Slowly moving tidal water flowed darkly beneath us! For twenty breathless seconds we watched--but nothing showed upon the surface.
"I hope his swimming is no better than his shooting," I said.
"It can avail him little," replied Harley grimly; "a river-police boat is waiting for anyone who tries to escape from that side of the house. We are by no means alone in this affair, Knox. But, firstly, what have we here!" He took up the bundle which the fugitive had deserted.
"Something incriminating when Ali of Cairo dared not stay to face it out! He would never have deserted this place in the ordinary way.
That fellow who was such a bad shot was left behind, when the news of our approach reached here, to make a desperate attempt to remove some piece of evidence! I'll swear to it. But we were too soon for him!"
All the time he was busily removing the pieces of sacking and scraps of Oriental stuff with which the bundle was fastened; and finally he drew out a dress-suit, together with the linen, collar, shoes, and underwear--a complete outfit, in fact--and on top of the whole was a soft gray felt hat!
Eagerly Harley searched the garments for some name of a maker by which their owner might be identified. Presently, inside the lining of the breast pocket, where such a mark is usually found, he discovered the label of a well-known West End firm.
"The police can confirm it, Knox!" he said, looking up, his face slightly flushed with triumph; "but I, personally, have no doubt!"
"You may have no doubt, Harley," I retorted, "but I am full of doubt!
What is the significance of this discovery to which you seem to attach so much importance?"
"At the moment," replied my friend, "never mind; I still have hopes-- although they have grown somewhat slender--of making a much more important discovery."
"Why not permit the police to aid in the search?"
"The police are more useful in their present occupation," he replied.
"We are dealing with the most cunning knave produced by East or West, and I don't mean to let him slip through my fingers if he is in this house! Nevertheless, Knox, I am submitting you to rather an appalling risk, I know; for our man is desperate, and if he is still in the place will prove as dangerous as a cornered rat."
"But the man who dropped through the trap?"
"The man who dropped through the trap," said Harley, "was not Ali of Cairo--and it is Ali of Cairo for whom I am looking!"
"The hunchback we saw to-night?"
Harley nodded, and having listened intently for a few moments, proceeded again to search the singular apartments of the abode. In each was evidence of Oriental occupancy; indeed, some of the rooms possessed a sort of Arabian Nights atmosphere. But no living creature was to be seen or heard anywhere. It was while the two of us, having examined every inch of wall, I should think, in the building, were standing staring rather blankly at each other in the room with the lighted lantern, that I saw Harley's expression change.
"Why," he muttered, "is this one room illuminated--and all the others in darkness?"
Even then the significance of this circumstance was not apparent to me. But Harley stared critically at an electric switch which was placed on the immediate right of the door and then up at the silk-shaded lantern which lighted the room. Crossing, he raised and lowered the switch rapidly, but the lamp continued to burn uninterruptedly!
"Ah!" he said--"a good trick!"
Grasping the wooden block to which the switch was attached, he turned it bodily--and I saw that it was a masked knob; for in the next moment he had pulled open the narrow section of wall--which proved to be nothing less than a cunningly fitted door!
A small, dimly lighted apartment was revealed, the Oriental note still predominant in its appointments, which, however, were few, and which I scarcely paused to note. For lying upon a mattress in this place was a pretty, fair-haired girl!
She lay on her side, having one white arm thrown out and resting limply on the floor, and she seemed to be in a semi-conscious condition, for although her fine eyes were widely opened, they had a glassy, witless look, and she was evidently unaware of our presence.
"Look at her pupils," rapped Harley. "They have drugged her with bhang! Poor, pretty fool!"
"Good God!" I cried. "Who is this, Harley?"
"Molly Clayton!" he answered. "Thank heaven we have saved one victim from Ali of Cairo."
V. The Harem Agency
Owing to the instrumentality of Paul Harley, the public never learned that the awful riverside murder called by the Press in reference to the victim's shaven skull "the barber atrocity" had any relation to the Deepbrow case. It was physically impossible to identify the victim, and Harley had his own reasons for concealing the truth. The house on the wharf with its choice Oriental furniture was seized by the police; but, strange to relate, no arrest was made in connection with this most gruesome outrage. The man who dropped through the trap had been wounded by one of Harley's shots, and he sank for the last time under the very eyes of the crew of the police cutter.
It was at a late hour on the night of this concluding tragedy that I learned the amazing truth underlying the case. Wessex was still at work in the East End upon the hundred and one formalities which attached to his office, and Harley and I sat in the study of my friend's chambers in Chancery Lane.
"You see," Harley was explaining. "I got my first clue down at Deepbrow. The tracks leading to the motor-car. They showed--to anyone not hampered by a preconceived opinion--that the girl and Vane had not gone on together (since the man's footprints proved him to have been running), but that she had gone first and that he had run after her! Arguments: (a) He heard the approach of the car; or (b) he heard her call for help. In fact, it almost immediately became evident to me that someone else had met her at the end of the lane; probably someone who expected her, and whom she was going to meet when she, accidentally, encountered Vane! The captain was not attired for an elopement, and, more significant still, he said he should stroll to the Deep Wood, and that was where he did stroll to; for it borders the road at this point!
"I had privately ascertained, from the postman, that Molly Clayton actually received a letter on that morning! This resolved my last doubt. She was not going to meet Vane on the night of her disappearance.
"Then whom?"
"The old love! He who some months earlier had had over fifty seductive pictures of this undoubtedly pretty girl prepared for a purpose of his own!"
"Vane interfered?"
"When the girl saw that they meant to take her away, she no doubt made a fuss! He ran to the rescue! They had not reckoned on his being there, but these are clever villains, who leave no clues-- except for one who has met them on their own ground!"
"On their own ground! What do you mean, Harley? Who are these people?"
"Well--where do you suppose those fifty photographs went?"
"I cannot conjecture!"
"Then I will tell you. The turmoil in the East has put wealth and power into unscrupulous hands. But even before the war there were marts, Knox--open marts--at which a Negro girl might be purchased for some 30 pounds, and a Circassian for anything from 250 pounds to 500 pounds! Ah! You stare! But I assure you it was so. Here is the point, though: there were, and still are, private dealers! Those photographs were circulated among the nouveaux riches of the East!
They were employed in the same way that any other merchant employs a catalogue. They reached the hands of many an opulent and abandoned 'profiteer' of Damascus, Stambul--where you will. Molly's picture would be one of many. Remember that hundreds of pretty girls disappear from their homes--taking the whole of the world--every year. Clearly, English beauty is popular at the moment! And," he added bitterly, "the arch-villain has escaped!"