir,” he said, but without conviction.
+
+“Is he?” rapped Bristol. “Well, I’ll leave my card.”
+
+He turned and quitted the office, carefully closing the door behind
+him. Three seconds later he reopened it, and peering in, was in time to
+see the boy knock upon the private door. A little wicket, or movable
+panel, was let down, the card of John Henry Smith was passed through to
+someone unseen, and the wicket was reclosed!
+
+
+The boy turned and met the wrathful eye of the detective. Bristol
+reentered, closing the door behind him.
+
+“See here, young fellow,” said he, “I don’t stand for those tricks! Why
+didn’t you tell me Mr. Knowlson was in?”
+
+“I’m very sorry, sir!”—the boy quailed beneath his glance—“but he won’t
+see any one who hasn’t an appointment.”
+
+“Is there someone with him, then?”
+
+“No.”
+
+“Well, what’s he doing?”
+
+“I don’t know, sir; I’ve never been in to see!”
+
+“What! never been in that room?”
+
+“Never!” declared the boy solemnly. “And I don’t mind telling you,” he
+added, recovering something of his natural confidence, “that I am
+leaving on the 31st. This job ain’t any use to me!”
+
+“Too much work?” suggested Bristol.
+
+“No work at all!” returned the boy indignantly. “I’m just here for a
+blessed buffer, that’s what I’m here for, a buffer!”
+
+“What do you mean?”
+
+“I just have to sit here and see that nobody gets into that office.
+Lively, ain’t it? Where’s the prospects?”
+
+Bristol surveyed him thoughtfully.
+
+“Look here, my lad,” he said quietly; “is that door locked?”
+
+“Always,” replied the boy.
+
+“Does Mr. Knowlson come to that shutter when you knock?”
+
+“Yes.”
+
+“Then go and knock!”
+
+The boy obeyed with alacrity. He rapped loudly on the door, not
+noticing or not caring that the visitor was standing directly behind
+him. The shutter was lowered and a grizzled, bearded face showed for a
+moment through the opening.
+
+Bristol leant over the boy and pushed a card through into the hand of
+the man beyond. On this occasion it did not bear the legend “John Henry
+Smith,” but the following—
+
+CHIEF INSPECTOR BRISTOL
+C.I.D.
+NEW SCOTLAND YARD
+
+“Good afternoon, Mr. Knowlson,” said the detective dryly. “I want to
+come in!”
+
+There followed a moment of silence, from which Bristol divined that he
+had blundered upon some mystery, possibly upon a big case; then a key
+was turned in the lock and the door thrown open.
+
+“Come right in, Inspector,” invited a strident voice. “Carter, you can
+go home.”
+
+Bristol entered warily, but not warily enough. For as the door was
+banged upon his entrance he faced around only in time to find himself
+looking down the barrel of a Colt automatic.
+
+With his back to the door which contained the wicket, now reclosed,
+stood the man with the bearded face. The revolver was held in his left
+hand; his right arm terminated in a bandaged stump. But without that
+his steel-gray eyes would have betrayed him to the detective.
+
+“Good God!” whispered Bristol. “It’s Earl Dexter!”
+
+“It is!” replied the cracksman, “and you’ve looked in at a real
+inconvenient time! My visitors mostly seem to have that knack. I’ll
+have to ask you to stay, Inspector. Sit down in that chair yonder.”
+
+Bristol knew his man too well to think of opening any argument at that
+time. He sat down as directed, and ignoring the revolver which covered
+him all the time, began coolly to survey the room in which he found
+himself. In several respects it was an extraordinary apartment.
+
+The only bright patch in the room was the shining disc upon the
+ceiling; and the detective noted with interest that this marked the
+position of an arrangement of mirrors. A white-covered table, entirely
+bare, stood upon the floor immediately beneath this mysterious
+apparatus. With the exception of one or two ordinary items of furniture
+and a small hand lathe, the office otherwise was unfurnished. Bristol
+turned his eyes again upon the daring man who so audaciously had
+trapped him—the man who had stolen the slipper of the Prophet and
+suffered the loss of his hand by the scimitar of an Hashishin as a
+result. When he had least expected to find one, Fate had thrown a clue
+in Bristol’s way. He reflected grimly that it was like to prove of
+little use to him.
+
+“Now,” said Dexter, “you can do as you please, of course, but you know
+me pretty well and I advise you to sit quiet.”
+
+“I am sitting quiet!” was the reply.
+
+“I am sorry,” continued Dexter, with a quick glance at his maimed arm,
+“that I can’t tie you up, but I am expecting a friend any moment now.”
+
+He suddenly raised the wicket with a twitch of his elbow and, without
+removing his gaze from the watchful detective, cried sharply—
+
+“Carter!”
+
+But there was no reply.
+
+“Good; he’s gone!”
+
+Dexter sat down facing Bristol.
+
+“I have lost my hand in this game, Mr. Bristol,” he said genially, “and
+had some narrow squeaks of losing my head; but having gone so far and
+lost so much I’m going through, if I don’t meet a funeral! You see I’m
+up against two tough propositions.”
+
+Bristol nodded sympathetically.
+
+“The first,” continued Dexter, “is you and Cavanagh, and English law
+generally. My idea—if I can get hold of the slipper again—oh! you
+needn’t stare; I’m out for it!—is to get the Antiquarian Institution to
+ransom it. It’s a line of commercial speculation I have worked
+successfully before. There’s a dozen rich highbrows, cranks to a man,
+connected with it, and they are my likeliest buyers—sure. But to keep
+the tone of the market healthy there’s Hassan of Aleppo, rot him! He’s
+a dangerous customer to approach, but you’ll note I’ve been in
+negotiation with him already and am still, if not booming, not much
+below par!”
+
+“Quite so,” said Bristol. “But you’ve cut off a pretty hefty chew
+nevertheless. They used to call you The Stetson Man, you used to dress
+like a fashion plate and stop at the big hotels. Those days are past,
+Dexter, I’m sorry to note. You’re down to the skulking game now and
+you’re nearer an advert for Clarkson than Stein-Bloch!”
+
+“Yep,” said Dexter sadly, “I plead guilty, but I think here’s Carneta!”
+
+Bristol heard the door of the outer office open, and a moment later
+that upon which his gaze was set opened in turn, to admit a girl who
+was heavily veiled, and who started and stood still in the doorway, on
+perceiving the situation. Never for one unguarded moment did the
+American glance aside from his prisoner.
+
+“The Inspector’s dropped in, Carneta!” he drawled in his strident way.
+“You’re handy with a ball of twine; see if you can induce him to stay
+the night!”
+
+The girl, immediately recovering her composure, took off her hat in a
+businesslike way and began to look around her, evidently in search of a
+suitable length of rope with which to fasten up Bristol.
+
+“Might I suggest,” said the detective, “that if you are shortly
+quitting these offices a couple of the window-cords neatly joined would
+serve admirably?”
+
+“Thanks,” drawled Dexter, nodding to his companion, who went into the
+outer office, where she might be heard lowering the windows. She was
+gone but a few moments ere she returned again, carrying a length of
+knotted rope. Under cover of Dexter’s revolver, Bristol stoically
+submitted to having his wrists tied behind him. The end of the line was
+then thrown through the ventilator above the door which communicated
+with the outer office and Bristol was triced up in such a way that, his
+wrists being raised behind him to an uncomfortable degree, he was
+almost forced to stand upon tiptoe. The line was then secured.
+
+“Very workmanlike!” commented the victim. “You’ll find a large
+handkerchief in my inside breast pocket. It’s a clean one, and I can
+recommend it as a gag!”
+
+Very promptly it was employed for the purpose, and Inspector Bristol
+found himself helpless and constrained in a very painful position.
+Dexter laid down his revolver.
+
+“We will now give you a free show, Inspector,” he said, genially, “of
+our camera obscura!”
+
+He pulled down the blinds, which Bristol noted with interest to be
+black, but through an opening in one of them a mysterious ray of
+light—the same that he had noticed from Fleet Street—shone upon that
+point in the ceiling where the arrangement of mirrors was attached.
+Dexter made some alteration, apparently in the focus of the lens (for
+Bristol had divined that in some way a lens had been fixed in the
+reflector above the bank window below) and the disc of light became
+concentrated. The white-covered table was moved slightly, and in the
+darkness some further manipulation was performed.
+
+“Observe,” came the strident voice—“we now have upon the screen here a
+minute moving picture. This little device, which is not protected in
+any way, is of my own invention, and proved extremely useful in the
+Arkwright jewel case, which startled Chicago. It has proved useful now.
+I know almost as much concerning the arrangements below as the manager
+himself. In confidence, Inspector, this is my last bid for the slipper!
+I have plunged on it. Madame Sforza, the distinguished Italian lady who
+recently opened an account below, opened it for 500 pounds cash. She
+has drawn a portion, but a balance remains which I am resigned to lose.
+Her motor-car (hired), her references (forged), the case of jewels
+which she deposited this morning (duds!)—all represent a considerable
+outlay. It’s a nerve-racking line of operation, too. Any hour of the
+day may bring such a visitor as yourself, for example. In short, I am
+at the end of my tether.”
+
+Bristol, ignoring the increasing pain in his arms and wrists, turned
+his eyes upon the white-covered table and there saw a minute and
+clear-cut picture, such as one sees in a focussing screen, of the
+interior of the manager’s office of the London County and Provincial
+Bank!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVI
+THE STRONG-ROOM
+
+
+I wonder how often a sense of humour has saved a man from desperation?
+Perhaps only the Easterns have thoroughly appreciated that divine gift.
+I have interpolated the adventure of Inspector Bristol in order that
+the sequence of my story be not broken; actually I did not learn it
+until later, but when, on the following day, the whole of the facts
+came into my possession, I laughed and was glad that I could laugh, for
+laughter has saved many a man from madness.
+
+Certainly the Fates were playing with us, for at a time very nearly
+corresponding with that when Bristol found himself bound and helpless
+in Bank Chambers I awoke to find myself tied hand and foot to my own
+bed! Nothing but the haziest recollections came to me at first, nothing
+but dim memories of the awful being who had lured me there; for I
+perceived now that all the messages proceeded, not from Bristol, but
+from Hassan of Aleppo! I had been a fool, and I was reaping the fruits
+of my folly. Could I have known that almost within pistol shot of me
+the Inspector was trussed up as helpless as I, then indeed my situation
+must have become unbearable, since upon him I relied for my speedy
+release.
