"I'd give a week's pay if Winter was here now, and I could see those big eyes of his bulging out of his head," he cackled.

Theydon nodded. He understood perfectly. Then he caught Forbes's inquiring glance, and explained matters.

"Mr. Furneaux hinted last night at some such development as that which your present statement conveys, and his colleague, Mr. Winter, pretended to scout it," he said.

"Pretended!" shrieked Furneaux, instantly in a rage.

"That was how it struck me," said Theydon coolly.

"Didn't I drag the Chinese aspect of the crime out of him with pincers?"

came the indignant demand.

"Unquestionably. I only remark that your large-sized friend had it tucked away all the time at the back of his head."

Furneaux pounded the table so viciously that the cups rattled.

"Of course, he has a nose to smell joss sticks, and eyes to see an ivory skull, but didn't he say I was talking nonsense when I spoke about Shang Ti scowling from a porcelain vase?" he shrilled.

"Yes. For all that, I don't think he missed the least hint of your meaning."

Furneaux gazed at Theydon fixedly.

"Sorry," he said, with an acid tone that was almost malicious. "I imagined you were so busy throwing dust in our eyes that you wouldn't have noticed such fine shades of perception on Winter's part."

But Theydon was now able to measure this strange little man with some degree of accuracy; he only smiled.

"As a thrower of dust I was a most abject failure," he said.

Furneaux smiled and turned to the millionaire.

"Pardon the interruption," he said. "Like every artist, I am pained when my best efforts are scoffed at by heedless mediocrity. You, at least, will understand what a big thing it was to deduce even the vaguest outline of the truth from the facts at my command."

"I certainly do," agreed Forbes. "Until this morning I was convinced that Mrs. Lester's death removed the one person in England who knew of my connection with the revolution in China. To revert to the Young Manchus--they have secured far more victims than the world at large is aware of. I am sure that they poisoned Arthur Lester, and his wife held the same view. They aim at nothing less than the extinction of the democratic cause by the murder of every prominent man connected with it.

But they never yet have been able to obtain a full and authentic list of the reform leaders. They suspected poor Lester of complicity in the movement, and killed him. It was through Mrs. Lester that I first became aware of their existence as an active organization, and I hoped that when she had returned to England, and was living quietly in London, she would be lost sight of--ignored, in fact. Nevertheless, both she and I thought it prudent that our acquaintance should cease until the turmoil in China had subsided. For that reason I never visited her, nor did I permit the growth of friendship between her and my wife and daughter--a friendship which, in happier conditions, would have been natural and inevitable. But we were woefully mistaken. An Oriental vendetta neither slackens nor dies. By some means wholly unknown to me, the Young Manchus must have discovered, or guessed, that in leaving Lester's widow out of their reckoning they had lost a promising clew. Be that as it may, they followed her to London, and, by a singular fatality, I was the first to know of it. Last Monday, while driving home from the city, my car was held up in Piccadilly for a few seconds. Looking idly out at the passing crowd, I saw a Chinaman in European clothes. He was waiting to cross the road, so I was able to scrutinize him carefully, and, owing to a scar on the left side of his face, recognized him. His name is Wong Li Fu, a Manchu of the Manchus, a mandarin of almost imperial lineage. Some years ago he was a young attache at the Chinese Embassy here. Suddenly, while on the way to my house, I recollected that certain members of the Revolutionary Committee had spoken of this very man as being one of the ablest and most unscrupulous adherents of the Manchu faction in Pekin.

Somehow, his presence in London was disconcerting and menacing. Who more likely than he, I argued, to be a leading spirit among the Young Manchus? In any event, London was not big enough to hold both Mrs.

Lester and him, and I decided to visit her that very night, tell her I had seen Wong Li Fu, and advise her to go away into the country, leaving no record of her whereabouts. I happened to be taking my daughter to Daly's Theater, and contrived to slip away on some pretext after the performance. I found Mrs. Lester alone in her flat, and she fell in with my views at once, because she, too, had heard of this very man, and the mere sound of his name terrified her. I was half inclined to urge that she should go to an hotel for the night, but the lateness of the hour and the seeming fact that if danger threatened she was safe at least till the morrow, prevented me."

