The Quest of the Sacred Slipper
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Sax Rohmer >> The Quest of the Sacred Slipper
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"Oh!" said Bristol, looking around him in apparent surprise: "how
long is he gone?"
"I don't know, sir. I've only been here three weeks, and Mr.
Knowlson only took the offices a month ago."
"Oh," commented Bristol, "then take my card to Mr. Knowlson; he
will probably be able to give me Mr. Boulter's present address."
The boy hesitated. The detective had that authoritative manner
which awes the youthful mind.
"He's out, sir," he said, but without conviction.
"Is he?" rapped Bristol. "Well, I'll leave my card."
He turned and quitted the office, carefully closing the door behind
him. Three seconds later he reopened it, and peering in, was in
time to see the boy knock upon the private door. A little wicket,
or movable panel, was let down, the card of John Henry Smith was
passed through to someone unseen, and the wicket was reclosed!
The boy turned and met the wrathful eye of the detective. Bristol
reentered, closing the door behind him.
"See here, young fellow," said he, "I don't stand for those tricks!
Why didn't you tell me Mr. Knowlson was in?"
"I'm very sorry, sir!"--the boy quailed beneath his glance--"but
he won't see any one who hasn't an appointment."
"Is there someone with him, then?"
"No."
"Well, what's he doing?"
"I don't know, sir; I've never been in to see!"
"What! never been in that room?"
"Never!" declared the boy solemnly. "And I don't mind telling
you," he added, recovering something of his natural confidence,
"that I am leaving on the 31st. This job ain't any use to me!"
"Too much work?" suggested Bristol.
"No work at all!" returned the boy indignantly. "I'm just here
for a blessed buffer, that's what I'm here for, a buffer!"
"What do you mean?"
"I just have to sit here and see that nobody gets into that
office. Lively, ain't it? Where's the prospects?"
Bristol surveyed him thoughtfully.
"Look here, my lad," he said quietly; "is that door locked?"
"Always," replied the boy.
"Does Mr. Knowlson come to that shutter when you knock?"
"Yes."
"Then go and knock!"
The boy obeyed with alacrity. He rapped loudly on the door, not
noticing or not caring that the visitor was standing directly
behind him. The shutter was lowered and a grizzled, bearded face
showed for a moment through the opening.
Bristol leant over the boy and pushed a card through into the hand
of the man beyond. On this occasion it did not bear the legend
"John Henry Smith," but the following--
CHIEF INSPECTOR BRISTOL
C.I.D.
NEW SCOTLAND YARD
"Good afternoon, Mr. Knowlson," said the detective dryly. "I want
to come in!"
There followed a moment of silence, from which Bristol divined that
he had blundered upon some mystery, possibly upon a big case; then
a key was turned in the lock and the door thrown open.
"Come right in, Inspector," invited a strident voice. "Carter, you
can go home."
Bristol entered warily, but not warily enough. For as the door
was banged upon his entrance he faced around only in time to
find himself looking down the barrel of a Colt automatic.
With his back to the door which contained the wicket, now reclosed,
stood the man with the bearded face. The revolver was held in his
left hand; his right arm terminated in a bandaged stump. But
without that his steel-gray eyes would have betrayed him to the
detective.
"Good God!" whispered Bristol. "It's Earl Dexter!"
"It is!" replied the cracksman, "and you've looked in at a real
inconvenient time! My visitors mostly seem to have that knack.
I'll have to ask you to stay, Inspector. Sit down in that chair
yonder."
Bristol knew his man too well to think of opening any argument at
that time. He sat down as directed, and ignoring the revolver
which covered him all the time, began coolly to survey the room
in which he found himself. In several respects it was an
extraordinary apartment.
The only bright patch in the room was the shining disc upon the
ceiling; and the detective noted with interest that this marked
the position of an arrangement of mirrors. A white-covered table,
entirely bare, stood upon the floor immediately beneath this
mysterious apparatus. With the exception of one or two ordinary
items of furniture and a small hand lathe, the office otherwise
was unfurnished. Bristol turned his eyes again upon the daring
man who so audaciously had trapped him--the man who had stolen the
slipper of the Prophet and suffered the loss of his hand by the
scimitar of an Hashishin as a result. When he had least expected
to find one, Fate had thrown a clue in Bristol's way. He reflected
grimly that it was like to prove of little use to him.
"Now," said Dexter, "you can do as you please, of course, but you
know me pretty well and I advise you to sit quiet."
