THE MUMMY
Dinner was out of the question that night for all of us. Kâramanèh,
who had spoken no word, but, grasping my hands, had looked into my
eyes--her own glassy with unshed tears--and then stolen away to her
cabin, had not since reappeared. Seated upon my berth, I stared
unseeingly before me, upon a changed ship, a changed sea and sky--upon
another world. The poor old Bishop, my neighbour, had glanced in
several times, as he hobbled by, and his spectacles were unmistakably
humid; but even he had vouchsafed no word, realizing that my sorrow
was too deep for such consolation.
When at last I became capable of connected thought, I found myself
faced by a big problem. Should I place the facts of the matter, as I
knew them to be, before the Captain? or could I hope to apprehend
Fu-Manchu's servant by the methods suggested by my poor friend? That
Smith's death was an accident, I did not believe for a moment; it was
impossible not to link it with the attempt upon Kâramanèh. In my
misery and doubt, I determined to take counsel with Dr. Stacey. I
stood up, and passed out on to the deck.
Those passengers whom I met on my way to his room regarded me in
respectful silence. By contrast, Stacey's attitude surprised and even
annoyed me.
"I'd be prepared to stake all I possess--although it's not much," he
said, "that this was not the work of your hidden enemy."
He blankly refused to give me his reasons for the statement and
strongly advised me to watch and wait but to make no communication to
the Captain.
At this hour I can look back and savour again something of the
profound dejection of that time. I could not face the passengers; I
even avoided Kâramanèh and Azîz. I shut myself in my cabin and sat
staring aimlessly into the growing darkness. The steward knocked,
once, inquiring if I needed anything, but I dismissed him abruptly. So
I passed the evening and the greater part of the night.
Those groups of promenaders who passed my door invariably were
discussing my poor friend's tragic end; but as the night wore on, the
deck grew empty, and I sat amid a silence that in my miserable state I
welcomed more than the presence of any friend, saving only the one
whom I should never welcome again.
Since I had not counted the bells, to this day I have only the vaguest
idea respecting the time whereat the next incident occurred which it
is my duty to chronicle. Perhaps I was on the verge of falling asleep,
seated there as I was; at any rate, I could scarcely believe myself
awake, when, unheralded by any footsteps to indicate his coming, some
one who seemed to be crouching outside my stateroom, slightly raised
himself and peered in through the port-hole--which I had not troubled
to close.
He must have been a fairly tall man to have looked in at all, and
although his features were indistinguishable in the darkness, his
outline, which was clearly perceptible against the white boat beyond,
was unfamiliar to me. He seemed to have a small and oddly swathed
head, and what I could make out of the gaunt neck and square shoulders
in some way suggested an unnatural thinness; in short, the smudgy
silhouette in the port-hole was weirdly like that of a _mummy_!
For some moments I stared at the apparition; then, rousing myself from
the apathy into which I had sunk, I stood up very quickly and stepped
across the room. As I did so the figure vanished, and when I threw
open the door and looked out upon the deck ... the deck was wholly
untenanted!
I realized at once that it would be useless, even had I chosen the
course, to seek confirmation of what I had seen from the officer on
the bridge: my own cabin, together with the one adjoining--that of the
Bishop--was not visible from the bridge.
For some time I stood in my doorway, wondering in a disinterested
fashion which now I cannot explain, if the hidden enemy had revealed
himself to me, or if disordered imagination had played me a trick.
Later, I was destined to know the truth of the matter, but when at
last I fell into a troubled sleep, that night, I was still in some
doubt upon the point.
My state of mind when I awakened on the following day was
indescribable; I found it difficult to doubt that Nayland Smith would
meet me on the way to the bath-room as usual, with the cracked briar
fuming between his teeth. I felt myself almost compelled to pass
around to his stateroom in order to convince myself that he was not
really there. The catastrophe was still unreal to me, and the world a
dream-world. Indeed, I retain scarcely any recollections of the
traffic of that day, or of the days that followed it until we reached
Port Said.
