The Devil Doctor
r from Nayland Smith
n the siphon, refle
he's a poor correspondent a
oman or s
s such a reticent beggar, I re
the truculent character of the man. His scanty fair hair, already grey over the temples, was silken and soft-looking: in appearance he was indeed a typical English churchman; bu
tuffing tobacco into an old pipe with fierce energy, "I ha
ha
beneath the site of the burnt-out cottage in D
alked to the hearth to th
If I thought that Dr. Fu-Manchu lived; if I seriously suspected that that stupendous intellect, tha
g my elbows on the tab
destroyed, then the peace of the world
I knew, and snapping his fingers to emphasize his words; a man compose
ear for your life every time that a night-call took you out alone? Why, man alive, it is only two years since he was here amongst us, since we were searching every sha
d, takin
tly-"searched in Egypt with
odd
my impression is that you were searching for the
tly; "but we could fi
were int
eplied, "until I realiz
rom your account, and from ot
d stood up, for I was anxious to ter
yed Eastern girl who had brought romance into my drab life; he knew that I treasured my memories of
ld appearance, and the gaunt, bronzed and steely-eyed Burmese commissioner, there was externally little in common; but it was some little nervous trick in his carriage that conjured up through the smoke-haze one distant summer
ars: "Imagine a person, tall, lean and feline, high-shouldered, with a brow like Shakespeare and a face like Satan, a close-shaven skull and long magnetic eyes of the true cat green. Invest him with all the cruel
e for my mood; for this singular clergyman had
pity that a man like that should be buried in Burma. Burma makes
rtly, "and is never
d at something
Nayland Smith is not the
ut"-he was growing painfully embarrassed-"it may be your d
watching him in
ears; but-er ... no, doctor!" He flushed like a girl. "It was wrong of me to open t
one bel
but I could see that he welcomed the interr
o the te
trie?" inquired
ho is s
ken more seriously ill.
only a profitable patient but an estimable lad
up the
?" asked Eltham,
it. You had b
ou, if it would not be intruding. Our con
ompany; and three minutes later we we
t like a veil draped from trunk to trunk, as in silence we passed
hich he had committed during his sojourn in England. So actively was my imagination at work that I felt again the menace which so long had hung over me; I felt as though that murderous yellow cloud s
this morbidly reflective mood, on finding that we had cr
I gather that you don't expect to be detained long? I
replied, and ra
n last I had visited her, a first-floor bedroom in the front of the house. My knocking and ringing produced no response for three or four
equires me?" I
ed more stupi
: "she don't, sir;
me!" I insisted, rat
d the now wide-eyed girl. "We
could be the meaning of the mysterious summons? I had made no mistake respecting the name of my patient; it had been twice repeated over the telephone; yet that the call had not emanated from Mrs.
alked up
person called for you almost directly you had left your
ously. "There are plenty of other d
ere actually up and dressed," explained Eltham; "
lankly. Was this another e
nce," I said. "That '
genuine! The poor girl was dreadfully agitated; her master has
e girl?" I a
ectly she had giv
he a s
her. I am sorry to hear that some one has played a silly joke on you, but believe me"-he was very ear
st go. Broken leg, you said?-and my surgic
an do something to alleviate the poor man's suffering immediately. I wil
ly good of
d up h
, Petrie, is one which I may no
ermination adamantine, but told him where he would find the bag and once more set o
f the improbability of even the most hardened practical joker practising his wiles at one o'clock in the morning. I thought of our recent conversation; above all I thought of the girl who had delivered the message to El
, I should have remembered before) tha
n. Where the lamps marked the main paths across the common nothing moved; in the shadows about me
was a
ittance to my brain. I strove to reassure myself, but the sense of impending evil and of mystery became heavier. At last I could c
r passed at the moment that I reached the high-road, and as I ran around behin
lock when my houseke
man just come, do
and raced up the s
face brown as a coffee-berry and his steely grey eyes fixed u
Nayland
ith, old man, by God,
ut there was little enough of gladness in his face. He was alto
Eltham?"
ack as though I
spered-"Eltham!
n minutes ago
o the palm of his left hand, an
said, "am I fated alw
nt were confirmed. I seemed to
you don'
far away. "Fu-Manchu is here; and Eltha