"I am sitting quiet!" was the reply.
"I am sorry," continued Dexter, with a quick glance at his maimed
arm, "that I can't tie you up, but I am expecting a friend any
moment now."
He suddenly raised the wicket with a twitch of his elbow and,
without removing his gaze from the watchful detective, cried
sharply--
"Carter!"
But there was no reply.
"Good; he's gone!"
Dexter sat down facing Bristol.
"I have lost my hand in this game, Mr. Bristol," he said genially,
"and had some narrow squeaks of losing my head; but having gone so
far and lost so much I'm going through, if I don't meet a funeral!
You see I'm up against two tough propositions."
Bristol nodded sympathetically.
"The first," continued Dexter, "is you and Cavanagh, and English
law generally. My idea--if I can get hold of the slipper again--
oh! you needn't stare; I'm out for it!--is to get the Antiquarian
Institution to ransom it. It's a line of commercial speculation I
have worked successfully before. There's a dozen rich highbrows,
cranks to a man, connected with it, and they are my likeliest
buyers--sure. But to keep the tone of the market healthy there's
Hassan of Aleppo, rot him! He's a dangerous customer to approach,
but you'll note I've been in negotiation with him already and am
still, if not booming, not much below par!"
"Quite so," said Bristol. "But you've cut off a pretty hefty chew
nevertheless. They used to call you The Stetson Man, you used to
dress like a fashion plate and stop at the big hotels. Those days
are past, Dexter, I'm sorry to note. You're down to the skulking
game now and you're nearer an advert for Clarkson than Stein-Bloch!"
"Yep," said Dexter sadly, "I plead guilty, but I think here's
Carneta!"
Bristol heard the door of the outer office open, and a moment later
that upon which his gaze was set opened in turn, to admit a girl
who was heavily veiled, and who started and stood still in the
doorway, on perceiving the situation. Never for one unguarded
moment did the American glance aside from his prisoner.
"The Inspector's dropped in, Carneta!" he drawled in his strident
way. "You're handy with a ball of twine; see if you can induce
him to stay the night!"
The girl, immediately recovering her composure, took off her hat
in a businesslike way and began to look around her, evidently in
search of a suitable length of rope with which to fasten up Bristol.
"Might I suggest," said the detective, "that if you are shortly
quitting these offices a couple of the window-cords neatly joined
would serve admirably?"
"Thanks," drawled Dexter, nodding to his companion, who went into
the outer office, where she might be heard lowering the windows.
She was gone but a few moments ere she returned again, carrying a
length of knotted rope. Under cover of Dexter's revolver, Bristol
stoically submitted to having his wrists tied behind him. The end
of the line was then thrown through the ventilator above the door
which communicated with the outer office and Bristol was triced up
in such a way that, his wrists being raised behind him to an
uncomfortable degree, he was almost forced to stand upon tiptoe.
The line was then secured.
"Very workmanlike!" commented the victim. "You'll find a large
handkerchief in my inside breast pocket. It's a clean one, and
I can recommend it as a gag!"
Very promptly it was employed for the purpose, and Inspector
Bristol found himself helpless and constrained in a very painful
position. Dexter laid down his revolver.
"We will now give you a free show, Inspector," he said, genially,
"of our camera obscura!"
He pulled down the blinds, which Bristol noted with interest to be
black, but through an opening in one of them a mysterious ray of
light--the same that he had noticed from Fleet Street--shone upon
that point in the ceiling where the arrangement of mirrors was
attached. Dexter made some alteration, apparently in the focus of
the lens (for Bristol had divined that in some way a lens had been
fixed in the reflector above the bank window below) and the disc
of light became concentrated. The white-covered table was moved
slightly, and in the darkness some further manipulation was
performed.
"Observe," came the strident voice--"we now have upon the screen
here a minute moving picture. This little device, which is not
protected in any way, is of my own invention, and proved extremely
useful in the Arkwright jewel case, which startled Chicago. It has
proved useful now. I know almost as much concerning the
arrangements below as the manager himself. In confidence, Inspector,
this is my last bid for the slipper! I have plunged on it. Madame
Sforza, the distinguished Italian lady who recently opened an
account below, opened it for 500 pounds cash. She has drawn a
portion, but a balance remains which I am resigned to lose. Her
motor-car (hired), her references (forged), the case of jewels which
she deposited this morning (duds!)--all represent a considerable
outlay. It's a nerve-racking line of operation, too. Any hour of
the day may bring such a visitor as yourself, for example. In short,
I am at the end of my tether."
