THREE NIGHTS LATER
"Listen!" cried Sir Lionel Barton.
He stood upon the black rug before the massive, carven mantelpiece, a
huge man in an appropriately huge setting.
I checked the words on my lips, and listened intently. Within
Graywater Park all was still, for the hour was late. Outside, the
rain was descending in a deluge, its continuous roar drowning any
other sound that might have been discernible. Then, above it, I
detected a noise that at first I found difficult to define.
"The howling of the leopards!" I suggested.
Sir Lionel shook his tawny head with impatience. Then, the sound
growing louder, suddenly I knew it for what it was.
"Some one shouting!" I exclaimed--"some one who rides a galloping
horse!"
"Coming here!" added Sir Lionel. "Hark! he is at the door!"
A bell rang furiously, again and again sending its brazen clangor
echoing through the great apartments and passages of Graywater.
"There goes Kennedy."
Above the sibilant roaring of the rain I could hear some one releasing
heavy bolts and bars. The servants had long since retired, as also had
Kâramaneh; but Sir Lionel's man remained wakeful and alert.
Sir Lionel made for the door, and I, standing up, was about to follow
him, when Kennedy appeared, in his wake a bedraggled groom, hatless,
and pale to the lips. His frightened eyes looked from face to face.
"Dr. Petrie?" he gasped interrogatively.
"Yes!" I said, a sudden dread assailing me. "What is it?"
"Gad! it's Hamilton's man!" cried Barton.
"Mr. Nayland Smith, sir," continued the groom brokenly--and all my
fears were realized. "He's been attacked, sir, on the road from the
station, and Dr. Hamilton, to whose house he was carried----"
"Kennedy!" shouted Sir Lionel, "get the Rolls-Royce out! Put your
horse up here, my man, and come with us!"
He turned abruptly ... as the groom, grasping at the wall, fell
heavily to the floor.
"Good God!" I cried--"What's the matter with him?"
I bent over the prostrate man, making a rapid examination.
"His head! A nasty blow. Give me a hand, Sir Lionel; we must get him
on to a couch."
The unconscious man was laid upon a Chesterfield, and, ably assisted
by the explorer, who was used to coping with such hurts as this, I
attended to him as best I could. One of the men-servants had been
aroused, and, just as he appeared in the doorway, I had the
satisfaction of seeing Dr. Hamilton's groom open his eyes, and look
about him, dazedly.
"Quick," I said. "Tell me--what hurt you?"
The man raised his hand to his head and groaned feebly.
"Something came _whizzing_, sir," he answered. "There was no report,
and I saw nothing. I don't know what it can have been----"
"Where did this attack take place?"
"Between here and the village, sir; just by the coppice at the
cross-roads on top of Raddon Hill."
"You had better remain here for the present," I said, and gave a few
words of instruction to the man whom we had aroused.
"This way," cried Barton, who had rushed out of the room, his huge
frame reappearing in the door-way; "the car is ready."
My mind filled with dreadful apprehensions, I passed out on to the
carriage sweep. Sir Lionel was already at the wheel.
"Jump in, Kennedy," he said, when I had taken a seat beside him; and
the man sprang into the car.
Away we shot, up the narrow lane, lurched hard on the bend--and were
off at ever growing speed toward the hills, where a long climb
awaited the car.
The head-light picked out the straight road before us, and Barton
increased the pace, regardless of regulations, until the growing slope
made itself felt and the speed grew gradually less; above the
throbbing of the motor, I could hear, now, the rain in the
overhanging trees.
I peered through the darkness, up the road, wondering if we were near
to the spot where the mysterious attack had been made upon Dr.
Hamilton's groom. I decided that we were just passing the place, and
to confirm my opinion, at that moment Sir Lionel swung the car around
suddenly, and plunged headlong into the black mouth of a narrow lane.
Hitherto, the roads had been fair, but now the jolting and swaying
became very pronounced.
"Beastly road!" shouted Barton--"and stiff gradient!"
I nodded.
That part of the way which was visible in front had the appearance of
a muddy cataract, through which we must force a path.
Then, as abruptly as it had commenced, the rain ceased; and at almost
the same moment came an angry cry from behind.
The canvas hood made it impossible to see clearly in the car, but,
turning quickly, I perceived Kennedy, with his cap off, rubbing his
close-cropped skull. He was cursing volubly.
"What is it, Kennedy?
