"Pu-Yi, I'm all right now. I owe my life to you!" And as I realized my
extraordinary deliverance in the very article of death, a sob burst from
me and I am not ashamed to say that my eyes filled with tears. My hand
is as strong as most men's, but I almost winced at the grip of those
fragile-looking, artistic fingers.
"You did the same for me, my honorable friend," he said quietly, "and
now--"
Before I knew what he would be at, he was feeling my pulse and listening
to my heart with his ear against my chest.
At length he gave a sigh of relief. "We had a doctor to you," he said,
"and he told us that, in his opinion, you would be little the worse. I
am rejoiced that his opinion is confirmed."
"Oh, I am all right now, and ready for anything."
"You are sure, Sir Thomas? What you have been through may have given you
a shock which--"
For answer, I held out my hand. It was as firm as a rock and did not
tremble. I heaved myself off the bed, took a cigarette from a box upon a
table, and began to smoke.
"Now then, Pu-Yi, I am just as I was before. First of all, where am I?"
"You are in the Palacete," he replied. "You were brought here at once."
Then I knew that I was in Morse's dwelling house, copied exactly, as I
have said before, from the Palacete Mendoza at Rio.
"Now tell me exactly what has happened, in as few words as possible."
"I am only too anxious to do so, Sir Thomas. You were brought back here.
Immediately after, Rolston descended by means of the outside stair and
summoned the staff. They are all here now. The electric cables have been
repaired. Lifts, telephones, electric light, and all the other machinery
is in working order. The body of Zorilla has been brought up to the City
and placed with that of Mulligan and my own servant. This house is
strongly guarded by armed men, and the whole City is patrolled."
"No one else was hurt?"
"No one else at all, Sir Thomas."
His face changed as he said this, and he looked me full in the eyes.
Then, with a start, I understood. Every detail of the past came back in
a vivid, instantaneous picture. Again I saw the silver bath descending
from the ceiling and heard the loud explosion of Rolston's pistol. And
as that furious noise resounded in my mental ear, once more the
grinning, corpse-pale face of Mark Antony Midwinter passed close to mine
and I felt the very wind of his passage as he rushed by and disappeared
down the long underground corridor leading to the safety-room.
"Midwinter!" I almost shouted. The face of the Chinaman had gone a dusky
gray--he told me afterwards that mine was white as linen.
"Vanished," he said--"disappeared utterly. And he is the master-mind!
While Mark Antony Midwinter is alive, Mr. Morse, none of us, will know a
moment of safety or of ease."
I could not quarrel with that. Zorilla was dead--a great gain--but no
one who had been through what I had and who knew the whole situation as
I knew it, could fail to appreciate the terrible seriousness of this
news. To you who read this record in peace and safety, this may seem a
wild or exaggerated statement, a product of over-strained nerves. But,
believe me, it was not so. I knew too much! The securest fortress in the
whole world had been already stormed. All the precautions that enormous
wealth and some of the subtlest brains alive could take had already
proved useless against the superhuman cunning, energy and ferocity of
this being who seemed, indeed, literally, more fiend than man. No! we
were no cowards, most of us, up there in the City of the Clouds, but we
might well quail still, to know that this fury was unchained. I know
that I sat down suddenly upon the bed with a groan of despair.
"Gone! Vanished! Surely he must be either in the City or has escaped! If
he is in the City, I admit the danger is imminent. He must be utterly
desperate, and will stick at nothing. If he has managed to get down to
the earth, he is dangerous still, but we have a breathing space. Which
is it?"
"We do not know, Sir Thomas. There is no trace of him anywhere, so far.
But, as I have said, we have more than a hundred men, armed and
patrolling the City. This house, at any rate, is secure for the moment.
A great search is being organized. The whole area is being mapped out
and it will be searched with such thoroughness before to-morrow's dawn
that a rat could not escape. My own theory is, and Mr. Morse agrees with
me, that Midwinter is still in the City. The most scrupulous inquiries
below seem to prove that he never descended from the tower, and you know
how minute and careful our organization is. And now that you are
yourself again, it is Mr. Morse's wish that we hold a conference and
settle exactly what is to be done. Do you think you are equal to it?"