Bristol, ignoring the increasing pain in his arms and wrists, turned
his eyes upon the white-covered table and there saw a minute and
clear-cut picture, such as one sees in a focussing screen, of the
interior of the manager's office of the London County and Provincial
Bank!
CHAPTER XXVI
THE STRONG-ROOM
I wonder how often a sense of humour has saved a man from
desperation? Perhaps only the Easterns have thoroughly appreciated
that divine gift. I have interpolated the adventure of Inspector
Bristol in order that the sequence of my story be not broken;
actually I did not learn it until later, but when, on the following
day, the whole of the facts came into my possession, I laughed and
was glad that I could laugh, for laughter has saved many a man from
madness.
Certainly the Fates were playing with us, for at a time very nearly
corresponding with that when Bristol found himself bound and
helpless in Bank Chambers I awoke to find myself tied hand and foot
to my own bed! Nothing but the haziest recollections came to me at
first, nothing but dim memories of the awful being who had lured me
there; for I perceived now that all the messages proceeded, not from
Bristol, but from Hassan of Aleppo! I had been a fool, and I was
reaping the fruits of my folly. Could I have known that almost
within pistol shot of me the Inspector was trussed up as helpless as
I, then indeed my situation must have become unbearable, since upon
him I relied for my speedy release.
My ankles were firmly lashed to the rails at the foot of my bed;
each of my wrists was tied back to a bedpost. I ached in every limb
and my head burned feverishly, which latter symptom I ascribed to
the powerful drug which had been expelled into my face by the
uncanny weapon carried by Hassan of Aleppo. I reflected bitterly
how, having transferred my quarters to the Astoria, I could not well
hope for any visitor to my chambers; and even the event of such a
visitor had been foreseen and provided against by the cunning lord
of the Hashishin. A gag, of the type which Dumas has described in
"Twenty Years After," the poire d'angoisse, was wedged firmly into
my mouth, so that only by preserving the utmost composure could I
breathe. I was bathed in cold perspiration. So I lay listening to
the familiar sounds without and reflecting that it was quite
possible so to lie, undisturbed, and to die alone, my presence there
wholly unsuspected!
Once, toward dusk, my phone bell rang, and my state of mind became
agonizing. It was maddening to think that someone, a friend, was
virtually within reach of me, yet actually as far removed as if an
ocean divided us! I tasted the hellish torments of Tantalus. I
cursed fate, heaven, everything; I prayed; I sank into bottomless
depths of despair and rose to dizzy pinnacles of hope, when a
footstep sounded on the landing and a thousand wild possibilities,
vague possibilities of rescue, poured into my mind.
The visitor hesitated, apparently outside my door; and a change, as
sudden as lightning out of a cloud, transformed my errant fancies.
A gruesome conviction seized me, as irrational as the hope which it
displayed, that this was one of the Hashishin--an apish yellow
dwarf, a strangler, the awful Hassan himself!
The footsteps receded down the stairs. And my thoughts reverted
into the old channels of dull despair.
I weighed the chances of Bristol's seeking me there; and, eager as
I was to give them substance, found them but airy--ultimately was
forced to admit them to be nil.
So I lay, whilst only a few hundred yards from me a singular scene
was being enacted. Bristol, a prisoner as helpless as myself,
watched the concluding business of the day being conducted in the
bank beneath him; he watched the lift descend to the strongroom
--the spying apparatus being slightly adjusted in some way; he saw
the clerks hastening to finish their work in the outer office, and
as he watched, absorbed by the novelty of the situation, he almost
forgot the pain and discomfort which he suffered . . .
"This little peep-show of ours has been real useful," Dexter
confided out of the darkness. "I got an impression of the key of
the strongroom door a week ago, and Carneta got one of the keys of
the safe only this morning, when she lodged her box of jewellery
with the bank! I was at work on that key when you interrupted me,
and as by means of this useful apparatus I have learnt the
combination, you ought to see some fun in the next few hours!"
Bristol repressed a groan, for the prospect of remaining in that
position was thus brought keenly home to him.
The bank staff left the premises one by one until only a solitary
clerk worked on at a back desk. His task completed, he, too, took
his departure and the bank messenger commenced his nightly duty of
sweeping up the offices. It was then that excitement like an
anaesthetic dulled the detective's pain--indeed, he forgot his
aching body and became merely a watchful intelligence.
