The wind was getting up on Richmond Hill and masses of cloud were
scudding from the South and obscuring the light of the moon, when at
about half-past nine a small, well-appointed motor coupe drew up in
front of the great gate at the tower inclosure.
The small closed-in car was painted dead black, the man who drove it was
in livery, and a professional-looking person in a fur coat stepped out
and pressed the electric button of a small door in the wall by the side
of the huge main gates. In his hand he had a little black bag.
In a moment the door opened a few inches and a large, saffron-colored,
intelligent face could be seen in the aperture.
"The doctor!" said the gentleman from the coupe. The door opened at once
to admit him.
He turned and spoke to the chauffeur.
"As I cannot tell you how long I shall be, Williams," he said, "you had
better go back to the surgery and wait there. I have no doubt I can
telephone when I require you."
The man touched his cap and drove off, and the doctor found himself in a
vaulted passage, to the right of which was a brightly lit room. Standing
in the passage and bowing was a gigantic Chinaman, Kwang-su, the keeper
of the gate, in a quilted black robe lined with fur. The man bowed low,
and a second Chinaman came out of the room, a thin ascetic-looking
person.
"Ah, Dr. Thomas!" he said, "we've been expecting you. I am secretary to
Mr. Morse. Perhaps you will come this way."
He led the doctor down the passage, unlocked a further door and the two
men emerged into the grounds, proceeding down a wide, graveled road,
bordered by strips of lawn and lit at intervals with electric standards.
In the distance there were ranges of lit buildings with figures flitting
backwards and forwards before the orange oblongs of doors and windows.
In another quarter rose the lighted dome of the great Power House from
which the low hum of dynamos and the steady throb of engines could be
faintly heard in pauses of the gale. It was exactly like standing at
night in the center of some great exhibition grounds, save that straight
ahead, overshadowing everything and covering an immense area of ground,
were the bases of the three great towers, a nightmare of fantastic steel
tracery such as no man's eye had beheld before in the history of the
world.
"So far, so good," said Pu-Yi with a sigh of relief. "That was
excellently managed, the motor-car was quite in keeping. Your wonderful
little friend who speaks my language so well is already in the compound
with some of the men. He will await here to take any orders that may be
necessary."