"Perfectly," I replied, and without another word Pu-Yi led the way out
of the room.
I found Mr. Morse sitting in his library. He was pale, and seemed much
shaken. There were red rims round the keen, masterful eyes, but his
voice was strong and resolute, and I could see that, whatever his
opinion of his chances, he would fight till the end.
I need not go into details of the private conversation we had for a
minute or two. His gratitude was pathetic, and I felt more drawn to him
than ever before. When at length Juanita, followed by little Rolston,
entered the room, all trace of his emotion had gone and we settled down
round the table as calm and business-like as a board of directors in a
bank. And yet, you know, no group of people in Europe stood in such
peril as we did then. Behind the long, silken curtains, the shutters
were of bullet-proof steel. The corridor outside, the gardens of the
house, swarmed with men armed to the teeth. It was dark in the sky, but
the City in the Clouds blazed everywhere with an artificial sunlight
from the great electric lamps.
Two thousand feet up in the air we sat and spoke in quiet voices of the
horror that was past and the horror that threatened us. Far down below,
London was waking up to a night of pleasure. People were dressing for
dinners and the theater, thousands upon thousands of toilers had left
their work and were about to enjoy the hours of rest and recreation. And
not a soul, probably, among all those millions that crawled like ants at
our feet had the least suspicion of what was going on in our high place.
They were accustomed to the great towers now. The sensation of their
building was over and done, there were no more thrills. If they had only
known!
I was not aware if strata of clouds hid us from the world below, as so
often happened; but if the night were clear I do remember thinking that
any one who cast their eyes up into the sky might well notice an unusual
brilliancy in the pleasure city of the millionaire, that mysterious
theater of the unknown, which dominated the greatest city in the world.
... "Well, Tom," said Mr. Morse, "Pu-Yi tells me that you are now
acquainted with all the facts. The question we have to decide is, what
are we to do?"
He turned to Juanita, and nodded. She left the room.
"The situation, as I understand it," I replied, "is that Midwinter"--I
had a curious reluctance in pronouncing the name aloud--"is either
concealed here in the City or has made his escape. If he is here, we
shall know before to-morrow morning, shall we not?"
"Precisely. I have spent the last hour in going over the plans of the
City with the chiefs of the staff. We have divided up the two stages
into small sections, and even while I am talking to you the search has
begun. The orders are to shoot at sight, to kill that man with less
compunction than one would kill a mad dog. If he is really here, he
cannot possibly escape."
"Very well, then," I said, "let us turn our attention to the other
possibility. Assuming that he has got away, I think we may safely say
that the danger is very much lessened."
"While we remain here in the City--yes," Morse agreed.
"And you are determined to do that?"
He took the cigar he had been smoking from his lips, and his hand shook
a little. "Think what you like of me," he said, "but remember that there
is Juanita. I say to you, Kirby, that if I never descend to the world
again alive, I must stay here until Mark Antony Midwinter is dead."
Well, I had already made up my mind on this point. "I think you are
quite right," I told him. "Still, he will not make a second appearance
in the City. You can treble your precautions. He must be attacked down
in the world."
Then a thought struck me for the first time. "But how," I said, "did he
and Zorilla ever come here in the first instance? Treachery among the
staff? It is the only explanation."
Pu-Yi shook his head. "You may put that out of your mind, Sir Thomas,"
he said. "That is my department. I know what you cannot know about my
chosen compatriots."
"But the man isn't a specter! He's a devil incarnate, but there's
nothing supernatural about him."
Then little Rolston spoke. "I've been down below all day," he said, "and
though I haven't discovered anything of Midwinter, I am certain of how
he and Zorilla got here."
We all turned to him with startled faces.
"Do you remember, Sir Thomas," he said, "that, shortly after your
arrival, when you were looking down upon London from one of the
galleries, there was a big fair in Richmond Park?"