Part 28 (2/2)

Cautiously, noiselessly, edging inch by inch across the veranda, the man approached the door. It was open, hooked back against the wall; only the wire screen was in his way. Against this he flattened his face; and a full, long minute elapsed while he carefully surveyed what was visible of the interior. Even Sum Fat held his breath throughout that interminable reconnoissance.

At length, rea.s.sured, the man laid hold of the screen and drew it open.

It complained a little, and he started violently and waited another minute for the alarm which did not ensue. Then abruptly he slipped into the room and slowly drew the screen shut behind him. Another minute: no sound detectable more untoward than that of steady respiration in the bedroom; with a movement as swift and sinister as the swoop of a vulture the man sprang toward the bedroom door.

Leaping from a sitting position, with a bound that was little less than a flight through the air, the Chinaman caught him halfway. There followed a shriek, a heavy fall that shook the bungalow, the report of a revolver, sounds of scuffling....

Whitaker, half dazed, found himself standing in the doorway, regardless of his injury.

He saw, as one who dreams and yet is conscious that he does but dream, Ember lighting candles--calmly applying the flame of a taper to one after another as he made a round of the sconces. The moonlight paled and the windows turned black as the mellow radiance brightened.

Then a slight movement in the shadow of the table drew his attention to the floor. Sum Fat was kneeling there, on all fours, above something that breathed heavily and struggled without avail.

Whitaker's sleep-numbed faculties cleared.

”Ember!” he cried. ”What in the name of all things strange--!”

Ember threw him a flickering smile. ”Oh, there you are?” he said cheerfully. ”I've got something interesting to show you. Sum Fat”--he stooped and picked up a revolver--”you may let him up, now, if you think he's safe.”

”Safe enough.” Sum Fat rose, grinning. ”Had d.a.m.n plenty.”

He mounted guard beside the door.

For an instant his captive seemed reluctant to rise; free, he lay without moving, getting his breath in great heaving sobs; only his gaze ranged ceaselessly from Ember's face to Whitaker's and back again, and his hands opened and closed convulsively.

Ember moved to his side and stood over him, balancing the revolver in his palm.

”Come,” he said impatiently. ”Up with you!”

The man sat up as if galvanized by fear, got more slowly to his knees, then, grasping the edge of the table, dragged himself laboriously to a standing position. He pa.s.sed a hand uncertainly across his mouth, brushed the hair out of his eyes and tried to steady himself, attempting to infuse defiance into his air, even though cornered, beaten and helpless.

Whitaker's jaw dropped and his eyes widened with wonder and pity. He couldn't deny the man, yet he found it hard to believe that this quivering, shaken creature, with his lean and pasty face and desperate, glaring eyes, this man in rough, stained, soiled and shapeless garments, could be identical with the well set-up, prosperous and confident man of affairs he remembered as Drummond. And yet they were one. Appalling to contemplate the swift devastating course of moral degeneration, that had spread like gangrene through all the man's physical and mental fibre....

”Take a good look,” Ember advised grimly. ”How about that pet myth thing, now? What price the astute sleuth--eh? Perhaps you'd like to take a few more funny cracks at my simple faith in hallucinations.”

”Good G.o.d!” said Whitaker in a low voice, unable to remove his gaze from Drummond.

”I had a notion he'd be hanging round,” Ember went on; ”I thought I saw somebody hiding in the woods this afternoon; and then I was sure I saw him skulking round the edges of the clearing, after dinner. So I set Sum Fat to watch, drove back to the village to mislead him, left my car there and walked back. And sure enough--!”

Without comment, Whitaker, unable to stand any longer without discomfort, hobbled to a chair and sat down.

”Well?” Drummond demanded harshly in a quavering snarl. ”Now that you've got me, what're you going to do with me?”

There was a high, hysterical accent in his voice that struck unpleasantly on Ember's ear. He c.o.c.ked his head to one side, studying the man intently.

Drummond flung himself a step away from the table, paused, and again faced his captors with bravado.

”Well?” he cried again. ”Well?”

Ember nodded toward Whitaker. ”Ask him,” he said briefly.

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