+
+My ankles were firmly lashed to the rails at the foot of my bed; each
+of my wrists was tied back to a bedpost. I ached in every limb and my
+head burned feverishly, which latter symptom I ascribed to the powerful
+drug which had been expelled into my face by the uncanny weapon carried
+by Hassan of Aleppo. I reflected bitterly how, having transferred my
+quarters to the Astoria, I could not well hope for any visitor to my
+chambers; and even the event of such a visitor had been foreseen and
+provided against by the cunning lord of the Hashishin. A gag, of the
+type which Dumas has described in “Twenty Years After,” the poire
+d’angoisse, was wedged firmly into my mouth, so that only by preserving
+the utmost composure could I breathe. I was bathed in cold
+perspiration. So I lay listening to the familiar sounds without and
+reflecting that it was quite possible so to lie, undisturbed, and to
+die alone, my presence there wholly unsuspected!
+
+Once, toward dusk, my phone bell rang, and my state of mind became
+agonizing. It was maddening to think that someone, a friend, was
+virtually within reach of me, yet actually as far removed as if an
+ocean divided us! I tasted the hellish torments of Tantalus. I cursed
+fate, heaven, everything; I prayed; I sank into bottomless depths of
+despair and rose to dizzy pinnacles of hope, when a footstep sounded on
+the landing and a thousand wild possibilities, vague possibilities of
+rescue, poured into my mind.
+
+The visitor hesitated, apparently outside my door; and a change, as
+sudden as lightning out of a cloud, transformed my errant fancies. A
+gruesome conviction seized me, as irrational as the hope which it
+displayed, that this was one of the Hashishin—an apish yellow dwarf, a
+strangler, the awful Hassan himself!
+
+The footsteps receded down the stairs. And my thoughts reverted into
+the old channels of dull despair.
+
+I weighed the chances of Bristol’s seeking me there; and, eager as I
+was to give them substance, found them but airy—ultimately was forced
+to admit them to be nil.
+
+So I lay, whilst only a few hundred yards from me a singular scene was
+being enacted. Bristol, a prisoner as helpless as myself, watched the
+concluding business of the day being conducted in the bank beneath him;
+he watched the lift descend to the strongroom—the spying apparatus
+being slightly adjusted in some way; he saw the clerks hastening to
+finish their work in the outer office, and as he watched, absorbed by
+the novelty of the situation, he almost forgot the pain and discomfort
+which he suffered...
+
+“This little peep-show of ours has been real useful,” Dexter confided
+out of the darkness. “I got an impression of the key of the strongroom
+door a week ago, and Carneta got one of the keys of the safe only this
+morning, when she lodged her box of jewellery with the bank! I was at
+work on that key when you interrupted me, and as by means of this
+useful apparatus I have learnt the combination, you ought to see some
+fun in the next few hours!”
+
+Bristol repressed a groan, for the prospect of remaining in that
+position was thus brought keenly home to him.
+
+The bank staff left the premises one by one until only a solitary clerk
+worked on at a back desk. His task completed, he, too, took his
+departure and the bank messenger commenced his nightly duty of sweeping
+up the offices. It was then that excitement like an anaesthetic dulled
+the detective’s pain—indeed, he forgot his aching body and became
+merely a watchful intelligence.
+
+So intent had he become upon the picture before him that he had not
+noticed the fact that he was alone in the office of the Congo Fibre
+Company. Now he realized it from the absolute silence about him, and
+from another circumstance.
+
+The spying apparatus had been left focussed, and on to the screen
+beneath his eyes, bending low behind the desks and creeping,
+Indian-like, around, toward the head of the stair which communicated
+with the strongroom and the apartment used by the messenger, came the
+alert figure of Earl Dexter!
+
+It may be a surprise to some people to learn that at any time in the
+day the door of a bank, unguarded, should be left open, when only a
+solitary messenger is within the premises; yet for a few minutes at
+least each evening this happens at more than one City bank, where one
+of the duties of the resident messenger is to clean the outer steps.
+Dexter had taken advantage of the man’s absence below in quest of
+scrubbing material to enter the bank through the open door.
+
+Watching, breathless, and utterly forgetful of his own position,
+Bristol saw the messenger, all unconscious of danger, come up the
+stairs carrying a pail and broom. As his head reached the level of the
+railings The Stetson Man neatly sand-bagged him, rushed across to the
+outer door, and closed it!
+
+Given duplicate keys and the private information which Dexter so
+ingeniously had obtained, there are many London banks vulnerable to
+similar attack. Certainly, bullion is rarely kept in a branch
+storeroom, but the detective was well aware that the keys of the case
+containing the slipper were kept in this particular safe!
+
+He was convinced, and could entertain no shadowy doubt, that at last
+Dexter had triumphed. He wondered if it had ever hitherto fallen to the
+lot of a representative of the law thus to be made an accessory to a
+daring felony!
+
+But human endurance has well-defined limits. The fading light rendered
+the ingenious picture dim and more dim. The pain occasioned by his
+position became agonizing, and uttering a stifled groan he ceased to
+take an interest in the robbery of the London County and Provincial
+Bank.
+
+Fate is a comedian; and when later I learned how I had lain strapped to
+my bed, and, so near to me, Bristol had hung helpless as a butchered
+carcass in the office of the Congo Fibre Company, whilst, in our
+absence from the stage, the drama of the slipper marched feverish to
+its final curtain, I accorded Fate her well-earned applause. I laughed;
+not altogether mirthfully.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVII
+THE SLIPPER
+
+
+Someone was breaking in at the door of my chambers!
+
+I aroused myself from a state of coma almost death-like and listened to
+the blows. The sun was streaming in at my windows.
+
+A splintering crash told of a panel broken. Then a moment later I heard
+the grating of the lock, and a rush of footsteps along the passage.
+
+“Try the study!” came a voice that sounded like Bristol’s, save that it
+was strangely weak and shaky.
+
+Almost simultaneously the Inspector himself threw open the bedroom
+door—and, very pale and haggard-eyed, stood there looking across at me.
+It was a scene unforgettable.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh!” he said huskily—“Mr. Cavanagh! Thank God you’re alive!
+But”—he turned—“this way, Marden!” he cried, “Untie him quickly! I’ve
+got no strength in my arms!”
+
+Marden, a C.I.D. man, came running, and in a minute, or less, I was
+sitting up gulping brandy.
+
+“I’ve had the most awful experience of my life,” said Bristol. “You’ve
+fared badly enough, but I’ve been hanging by my wrists—you know
+Dexter’s trick!—for close upon sixteen hours! I wasn’t released until
+Carter, an office boy, came on the scene this morning!”
+
+Very feebly I nodded; I could not talk.
+
+“The strong-room of your bank was rifled under my very eyes last
+evening!” he continued, with something of his old vigour; “and five
+minutes after the Antiquarian Museum was opened to the public this
+morning quite an unusual number of visitors appeared.
+
+“I saw the bank manager the moment he arrived, and learned a piece of
+news that positively took my breath away! I was at the Museum seven
+minutes later and got another shock! There in the case was the red
+slipper!”
+
+“Then,” I whispered—“it hadn’t been stolen?”
+
+“Wrong! It had! This was a duplicate, as Mostyn, the curator, saw at a
+glance! Some of the early visitors—they were Easterns—had quite
+surrounded the case. They were watched, of course, but any number of
+Orientals come to see the thing; and, short of smashing the glass,
+which would immediately attract attention, the authorities were
+unprepared, of course, for any attempt. Anyway, they were tricked.
+Somebody opened the case. The real slipper of the Prophet is gone!”
+
+“They told you at the bank—”
+
+“That you had withdrawn the keys! If Dexter had known that!”
+
+“Hassan of Aleppo took them from me last night! At last the Hashishin
+have triumphed.”
+
+Bristol sank into the armchair.
+
+“Every port is watched,” he said. “But—”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXVIII
+CARNETA
+
+
+“I am entirely at your mercy; you can do as you please with me. But
+before you do anything I should like you to listen to what I have to
+say.”
+
+Her beautiful face was pale and troubled. Violet eyes looked sadly into
+mine.
+
+“For nearly an hour I have been waiting for this chance—until I knew
+you were alone,” she continued. “If you are thinking of giving me up to
+the police, at least remember that I came here of my own free will. Of
+course, I know you are quite entitled to take advantage of that; but
+please let me say what I came to say!”
+
+She pleaded so hard, with that musical voice, with her evident
+helplessness, most of all with her wonderful eyes, that I quite
+abandoned any project I might have entertained to secure her arrest. I
+think she divined this masculine weakness, for she said, with greater
+confidence—
+
+“Your friend, Professor Deeping, was murdered by the man called Hassan
+of Aleppo. Are you content to remain idle while his murderer escapes?”
+
+God knows I was not. My idleness in the matter was none of my choosing.
+Since poor Deeping’s murder I had come to handgrips with the assassins
+more than once, but Hassan had proved too clever for me, too clever for
+Scotland Yard. The sacred slipper was once more in the hands of its
+fanatic guardian.
+
+One man there was who might have helped the search, Earl Dexter. But
+Earl Dexter was himself wanted by Scotland Yard!
+
+From the time of the bank affair up to the moment when this beautiful
+visitor had come to my chambers I had thought Dexter, as well as
+Hassan, to have fled secretly from England. But the moment that I saw
+Carneta at my door I divined that The Stetson Man must still be in
+London.
+
+She sat watching me and awaiting my answer.
+
+“I cannot avenge my friend unless I can find his murderer.”
+
+Eagerly she bent forward.
+
+“But if I can find him?”
+
+That made me think, and I hesitated before speaking again.
+
+“Say what you came to say,” I replied slowly. “You must know that I
+distrust you. Indeed, my plain duty is to detain you. But I will listen
+to anything you may care to tell me, particularly if it enables me to
+trap Hassan of Aleppo.”
+
+“Very well,” she said, and rested her elbows upon the table before her.
+“I have come to you in desperation. I can help you to find the man who
+murdered Professor Deeping, but in return I want you to help me!”
+
+I watched her closely. She was very plainly, almost poorly, dressed.
+Her face was pale and there were dark marks around her eyes. This but
+served to render their strange beauty more startling; yet I could see
+that my visitor was in real trouble. The situation was an odd one.
+
+“You are possibly about to ask me,” I suggested, “to assist Earl Dexter
+to escape the police?”
