"So much for unknown friends," said Weymouth. "As to unknown enemies, either you have a Dacoit amongst your workmen or there was a stranger in camp last night. "
"You've found a clue!" Rima cried.
"I have, Miss Barton. There's only one fact of which I have to make sure. If I am wrong in that, maybe all my theory falls down. "
"What's the fact?" Forester asked, with an eagerness which told how deeply he was impressed.
"It's this," said Weymouth. He fixed a penetrating gaze upon me. "Was Sir Lionel completely undressed when you found him? "
"No," I replied promptly. "It was arranged that we all turned out at four to work on the job. "
"Then he was fully dressed? "
"Not fully "
"Did he carry the key of this hut? "
"He carried all the keys on a chain. "
"Was this chain on him when you found him? "
"Yes. "
"Did you detach it? "
"No; we laid him here as we found him. "
"Partially dressed? "
"Yes."
Weymouth slowly crossed to the mummy case at one end of the hut. The lid was detached and leaned against the wall beside the case.
"Both you, Greville," he went on, turning, "and Forester were present when Sir Lionel's body was brought in here? "
"Ali and I carried him," Forester returned shortly.
"Greville supervised. "
"Did Ali leave when you left? "
"He did. "
"Good," Weymouth went on quietly; "but I am prepared to swear that not one of you looked into the recess behind this sarcoph- agus lid."
I stared blankly at Forester. He shook his head.
"We never even thought of it," he confessed.
"Naturally enough," said Weymouth. "Look what I found there."
A lamp stood on the long table; and now, taking a piece of paper from his pocket, and opening the paper under the lamp, the super- intendent exposed a reddish, fibrous mass. Rima sprang forward and with Forester and myself bent eagerly over it. Petrie watched.
"It looks to me like a wad of tobacco," said Forester, "chewed by someone whose gums were bleeding!"
Petrie bent between us and placed a lens upon the table.
"I have examined it," he said. "Give me your opinion, Mr. Forester. As a physician you may recognise it."
Forester looked, and we all watched him in silence. I remember that I heard Ali Mahmoud coughing out in the wadi and real- ized that he was keeping as close to human companionship that night as his sentry duties permitted.
Shrugging, Forester passed the glass to me. I peered in turn, but almost immediately laid the glass down.
Petrie looked at Forester; but: "Out of my depth!" the latter declared. "It's vegetable; but if it's something tropical, I plead ignorance. "
"It is something tropical," said Petrie. "It's betel nut."
Weymouth intruded quietly, and: "Someone who chewed betel nut," he explained, "was hiding behind that sarcoph- agus lid when you brought Sir Lionel's body into this hut. Now, I'm prepared to hear that before that the door was unlocked? "
"You're right," I admitted; "it was. We locked it after his body had been placed here. "
"As I thought."
Weymouth paused; then: "Someone who chewed betel nut," he went on, "must have been listening outside Sir Lionel's tent when you decided to move his body to this hut. He anticipated you, concealed himself, and, at some suitable time later, with the key which Sir Lionel carried on his chain, he unlocked the door and removed the body!"
I entirely agree," said Forester, staring very hard, "and I compliment you heartily. But--betel nut? "
"Perfectly simple," Petrie replied. "Many dacoits chew betel nut."
At which moment, unexpectedly: "Perhaps," came Rima's quiet voice, "I can show you the man! "
"What!" I exclaimed.
"I think I may have his photograph... and the photograph of someone else!"
Chapter Third
TOMB OF THE BLACK APE
I might have thought, during that strange conference in the hut, that life had nothing more unexpected to offer me. Little I knew what Fate held in store. This was only the beginning. Dawn was close upon us. Yet, before the sun came blushing over the Nile Valley, I was destined to face stranger experi- ences.
I went with Rima from the hut to the tent. All our old sense of security was gone. No one knew what to expect now that the shadow of Fu Manchu had fallen upon us.
"Imagine a person tall, lean, and feline, high shouldered, with a brow like Shake- speare and a face like Satan... long, magnetic eyes of the true cat-green..."
Petrie's description stuck in my memory; especially "tall, lean, and feline... eyes of the true cat-green..."
A lamp was lighted in Rima's tent, and she hastily collected some other photographic gear and rejoined me as Ali came up shoul- dering his rifle.
"Anything to report, Ali Mahmoud? "
"Nothing, Effendim."
When we got back to the hut I could see how eagerly we were awaited. A delicious shyness which I loved--for few girls are shy-- descended upon Rima when she realized how we were all awaiting what she had to say. She was so charmingly petite, so vividly alive, that the deep note which came into her voice in moments of earnestness had seemed, when I heard it first, alien to her real personality. Her steady grey eyes, though, belonged to the real Rima--the shy Rima.
"Please don't expect too much of me," she said glancing around quickly. "But I think perhaps I may be able to help. I wasn't really qualified for my job here, but... Uncle Lionel was awfully kind; and I wanted to come. Really, all I've done is wild-life photography --before, I mean."
She bent and opened a paper folder which ahe had put on the table; then: "I used to lay traps," she went on, "for all sorts of birds and animals. "
"What do you mean by 'traps' Miss Barton?" Weymouth asked.
"Oh, perhaps you don't know. Well, there's a bait--and the bait is attached to the trigger of the camera. "
"Perfectly clear. You need not explain further."
"For night things, it's more complicated; because the act of taking the bait has to touch off a charge of flash powder as well as expose the film. It doesn't work very often. But I had set a trap--with the camera most cunningly concealed--on the plateau just by the entrance to the old shaft. "
"Lafleur's Shaft!" I exclaimed.
"Yes; there was a track there which I thought might mean jackal--and I have never got a close-up of a jackal. The night before I went to Luxor something fell into my trap! I was rather puzzled, because the bait didn't seem to have been touched. It looked as though someone might have stumbled over it. But I never imagined that anyone would pass that way at night--or at any other time, really."
She stopped, looking at Weymouth; then: "I took the film to Luxor," she said; "but I didn't develop it until to-day. When I saw what it was, I couldn't believe my eyes! I have made a print of it. Look!"
Rima laid a photographic print on the table and we all bent over it.
"To have touched off the trigger and yet got in focus," she said, "they must have been actually coming out of the shaft. I simply can't imagine why they left the camera undis- turbed. Unless they failed to find it or the flash scared them!"
I stared dazedly at the print.
It represented three faces--one indistin- guishably foggy, in semi-profile. That nearest to the camera was quite unmistakable. It was a photograph of the cross-eyed man who had followed me to Cairo!
This was startling enough. But the second face--that of someone directly behind him-- literally defeated me. It was the face of a woman--wearing a black native veil but held aside so that her clear-cut features were reproduced sharply....