"Somebody sniping!" cried the man. "Lucky for me I had my cap on!"
"Eh, sniping?" said Barton, glancing over his shoulder. "What d'you
mean? A stone, was it?"
"No, sir," answered Kennedy. "I don't know what it was--but it wasn't
a stone."
"Hurt much?" I asked.
"No, sir! nothing at all." But there was a note of fear in the man's
voice--fear of the unknown.
Something struck the hood with a dull drum-like thud.
"There's another, sir!" cried Kennedy. "There's some one following us!"
"Can you see any one?" came the reply. "I thought I saw something
then, about twenty yards behind. It's so dark."
"Try a shot!" I said, passing my Browning to Kennedy.
The next moment, the crack of the little weapon sounded sharply, and I
thought I detected a vague, answering cry.
"See anything?" came from Barton.
Neither Kennedy nor I made reply; for we were both looking back down
the hill. Momentarily, the moon had peeped from the cloud-banks, and
where, three hundreds yards behind, the bordering trees were few, a
patch of dim light spread across the muddy road--and melted away as a
new blackness gathered.
But, in the brief space, three figures had shown, only for an instant--
but long enough for us both to see that they were those of three gaunt
men, seemingly clad in scanty garments. What weapons they employed I
could not conjecture; but we were pursued by three of Dr. Fu-Manchu's
dacoits!
Barton growled something savagely, and ran the car to the left of the
road, as the gates of Dr. Hamilton's house came in sight.
A servant was there, ready to throw them open; and Sir Lionel swung
around on to the drive, and drove ahead, up the elm avenue to where the
light streamed through the open door on to the wet gravel. The house
was a blaze of lights, every window visible being illuminated; and Mrs.
Hamilton stood in the porch to greet us.
"Doctor Petrie?" she asked, nervously, as we descended.
"I am he," I said. "How is Mr. Smith?"
"Still insensible," was the reply.
Passing a knot of servants who stood at the foot of the stairs like a
little flock of frightened sheep--we made our way into the room where
my poor friend lay.
Dr. Hamilton, a gray-haired man of military bearing, greeted Sir
Lionel, and the latter made me known to my fellow practitioner, who
grasped my hand, and then went straight to the bedside, tilting the
lampshade to throw the light directly upon the patient.
Nayland Smith lay with his arms outside the coverlet and his fists
tightly clenched. His thin, tanned face wore a grayish hue, and a
white bandage was about his head. He breathed stentoriously.
"We can only wait," said Dr. Hamilton, "and trust that there will be
no complications."
I clenched my fists involuntarily, but, speaking no word, turned and
passed from the room.
Downstairs in Dr. Hamilton's study was the man who had found Nayland
Smith.
"We don't know when it was done, sir," he said, answering my first
question. "Staples and me stumbled on him in the dusk, just by the big
beech--a good quarter-mile from the village. I don't know how long
he'd laid there, but it must have been for some time, as the last
rain arrived an hour earlier. No, sir, he hadn't been robbed; his
money and watch were on him but his pocketbook lay open beside him;--
though, funny as it seems, there were three five-pound notes in it!"
"Do you understand, Petrie?" cried Sir Lionel. "Smith evidently
obtained a copy of the old plan of the secret passages of Graywater
and Monkswell, sooner than he expected, and determined to return
to-night. They left him for dead, having robbed him of the plans!"
"But the attack on Dr. Hamilton's man?"
"Fu-Manchu clearly tried to prevent communication with us to-night! He
is playing for time. Depend on it, Petrie, the hour of his departure
draws near and he is afraid of being trapped at the last moment."
He began taking huge strides up and down the room, forcibly reminding
me of a caged lion.
"To think," I said bitterly, "that all our efforts have failed to
discover the secret----"
"The secret of my own property!" roared Barton--"and one known to
that damned, cunning Chinese devil!"
"And in all probability now known also to Smith----"
"And he cannot speak! ..."
"_Who_ cannot speak?" demanded a hoarse voice.
I turned in a flash, unable to credit my senses--and there, holding
weakly to the doorpost, stood Nayland Smith!
"Smith!" I cried reproachfully--"you should not have left your room!"
He sank into an arm-chair, assisted by Dr. Hamilton.
"My skull is fortunately thick!" he replied, a ghostly smile playing
around the corners of his mouth--"and it was a physical impossibility
for me to remain inert considering that Dr. Fu-Manchu proposes to
leave England to-night!"