+
+She shook her head. Her voice trembled as she replied—
+
+“That would not have induced me to run the risk of coming here. I came
+because I wanted to find a man who was brave enough to help me. We have
+no friends in London, and so it became a question of terms. I can repay
+you by helping you to trace Hassan.”
+
+“What is it, then, that Dexter asks me to do?”
+
+“He asks nothing. I, Carneta, am asking!”
+
+“Then you are not come from him?”
+
+At my question, all her self-possession left her. She abruptly dropped
+her face into her hands and was shaken with sobs! It was more than I
+could bear, unmoved. I forgot the shady past, forgot that she was the
+associate of a daring felon, and could only realize that she was a
+weeping woman, who had appealed to my pity and who asked my aid.
+
+I stood up and stared out of the window, for I experienced a not
+unnatural embarrassment. Without looking at her I said—
+
+“Don’t be afraid to tell me your troubles. I don’t say I should go out
+of my way to be kind to Mr. Dexter, but I have no wish whatever to be
+instrumental in”—I hesitated—“in making you responsible for his
+misdeeds. If you can tell me where to find Hassan of Aleppo, I won’t
+even ask you where Dexter is—”
+
+“God help me! I don’t know where he is!”
+
+There was real, poignant anguish in her cry. I turned and confronted
+her. Her lashes were all wet with tears.
+
+“What! has he disappeared?”
+
+She nodded, fought with her emotion a moment, and went on unsteadily,
+
+“I want you to help me to find him for in finding him we shall find
+Hassan!”
+
+“How so?”
+
+Her gaze avoided me now.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh, he has staked everything upon securing the slipper—and
+the Hashishin were too clever for him. His hand—those Eastern fiends
+cut off his hand! But he would not give in. He made another bid—and
+lost again. It left him almost penniless.”
+
+She spoke of Earl Dexter’s felonious plans as another woman might have
+spoken of her husband’s unwise investments! It was fantastic hearing
+that confession of The Stetson Man’s beautiful partner, and I counted
+the interview one of the strangest I had ever known.
+
+A sudden idea came to me. “When did Dexter first conceive the plan to
+steal the slipper?” I asked.
+
+“In Egypt!” answered Carneta. “Yes! You may as well know! He is
+thoroughly familiar with the East, and he learned of the robbery of
+Professor Deeping almost as soon as it became known to Hassan. I know
+what you are going to ask—”
+
+“Ahmad Ahmadeen!”
+
+“Yes! He travelled home as Ahmadeen—the only time he ever used a
+disguise. Oh! the thing is accursed!” she cried. “I begged him,
+implored him, to abandon his attempts upon it. Day and night we were
+watched by those ghastly yellow men! But it was all in vain. He knew,
+had known for a long time, where Hassan of Aleppo was in hiding!”
+
+And I reflected that the best men at New Scotland Yard had failed to
+pick up the slightest clue!
+
+“The Hashishin, of whom that dreadful man is leader, are rich, or have
+supporters who are rich. The plan was to make them pay for the
+slipper.”
+
+“My God! it was playing with fire!”
+
+She sat silent awhile. Emotion threatened to get the upper hand. Then—
+
+“Two days ago,” she almost whispered, “he set out—to ... get the
+slipper!”
+
+“To steal it?”
+
+“To steal it!”
+
+“From Hassan of Aleppo?”
+
+I could scarcely believe that any man, single-handed, could have had
+the hardihood to attempt such a thing.
+
+“From Hassan, yes!”
+
+I faced her, amazed, incredulous.
+
+“Dexter had suffered mutilation, he knew that the Hashishin sought his
+life for his previous attempts upon the relic of the Prophet, and yet
+he dared to venture again into the very lions’ den?”
+
+“He did, Mr. Cavanagh, two days ago. And—”
+
+“Yes?” I urged, as gently as I could, for she was shaking pitifully.
+
+“He never came back!”
+
+The words were spoken almost in a whisper. She clenched her hands and
+leapt from the chair, fighting down her grief and with such a stark
+horror in her beautiful eyes that from my very soul I longed to be able
+to help her.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh” (she had courage, this bewildering accomplice of a
+cracksman), “I know the house he went to! I cannot hope to make you
+understand what I have suffered since then. A thousand times I have
+been on the point of going to the police, confessing all I knew, and
+leading them to that house! O God! if only he is alive, this shall be
+his last crooked deal—and mine! I dared not go to the police, for his
+sake! I waited, and watched, and hoped, through two such nights and
+days ... then I ventured. I should have gone mad if I had not come
+here. I knew you had good cause to hate, to detest me, but I remembered
+that you had a great grievance against Hassan. Not as great, O heaven!
+not as great as mine, but yet a great one. I remembered, too, that you
+were the kind of man—a woman can come to...”
+
+She sank back into the chair, and with her fingers twining and
+untwining, sat looking dully before her.
+
+“In brief,” I said, “what do you propose?”
+
+“I propose that we endeavour to obtain admittance to the house of
+Hassan of Aleppo—secretly, of course, and all I ask of you in return
+for revealing the secret of its situation is—”
+
+“That I let Dexter go free?”
+
+Almost inaudibly she whispered: “If he lives!”
+
+Surely no stranger proposition ever had been submitted to a law-abiding
+citizen. I was asked to connive in the escape of a notorious criminal,
+and at one and the same time to embark upon an expedition patently
+burglarious! As though this were not enough, I was invited to beard
+Hassan of Aleppo, the most dreadful being I had ever encountered East
+or West, in his mysterious stronghold!
+
+I wondered what my friend, Inspector Bristol, would have thought of the
+project; I wondered if I should ever live to see Hassan meet his just
+deserts as a result of this enterprise, which I was forced to admit a
+foolhardy one. But a man who has selected the career of a war
+correspondent from amongst those which Fleet Street offers, is the
+victim of a certain craving for fresh experiences; I suppose, has in
+his character something of an adventurous turn.
+
+For a while I stood staring from the window, then faced about and
+looked into the violet eyes of my visitor.
+
+“I agree, Carneta!” I said.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXIX
+WE MEET MR. ISAACS
+
+
+Quitting the wayside station, and walking down a short lane, we came
+out upon Watling Street, white and dusty beneath the afternoon sun. We
+were less than an hour’s train journey from London but found ourselves
+amid the Kentish hop gardens, amid a rural peace unbroken. My companion
+carried a camera case slung across her shoulder, but its contents were
+less innocent than one might have supposed. In fact, it contained a
+neat set of those instruments of the burglar’s art with whose use she
+appeared to be quite familiar.
+
+“There is an inn,” she said, “about a mile ahead, where we can obtain
+some vital information. He last wrote to me from there.”
+
+Side by side we tramped along the dusty road. We both were silent,
+occupied with our own thoughts. Respecting the nature of my companion’s
+I could entertain little doubt, and my own turned upon the foolhardy
+nature of the undertaking upon which I was embarked. No other word
+passed between us then, until upon rounding a bend and passing a
+cluster of picturesque cottages, the yard of the Vinepole came into
+view.
+
+“Do they know you by sight here?” I asked abruptly.
+
+“No, of course not; we never made strategic mistakes of that kind. If
+we have tea here, no doubt we can learn all we require.”
+
+I entered the little parlour of the inn, and suggested that tea should
+be served in the pretty garden which opened out of it upon the right.
+
+The host, who himself laid the table, viewed the camera case
+critically.
+
+“We get a lot of photographers down here,” he remarked tentatively.
+
+“No doubt,” said my companion. “There is some very pretty scenery in
+the neighbourhood.”
+
+The landlord rested his hands upon the table.
+
+“There was a gentleman here on Wednesday last,” he said; “an old
+gentleman who had met with an accident, and was staying somewhere
+hereabouts for his health. But he’d got his camera with him, and it was
+wonderful the way he could use it, considering he hadn’t got the use of
+his right hand.”
+
+“He must have been a very keen photographer,” I said, glancing at the
+girl beside me.
+
+“He took three or four pictures of the Vinepole,” replied the landlord
+(which I doubted, since probably his camera was a dummy); “and he
+wanted to know if there were any other old houses in the neighbourhood.
+I told him he ought to take Cadham Hall, and he said he had heard that
+the Gate House, which is about a mile from here, was one of the oldest
+buildings about.”
+
+A girl appeared with a tea tray, and for a moment I almost feared that
+the landlord was about to retire; but he lingered, whilst the girl
+distributed the things about the table, and Carneta asked casually,
+“Would there be time for me to photograph the Gate House before dark?”
+
+“There might be time,” was the reply, “but that’s not the difficulty.
+Mr. Isaacs is the difficulty.”
+
+“Who is Mr. Isaacs?” I asked.
+
+“He’s the Jewish gentleman who bought the Gate House recently. Lots of
+money he’s got and a big motor car. He’s up and down to London almost
+every day in the week, but he won’t let anybody take photographs of the
+house. I know several who’ve asked.”
+
+“But I thought,” said Carneta, innocently, “you said the old gentleman
+who was here on Wednesday went to take some?”
+
+“He went, yes, miss; but I don’t know if he succeeded.”
+
+Carneta poured out some tea.
+
+“Now that you speak of it,” she said, “I too have heard that the Gate
+House is very picturesque. What objection can Mr. Isaacs have to
+photographers?”
+
+“Well, you see, miss, to get a picture of the house, you have to pass
+right through the grounds.”
+
+“I should walk right up to the house and ask permission. Is Mr. Isaacs
+at home, I wonder?”
+
+“I couldn’t say. He hasn’t passed this way to-day.”
+
+“We might meet him on the way,” said I. “What is he like?”
+
+“A Jewish gentleman sir, very dark, with a white beard. Wears gold
+glasses. Keeps himself very much to himself. I don’t know anything
+about his household; none of them ever come here.”
+
+Carneta inquired the direction of Cadham Hall and of the Gate House,
+and the landlord left us to ourselves. My companion exhibited signs of
+growing agitation, and it seemed to me that she had much ado to
+restrain herself from setting out without a moment’s delay for the Gate
+House, which, I readily perceived, was the place to which our strange
+venture was leading us.
+
+I found something very stimulating in the reflection that, rash though
+the expedition might be, and, viewed from whatever standpoint,
+undeniably perilous, it promised to bring me to that secret stronghold
+of deviltry where the sinister Hassan of Aleppo so successfully had
+concealed himself.
+
+The work of the modern journalist had many points of contact with that
+of the detective; and since the murder of Professor Deeping I had
+succumbed to the man-hunting fever more than once. I knew that Scotland
+Yard had failed to locate the hiding-place of the remarkable and evil
+man who, like an efreet of Oriental lore, obeyed the talisman of the
+stolen slipper, striking down whomsoever laid hand upon its sacredness.
