The Insidious Dr. Fu Manchu
Sax Rohmer
Paperback
(Independently published, Aug. 13, 2019)
"A GENTLEMAN to see you, Doctor."From across the common a clock sounded the half-hour."Ten-thirty!" I said. "A late visitor. Show him up, if you please."I pushed my writing aside and tilted the lamp-shade, as footsteps sounded on the landing. The next moment I had jumped to my feet, for a tall, lean man, with his square-cut, clean-shaven face sun-baked to the hue of coffee, entered and extended both hands, with a cry:"Good old Petrie! Didn't expect me, I'll swear!"It was Nayland Smith—whom I had thought to be in Burma!"Smith," I said, and gripped his hands hard, "this is a delightful surprise! Whatever—however—""Excuse me, Petrie!" he broke in. "Don't put it down to the sun!" And he put out the lamp, plunging the room into darkness.I was too surprised to speak."No doubt you will think me mad," he continued, and, dimly, I could see him at the window, peering out into the road, "but before you are many hours older you will know that I have good reason to be cautious. Ah, nothing suspicious! Perhaps I am first this time." And, stepping back to the writing-table he relighted the lamp."Mysterious enough for you?" he laughed, and glanced at my unfinished MS. "A story, eh? From which I gather that the district is beastly healthy—what, Petrie? Well, I can put some material in your way that, if sheer uncanny mystery is a marketable commodity, ought to make you independent of influenza and broken legs and shattered nerves and all the rest."