So intent had he become upon the picture before him that he had not
noticed the fact that he was alone in the office of the Congo Fibre
Company. Now he realized it from the absolute silence about him,
and from another circumstance.
The spying apparatus had been left focussed, and on to the screen
beneath his eyes, bending low behind the desks and creeping,
Indian-like, around, toward the head of the stair which communicated
with the strongroom and the apartment used by the messenger, came the
alert figure of Earl Dexter!
It may be a surprise to some people to learn that at any time in
the day the door of a bank, unguarded, should be left open, when
only a solitary messenger is within the premises; yet for a few
minutes at least each evening this happens at more than one City
bank, where one of the duties of the resident messenger is to clean
the outer steps. Dexter had taken advantage of the man's absence
below in quest of scrubbing material to enter the bank through the
open door.
Watching, breathless, and utterly forgetful of his own position,
Bristol saw the messenger, all unconscious of danger, come up the
stairs carrying a pail and broom. As his head reached the level
of the railings The Stetson Man neatly sand-bagged him, rushed
across to the outer door, and closed it!
Given duplicate keys and the private information which Dexter so
ingeniously had obtained, there are many London banks vulnerable to
similar attack. Certainly, bullion is rarely kept in a branch
storeroom, but the detective was well aware that the keys of the
case containing the slipper were kept in this particular safe!
He was convinced, and could entertain no shadowy doubt, that at
last Dexter had triumphed. He wondered if it had ever hitherto
fallen to the lot of a representative of the law thus to be made
an accessory to a daring felony!
But human endurance has well-defined limits. The fading light
rendered the ingenious picture dim and more dim. The pain
occasioned by his position became agonizing, and uttering a stifled
groan he ceased to take an interest in the robbery of the London
County and Provincial Bank.
Fate is a comedian; and when later I learned how I had lain strapped
to my bed, and, so near to me, Bristol had hung helpless as a
butchered carcass in the office of the Congo Fibre Company, whilst,
in our absence from the stage, the drama of the slipper marched
feverish to its final curtain, I accorded Fate her well-earned
applause. I laughed; not altogether mirthfully.
CHAPTER XXVII
THE SLIPPER
Someone was breaking in at the door of my chambers!
I aroused myself from a state of coma almost death-like and listened
to the blows. The sun was streaming in at my windows.
A splintering crash told of a panel broken. Then a moment later I
heard the grating of the lock, and a rush of footsteps along the
passage.
"Try the study!" came a voice that sounded like Bristol's, save that
it was strangely weak and shaky.
Almost simultaneously the Inspector himself threw open the bedroom
door--and, very pale and haggard-eyed, stood there looking across at
me. It was a scene unforgettable.
"Mr. Cavanagh!" he said huskily--"Mr. Cavanagh! Thank God you're
alive! But"--he turned--"this way, Marden!" he cried, "Untie him
quickly! I've got no strength in my arms!"
Marden, a C.I.D. man, came running, and in a minute, or less, I was
sitting up gulping brandy.
"I've had the most awful experience of my life," said Bristol.
"You've fared badly enough, but I've been hanging by my wrists--you
know Dexter's trick!--for close upon sixteen hours! I wasn't
released until Carter, an office boy, came on the scene this morning!"
Very feebly I nodded; I could not talk.
"The strong-room of your bank was rifled under my very eyes last
evening!" he continued, with something of his old vigour; "and five
minutes after the Antiquarian Museum was opened to the public this
morning quite an unusual number of visitors appeared.
"I saw the bank manager the moment he arrived, and learned a piece
of news that positively took my breath away! I was at the Museum
seven minutes later and got another shock! There in the case was
the red slipper!"
"Then," I whispered-"it hadn't been stolen?"
"Wrong! It had! This was a duplicate, as Mostyn, the curator, saw
at a glance! Some of the early visitors--they were Easterns--had
quite surrounded the case. They were watched, of course, but any
number of Orientals come to see the thing; and, short of smashing
the glass, which would immediately attract attention, the authorities
were unprepared, of course, for any attempt. Anyway, they were
tricked. Somebody opened the case. The real slipper of the Prophet
is gone!"
"They told you at the bank--"
"That you had withdrawn the keys! If Dexter had known that!"
"Hassan of Aleppo took them from me last night! At last the
Hashishin have triumphed."
Bristol sank into the armchair.
"Every port is watched," he said. "But--"
CHAPTER XXVIII
CARNETA
"I am entirely at your mercy; you can do as you please with me. But
before you do anything I should like you to listen to what I have
to say."