+It was a novel sensation to know that, aided by this beautiful
+accomplice of a rogue, I had succeeded where the experts had failed!
+
+Misgivings I had and shall not deny. If our scheme succeeded it would
+mean that Deeping’s murderer should be brought to justice. If it
+failed-well, frankly, upon that possibility I did not dare to reflect!
+
+It must be needless for me to say that we two strangely met allies were
+ill at ease, sometimes to the point of embarrassment. We proceeded on
+our way in almost unbroken silence, and, save for a couple of farm
+hands, without meeting any wayfarer, up to the time that we reached the
+brow of the hill and had our first sight of the Gate House lying in a
+little valley beneath. It was a small Tudor mansion, very compact in
+plan and its roof glowed redly in the rays of the now setting sun.
+
+From the directions given by the host of the Vinepole it was impossible
+to mistake the way or to mistake the house. Amid well-wooded grounds it
+stood, a place quite isolated, but so typically English that, as I
+stood looking down upon it, I found myself unable to believe that any
+other than a substantial country gentleman could be its proprietor.
+
+I glanced at Carneta. Her violet eyes were burning feverishly, but her
+lips twitched in a bravely pitiful way.
+
+Clearly now my adventure lay before me; that red-roofed homestead
+seemed to have rendered it all substantial which hitherto had been
+shadowy; and I stood there studying the Gate House gravely, for it
+might yet swallow me up, as apparently it had swallowed Earl Dexter.
+
+There, amid that peaceful Kentish landscape, fantasy danced and horrors
+unknown lurked in waiting...
+
+The eminence upon which we were commanded an extensive prospect, and
+eastward showed a tower and flagstaff which marked the site of Cadham
+Hall. There were homeward-bound labourers to be seen in the lanes now,
+and where like a white ribbon the Watling Street lay across the verdant
+carpet moved an insect shape, speedily.
+
+It was a car, and I watched it with vague interest. At a point where a
+dense coppice spread down to the roadway and a lane crossed west to
+east, the car became invisible. Then I saw it again, nearer to us and
+nearer to the Gate House. Finally it disappeared among the trees.
+
+I turned to Carneta. She, too, had been watching. Now her gaze met
+mine.
+
+“Mr. Isaacs!” she said; and her voice was less musical than usual. “His
+chauffeur, who learned his business in Cairo, is probably the only one
+of his servants who remains in England.”
+
+“What!” I began—and said no more.
+
+Where the road upon which we stood wound down into the valley and lost
+itself amid the trees surrounding the Gate House, the car suddenly
+appeared again, and began to mount the slope toward us!
+
+“Heavens!” whispered Carneta. “He may have seen us—with glasses! Quick!
+Let us walk back until the hill-top conceals us; then we must hide
+somewhere!”
+
+I shared her excitement. Without a moment’s hesitation we both turned
+and retraced our steps. Twenty paces brought us to a spot where a stack
+of mangel wurzels stood at the roadside.
+
+“This will do!” I said.
+
+We ran around into the field, and crouched where we could peer out on
+the road without ourselves being seen. Nor had we taken up this
+position a moment too soon.
+
+Topping the slope came a light-weight electric, driven by a man who, in
+his spruce uniform, might have passed at a glance for a very dusky
+European. The car had a limousine back, and as the chauffeur slowed
+down, out from the open windows right and left peered the solitary
+occupant.
+
+He had the cast of countenance which is associated with the best type
+of Jew, with clear-cut aquiline features wholly destitute of grossness.
+His white beard was patriarchal and he wore gold-rimmed pince-nez and a
+glossy silk hat. Such figures may often be met with in the great
+money-markets of the world, and Mr. Isaacs would have passed for a
+successful financier in even more discerning communities than that of
+Cadham.
+
+But I scarcely breathed until the car was past; and, beside me, my
+companion, crouching to the ground, was trembling wildly. Fifty yards
+toward the village Mr. Isaacs evidently directed the man to return.
+
+The car was put about, and flashed past us at high speed down into the
+valley. When the sound of the humming motor had died to something no
+louder than the buzz of a sleepy wasp, I held out my hand to Carneta
+and she rose, pale, but with blazing eyes, and picked up her camera
+case.
+
+“If he had detected us, everything would have been lost!” she
+whispered.
+
+“Not everything!” I replied grimly—and showed her the revolver which I
+had held in my hand whilst those eagle eyes had been seeking us. “If he
+had made a sign to show that he had seen us, in fact, if he had once
+offered a safe mark by leaning from the car, I should have shot him
+dead without hesitation!”
+
+“We must not show ourselves again, but wait for dusk. He must have seen
+us, then, on the hilltop, but I hope without recognizing us. He has the
+sight and instincts of a vulture!”
+
+I nodded, slipping the revolver into my pocket, but I wondered if I
+should not have been better advised to have risked a shot at the moment
+that I had recognized “Mr. Isaacs” for Hassan of Aleppo.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXX
+AT THE GATE HOUSE
+
+
+From sunset to dusk I lurked about the neighbourhood of the Gate House
+with my beautiful accomplice—watching and waiting: a man bound upon
+stranger business, I dare swear, than any other in the county of Kent
+that night.
+
+Our endeavour now was to avoid observation by any one, and in this, I
+think, we succeeded. At the same time, Carneta, upon whose experience I
+relied implicitly, regarded it as most important that we should observe
+(from a safe distance) any one who entered or quitted the gates.
+
+But none entered, and none came out. When, finally, we made along the
+narrow footpath skirting the west of the grounds, the night was
+silent—most strangely still.
+
+The trees met overhead, but no rustle disturbed their leaves and of
+animal life no indication showed itself. There was no moon.
+
+A full appreciation of my mad folly came to me, and with it a sense of
+heavy depression. This stillness that ruled all about the house which
+sheltered the awful Sheikh of the Assassins was ominous, I thought. In
+short, my nerves were playing me tricks.
+
+“We have little to fear,” said my companion, speaking in a hushed and
+quivering voice. “The whole of the party left England some days ago.”
+
+“Are you sure?”
+
+“Certain! We learned that before Earl made his attempt. Hassan remains,
+for some reason; Hassan and one other—the one who drives the car.”
+
+“But the slipper?”
+
+“If Hassan remains, so does the slipper!” From the knapsack, which, as
+you will have divined, did not contain a camera, she took out an
+electric pocket lamp, and directed its beam upon the hedge above us.
+
+“There is a gap somewhere here!” she said. “See if you can find it. I
+dare not show the light too long.”
+
+Darkness followed. I clambered up the bank and sought for the opening
+of which Carneta had spoken.
+
+“The light here a moment,” I whispered. “I think I have it!”
+
+Out shone the white beam, and momentarily fell upon a black hole in the
+thickset hedge. The light disappeared, and as I extended my hand to
+Carneta she grasped it and climbed up beside me.
+
+“Put on your rubber shoes,” she directed. “Leave the others here.”
+
+There in the darkness I did as she directed, for I was provided with a
+pair of tennis shoes. Carneta already was suitably shod.
+
+“I will go first,” I said. “What is the ground like beyond?”
+
+“Just unkempt bushes and weeds.”
+
+Upon hands and knees I crawled through, saw dimly that there was a
+short descent, corresponding with the ascent from the lane, and turned,
+whispering to my fellow conspirator to follow.
+
+The grounds proved even more extensive than I had anticipated. We
+pressed on, dodging low-sweeping branches and keeping our arms up to
+guard our faces from outshoots of thorn bushes. Our progress
+necessarily was slow, but even so quite a long time seemed to have
+elapsed ere we came in sight of the house.
+
+This was my first expedition of the kind; and now that my goal was
+actually in sight I became conscious of a sort of exultation hard to
+describe. My companion, on the contrary, seemed to have become icily
+cool. When next she spoke, her voice had a businesslike ring, which
+revealed the fact that she was no amateur at this class of work.
+
+“Wait here,” she directed. “I am going to pass all around the house,
+and I will rejoin you.”
+
+I could see her but dimly, and she moved off as silent as an Indian
+deer-stalker, leaving me alone there crouching at the extreme edge of
+the thicket. I looked out over a small wilderness of unkempt
+flower-beds; so much it was just possible to perceive. The plants in
+many instances had spread on to the pathways and contested survival
+with the flourishing weeds. All was wild—deserted—eerie.
+
+A sense of dampness assailed me, and I raised my eyes to the low-lying
+building wherein no light showed, no sign of life was evident. The
+nearer wing presented a verandah apparently overgrown by some climbing
+plant, the nature of which it was impossible to determine in the
+darkness.
+
+The zest for the nocturnal operation which temporarily had thrilled me
+succumbed now to loneliness. With keen anxiety I awaited the return of
+my more experienced accomplice. The situation was grotesque, utterly
+bizarre; but even my sense of humour could not save me from the growing
+dread which this seemingly deserted place poured into my heart.
+
+When upon the right I heard a faint rustling I started, and grasped the
+revolver in my pocket.
+
+“Not a sound!” came in Carneta’s voice. “Keep just inside the bushes
+and come this way. There is something I want to show you.”
+
+The various profuse growths rendered concealment simple enough—if
+indeed any other concealment were necessary than that which the
+strangely black night afforded. Just within the evil-smelling thicket
+we made a half circuit of the building, and stopped.
+
+“Look!” whispered Carneta.
+
+The word was unnecessary, for I was staring fixedly in the direction of
+that which evidently had occasioned her uneasiness.
+
+It was a small square window, so low-set that I assumed it to be that
+of a cellar, and heavily cross-barred.
+
+From it, out upon a tangled patch of vegetation, shone a dull red
+light!
+
+“There’s no other light in the place,” my companion whispered. “For
+God’s sake, what can it be?”
+
+My mind supplied no explanation. The idea that it might be a dark room
+no doubt was suggested by the assumed role of Carneta; but I knew that
+idea to be absurd. The red light meant something else.
+
+Evidently the commencing of operations before all lights were out was
+irregular, for Carneta said slowly—
+
+“We must wait and watch the light. There was formerly a moat around the
+Gate House; that must be the window of a dungeon.”
+
+I little relished the prospect of waiting in that swamp-like spot, but
+since no alternative presented itself I accepted the inevitable. For
+close upon an hour we stood watching the red window. No sound of bird,
+beast, or man disturbed our vigil; in fact, it would appear that the
+very insects shunned the neighbourhood of Hassan of Aleppo. But the red
+light still shone out.
