MAN WITH THE SHAVEN SKULL, Page 2

  Harley produced a piece of thick silk twine.

  "What is it?"

  "It is a link, Knox—a link to seek which I really went down to Deepbrow." He stared at me quizzically, but my answering look must have been a blank one. "It is part of the tassel of one of those red cloth caps commonly called in England, a fez!"

  He continued to stare at me and I to stare at the piece of silk; then:

  "What is the next move?" I demanded. "Your new clue rather bewilders me."

  "The next move," he said, "is to retire to the adjoining room and make ourselves look as much like a couple of Oriental commercial travellers as our correctly British appearance will allow!"

  "What!" I cried.

  "That's it!" laughed Harley. "I have a perpetual tan, and I think I can give you a temporary one which I keep in a bottle for the purpose."

  Twenty minutes later, then, having quitted Harley's chambers by a back way opening into one of those old-world courts which abound in this part of the metropolis, two quietly attired Eastern gentlemen got into a cab at the corner of Chancery Lane and proceeded in the direction of Limehouse.

  There are haunts in many parts of London whose very existence is unsuspected by all but the few; haunts unvisited by the tourist and even unknown to the copy-hunting pressman. Into a quiet thoroughfare not three minutes' walk from the busy life of West India Dock Road, Harley led the way. Before a door sandwiched in between the entrance to a Greek tobacconist's establishment and a boarded shop-front, he paused and turned to me.

  "Whatever you see or hear," he cautioned, "express no surprise. Above all, show no curiosity."

  He rang the bell beside the door, and almost immediately it was opened by a Negress, grossly and repellently ugly.

  Harley pattered something in what sounded like Arabic, whereat the Negress displayed the utmost servility, ushering us into an ill-lighted passage with every evidence of respect. Following this passage to its termination, an inner door was opened, and a burst of discordant music greeted us, together with a wave of tobacco smoke. We entered.

  Despite my friend's particular injunctions to the contrary I gave a start of amazement.

  We stood in the doorway of a fairly large apartment having a divan round three of its sides. This divan was occupied by ten or a dozen men of mixed nationalities—Arabs, Greeks, lascars, and others. They smoked cigarettes for the most part and sipped Mokha from little cups. A girl was performing a wriggling dance upon the square carpet occupying the centre of the floor, accompanied by a Nubian boy who twanged upon a guitar, and by most of the assembled company, who clapped their hands to the music or droned a low, tuneless dirge.

  Shortly after our entrance the performance terminated, and the girl retired through a curtained doorway at the farther end of the room. Our presence being now observed, suspicious glances were cast in our direction, and a very aged man, who sat smoking a narghli near the door by which the girl had made her exit, gravely waved towards us the amber mouthpiece which he held in his hand.

  Harley walked straight across to him, I close at his heels. The light of a lamp which hung close by fell fully upon my friend's face; and, rising from his seat, the old man greeted him with the dignified and graceful salutation of the East. At his request we seated ourselves beside him, and, while we all three smoked excellent Turkish cigarettes, Harley and he conversed in a low tone. Suddenly, at some remark of my friend's, our strange host rose to his feet, an angry frown contracting his heavy eyebrows.

  Silence fell upon the company.

  In a loud and peremptory voice he called out something in Arabic.

  Instantly I detected a fellow near the entrance door, and whom I had not hitherto observed, slipping furtively into the shadow, with a view, as I thought, to secret departure. He seemed to be deformed in some way and had the most evil, pock-marked face I had ever beheld in my life. Angrily, the majestic old man recalled him. Whereupon, with a sort of animal snarl quite indescribable, the fellow plucked out a knife! Two men who had been on the point of seizing him fell back, and:

  "Hold him!" shouted Harley, springing forward—"hold him! It's Ali of Cairo!"

  But Harley was too late. Turning, the strange and formidable- looking Oriental ran like the wind! Ere hand could be raised to stay him he was through the doorway!

  "That settles it," said Harley grimly, as once more I found myself in a cab beside him. "I was right; but he'll forestall us!"