Two things only made any striking appeal to my dulled intelligence at
that time. These were: the aloof attitude of Dr. Stacey, who seemed
carefully to avoid me; and a curious circumstance which the second
officer mentioned in conversation one evening as we strolled up and
down the main deck together.
"Either I was fast asleep at my post, Dr. Petrie," he said, "or last
night, in the middle watch, someone or something came over the side of
the ship just aft the bridge, slipped across the deck, and
disappeared."
I stared at him wonderingly.
"Do you mean something that came up out of the sea?" I said.
"Nothing could very well have come up out of the sea," he replied,
smiling slightly, "so that it must have come up from the deck below."
"Was it a man?"
"It looked like a man, and a fairly tall one, but he came and was gone
like a fish, and I saw no more of him up to the time I was relieved.
To tell you the truth, I did not report it because I thought I must
have been dozing; it's a dead slow watch, and the navigation on this
part of the run is child's play."
I was on the point of telling him what I had seen myself, two evenings
before, but for some reason I refrained from doing so, although I
think, had I confided in him, he would have abandoned the idea that
what he had seen was phantasmal; for the pair of us could not very
well have been dreaming. Some malignant presence haunted the ship; I
could not doubt this; yet I remained passive, sunk in a lethargy of
sorrow.
We were scheduled to reach Port Said at about eight o'clock in the
evening, but by reason of the delay occasioned so tragically, I learnt
that in all probability we should not arrive earlier than midnight,
whilst passengers would not go ashore until the following morning.
Kâramanèh, who had been staring ahead all day, seeking a first glimpse
of her native land, was determined to remain up until the hour of our
arrival, but after dinner a notice was posted up stating that we
should not be in before two a.m. Even those passengers who were the
most enthusiastic thereupon determined to postpone, for a few hours,
their first glimpse of the land of the Pharaohs and even to forgo the
sight--one of the strangest and most interesting in the world--of Port
Said by night.
For my own part, I confess that all the interest and hope with which I
had looked forward to our arrival had left me, and often I detected
tears in the eyes of Kâramanèh; whereby I knew that the coldness in my
heart had manifested itself even to her. I had sustained the greatest
blow of my life, and not even the presence of so lovely a companion
could entirely recompense me for the loss of my dearest friend.
The lights on the Egyptian shore were faintly visible when the last
group of stragglers on deck broke up. I had long since prevailed upon
Kâramanèh to retire, and now, utterly sick at heart, I sought my own
stateroom, mechanically undressed, and turned in.
It may, or may not be singular that I had neglected all precautions
since the night of the tragedy; I was not even conscious of a desire
to visit retribution upon our hidden enemy; in some strange fashion I
took it for granted that there would be no further attempts upon
Kâramanèh, Azîz, or myself. I had not troubled to confirm Smith's
surmise respecting the closing of the port-holes; but I know now for a
fact that, whereas they had been closed from the time of our leaving
the Straits of Messina, to-night, in sight of the Egyptian coasts, the
regulation was relaxed again. I cannot say if this is usual, but that
it occurred on this ship is a fact to which I can testify--a fact to
which my attention was to be drawn dramatically.
The night was steamingly hot, and because I welcomed the circumstance
that my own port was widely opened, I reflected that those on the
lower decks might be open also. A faint sense of danger stirred within
me; indeed, I sat upright and was about to spring out of my berth when
that occurred which induced me to change my mind.
All passengers had long since retired, and a midnight silence
descended upon the ship, for we were not yet close enough to port for
any unusual activities to have commenced.
Clearly outlined in the open port-hole there suddenly arose that same
grotesque silhouette which I had seen once before.