+
+“We must risk it!” said Carneta steadily. “There are French windows
+opening on to that verandah. Ten yards farther around the bushes come
+right up to the wall of the house. We’ll go that way and around by the
+other wing on to the verandah.”
+
+Any action was preferable to this nerve-sapping delay, and with a
+determination to shoot, and shoot to kill, any one who opposed our
+entrance, I passed through the bushes and, with Carneta, rounded the
+southern border of that silent house and slipped quietly on to the
+verandah.
+
+Kneeling, Carneta opened the knapsack. My eyes were growing accustomed
+to the darkness, and I was just able to see her deft hands at work upon
+the fastenings. She made no noise, and I watched her with an
+ever-growing wonder. A female burglar is a personage difficult to
+imagine. Certainly, no one ever could have suspected this girl with the
+violet eyes of being an expert crackswoman; but of her efficiency there
+could be no question. I think I had never witnessed a more amazing
+spectacle than that of this cultured girl manipulating the tools of the
+house breaker with her slim white fingers.
+
+Suddenly she turned and clutched my arm.
+
+“The windows are not fastened!” she whispered.
+
+A strange courage came to me—perhaps that of desperation. For, ignoring
+the ominous circumstance, I pushed open the nearest window and stepped
+into the room beyond! A hissing breath from Carneta acknowledged my
+performance, and she entered close behind me, silent in her
+rubber-soled shoes.
+
+For one thrilling moment we stood listening. Then came the white beam
+from the electric lamp to cut through the surrounding blackness.
+
+The room was totally unfurnished!
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXI
+THE POOL OF DEATH
+
+
+Not a sound broke the stillness of the Gate House. It was the most
+eerily silent place in which I had ever found myself. Out into the
+corridor we went, noiselessly. It was stripped, uncarpeted.
+
+Three doors we passed, two upon the left and one upon the right. We
+tried them all. All were unfastened, and the rooms into which they
+opened bare and deserted. Then we came upon a short, descending stair,
+at its foot a massive oaken door.
+
+Carneta glided down, noiseless as a ghost, and to one of the blackened
+panels applied an ingenious little instrument which she carried in her
+knapsack. It was not unlike a stethoscope; and as I watched her
+listening, by means of this arrangement, for any sound beyond the oaken
+door, I reflected how almost every advance made by science places a new
+tool in the hand of the criminal.
+
+No word had been spoken since we had discovered this door; none had
+been necessary. For we both knew that the place beyond was that from
+which proceeded the mysterious red light.
+
+I directed the ray of the electric torch upon Carneta, as she stood
+there listening, and against that sombre oaken background her face and
+profile stood out with startling beauty. She seemed half perplexed and
+half fearful. Then she abruptly removed the apparatus, and, stooping to
+the knapsack, replaced it and took out a bunch of wire keys, signing to
+me to hand her the lamp.
+
+As I crept down the steps I saw her pause, glancing back over her
+shoulder toward the door. The expression upon her face induced me to
+direct the light in the same direction.
+
+Why neither of us had observed the fact before I cannot conjecture; but
+a key was in the lock!
+
+Perhaps the traffic of the night afforded no more dramatic moment than
+this. The house which we were come prepared burglariously to enter was
+thrown open, it would seem, to us, inviting our inspection!
+
+Looking back upon that moment, it seems almost incredible that the
+sight of a key in a lock should have so thrilled me. But at the time I
+perceived something sinister in this failure of the Lord of the
+Hashishin to close his doors to intruders. That Carneta shared my
+doubts and fears was to be read in her face; but her training had been
+peculiar, I learned, and such as establishes a surprising resoluteness
+of character.
+
+Quite noiselessly she turned the key, and holding a dainty pocket
+revolver in her hand, pushed the door open slowly!
+
+An odour, sickly sweet and vaguely familiar, was borne to my nostrils.
+Carneta became outlined in dim, reddish light. Bending forward
+slightly, she entered the room, and I, with muscles tensed nervously,
+advanced and stood beside her.
+
+I perceived that this was a cellar; indeed, I doubt not that in some
+past age it had served as a dungeon. From the stone roof hung the first
+evidence of Eastern occupation which the Gate House had yielded; in the
+form of an Oriental lantern, or fanoos, of rose-coloured waxed paper
+upon a copper frame. Its vague light revealed the interior of the
+hideous place upon whose threshold we stood.
+
+Straight before us, deep set in the stone wall, was the tiny square
+window, iron-barred without, and glazed with red glass, the light from
+which had so deeply mystified us. Within a niche in the wall, a little
+to the left of the window, rested an object which, at that moment,
+claimed our undivided attention the sight of which so wrought upon us
+that temporarily all else was forgotten.
+
+It was the red slipper of the Prophet!
+
+“My God!” whispered Carneta—“my God!”—and clutched at me, swaying
+dizzily.
+
+A few inches from our feet the floor became depressed, how deeply I
+could not determine, for it was filled with water, water filthy and
+slimy! The strange, nauseating odour had grown all but unsupportable;
+it seemingly proceeded from this fetid pool which, occupying the floor
+of the dungeon, offered a barrier, since its depth was unknown, of
+fully twelve feet between ourselves and the farther wall.
+
+There was a faint, dripping sound: a whispering, echoing drip-drip of
+falling water. I could not tell from whence it proceeded.
+
+Almost supporting my companion, whose courage seemed suddenly to have
+failed her, I stared fascinatedly at that blood-stained relic.
+Something then induced me to look behind; I suppose a warning instinct
+of that sort which is unexplainable. I only know that upholding Carneta
+with my left arm, and nervously grasping my revolver in my right, I
+turned and glanced over my shoulder.
+
+Very slowly, but with a constant, regular motion, the massive door was
+closing!
+
+I snatched away my arm; in my left hand I held the electric torch, and
+springing sharply about I directed the searching ray into the black gap
+of the stairway. A yellow face, a malignant Oriental face, came
+suddenly, fully, into view! Instantly I recognized it for that of the
+man who had driven Hassan’s car!
+
+Acting upon the determination with which I had entered the Gate House,
+I raised my revolver and fired straight between the evil eyes! To the
+fact that I dropped my left hand in the act of pulling the trigger with
+my right, and thus lost my mark, the servant of Hassan of Aleppo owed
+his escape. I missed him. He uttered a shrill cry of fear and went
+racing up the wooden stair. I followed him with the light and fired
+twice at the retreating figure. I heard him stumble and a second time
+cry out. But, though I doubt not he was hit, he recovered himself, for
+I heard his tread in the corridor above.
+
+Propping wide the door with my foot, I turned to Carneta. Her face was
+drawn and haggard; but her mouth set in a sort of grim determination.
+
+“Earl is dead!” she said, in a queer, toneless voice. “He died trying
+to get—that thing! I will get it, and destroy it!”
+
+Before I could detain her, even had I sought to do so, she stepped into
+the filthy water, struggled to recover her foothold, and sank above her
+waist into its sliminess. Without hesitation she began to advance
+toward the niche which contained the slipper. In the middle of the pool
+she stopped.
+
+What memory it was which supplied the clue to the identity of that
+nauseating smell, heaven alone knows; but as the girl stopped and drew
+herself up rigidly—then turned and leapt wildly back toward the door—I
+knew what occasioned that sickly odour!
+
+She screamed once, dreadfully—shrilly—a scream of agonizing fear that I
+can never forget. Then, roughly I grasped her, for the need was
+urgent—and dragged her out on to the floor beside me. With her wet
+garments clinging to her limbs, she fell prostrate on the stones.
+
+A yard from the brink the slimy water parted, and the yellow snout of a
+huge crocodile was raised above the surface! The saurian eyes, hungrily
+malevolent, rose next to view!
+
+The extremity of our danger found me suddenly cool. As the thing drew
+its slimy body up out of the pool I waited. The jaws were extended
+toward the prostrate body, were but inches removed from it, dripped
+their saliva upon the soddened skirt—when I bent forward, and at a
+range of some ten inches emptied the remaining three loaded chambers of
+my revolver into the creature’s left eye!
+
+Upchurned in bloody foam became the water of that dreadful place.... As
+one recalls the incidents of a fevered dream, I recall dragging Carneta
+away from the contorted body of the death-stricken reptile. A nightmare
+chaos of horrid, revolting sights and sounds forms my only recollection
+of quitting the dungeon of the slipper.
+
+I succeeded in carrying her up the stairs and out through the empty
+rooms on to the verandah; but there, from sheer exhaustion, I laid her
+down. I had no means of reviving her and I lacked the strength to carry
+her farther. Having recharged my revolver, I stood watching her where
+she lay, wanly beautiful in the dim light.
+
+There was no doubt in my mind respecting the fate of Earl Dexter, nor
+could I doubt that the slipper in the dungeon below was a duplicate of
+the real one. It was a death-trap into which he had lured Dexter and
+which he had left baited for whomsoever might trace the cracksman to
+the Gate House. Why Hassan should have remained behind, unless from
+fanatic lust of killing, I could not imagine.
+
+When at last the fresher night air had its effect, and Carneta opened
+her eyes, I led her to the gates, nor did she offer the slightest
+resistance, but looked dully before her, muttering over and over again,
+“Earl, Earl!”
+
+The gates were open; we passed out on to the open road. No man pursued
+us, and the night was gravely still.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXII
+SIX GRAY PATCHES
+
+
+When the invitation came from my old friend Hilton to spend a week
+“roughing it” with him in Warwickshire I accepted with alacrity. If
+ever a man needed a holiday I was that man. Nervous breakdown
+threatened me at any moment; the ghastly experience at the Gate House
+together with Carneta’s grief-stricken face when I had parted from her
+were obsessing memories which I sought in vain to shake off.
+
+A brief wire had contained the welcome invitation, and up to the time
+when I had received it I had been unaware that Hilton was back in
+England. Moreover, beyond the fact that his house, “Uplands,” was near
+H—, for which I was instructed to change at New Street Station,
+Birmingham, I had little idea of its location. But he added “Wire train
+and will meet at H—”; so that I had no uneasiness on that score.
+
+I had contemplated catching the 2:45 from Euston, but by the time I had
+got my work into something like order, I decided that the 6:55 would be
+more suitable and decided to dine on the train.
