LITMIR.BIZ

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and we had made up my camp-bed at one end,

      stuffing odds and ends under the clothes to lend the appearance of a

      sleeper, which device we also had adopted in the case of the larger

      bed. The perfumed envelope lay upon a little coffee table in the

      center of the floor, and Smith, with an electric pocket lamp, a

      revolver, and a brassey beside him, sat on cushions in the shadow of

      the wardrobe. I occupied a post between the windows.

      No unusual sound, so far, had disturbed the stillness of the night.

      Save for the muffled throb of the rare all-night cars passing the front

      of the house, our vigil had been a silent one. The full moon had

      painted about the floor weird shadows of the clustering ivy, spreading

      the design gradually from the door, across the room, past the little

      table where the envelope lay, and finally to the foot of the bed.

      The distant clock struck a quarter-past two.

      A slight breeze stirred the ivy, and a new shadow added itself to the

      extreme edge of the moon's design.

      Something rose, inch by inch, above the sill of the westerly window. I

      could see only its shadow, but a sharp, sibilant breath from Smith told

      me that he, from his post, could see the cause of the shadow.

      Every nerve in my body seemed to be strung tensely. I was icy cold,

      expectant, and prepared for whatever horror was upon us.

      The shadow became stationary. The dacoit was studying the interior of

      the room.

      Then it suddenly lengthened, and, craning my head to the left, I saw a

      lithe, black-clad form, surmounted by a Yellow face, sketchy in the

      moonlight, pressed against the window-panes!

      One thin, brown hand appeared over the edge of the lowered sash, which

      it grasped--and then another. The man made absolutely no sound

      whatever. The second hand disappeared--and reappeared. It held a

      small, square box. There was a very faint CLICK.

      The dacoit swung himself below the window with the agility of an ape,

      as, with a dull, muffled thud, SOMETHING dropped upon the carpet!

      "Stand still, for your life!" came Smith's voice, high-pitched.

      A beam of white leaped out across the room and played full upon the

      coffee-table in the center.

      Prepared as I was for something horrible, I know that I paled at sight

      of the thing that was running round the edge of the envelope.

      It was an insect, full six inches long, and of a vivid, venomous, red

      color! It had something of the appearance of a great ant, with its

      long, quivering antennae and its febrile, horrible vitality; but it was

      proportionately longer of body and smaller of head, and had numberless

      rapidly moving legs. In short, it was a giant centipede, apparently of

      the scolopendra group, but of a form quite new to me.

      These things I realized in one breathless instant; in the next--Smith

      had dashed the thing's poisonous life out with one straight, true blow

      of the golf club!

      I leaped to the window and threw it widely open, feeling a silk thread

      brush my hand as I did so. A black shape was dropping, with incredible

      agility from branch to branch of the ivy, and, without once offering a

      mark for a revolver-shot, it merged into the shadows beneath the trees

      of the garden. As I turned and switched on the light Nayland Smith

      dropped limply into a chair, leaning his head upon his hands. Even

      that grim courage had been tried sorely.

      "Never mind the dacoit, Petrie," he said. "Nemesis will know where to

      find him. We know now what causes the mark of the Zayat Kiss.

      Therefore science is richer for our first brush with the enemy, and the

      enemy is poorer--unless he has any more unclassified centipedes. I

      understand now something that has been puzzling me since I heard of

      it--Sir Crichton's stifled cry. When we remember that he was almost

      past speech, it is reasonable to suppose that his cry was not 'The red

      hand!' but 'The red ANT!' Petrie, to think that I failed, by less than

      an hour, to save him from such an end!"

      CHAPTER IV

      "THE body of a lascar, dressed in the manner usual on the P. & O.

      boats, was recovered from the Thames off Tilbury by the river police at

      six A.M. this morning. It is supposed that the man met with an

      accident in leaving his ship."

      Nayland Smith passed me the evening paper and pointed to the above

      paragraph.

      "For 'lascar' read 'dacoit,'" he said. "Our visitor, who came by way

      of the ivy, fortunately for us, failed to follow his instructions.

      Also, he lost the centipede and left a clew behind him. Dr. Fu-Manchu

      does not overlook such lapses."

      It was a sidelight upon the character of the awful being with whom we

      had to deal. My very soul recoiled from bare consideration of the fate

      that would be ours if ever we fell into his hands.

      The telephone bell rang. I went out and found that Inspector Weymouth

      of New Scotland Yard had called us up.

      "Will Mr. Nayland Smith please come to the Wapping River Police Station

      at once," was the message.

      Peaceful interludes were few enough throughout that wild pursuit.

      "It is certainly something important," said my friend; "and, if

      Fu-Manchu is at the bottom of it--as we must presume him to

      be--probably something ghastly."

      A brief survey of the time-tables showed us that there were no trains

      to serve our haste. We accordingly chartered a cab and proceeded east.

      Smith, throughout the journey, talked entertainingly about his work in

      Burma. Of intent, I think, he avoided any reference to the

      circumstances which first had brought him in contact with the sinister

      genius of the Yellow Movement. His talk was rather of the sunshine of

      the East than of its shadows.

      But

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