Prompted by I know not what, I lay still and simulated heavy
breathing; for it was evident to me that I must be partly visible to
the watcher, so bright was the night. For ten--twenty--thirty seconds
he studied me in absolute silence, that gaunt thing so like a mummy;
and, my eyes partly closed, I watched him, breathing heavily all the
time. Then making no more noise than a cat, he moved away across the
deck, and I could judge of his height by the fact that his small
swathed head remained visible almost to the time that he passed to the
end of the white boat which swung opposite my stateroom.
In a moment I slipped quietly to the floor, crossed and peered out of
the port-hole; so that at last I had a clear view of the sinister
mummy-man. He was crouching under the bow of the boat, and attaching
to the white rails, below, a contrivance of a kind with which I was
not entirely unfamiliar. This was a thin ladder of silken rope, having
bamboo rungs, with two metal hooks for attaching it to any suitable
object.
The one thus engaged was, as Kâramanèh had declared, almost
superhumanly thin. His loins were swathed in a sort of linen garment,
and his head so bound about, turban fashion, that only his gleaming
eyes remained visible. The bare limbs and body were of a dusky yellow
colour, and, at sight of him, I experienced a sudden nausea.
My pistol was in my cabin-trunk, and to have found it in the dark,
without making a good deal of noise, would have been impossible.
Doubting how I should act, I stood watching the man with the swathed
head whilst he threw the end of the ladder over the side, crept past
the bow of the boat, and swung his gaunt body over the rail,
exhibiting the agility of an ape. One quick glance fore and aft he
gave, then began to swarm down the ladder; in which instant I knew his
mission.
With a choking cry, which forced itself unwilled from my lips, I tore
at the door, threw it open, and sprang across the deck. Plans, I had
none, and since I carried no instrument wherewith to sever the ladder,
the murderer might indeed have carried out his design for all that I
could have done to prevent him, were it not that another took a hand
in the game....
At the moment that the mummy-man--his head now on a level with the
deck--perceived me, he stopped dead. Coincident with his stopping, the
crack of a pistol sounded--from immediately beyond the boat.
Uttering a sort of sobbing sound, the creature fell--then clutched,
with straining yellow fingers, at the rails, and, seemingly by dint of
a great effort, swarmed along aft some twenty feet, with incredible
swiftness and agility, and clambered on to the deck.
A second shot cracked sharply; and a voice (God, was I mad?) cried:
"Hold him, Petrie!"
Rigid with fearful astonishment I stood, as out from the boat above me
leapt a figure attired solely in shirt and trousers. The new-comer
leapt away in the wake of the mummy-man--who had vanished around the
corner by the smokeroom. Over his shoulder he cried back at me:
"The Bishop's stateroom! See that no one enters!"
I clutched at my head--which seemed to be fiery hot; I realized, in my
own person, the sensations of one who knows himself mad.
For the man who pursued the mummy was _Nayland Smith_!
* * * * *
I stood in the Bishop's stateroom, Nayland Smith, his gaunt face wet
with perspiration, beside me, handling certain odd-looking objects
which littered the place, and lay about amid the discarded garments of
the absent cleric.
"Pneumatic pads!" he snapped. "The man was a walking air-cushion!" He
gingerly fingered two strange rubber appliances. "For distending the
cheeks," he muttered, dropping them disgustedly on the floor. "His
hands and wrists betrayed him, Petrie. He wore his cuffs unusually
long but could not entirely hide his bony wrists. To have watched him,
whilst remaining myself unseen, was next to impossible; hence my
device of tossing a dummy overboard, calculated to float for less than
ten minutes! It actually floated nearly fifteen, as a matter of fact,
and I had some horrible moments!"
"Smith!" I said, "how could you submit me ...?"
He clapped his hands on my shoulders.
"My dear old chap--there was no other way, believe me. From that boat
I could see right into his stateroom, but, once in, I dare not leave
it--except late at night, stealthily! The second spotted me one night
and I thought the game was up, but evidently he didn't report it."
"But you might have confided...."