+
+Altogether, there was something of a rush and hustle attendant upon
+getting away, and when at last I found myself in the cab, bound for
+Euston, I sat back with a long-drawn sigh. The quest of the Prophet’s
+slipper was ended; in all probability that blood-stained relic was
+already Eastward bound. Hassan of Aleppo, its awful guardian, had
+triumphed and had escaped retribution. Earl Dexter was dead. I could
+not doubt that; for the memory of his beautiful accomplice, Carneta, as
+I last had seen her, broken-hearted, with her great violet eyes dulled
+in tearless agony—have I not said that it lived with me?
+
+Even as the picture of her lovely, pale face presented itself to my
+mind, the cab was held up by a temporary block in the traffic—and my
+imagination played me a strange trick.
+
+Another taxi ran close alongside, almost at the moment that the press
+of vehicles moved on again. Certainly, I had no more than a passing
+glimpse of the occupants; but I could have sworn that violet eyes
+looked suddenly into mine, and with equal conviction I could have sworn
+to the gaunt face of the man who sat beside the violet-eyed girl for
+that of Earl Dexter!
+
+The travellers, however, were immediately lost to sight in the rear,
+and I was left to conjecture whether this had been a not uncommon form
+of optical delusion or whether I had seen a ghost.
+
+At any rate, as I passed in between the big pillars, “The gateway of
+the North,” I scrutinized, and closely, the numerous hurrying figures
+about me. None of them, by any stretch of the imagination, could have
+been set down for that of Dexter, The Stetson Man. No doubt, I
+concluded, I had been tricked by a chance resemblance.
+
+Having dispatched my telegram, I boarded the 6:55. I thought I should
+have the compartment to myself, and so deep in reverie was I that the
+train was actually clear of the platforms ere I learned that I had a
+companion. He must have joined me at the moment that the train started.
+Certainly, I had not seen him enter. But, suddenly looking up, I met
+the eyes of this man who occupied the corner seat facing me.
+
+This person was olive-skinned, clean-shaven, fine featured, and
+perfectly groomed. His age might have been anything from twenty-five to
+forty-five, but his hair and brows were jet black. His eyes, too, were
+nearer to real black than any human eyes I had ever seen
+before—excepting the awful eyes of Hassan of Aleppo. Hassan of Aleppo!
+It was, to that hour, a mystery how his group of trained assassins—the
+Hashishin—had quitted England. Since none of them were known to the
+police, it was no insoluble mystery, I admit; but nevertheless it was
+singular that the careful watching of the ports had yielded no result.
+Could it be that some of them had not yet left the country? Could it
+be—
+
+I looked intently into the black eyes. They were caressing, smiling
+eyes, and looked boldly into mine. I picked up a magazine, pretending
+to read. But I supported it with my left hand; my right was in my coat
+pocket—and it rested upon my Smith and Wesson!
+
+So much had the slipper of Mohammed done for me: I went in hourly dread
+of murderous attack!
+
+My travelling companion watched me; of that I was certain. I could feel
+his gaze. But he made no move and no word passed between us. This was
+the situation when the train slowed into Northampton. At Northampton,
+to my indescribable relief (frankly, I was as nervous in those days as
+a woman), the Oriental traveller stepped out on to the platform.
+
+Having reclosed the door, he turned and leaned in through the open
+window.
+
+“Evidently you are not concerned, Mr. Cavanagh,” he said. “Be warned.
+Do not interfere with those that are!”
+
+The night swallowed him up.
+
+My fears had been justified; the man was one of the Hashishin—a spy of
+Hassan of Aleppo! What did it mean?
+
+I craned from the window, searching the platform right and left. But
+there was no sign of him.
+
+When the train left Northampton I found myself alone, and I should only
+weary you were I to attempt to recount the troubled conjectures that
+bore me company to Birmingham.
+
+The train reached New Street at nine, with the result that having
+gulped a badly needed brandy and soda in the buffet, I grabbed my bag,
+raced across—and just missed the connection! More than an hour later I
+found myself standing at ten minutes to eleven upon the H— platform,
+watching the red taillight of the “local” disappear into the night.
+Then I realized to the full that with four miles of lonely England
+before me there hung above my head a mysterious threat—a vague menace.
+The solitary official, who but waited my departure to lock up the
+station, was the last representative of civilization I could hope to
+encounter until the gates of “Uplands” should be opened to me!
+
+What was the matter with which I was warned not to interfere? Might I
+not, by my mere presence in that place, unwittingly be interfering now?
+
+With the station-master’s directions humming like a refrain in my ears,
+I passed through the sleeping village and out on to the road. The moon
+was exceptionally bright and unobscured, although a dense bank of cloud
+crept slowly from the west, and before me the path stretched as an
+unbroken thread of silvery white twining a sinuous way up the
+bracken-covered slope, to where, sharply defined against the moonlight
+sky, a coppice in grotesque silhouette marked the summit.
+
+The month had been dry and tropically hot, and my footsteps rang
+crisply upon the hard ground. There is nothing more deceptive than a
+straight road up a hill; and half an hour’s steady tramping but saw me
+approaching the trees.
+
+I had so far resolutely endeavoured to keep my mind away from the idea
+of surveillance. Now, as I paused to light my pipe—a never-failing
+friend in loneliness—I perceived something move in the shadows of a
+neighbouring bush.
+
+This object was not unlike a bladder, and the very incongruity of its
+appearance served to revive all my apprehensions. Taking up my grip, as
+though I had noticed nothing of an alarming nature, I pursued my way up
+the slope, leaving a trail of tobacco smoke in my wake; and having my
+revolver secreted up my right coat-sleeve.
+
+Successfully resisting a temptation to glance behind, I entered the
+cover of the coppice, and, now invisible to any one who might be
+dogging me, stood and looked back upon the moon-bright road.
+
+There was no living thing in sight, the road was empty as far as the
+eye could see. The coppice now remained to be negotiated, and then, if
+the station-master’s directions were not at fault, “Uplands” should be
+visible beyond. Taking, therefore, what I had designed to be a final
+glance back down the hillside, I was preparing to resume my way when I
+saw something—something that arrested me.
+
+It was a long way behind—so far that, had the moon been less bright, I
+could never have discerned it. What it was I could not even conjecture;
+but it had the appearance of a vague gray patch, moving—not along the
+road, but through the undergrowth—in my direction.
+
+For a second my eye rested upon it. Then I saw a second patch—a third—a
+fourth!
+
+Six!
+
+There were six gray patches creeping up the slope toward me!
+
+The sight was unnerving. What were these things that approached,
+silently, stealthily—like snakes in the grass?
+
+A fear, unlike anything I had known before the quest of the Prophet’s
+slipper had brought fantastic horror into my life, came upon me.
+Revolver in hand I ran—ran for my life toward the gap in the trees that
+marked the coppice end. And as I went something hummed through the
+darkness beside my head, some projectile, some venomous thing that
+missed its mark by a bare inch!
+
+Painfully conversant with the uncanny weapons employed by the
+Hashishin, I knew now, beyond any possibility of doubt, that death was
+behind me.
+
+A pattering like naked feet sounded on the road, and, without pausing
+in my headlong career, I sent a random shot into the blackness.
+
+The crack of the Smith and Wesson reassured me. I pulled up short,
+turned, and looked back toward the trees.
+
+Nothing—no one!
+
+Breathing heavily, I crammed my extinguished briar into my
+pocket—re-charged the empty chamber of the revolver—and started to run
+again toward a light that showed over the treetops to my left.
+
+That, if the man’s directions were right, was “Uplands”—if his
+directions were wrong—then...
+
+A shrill whistle—minor, eerie, in rising cadence—sounded on the dead
+silence with piercing clearness! Six whistles—seemingly from all around
+me—replied!
+
+Some object came humming through the air, and I ducked wildly.
+
+On and on I ran—flying from an unknown, but, as a warning instinct told
+me, deadly peril—ran as a man runs pursued by devils.
+
+The road bent sharply to the left then forked. Overhanging trees
+concealed the house, and the light, though high up under the eaves, was
+no longer visible. Trusting to Providence to guide me, I plunged down
+the lane that turned to the left, and, almost exhausted, saw the gates
+before me—saw the sweep of the drive, and the moonlight, gleaming on
+the windows!
+
+None of the windows were illuminated.
+
+Straight up to the iron gates I raced.
+
+They were locked!
+
+Without a moment’s hesitation I hurled my grip over the top and
+clambered up the bars! As I got astride, from the blackness of the lane
+came the ominous hum, and my hat went spinning away across the
+lawn!—the black cloud veiled the moon and complete darkness fell.
+
+Then I dropped and ran for the house—shouting, though all but
+winded—“Hilton! Hilton! Open the door!”
+
+Sinking exhausted on the steps, I looked toward the gates—but they
+showed only dimly in the dense shadows of the trees.
+
+Bzzz! Buzz!
+
+I dropped flat in the portico as something struck the metal knob of the
+door and rebounded over me. A shower of gravel told of another
+misdirected projectile.
+
+Crack! Crack! Crack! The revolver spoke its short reply into the
+mysterious darkness; but the night gave up no sound to tell of a shot
+gone home.
+
+“Hilton! Hilton!” I cried, banging on the panels with the butt of the
+weapon. “Open the door! Open the door!”
+
+And now I heard the coming footsteps along the hall within; heavy bolts
+were withdrawn—the door swung open—and Hilton, pale-faced, appeared.
+His hand shot out, grabbed my coat collar; and weak, exhausted, I found
+myself snatched into safety, and the door rebolted.
+
+“Thank God!” I whispered. “Thank God! Hilton, look to all your bolts
+and fastenings. Hell is outside!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIII
+HOW WE WERE REINFORCED
+
+
+Hilton, I learned, was living the simple life at “Uplands.” The place
+was not yet decorated and was only partly furnished. But with his man,
+Soar, he had been in solitary occupation for a week.
+
+“Feel better now?” he asked anxiously.
+
+I reached for my tumbler and blew a cloud of smoke into the air. I
+could hear Soar’s footsteps as he made the round of bolts and bars,
+testing each anxiously.
+
+“Thanks, Hilton,” I said. “I’m quite all right. You are naturally
+wondering what the devil it all means? Well, then, I wired you from
+Euston that I was coming by the 6:55.”
+
+“H— Post Office shuts at 7. I shall get your wire in the morning!”
+
+“That explains your failing to meet me. Now for my explanation!”
+
+“Surrounding this house at the present moment,” I continued, “are
+members of an Eastern organization—the Hashishin, founded in Khorassan
+in the eleventh century and flourishing to-day!”