Her beautiful face was pale and troubled. Violet eyes looked sadly
into mine.
"For nearly an hour I have been waiting for this chance--until I
knew you were alone," she continued. "If you are thinking of giving
me up to the police, at least remember that I came here of my own
free will. Of course, I know you are quite entitled to take
advantage of that; but please let me say what I came to say!"
She pleaded so hard, with that musical voice, with her evident
helplessness, most of all with her wonderful eyes, that I quite
abandoned any project I might have entertained to secure her arrest.
I think she divined this masculine weakness, for she said, with
greater confidence--
"Your friend, Professor Deeping, was murdered by the man called
Hassan of Aleppo. Are you content to remain idle while his murderer
escapes?"
God knows I was not. My idleness in the matter was none of my
choosing. Since poor Deeping's murder I had come to handgrips
with the assassins more than once, but Hassan had proved too clever
for me, too clever for Scotland Yard. The sacred slipper was once
more in the hands of its fanatic guardian.
One man there was who might have helped the search, Earl Dexter.
But Earl Dexter was himself wanted by Scotland Yard!
From the time of the bank affair up to the moment when this
beautiful visitor had come to my chambers I had thought Dexter, as
well as Hassan, to have fled secretly from England. But the moment
that I saw Carneta at my door I divined that The Stetson Man must
still be in London.
She sat watching me and awaiting my answer.
"I cannot avenge my friend unless I can find his murderer."
Eagerly she bent forward.
"But if I can find him?"
That made me think, and I hesitated before speaking again.
"Say what you came to say," I replied slowly. "You must know that
I distrust you. Indeed, my plain duty is to detain you. But I will
listen to anything you may care to tell me, particularly if it
enables me to trap Hassan of Aleppo."
"Very well," she said, and rested her elbows upon the table before
her. "I have come to you in desperation. I can help you to find
the man who murdered Professor Deeping, but in return I want you to
help me!"
I watched her closely. She was very plainly, almost poorly, dressed.
Her face was pale and there were dark marks around her eyes. This
but served to render their strange beauty more startling; yet I
could see that my visitor was in real trouble. The situation was an
odd one.
"You are possibly about to ask me," I suggested, "to assist Earl
Dexter to escape the police?"
She shook her head. Her voice trembled as she replied--
"That would not have induced me to run the risk of coming here. I
came because I wanted to find a man who was brave enough to help me.
We have no friends in London, and so it became a question of terms.
I can repay you by helping you to trace Hassan."
"What is it, then, that Dexter asks me to do?"
"He asks nothing. I, Carneta, am asking!"
"Then you are not come from him?"
At my question, all her self-possession left her. She abruptly
dropped her face into her hands and was shaken with sobs! It was
more than I could bear, unmoved. I forgot the shady past, forgot
that she was the associate of a daring felon, and could only realize
that she was a weeping woman, who had appealed to my pity and who
asked my aid.
I stood up and stared out of the window, for I experienced a not
unnatural embarrassment. Without looking at her I said--
"Don't be afraid to tell me your troubles. I don't say I should go
out of my way to be kind to Mr. Dexter, but I have no wish whatever
to be instrumental in"--I hesitated--"in making you responsible
for his misdeeds. If you can tell me where to find Hassan of
Aleppo, I won't even ask you where Dexter is--"
"God help me! I don't know where he is!"
There was real, poignant anguish in her cry. I turned and
confronted her. Her lashes were all wet with tears.
"What! has he disappeared?"
She nodded, fought with her emotion a moment, and went on unsteadily,
"I want you to help me to find him for in finding him we shall find
Hassan!"
"How so?"
Her gaze avoided me now.
"Mr. Cavanagh, he has staked everything upon securing the slipper
--and the Hashishin were too clever for him. His hand--those
Eastern fiends cut off his hand! But he would not give in. He
made another bid--and lost again. It left him almost penniless."
She spoke of Earl Dexter's felonious plans as another woman might
have spoken of her husband's unwise investments! It was fantastic
hearing that confession of The Stetson Man's beautiful partner, and
I counted the interview one of the strangest I had ever known.
A sudden idea came to me. "When did Dexter first conceive the plan
to steal the slipper?" I asked.
"In Egypt!" answered Carneta. "Yes! You may as well know! He is
thoroughly familiar with the East, and he learned of the robbery of
Professor Deeping almost as soon as it became known to Hassan. I
know what you are going to ask--"
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