  "Who will forestall us?" I asked in bewilderment.

  "The biggest villain in Europe, Asia, or Africa!" cried my companion. "I have wasted precious time to-day. I might have known." He drummed irritably upon his knees. "The place we have just left is a sort of club, you understand, Knox, and Hakim is the proprietor or host as well as being an old gentleman of importance and authority in the Moslem world. I told him of my suspicions—which step I should have taken earlier—and they were instantly confirmed. My man was there—recognized me—and bolted! He'll forestall us."

  "But my dear fellow," I said patiently—"who is this man, and what has he to do with the Deepbrow case?"

  "He is the blackest scoundrel breathing!" answered Harley bitterly. "As to what he has to do with the case—why did he bolt? At any rate, I know where to find him now—and we may not be too late after all."

  "But who and what is this man?"

  "He is Ali of Cairo! As to what he is—you will soon learn."

  IV. THE HOUSE BY THE RIVER

  On quitting the singular Oriental club, Harley had first raced off to a public telephone, where he had spoken for some time—as I now divined—to Scotland Yard. For when we presently arrived at the headquarters of the Metropolitan Police, I was surprised to find Inspector Wessex awaiting us. Leaning out of the cab window:

  "Yes?" called Harley excitedly. "Was I right?"

  "You were, Mr. Harley," answered Wessex, who seemed to be no less excited than my companion. "I got the man's reply an hour ago."

  "I knew it!" said Harley shortly. "Get in, Wessex; we haven't a minute to waste."

  The Inspector joined us in the cab, having first given instructions to the chauffeur. As we set out once more:

  "You have had very little time to make the necessary arrangements," continued my friend.

  "Time enough," replied Wessex. "They will not be expecting us."

  "I'm not so sure of it. One of the biggest villains in the civilized world recognized me three minutes before I called you up and then made good his escape. However, there is at least a fighting chance."

  Little more was said from that moment until the end of the drive, both my companions seeming to be consumed by an intense eagerness to reach our destination. At last the cab drew up in a deserted street. I had rather lost my bearings; but I knew that we were once more somewhere in the Chinatown area, and:

  "Follow us until we get into the house," Harley said to Inspector Wessex, "and wait out of sight. If you hear me blow this whistle, bring up the men you have posted—as quick as you like! But make it your particular business to see that no one gets out!"

  Into a pitch-dark yard we turned, and I felt a shudder of apprehension upon observing that it was the entrance to a wharf. Dully gleaming in the moonlight, the Thames, that grave of many a ghastly secret, flowed beneath us. Emerging from the shadow of the archway, we paused before a door in the wall on our left.

  At that moment something gleamed through the air, whizzed past my ear, and fell with a metallic jingle on the stones!

  Instinctively we both looked up.

  At an unlighted window on the first floor I caught a fleeting glimpse of a dark face.

  "You were right!" I said. "Ali of Cairo has forestalled us!"

  Harley stooped and picked up a knife with a broad and very curious blade. He slipped it into his pocket, nonchalantly.

  "All evidence!" he said. "Keep in the shadow and bend down. I am going to stand on your shoulders and get into that window!"

  Wondering at his daring, I nevertheless obeyed; and
Harley succeeded, although not without difficulty, in achieving his purpose. A moment after he had disappeared in the blackness of the room above.

  "Stand clear, Knox!" I heard.

  Two of the cushion seats sometimes called "poof-ottomans" were thrown down, and:

  "Up you come!" called Harley. "I'll grasp your hands if you can reach."

  It proved no easy task, but I finally managed to scramble up beside my friend—to find myself in a dark and stuffy little room.

  "This way!" said Harley rapidly—"upstairs."

  He led the way without more ado, but it was with serious misgivings that I stumbled up a darkened stair in the rear of my greatly daring friend.

  A pistol cracked in the darkness—and my fez was no longer on my head!

  Harley's repeater answered, and we stumbled through a heavily curtained door into a heated room, the air of which was laden with some Eastern perfume. In the dim light from a silken-shaded lantern a figure showed, momentarily, darting across the place before us.