+
+“Do you mean it, Cavanagh?”
+
+“I do! One Hassan of Aleppo is the present Sheikh of the order, and he
+has come to England, bringing a fiendish company in his train, in
+pursuit of the sacred slipper of Mohammed, which was stolen by the late
+Professor Deeping—-”
+
+“Surely I have read something about this?”
+
+“Probably. Deeping was murdered by Hassan! The slipper was placed in
+the Antiquarian Museum—”
+
+“From which it was stolen again!”
+
+“Correct—by Earl Dexter, America’s foremost crook! But the real facts
+have never got into print. I am the only pressman who knows them, and I
+have good reason for keeping my knowledge to myself! Dexter is dead (I
+believe I saw his ghost to-day). But although, to the best of my
+knowledge, the accursed slipper is in the hands of Hassan and Company,
+I have been watched since I left Euston, and on my way to ‘Uplands’ my
+life was attempted!”
+
+“For God’s sake, why?”
+
+“I cannot surmise, Hilton. Deeping, for certain reasons that are
+irrelevant at the moment, left the keys of the case at the Museum in my
+perpetual keeping—but the case was rifled a second time—”
+
+“I read of it!”
+
+“And the keys were stolen from me. I am utterly at a loss to understand
+why the Hashishin—for it is members of that awful organization who,
+without a doubt, surround this house at the present moment—should seek
+my life. Hilton, I have brought trouble with me!”
+
+“It’s almost incredible!” said Hilton, staring at me. “Why do these
+people pursue you?”
+
+Ere I had time to reply Soar entered, arrayed, as was Hilton, in his
+night attire. Soar was an ex-dragoon and a model man.
+
+“Everything fast, sir,” he reported; “but from the window of the
+bedroom over here—the room I got ready for Mr. Cavanagh—I thought I saw
+someone in the orchard.”
+
+“Eh?” jerked Hilton—“in the orchard? Come on up, Cavanagh!”
+
+We all ran upstairs. The moonlight was streaming into the room.
+
+“Keep back!” I warned.
+
+Well within the shadow, I crept up to the window and looked out. The
+night was hot and still. No breeze stirred the leaves, but the edge of
+the frowning thunder cloud which I had noted before spread a heavy
+carpet of ebony black upon the ground. Beyond, I could dimly discern
+the hills. The others stood behind me, constrained by the fear of this
+mysterious danger which I had brought to “Uplands.”
+
+There was someone moving among the trees!
+
+Closer came the figure, and closer, until suddenly a shaft of moonlight
+found passage and spilled a momentary pool of light amid the shadows, I
+could see the watcher very clearly. A moment he stood there,
+motionless, and looking up at the window; then as he glided again into
+the shade of the trees the darkness became complete. But I watched,
+crouching there nervously, for long after he was gone.
+
+“For God’s sake, who is it?” whispered Hilton, with a sort of awe in
+his voice.
+
+“It’s Hassan of Aleppo!” I replied.
+
+Virtually, the house, with the capital of the Midlands so near upon the
+one hand, the feverish activity of the Black Country reddening the
+night upon the other, was invested by fanatic Easterns!
+
+We descended again to the extemporized study. Soar entered with us and
+Hilton invited him to sit down.
+
+“We must stick together to-night!” he said. “Now, Cavanagh, let us see
+if we can find any explanation of this amazing business. I can
+understand that at one period of the slipper’s history you were an
+object of interest to those who sought to recover it; but if, as you
+say, the Hashishin have the slipper now, what do they want with you? If
+you have never touched it, they cannot be prompted by desire for
+vengeance.”
+
+“I have never touched it,” I replied grimly; “nor even any receptacle
+containing it.”
+
+As I ceased speaking came a distant muffled rumbling.
+
+“That’s the thunder,” said Hilton. “There’s a tremendous storm
+brewing.”
+
+He poured out three glasses of whisky, and was about to speak when Soar
+held up a warning finger.
+
+“Listen!” he said.
+
+At his words, with tropical suddenness down came the rain.
+
+Hilton, his pipe in his hand, stood listening intently.
+
+“What?” he asked.
+
+“I don’t know, sir; the sound of the rain has drowned it.”
+
+Indeed, the rain was descending in a perfect deluge, its continuous
+roar drowning all other sounds; but as we three listened tensely we
+detected a noise which hitherto had seemed like the overflowing of some
+spout.
+
+But louder and clearer it grew, until at last I knew it for what it
+was.
+
+“It’s a motor-car!” I cried.
+
+“And coming here!” added Soar. “Listen! it’s in the lane!”
+
+“It certainly isn’t a taxicab,” declared Hilton. “None of the men will
+come beyond the village.”
+
+“That’s the gate!” said Soar, in an awed voice, and stood up, looking
+at Hilton.
+
+“Come on,” said the latter abruptly, making for the door.
+
+“Be careful, Hilton!” I cried; “it may be a trick!”
+
+Soar unbolted the front door, threw it open, and looked out. In the
+darkness of the storm it was almost impossible to see anything in the
+lane outside. But at that moment a great sheet of lightning split the
+gloom, and we saw a taxicab standing close up to the gateway!
+
+“Help! Open the gate!” came a high-pitched voice; “open the gate!”
+
+Out into the rain we ran and down the gravel path. Soar had the gate
+open in a twinkling, and a woman carrying a brown leather grip, but who
+was so closely veiled that I had no glimpse of her features, leapt
+through on to the drive.
+
+“Lend a hand, two of you!” cried a vaguely familiar voice—“this way!”
+
+Hilton and Soar stepped out into the road. The driver of the cab was
+lying forward across the wheel, apparently insensible, but as Hilton
+seized his arm he moved and spoke feebly.
+
+“For God’s sake be quick, sir!” he said. “They’re after us! They’re on
+the other side of the lane, there!”
+
+With that he dropped limply into Hilton’s arms!
+
+He was dragged in on to the drive—and something whizzed over our heads
+and went sputtering into the gravel away up toward the house. The last
+to enter was the man who had come in the cab. As he barred the gate
+behind him he suddenly reached out through the bars and I saw a pistol
+in his hand.
+
+Once—twice—thrice—he fired into the blackness of the lane.
+
+“Take that, you swine!” he shouted. “Take that!”
+
+As quickly as we could, bearing the insensible man, we hurried back to
+the door. On the step the woman was waiting for us, with her veil
+raised. A blinding flash of lightning came as we mounted the step—and I
+looked into the violet eyes of Carneta! I turned and stared at the man
+behind me.
+
+It was Earl Dexter.
+
+Three of the mysterious missiles fell amongst us, but miraculously no
+one was struck. Amid the mighty booming of the thunder we reentered the
+houses and got the door barred. In the hall we laid down the
+unconscious man and stood, a strangely met company, peering at one
+another in the dim lamplight.
+
+“We’ve got to bury the hatchet, Mr. Cavanagh!” said Dexter. “It’s a
+case of the common enemy. I’ve brought you your bag!” and he pointed to
+the brown grip upon the floor.
+
+“My bag!” I cried. “My bag is upstairs in my room.”
+
+“Wrong, sir!” snapped The Stetson Man. “They are like as two peas in a
+pod, I’ll grant you, but the bag you snatched off the platform at New
+Street was mine! That’s what I’m after; I ought to be on the way to
+Liverpool. That’s what Hassan’s after!”
+
+“The bag!”
+
+“You don’t need to ask what’s in the bag?” suggested Dexter.
+
+“What is in the bag?” ask Hilton hoarsely.
+
+“The slipper of the Prophet, sir!” was the reply.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XXXIV
+MY LAST MEETING WITH HASSAN OF ALEPPO
+
+
+I felt dazed, as a man must feel who has just heard the death sentence
+pronounced upon him. Hilton seemed to have become incapable of speech
+or action; and in silence we stood watching Carneta tending the
+unconscious man. She forced brandy from a flask between his teeth,
+kneeling there beside him with her face very pale and dark rings around
+her eyes. Presently she looked up.
+
+“Will you please get me a bowl of water and a sponge?” she said
+quietly.
+
+Soar departed without a word, and no one spoke until he returned,
+bringing the sponge and the water, when the girl set to work in a
+businesslike way to cleanse a wound which showed upon the man’s head.
+
+“She’s a good nurse is Carneta,” said Dexter coolly. “She was the only
+doctor I had through this”—indicating his maimed wrist. “If you will
+fetch my bag down, there’s some lint in it.”
+
+I hesitated.
+
+“You needn’t worry,” said Dexter; “as well be hung for a sheep as a
+lamb. You’ve handled the bag, and I’m not asking you to do any more.”
+
+I went up to my room and lifted the grip from the chair upon which I
+had put it. Even now I found it difficult to perceive any difference
+between this and mine. Both were of identical appearance and both new.
+In fact, I had bought mine only that morning, my old one being past
+use, and being in a hurry, I had not left it to be initialled.
+
+As I picked up the bag the lightning flashed again, and from the window
+I could see the orchard as clearly as by sunlight. At the farther end
+near the wall someone was standing watching the house.
+
+I went downstairs carrying the fatal bag, and rejoined the group in the
+hall.
+
+“He will have to be got to bed,” said Carneta, referring to the wounded
+man; “he will probably remain unconscious for a long time.”
+
+Accordingly, we took the patient into one of the few furnished
+bedrooms, and having put him to bed left him in care of the beautiful
+nurse. When we four men met again downstairs, amazement had rendered
+the whole scene unreal to me. Soar stood just within the open door, not
+knowing whether to go or to remain; but Hilton motioned to him to stay.
+Earl Dexter bit off the end of a cigar and stood with his left elbow
+resting on the mantelpiece.
+
+His gaunt face looked gaunter than ever, but the daredevil gray eyes
+still nursed that humorous light in their depths.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh,” he said, “we’re brothers! And if you’ll consider a
+minute, you’ll see that I’m not lying when I say I’m on the straight,
+now and for always!”
+
+I made no reply: I could think of none.
+
+“I’m a crook,” he resumed, “or I was up to a while ago. There’s a
+warrant out for me—the first that ever bore my name. I’ve sailed near
+the wind often enough, but it was desperation that got me into hot
+water about that!”
+
+He jerked his cigar in the direction of his grip, which lay now on the
+rug at his feet.
+
+“I lost a useful right hand,” he went on—“and I lost every cent I had.
+It was a dead rotten speculation—for I lost my good name! I mean it!
