THE FINDING OF KAZMAH
At a point just above the sweep of Limehouse Reach a watchful river
police patrol observed a moving speck of light on the right bank of the
Thames. As if in answer to the signal there came a few moments later a
second moving speck at a point not far above the district once
notorious in its possession of Ratcliff Highway. A third light answered
from the Surrey bank, and a fourth shone out yet higher up and on the
opposite side of the Thames.
The tide had just turned. As Chief Inspector Kerry had once observed,
“there are no pleasure parties punting about that stretch,” and,
consequently, when George Martin tumbled into his skiff on the Surrey
shore and began lustily to pull up stream, he was observed almost
immediately by the River Police.
Pulling hard against the stream, it took him a long time to reach his
destination—stone stairs near the point from which the second light had
been shown. Rain had ceased and the mist had cleared shortly after
dusk, as often happens at this time of year, and because the night was
comparatively clear the pursuing boats had to be handled with care.
George did not disembark at the stone steps, but after waiting there
for some time he began to drop down on the tide, keeping close inshore.
“He knows we’ve spotted him,” said Sergeant Coombes, who was in one of
the River Police boats. “It was at the stairs that he had to pick up
his man.”
Certainly, the tactics of George suggested that he had recognized
surveillance, and, his purpose abandoned, now sought to efface himself
without delay. Taking advantage of every shadow, he resigned his boat
to the gentle current. He had actually come to the entrance of
Greenwich Reach when a dock light, shining out across the river,
outlined the boat yellowly.
“He’s got a passenger!” said Coombes amazedly.
Inspector White, who was in charge of the cutter, rested his arm on
Coombes’ shoulder and stared across the moving tide.
“I can see no one,” he replied. “You’re over anxious,
Detective-Sergeant—and I can understand it!”
Coombes smiled heroically.
“I may be over anxious, Inspector,” he replied, “but if _I_ lost Sin
Sin Wa, the River Police had never even _heard_ of him till the C.I.D.
put ’em wise.”
“H’m!” muttered the Inspector. “D’you suggest we board him?”
“No,” said Coombes, “let him land, but don’t trouble to hide any more.
Show him we’re in pursuit.”
No longer drifting with the outgoing tide, George Martin had now boldly
taken to the oars. The River Police boat close in his wake, he headed
for the blunt promontory of the Isle of Dogs. The grim pursuit went on
until:
“I bet I know where he’s for,” said Coombes.
“So do I,” declared Inspector White; “Dougal’s!”
Their anticipations were realized. To the wooden stairs which served as
a water-gate for the establishment on the Isle of Dogs, George Martin
ran in openly; the police boat followed, and:
“You were right!” cried the Inspector, “he has somebody with him!”
A furtive figure, bearing a burden upon its shoulder, moved up the
slope and disappeared. A moment later the police were leaping ashore.
George deserted his boat and went running heavily after his passenger.
“After them!” cried Coombes. “That’s _Sin Sin Wa!_”
Around the mazey, rubbish-strewn paths the pursuit went hotly. In sight
of Dougal’s Coombes saw the swing door open and a silhouette—that of a
man who carried a bag on his shoulder—pass in. George Martin followed,
but the Scotland Yard man had his hand upon his shoulder.
“Police!” he said sharply. “Who’s your friend?”
George turned, red and truculent, with clenched fists.
“Mind your own bloody business!” he roared.
“Mind yours, my lad!” retorted Coombes warningly. “You’re no Thames
waterman. Who’s your friend?”
“Wotcher mean?” shouted George. “You’re up the pole or canned you are!”
“Grab him!” said Coombes, and he kicked open the door and entered the
saloon, followed by Inspector White and the boat’s crew.
As they appeared, the Inspector conspicuous in his uniform, backed by
the group of River Police, one of whom grasped George Martin by his
coat collar:
“_Splits!_” bellowed Dougal in a voice like a fog-horn.
Twenty cups of tea, coffee and cocoa, too hot for speedy assimilation,
were spilled upon the floor.
The place as usual was crowded, more particularly in the neighborhood
of the two stoves. Here were dock laborers, seamen and riverside
loafers, lascars, Chinese, Arabs, negroes and dagoes. Mrs. Dougal,
defiant and red, brawny arms folded and her pose as that of one
contemplating a physical contest, glared from behind the “solid”
counter. Dougal rested his hairy hands upon the “wet” counter and
revealed his defective teeth in a vicious snarl. Many of the patrons
carried light baggage, since a P and O boat, an oriental, and the _S.
S. Mahratta_, were sailing that night or in the early morning, and
Dougal’s was the favorite house of call for a _doch-an-dorrich_ for
sailormen, particularly for sailormen of color.
Upon the police group became focussed the glances of light eyes and
dark eyes, round eyes, almond-shaped eyes, and oblique eyes. Silence
fell.
“We are police officers,” called Coombes formally. “All papers,
please.”
Thereupon, without disturbance, the inspection began, and among the
papers scrutinized were those of one, Chung Chow, an able-bodied
Chinese seaman. But since his papers were in order, and since he
possessed two eyes and wore no pigtail, he excited no more interest in
the mind of Detective-Sergeant Coombes than did any one of the other
Chinamen in the place.