"Impossible! I'll admit I nearly fell to the temptation that first
night; for I could see into your room as well as into his!" He slapped
me boisterously on the back, but his grey eyes were suspiciously
moist. "Dear old Petrie! Thank God for our friends! But you'd be the
first to admit, old man, that you're a dead poor actor! Your portrayal
of grief for the loss of a valued chum would not have convinced a soul
on board!
"Therefore I made use of Stacey, whose callous attitude was less
remarkable. Gad, Petrie! I nearly bagged our man the first night! The
elaborate plan--Marconi message to get you out of the way, and so
forth--had miscarried, and he knew the port-hole trick would be
useless once we got into the open sea. He took a big chance. He
discarded his clerical guise and peeped into your room--you
remember?--but you were awake, and I made no move when he slipped back
to his own cabin; I wanted to take him red-handed."
"Have you any idea ...?"
"Who he is? No more than _where_ he is! Probably some creature of Dr.
Fu-Manchu specially chosen for the purpose; obviously a man of
culture, and probably of thug ancestry. I hit him--in the shoulder;
but even then he ran like a hare. We've searched the ship, without
result. He may have gone overboard and chanced the swim to shore...."
We stepped out on to the deck. Around us was that unforgettable
scene--Port Said by night. The ship was barely moving through the
glassy water, now. Smith took my arm and we walked forward. Above us
was the mighty peace of Egypt's sky ablaze with splendour; around and
about us moved the unique turmoil of the clearing-house of the Near
East.
"I would give much to know the real identity of the Bishop of
Damascus," muttered Smith.
He stopped abruptly, snapping his teeth together and grasping my arm
as in a vice. Hard upon his words had followed the rattling clangour
as the great anchor was let go; but horribly intermingled with the
metallic roar there came to us such a fearful inarticulate shrieking
as to chill one's heart.
The anchor plunged into the water of the harbour; the shrieking
ceased. Smith turned to me, and his face was tragic in the light of
the arc lamp swung hard by.
"We shall never know," he whispered. "God forgive him--he must be in
bloody tatters now. Petrie, the poor fool was hiding in the
_chain-locker!_"
A little hand stole into mine. I turned quickly. Kâramanèh stood
beside me. I placed my arm about her shoulders, drawing her close; and
I blush to relate that all else was forgotten.
For a moment, heedless of the fearful turmoil forward, Nayland Smith
stood looking at us. Then he turned, with his rare smile, and walked
aft.
"Perhaps you're right, Petrie!" he said.
* * * * *
Uniform with this Volume
36 De Profundis Oscar Wilde
37 Lord Arthur Savile's Crime Oscar Wilde
38 Selected Poems Oscar Wilde
39 An Ideal Husband Oscar Wilde
40 Intentions Oscar Wilde
41 Lady Windermere's Fan Oscar Wilde
77 Selected Prose Oscar Wilde
85 The Importance of Being Earnest Oscar Wilde
146 A Woman of No Importance Oscar Wilde
43 Harvest Home E. V. Lucas
44 A Little of Everything E. V. Lucas
78 The Best of Lamb E. V. Lucas
141 Variety Lane E. V. Lucas
292 Mixed Vintages E. V. Lucas
45 Vailima Letters Robert Louis Stevenson
80 Selected Letters Robert Louis Stevenson
46 Hills and the Sea Hilaire Belloc
96 A Picked Company Hilaire Belloc
193 On Nothing Hilaire Belloc
226 On Everything Hilaire Belloc
254 On Something Hilaire Belloc
47 The Blue Bird Maurice Maeterlinck
