The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu | Page 7

At the
edge of the little coppice we stopped again abruptly.
Smith turned and thrust his pistol into my hand. A white ray of light pierced the shadows;
my companion carried an electric torch. But no trace of Eltham was discoverable.
There had been a heavy shower of rain during the evening just before sunset, and
although the open paths were dry again, under the trees the ground was still moist. Ten
yards within the coppice we came upon tracks--the tracks of one running, as the deep
imprints of the toes indicated.
Abruptly the tracks terminated; others, softer, joined them, two sets converging from left
and right. There was a confused patch, trailing off to the west; then this became indistinct,
and was finally lost upon the hard ground outside the group.
For perhaps a minute, or more, we ran about from tree to tree, and from bush to bush,
searching like hounds for a scent, and fearful of what we might find. We found nothing;
and fully in the moonlight we stood facing one another. The night was profoundly still.
Nayland Smith stepped back into the shadows, and began slowly to turn his head from
left to right, taking in the entire visible expanse of the common. Toward a point where the
road bisected it he stared intently. Then, with a bound, he set off.

"Come on, Petrie!" he cried. " There they are!"
Vaulting a railing he went away over a field like a madman. Recovering from the shock
of surprise, I followed him, but he was well ahead of me, and making for some vaguely
seen object moving against the lights of the roadway.
Another railing was vaulted, and the corner of a second, triangular grass patch crossed at
a hot sprint. We were twenty yards from the road when the sound of a starting motor
broke the silence. We gained the graveled footpath only to see the taillight of the car
dwindling to the north!
Smith leaned dizzily against a tree.
"Eltham is in that car!" he gasped. "Just God! are we to stand here and see him taken
away to--"
He beat his fist upon the tree, in a sort of tragic despair. The nearest cab-rank was no
great distance away, but, excluding the possibility of no cab being there, it might, for all
practical purposes, as well have been a mile off.
The beat of the retreating motor was scarcely audible; the lights might but just be
distinguished. Then, coming in an opposite direction, appeared the headlamp of another
car, of a car that raced nearer and nearer to us, so that, within a few seconds of its first
appearance, we found ourselves bathed in the beam of its headlights.
Smith bounded out into the road, and stood, a weird silhouette, with upraised arms, fully
in its course!
The brakes were applied hurriedly. It was a big limousine, and its driver swerved
perilously in avoiding Smith and nearly ran into me. But, the breathless moment past, the
car was pulled up, head on to the railings; and a man in evening clothes was demanding
excitedly what had happened. Smith, a hatless, disheveled figure, stepped up to the door.
"My name is Nayland Smith," he said rapidly--Burmese Commissioner." He snatched a
letter from his pocket and thrust it into the hands of the bewildered man. "Read that. It is
signed by another Commissioner--the Commissioner of Police."
With amazement written all over him, the other obeyed.
"You see," continued my friend, tersely--"it is carte blanche. I wish to commandeer your
car, sir, on a matter of life and death!".
The other returned the letter.
"Allow me to offer it!" he said, descending. "My man will take your orders. I can finish
my journey by cab. I am--"
But Smith did not wait to learn whom he might be.

"Quick!" he cried to the stupefied chauffeur--"You passed a car a minute ago--yonder.
Can you overtake it?"
"I can try, sir, if I don't lose her track."
Smith leaped in, pulling me after him.
"Do it!" he snapped."There are no speed limits for me. Thanks! Goodnight, sir!"
We were off! The car swung around and the chase commenced.
One last glimpse I had of the man we had dispossessed, standing alone by the roadside,
and at ever increasing speed, we leaped away in the track of Eltham's captors.
Smith was too highly excited for ordinary conversation, but he threw out short, staccato
remarks.
"I have followed Fu-Manchu from Hongkong," he jerked. "Lost him at Suez. He got here
a boat ahead of me. Eltham has been corresponding with some mandarin up-country.
Knew that. Came straight to you. Only got in this evening. He--Fu-Manchu--has been
sent here to get Eltham. My God! and he has him! He will question him! The