A careful search of the premises led to no better result, and George
Martin accounted for his possession of a considerable sum of money
found upon him by explaining that he had recently been paid off after a
long voyage and had been lucky at cards.
The result of the night’s traffic, then, spelled failure for British
justice, the S.S. _Mahratta_ sailed one stewardess short of her
complement; but among the Chinese crew of another steamer Eastward
bound was one, Chung Chow, formerly known as Sin Sin Wa. And sometimes
in the night watches there arose before him the picture of a black bird
resting upon the knees of an aged Chinaman. Beyond these figures dimly
he perceived the paddy-fields of Ho-Nan and the sweeping valley of the
Yellow River, where the opium poppy grows.
It was about an hour before the sailing of the ship which numbered
Chung Chow among the yellow members of its crew that Seton Pasha
returned once more to the deserted wharf whereon he had found Mrs.
Monte Irvin’s spaniel. Afterwards, in the light of ascertained facts,
he condemned himself for a stupidity passing the ordinary. For while he
had conducted a careful search of the wharf and adjoining premises,
convinced that there was a cellar of some kind below, he had omitted to
look for a water-gate to this hypothetical cache.
Perhaps his self-condemnation was deserved, but in justice to the agent
selected by Lord Wrexborough, it should be added that Chief Inspector
Kerry had no more idea of the existence of such an entrance, and exit,
than had Seton Pasha.
Leaving the dog at Leman Street then, and learning that there was no
news of the missing Chief Inspector, Seton had set out once more. He
had been informed of the mysterious signals flashed from side to side
of the Lower Pool, and was hourly expecting a report to the effect that
Sin Sin Wa had been apprehended in the act of escaping. That Sin Sin Wa
had dropped into the turgid tide from his underground hiding-place, and
pushing his property—which was floatable—before him, encased in a
waterproof bag, had swum out and clung to the stern of George Martin’s
boat as it passed close to the empty wharf, neither Seton Pasha nor any
other man knew—except George Martin and Sin Sin Wa.
At a suitably dark spot the Chinaman had boarded the little craft, not
without difficulty, for his wounded shoulder pained him, and had
changed his sodden attire for a dry outfit which awaited him in the
locker at the stern of the skiff. The cunning of the Chinese has the
simplicity of true genius.
Not two paces had Seton taken on to the mystifying wharf when:
“Sam Tûk barber! Entrance in cellar!” rapped a ghostly, muffled voice
from beneath his feet. “Sam Tûk barber! Entrance in cellar!”
Seton Pasha stood still, temporarily bereft of speech. Then, “_Kerry!_”
he cried. “Kerry! Where are you?”
But apparently his voice failed to reach the invisible speaker, for:
“Sam Tûk barber! Entrance in cellar!” repeated the voice.
Seton Pasha wasted no more time. He ran out into the narrow street. A
man was on duty there.
“Call assistance!” ordered Seton briskly, “Send four men to join me at
the barber’s shop called Sam Tûk’s! You know it?”
“Yes, sir; I searched it with Chief Inspector Kerry.”
The note of a police whistle followed.
Ten minutes later the secret of Sam Tûk’s cellar was unmasked. The
place was empty, and the subterranean door locked; but it succumbed to
the persistent attacks of axe and crowbar, and Seton Pasha was the
first of the party to enter the vault. It was laden with chemical
fumes....
He found there an aged Chinaman, dead, seated by a stove in which the
fire had burned very low. Sprawling across the old man’s knees was the
body of a raven. Lying at his feet was a woman, lithe, contorted, the
face half hidden in masses of bright red hair.
“End case near the door!” rapped the voice of Kerry. “Slides to the
left!”
Seton Pasha vaulted over the counter, drew the shelves aside, and
entered the inner room.
By the dim light of a lantern burning upon a moorish coffee-table he
discerned an untidy bed, upon which a second woman lay, pallid.
“God!” he muttered; “this place is a morgue!”
“It certainly isn’t healthy!” said an irritable voice from the floor.
“But I think I might survive it if you could spare a second to untie
me.”
Kerry’s extensive practice in chewing and the enormous development of
his maxillary muscles had stood him in good stead. His keen, strong
teeth had bitten through the extemporized gag, and as a result the
tension of the handkerchief which had held it in place had become
relaxed, enabling him to rid himself of it and to spit out the
fragments of filthy-tasting wood which the biting operation had left in
his mouth.
Seton turned, stooped on one knee to release the captive... and found
himself looking into the face of someone who sat crouched upon the
divan behind the Chief Inspector. The figure was that of an oriental,
richly robed. Long, slim, ivory hands rested upon his knees, and on the
first finger of the right hand gleamed a big talismanic ring. But the
face, surmounted by a white turban, was wonderful, arresting in its
immobile intellectual beauty; and from under the heavy brows a pair of
abnormally large eyes looked out hypnotically.
“My God!” whispered Seton, then:
“If you’ve finished your short prayer,” rapped Kerry, “set about _my_
little job.”
“But, Kerry—Kerry, behind you!”
“I haven’t any eyes in my back hair!”
Mechanically, half fearfully, Seton touched the hands of the crouching
oriental. A low moan came from the woman in the bed, and:
“It’s _Kazmah!_” gasped Seton. “Kerry... Kazmah is—a _wax figure!_”
“Hell!” said Chief Inspector Kerry.