Furneaux, sitting on the edge of a chair, his head bent forward, his piercing black eyes intent as those of a hawk, a hand resting on each knee, his attitude curiously suggestive of a readiness to spring forward at any instant, now leaned over and tapped the millionaire decisively on the shoulder.

"You couldn't have saved her, Mr. Forbes," he said gravely. "She was marked down as the first warning. Didn't the letter you received this morning tell you something of the sort?"

Agitation gave place to utter astonishment in Forbes's face.

"In Heaven's name, how do you know anything of any letter?" he cried.

"I will tell you later. But am I not right?"

"Yes, you are."

"Where is it? May I see it?"

Forbes took a creased and soiled document from a small, flat cardboard box which he carried in the breast pocket of his coat. But first he withdrew from the box a little object, and placed it on the table. It was an ivory skull, and the very presence of such a sinister token brought some hint of the charnel-house into the cozy and sunlit room.

Furneaux, a creature oddly constituted either of all nerves or of no nerves, disregarded the skull. He had eyes only for the few words typed on a single sheet of note-paper. They ran:

"James Creighton Forbes: If you are willing to come to terms, announce the fact by advertisement in Thursday's Times. Address your reply to Y.

M., and sign it 'J. C. F.' Yield, and you will hear further. Refuse, and no other warning will be given."

CHAPTER VIII

THE FIRST COUNTER-STROKE

Furneaux apparently made up his mind with reference to the contents of a somewhat enigmatic message after one quick, unerring perusal.

"The man who wrote that took a great many things for granted," he said.

"He assumed, firstly, that you knew of Mrs. Lester's death and understood its significance; secondly, that you are aware of the nature of the 'terms' he will offer; thirdly, that you may hesitate between compliance and threatened death. 'Y. M.,' of course, can be read as 'Young Manchus.' Even there, the writer exhibits artistic reticence....

Frankly, Mr. Forbes, I wish you had come straight to Scotland Yard on Monday evening instead of wasting those precious hours at Daly's Theater."

Forbes was moved to energetic protest.

"How was I to deduce the true nature of these hell hounds' mission from a casual glance vouchsafed of one who may or may not be their leader?"

he cried.

"Yet you treated your discovery as serious enough to warrant a prompt visit to the woman with whom association was dangerous?"

"Yes; I wanted to act secretly."

"Just so. You were afraid the police would bungle the job. Between you and Mr. Theydon, you have exhibited remarkable skill in heading us off the scent. Fortunately, we were able to dispense with your assistance, having other matters to occupy our brains. You two were ripe nuts waiting to be cracked and have the contents extracted at leisure. There were a few freshly broken shells lying about which invited immediate attention. For instance, some four months ago, a well-known and reputable firm of private inquiry agents was instructed from Canton to secure all possible information about Mrs. Lester and you--yes, you, Mr.

Forbes--your household, friends, methods of living, servants, tradesmen,--every sort of fact, indeed, which might be useful to a thoroughgoing and well-organized society of cutthroats like the Young Manchus. The inquiry agents did their work well, and were handsomely paid for it. I haven't the least doubt that Wong Li Fu knows what brand of cigars you favor, and what you eat for breakfast. His informants sent us a copy of their notes an hour after the murder was announced in the newspapers. Mr. Lester is 'removed' in Shanghai. His widow comes home.

The inquiry agents receive instructions. They forward their report to Canton, and Wong Li Fu turns up in London. The program is a tribute to the excellence and regularity of the mail service between England and the Far East."

While the detective was speaking, Forbes's face, already haggard, had grown desperate.

"I care little for my own life," he said, "but I shall stop short of no measures to protect my wife and daughter."

"I certainly recommend that an armed guard should be on duty day and night in any house where you may happen to be living at the moment,"

replied Furneaux airily. "I really think that if your safety alone were at stake I would do you a good turn by arresting you on suspicion."

"On suspicion of what crime?"

"Of killing Mrs. Lester, to be sure."

"I regard you as a clever man, Mr. Furneaux, so may I remind you that this is neither the time nor the place for a display of gross humor?"