214 Select Essays Maurice Maeterlinck
50 Charles Dickens G. K. Chesterton
94 All Things Considered G. K. Chesterton
346 Tremendous Trifles G. K. Chesterton
54 The Life of John Ruskin W. G. Collingwood
57 Sevastopol and other Stories Leo Tolstoy
91 Social Evils and their Remedy Leo Tolstoy
223 Two Generations Leo Tolstoy
253 My Childhood and Boyhood Leo Tolstoy
286 My Youth Leo Tolstoy
58 The Lore of the Honey-Bee Tickner Edwardes
63 Oscar Wilde Arthur Ransome
64 The Vicar of Morwenstow S. Baring-Gould
76 Home Life in France M. Betham-Edwards
83 Reason and Belief Sir Oliver Lodge
93 The Substance of Faith Sir Oliver Lodge
116 The Survival of Man Sir Oliver Lodge
284 Modern Problems Sir Oliver Lodge
95 The Mirror of the Sea Joseph Conrad
126 Science from an Easy Chair Sir Ray Lankester
326 More Science from an Easy Chair Sir Ray Lankester
149 A Shepherd's Life W. H. Hudson
200 Jane Austen and her Times G. E. Mitton
218 R. L. S. Francis Watt
285 The Old Time Parson P. H. Ditchfield
287 The Customs of Old England F. J. Snell
71 The Gates of Wrath Arnold Bennett
81 The Card Arnold Bennett
125 The Regent Arnold Bennett
288 A Great Man Arnold Bennett
316 Whom God Hath Joined Arnold Bennett
355 A Man from the North Arnold Bennett
4 Spanish Gold G. A. Birmingham
87 Lalage's Lovers G. A. Birmingham
108 The Adventures of Dr. Whitty G. A. Birmingham
349 The Island Mystery G. A. Birmingham
296 William, by the Grace of God Marjorie Bowen
342 Jean of the Lazy A B. M. Bower
261 Tarzan of the Apes Edgar Rice Burroughs
304 The Return of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs
368 The Beasts of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs
382 The Son of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs
383 Tarzan and the Jewels of Opar Edgar Rice Burroughs
384 Jungle Tales of Tarzan Edgar Rice Burroughs
385 A Princess of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs
392 The Gods of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs
393 The Warlord of Mars Edgar Rice Burroughs
315 The Flying Inn G. K. Chesterton
212 Under Western Eyes Joseph Conrad
325 A Set of Six Joseph Conrad
143 Sandy Married Dorothea Conyers
1 The Mighty Atom Marie Corelli
2 Jane Marie Corelli
3 Boy Marie Corelli
231 Cameos Marie Corelli
336 The O'Ruddy Stephen Crane and
Robert Barr
18 Round the Red Lamp Sir A. Conan Doyle
332 Rachel Jane H. Findlater
396 Tongues of Conscience Robert Hichens
20 Light Freights W. W. Jacobs
92 White Fang Jack London
374 Ninety-six Hours' Leave Stephen McKenna
389 The Sixth Sense Stephen McKenna
330 The Fortune of Christina McNab S. Macnaughtan
303 The Carissima Lucas Malet
391 Clementina A. E. W. Mason
289 The Rest Cure W. B. Maxwell
334 Bellamy Elinor Mordaunt
215 Mr. Grex of Monte Carlo E. Phillips Oppenheim
295 The Hillman E. Phillips Oppenheim
276 Mary All-alone John Oxenham
329 '1914' John Oxenham
399 The Closed Book Wm. Le Queux
113 Lavender and Old Lace Myrtle Reed
135 A Spinner in the Sun Myrtle Reed
343 The Shadow of Victory Myrtle Reed
137 The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu Sax Rohmer
290 The Devil Doctor Sax Rohmer
293 The Si-Fan Mysteries Sax Rohmer
352 Tales of Secret Egypt Sax Rohmer
388 The Orchard of Tears Sax Rohmer
395 The Golden Scorpion Sax Rohmer
229 My Friend the Chauffeur C. N. and A. M. Williamson
279 The War Wedding C. N. and A. M. Williamson
344 This Woman to this Man C. N. and A. M. Williamson
9 The Unofficial Honeymoon Dolf Wyllarde
A short Selection only.
* * * * *