  Again Harley's pistol spoke, but, as it seemed, ineffectively.

  I had little enough opportunity to survey my surroundings; yet even in those brief, breathless moments I saw enough of the place wherein we stood to make me doubt the evidence of my senses! Outside, I knew, lay a dingy wharf, amid a maze of mean streets; here was an opulently furnished apartment with a strong Oriental note in the decorations!

  Snatching an electric torch from his pocket, Harley leaped through a doorway draped with rich Persian tapestry, and I came close on his heels. Outside was darkness. A strong draught met us; and, passing along a carpeted corridor, we never halted until we came to a room filled with the weirdest odds and ends, apparently collected from every quarter of the globe.

  Crack!

  A bullet flattened itself on the wall behind us!

  "Good job he can't shoot straight!" rapped Harley.

  The ray of the torch suddenly picked out the head and shoulders of a man who was descending through a trap in the floor! Ere we had time to shoot he was gone! I saw his brown fingers relax their hold—and a bundle which he had evidently hoped to take with him was left lying upon the floor.

  Together we ran to the trap and looked down.

  Slowly moving tidal water flowed darkly beneath us! For twenty breathless seconds we watched—but nothing showed upon the surface.

  "I hope his swimming is no better than his shooting," I said.

  "It can avail him little," replied Harley grimly; "a river-police boat is waiting for anyone who tries to escape from that side of the house. We are by no means alone in this affair, Knox. But, firstly, what have we here!" He took up the bundle which the fugitive had deserted. "Something incriminating when Ali of Cairo dared not stay to face it out! He would never have deserted this place in the ordinary way. That fellow who was such a bad shot was left behind, when the news of our approach reached here, to make a desperate attempt to remove some piece of evidence! I'll swear to it. But we were too soon for him!"

  All the time he was busily removing the pieces of sacking and scraps of Oriental stuff with which the bundle was fastened; and finally he drew out a dress-suit, together with the linen, collar, shoes, and underwear—a complete outfit, in fact—and on top of the whole was a soft gray felt hat!

  Eagerly Harley searched the garments for some name of a maker by which their owner might be identified. Presently, inside the lining of the breast pocket, where such a mark is usually found, he discovered the label of a well-known West End firm.

  "The police can confirm it, Knox!" he said, looking up, his face slightly flushed with triumph; "but I, personally, have no doubt!"

  "You may have no doubt, Harley," I retorted, "but I am full of doubt! What is the significance of this discovery to which you seem to attach so much importance?"

  "At the moment," replied my friend, "never mind; I still have hopes—although they have grown somewhat slender—of making a much more important discovery."

  "Why not permit the police to aid in the search?"

  "The police are more useful in their present occupation," he replied. "We are dealing with the most cunning knave produced by East or West, and I don't mean to let him slip through my fingers if he is in this house! Nevertheless, Knox, I am submitting you to rather an appalling risk, I know; for our man is desperate, and if he is still in the place will prove as dangerous as a cornered rat."

  "But the man who dropped through the trap?"

  "The man who dropped through the trap," said Harley, "was not Ali of Cairo—and it is Ali of Cairo for whom I am looking!"

  "The hunchback we saw to-night?"

  Harley nodded, and having listened intently for a few moments, proceeded again to search the singular apartments of the abode. In each was evidence of Oriental occupancy; indeed, some of the rooms possessed a sort of Arabian Nights atmosphere. But no living creature was to be seen or heard anywhere. It was while the two of us, having examined every inch of wall, I should think, in the building, were standing staring rather blankly at each other in the room with the lighted lantern, that I saw Harley's expression change.

  "Why," he muttered, "is this one room illuminated—and all the others in darkness?"

  Even then the significance of this circumstance was not apparent to me. But Harley stared critically at an electric switch which was placed on the immediate right of the door and then up at the silk-shaded lantern which lighted the room. Crossing, he raised and lowered the switch rapidly, but the lamp continued to burn uninterruptedly!