+Believe me, I’ve handled some shady propositions in the past, but I did
+it right in the sunlight! Up to the time I went out for that damned
+slipper I could have had lunch with any detective from Broadway to the
+Strand! I didn’t need any false whiskers and the Ritz was good enough
+for The Stetson Man. What now? I’m ‘wanted!’ Enough said.”
+
+He tossed the cigar—he had smoked scarce an inch of it—into the empty
+grate.
+
+“I’m an Aunt Sally for any man to shy at,” he resumed bitterly. “My
+place henceforth is in the dark. Right! I’ve finished; the book’s
+closed. From the time I quit England—if I can quit—I’m on the straight!
+I’ve promised Carneta, and I mean to keep my word. See here—”
+
+Dexter turned to me.
+
+“You’ll want to know how I escaped from the cursed death-trap at
+Hassan’s house in Kent? I’ll tell you. I was never in it! I was hiding
+and waiting my chance. You know what was left to guard the slipper
+while the Sheikh—rot him—was away looking after arrangements for
+getting his mob out of the country?”
+
+I nodded.
+
+“You fell into the trap—you and Carneta. By God! I didn’t know till it
+was all over! But two minutes later I was inside that place—and three
+minutes later I was away with the slipper! Oh, it wasn’t a duplicate;
+it was the goods! What then? Carneta had had a sickening of the
+business and she just invited me to say Yes or No. I said Yes; and I’m
+a straight man onward.”
+
+“Then what were you doing on the train with the slipper?” asked Hilton
+sharply.
+
+“I was going to Liverpool, sir!” snapped The Stetson Man, turning on
+him. “I was going to try to get aboard the Mauretania and then make
+terms for my life! What happened? I slipped out at Birmingham for a
+drink—grip in hand! I put it down beside me, and Mr. Cavanagh here, all
+in a hustle, must have rushed in behind me, snatched a whisky and
+snatched my grip and started for H—!”
+
+A vivid flash of lightning flickered about the room. Then came the
+deafening boom of the thunder, right over the house it seemed.
+
+“I knew from the weight of the grip it wasn’t mine,” said Dexter, “and
+I was the most surprised guy in Great Britain and Ireland when I found
+whose it was! I opened it, of course! And right on top was a waistcoat
+and right in the first pocket was a telegram. Here it is!”
+
+He passed it to me. It was that which I had received from Hilton. I had
+packed the suit which I had been wearing that morning and must
+previously have thrust the telegram into the waistcoat pocket.
+
+“Providence!” Dexter assured me. “Because I got on the station in time
+to see Hassan of Aleppo join the train for H—! I was too late, though.
+But I chartered a taxi out on Corporation Street and invited the man to
+race the local! He couldn’t do it, but we got here in time for the
+fireworks! Mr. Cavanagh, there are anything from six to ten Hashishin
+watching this house!”
+
+“I know it!”
+
+“They’re bareheaded; and in the dark their shaven skulls look like
+nothing human. They’re armed with those damned tubes, too. I’d give a
+thousand dollars—if I had it!—to know their mechanism. Well, gentlemen,
+deeds speak. What am I here for, when I might be on the way to
+Liverpool, and safety?”
+
+“You’re here to try to make up for the past a bit!” said a soft,
+musical voice. “Mr. Cavanagh’s life is in danger.”
+
+Carneta entered the room.
+
+The light played in that wonderful hair of hers; and pale though she
+was, I thought I had never seen a more beautiful woman.
+
+“Tell them,” she said quietly, “what must be done.”
+
+Soar glanced at me out of the corner of his eyes and shifted uneasily.
+Hilton stared as if fascinated.
+
+“Now,” rapped Dexter, in his strident voice, “putting aside all
+questions of justice and right (we’re not policemen), what do we
+want—you and I, Mr. Cavanagh?”
+
+“I can’t think clearly about anything,” I said dully. “Explain
+yourself.”
+
+“Very well. Inspector Bristol, C.I.D., would want me and Hassan
+arrested. I don’t want that! What I want is peace; I want to be able to
+sleep in comfort; I want to know I’m not likely to be murdered on the
+next corner! Same with you?”
+
+“Yes—yes.”
+
+“How can we manage it? One way would be to kill Hassan of Aleppo; but
+he wants a lot of killing—I’ve tried! Moreover, directly we’d done it,
+another Sheikh-al-jebal would be nominated and he’d carry on the bloody
+work. We’d be worse off than ever. Right! we’ve got to connive at
+letting the blood-stained fanatic escape, and we’ve got to give up the
+slipper!”
+
+“I’ll do that with all my heart!”
+
+“Sure! But you and I have both got little scores up against Hassan,
+which it’s not in human nature to forget. But I’ve got it worked out
+that there’s only one way. It may nearly choke us to have to do it,
+I’ll allow. I’m working on the Moslem character. Mr. Hilton, make up a
+fire in the grate here!”
+
+Hilton stared, not comprehending.
+
+“Do as he asks,” I said. “Personally, I am resigned to mutilation,
+since I have touched the bag containing the slipper, but if Dexter has
+a plan—”
+
+“Excuse me, sir,” Soar interrupted. “I believe there’s some coal in the
+coal-box, but I shall have to break up a packing-case for firewood—or
+go out into the yard!”
+
+“Let it be the packing-case,” replied Hilton hastily.
+
+Accordingly a fire was kindled, whilst we all stood about the room in a
+sort of fearful uncertainty; and before long a big blaze was roaring up
+the chimney. Dexter turned to me.
+
+“Mr. Cavanagh,” said he, “I want you to go right upstairs, open a
+first-floor window—I would suggest that of your bedroom—and invite
+Hassan of Aleppo to come and discuss terms!”
+
+Silence followed his words; we were all amazed. Then—
+
+“Why do you ask me to do this?” I inquired.
+
+“Because,” replied Dexter, “I happen to know that Hassan has some queer
+kind of respect for you—I don’t know why.”
+
+“Which is probably the reason why he tried to kill me to-night!”
+
+“That’s beside the question, Mr. Cavanagh. He will believe you—which is
+the important point.”
+
+“Very well. I have no idea what you have in mind but I am prepared to
+adopt any plan since I have none of my own. What shall I say?”
+
+“Say that we are prepared to return the slipper—on conditions.”
+
+“He will probably try to shoot me as I stand at the window.”
+
+Dexter shrugged his shoulders.
+
+“Got to risk it,” he drawled.
+
+“And what are the conditions?”
+
+“He must come right in here and discuss them! Guarantee him safe
+conduct and I don’t think he’ll hesitate. Anyway, if he does, just tell
+him that the slipper will be destroyed immediately!”
+
+Without a word I turned on my heel and ascended the stairs.
+
+I entered my room, crossed to the window, and threw it widely open.
+Hovering over the distant hills I could see the ominous thunder cloud,
+but the storm seemed to have passed from “Uplands,” and only a distant
+muttering with the faint dripping of water from the pipes broke the
+silence of the night. A great darkness reigned, however, and I was
+entirely unable to see if any one was in the orchard.
+
+Like some mueddin of fantastic fable I stood there.
+
+“Hassan!” I cried—“Hassan of Aleppo!”
+
+The name rang out strangely upon the stillness—the name which for me
+had a dreadful significance; but the whole episode seemed unreal, the
+voice that had cried unlike my voice.
+
+Instantly as any magician summoning an efreet I was answered.
+
+Out from the trees strode a tall figure, a figure I could not mistake.
+It was that of Hassan of Aleppo!
+
+“I hear, effendim, and obey,” he said. “I am ready. Open the door!”
+
+“We are prepared to discuss terms. You may come and go safely”—still my
+voice sounded unfamiliar in my ears.
+
+“I know, effendim; it is so written. Open the door.”
+
+I closed the window and mechanically descended the stairs.
+
+“Mind it isn’t a trap!” cried Hilton, who, with the others, had
+overheard every word of this strange interview. “They may try to rush
+the door directly we open it.”
+
+“I’ll stand the chest behind it,” said Soar; “between the door and the
+wall, so that only one can enter at a time.”
+
+This was done, and the door opened.
+
+Alone, majestic, entered Hassan of Aleppo.
+
+He was dressed in European clothes but wore the green turban of a
+Sherif. With his snowy beard and coal-black eyes he seemed like a
+vision of the Prophet, of the Prophet in whose name he had committed
+such ghastly atrocities.
+
+Deigning no glance to Soar nor to Hilton, he paced into the room,
+passing me and ignoring Carneta, where Earl Dexter awaited him. I shall
+never forget the scene as Hassan entered, to stand looking with blazing
+eyes at The Stetson Man, who sat beside the fire with the slipper of
+Mohammed in his hand!
+
+“Hassan,” said Dexter quietly, “Mr. Cavanagh has had to promise you
+safe conduct, or as sure as God made me, I’d put a bullet in you!”
+
+The Sheikh of the Hashishin glared fixedly at him.
+
+“Companion of the evil one,” he said, “it is not written that I shall
+die by your hand—or by the hand of any here. But it has been revealed
+to me that to-night the gates of Paradise may be closed in my face.”
+
+“I shouldn’t be at all surprised,” drawled Dexter. “But it’s up to you.
+You’ve got to swear by Mohammed—”
+
+“Salla-’llahu ’aleyhi wasellem!”
+
+“That you won’t lay a hand upon any living soul, or allow any of your
+followers to do so, who has touched the slipper or had anything to do
+with it, but that you will go in peace.”
+
+“You are doomed to die!”
+
+“You don’t agree, then?”
+
+“Those who have offended must suffer the penalty!”
+
+“Right!” said Dexter—and prepared to toss the slipper into the heart of
+the fire!
+
+“Stop! Infidel! Stop!”
+
+There was real agony in Hassan’s voice. To my inexpressible surprise he
+dropped upon his knee, extending his lean brown hands toward the
+slipper.
+
+Dexter hesitated. “You agree, then?”
+
+Hassan raised his eyes to the ceiling.
+
+“I agree,” he said. “Dark are the ways. It is the will of God...”
+
+Dimly the booming of the thunder came echoing back to us from the
+hills. Above its roll sounded a barbaric chanting to which the drums of
+angry heaven formed a fitting accompaniment.
+
+I heard Soar shooting the bolts again upon the going of our strange
+visitor.
+
+Faint and more faint grew the chanting, until it merged into the remote
+muttering of the storm—and was lost. The quest of the sacred slipper
+was ended.
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 2126 ***