  "Ah!" he said—"a good trick!"

  Grasping the wooden block to which the switch was attached, he turned it bodily—and I saw that it was a masked knob; for in the next moment he had pulled open the narrow section of wall—which proved to be nothing less than a cunningly fitted door!

  A small, dimly lighted apartment was revealed, the Oriental note still predominant in its appointments, which, however, were few, and which I scarcely paused to note. For lying upon a mattress in this place was a pretty, fair-haired girl!

  She lay on her side, having one white arm thrown out and resting limply on the floor, and she seemed to be in a semi-conscious condition, for although her fine eyes were widely opened, they had a glassy, witless look, and she was evidently unaware of our presence.

  "Look at her pupils," rapped Harley. "They have drugged her with bhang! Poor, pretty fool!"

  "Good God!" I cried. "Who is this, Harley?"

  "Molly Clayton!" he answered. "Thank heaven we have saved one victim from Ali of Cairo."

  V. THE HAREM AGENCY

  Owing to the instrumentality of Paul Harley, the public never learned that the awful riverside murder called by the Press in reference to the victim's shaven skull "the barber atrocity" had any relation to the Deepbrow case. It was physically impossible to identify the victim, and Harley had his own reasons for concealing the truth. The house on the wharf with its choice Oriental furniture was seized by the police; but, strange to relate, no arrest was made in connection with this most gruesome outrage. The man who dropped through the trap had been wounded by one of Harley's shots, and he sank for the last time under the very eyes of the crew of the police cutter.

  It was at a late hour on the night of this concluding tragedy that I learned the amazing truth underlying the case. Wessex was still at work in the East End upon the hundred and one formalities which attached to his office, and Harley and I sat in the study of my friend's chambers in Chancery Lane.

  "You see," Harley was explaining. "I got my first clue down at Deepbrow. The tracks leading to the motor-car. They showed—to anyone not hampered by a preconceived opinion—that the girl and Vane had not gone on together (since the man's footprints proved him to have been running), but that she had gone first and that he had run after her! Arguments: (a) He heard the approach of the car; or (b) he heard her call for help. In fact, it almost immediately became evident to me that someone else had met her at the end of the lane; probably someone who expected her, an
d whom she was going to meet when she, accidentally, encountered Vane! The captain was not attired for an elopement, and, more significant still, he said he should stroll to the Deep Wood, and that was where he did stroll to; for it borders the road at this point!

  "I had privately ascertained, from the postman, that Molly Clayton actually received a letter on that morning! This resolved my last doubt. She was not going to meet Vane on the night of her disappearance.

  "Then whom?"

  "The old love! He who some months earlier had had over fifty seductive pictures of this undoubtedly pretty girl prepared for a purpose of his own!"

  "Vane interfered?"

  "When the girl saw that they meant to take her away, she no doubt made a fuss! He ran to the rescue! They had not reckoned on his being there, but these are clever villains, who leave no clues— except for one who has met them on their own ground!"

  "On their own ground! What do you mean, Harley? Who are these people?"

  "Well—where do you suppose those fifty photographs went?"

  "I cannot conjecture!"

  "Then I will tell you. The turmoil in the East has put wealth and power into unscrupulous hands. But even before the war there were marts, Knox—open marts—at which a Negro girl might be purchased for some 30 pounds, and a Circassian for anything from 250 pounds to 500 pounds! Ah! You stare! But I assure you it was so. Here is the point, though: there were, and still are, private dealers! Those photographs were circulated among the nouveaux riches of the East! They were employed in the same way that any other merchant employs a catalogue. They reached the hands of many an opulent and abandoned 'profiteer' of Damascus, Stambul—where you will. Molly's picture would be one of many. Remember that hundreds of pretty girls disappear from their homes—taking the whole of the world—every year. Clearly, English beauty is popular at the moment! And," he added bitterly, "the arch-villain has escaped!"

  "Ali of Cairo!" I cried. "Then Ali of Cairo———"

  "Is the biggest slave-dealer in the East!"

  "Good God! Harley—at last I understand!"