“Surely you understand? You _must_ understand. That cry in the garden
and now—this! It is the Living Death! It is the Living Death! He knew
before it claimed him. ‘_Amber—inject._’” She shook Petrie with a
sudden passionate violence. “Think! . . . _The flask is in your safe._”
And, watching Petrie’s face, I realized that what had been
unintelligible to me, to him had brought light.
“Merciful heavens!” he cried, and now I saw positive horror leap to his
eyes. “Merciful heavens! I can’t believe it—I _won’t_ believe it.”
He stared at me, a man distracted; and:
“Sir Lionel believed it,” his wife said. “He wrote it. This is what he
means.”
And now I remembered those hideous oblique eyes which had looked in at
me during my journey. I remembered the man in the car who had passed me
at Shepheard’s. Dacoits! Bands of Burmese robbers! I had thought of them
as scattered. Apparently they were associated—a sort of guild. Sir
Lionel knew the Far East almost better than he knew the Near East. So,
suddenly I spoke—or rather I cried the words aloud:
“Do you mean, Mrs. Petrie, that you think he’s been _murdered_?”
Dr. Petrie interrupted, and his reply silenced me.
“It’s worse than that,” he said.
If I had come to Cairo bearing a burden of sorrow, I thought, looking
from the face of my host to the beautiful face of his wife, that my
story had brought their happy world tumbling about them in dust.
§ 3
The train to Luxor was full, but I had taken the precaution of booking
accommodation before leaving the station. And, as I was later to learn,
I had been watched!
I was frankly out of my depth. That Petrie was deeply concerned for his
wife, who seemed now to be the victim of a mysterious terror, he was
quite unable to conceal. The object locked in the safe referred to by
Mrs. Petrie proved to be a glass flask sealed with wax and containing a
very small quantity of what might, from its appearance, have been
brandy. However, the doctor packed it up with care and placed it in his
professional bag before leaving.
This, together with the feverish state of excitement into which I seemed
to have thrown his household, was sufficiently mystifying. Coming on top
of a tragedy and a sleepless night, it was almost the last straw.
Petrie explored the train as though he expected to find Satan in person
on board.
“Are you looking for my cross-eyed man?” I asked.
“I am,” he returned grimly.
And somehow, as his steady glance met mine, it occurred to me that he
was hoping, and not fearing, to see the oblique-eyed spy. It dawned upon
me that his fears were for his wife, left behind in Cairo, rather than
for us. What in heaven’s name was it all about?
However, I was too far gone to pursue these reflections, and long before
the attendant had come to make the bed I fell fast asleep.
I was awakened by Dr. Petrie.
“I prescribe dinner,” he said.
Feeling peculiarly cheap, I managed to make myself sufficiently
presentable for the dining car, and presently sat down facing my friend,
of whom I had heard so much and whom the chief had evidently regarded as
a safe harbour in a storm.
A cocktail got me properly awake again and enabled me to define where
troubled dreams left off and reality began. Petrie was regarding me with
an expression compounded of professional sympathy and personal
curiosity; and:
“You have had a desperately trying time, Greville,” he said. “But you
can’t have failed to see that you have exploded a bombshell in my
household. Now, before I say any more on the latter point, please bring
me up to date. If there’s been foul play, is there anyone you could even
remotely suspect?”
“There is certainly a lot of mystery about our job,” I confessed. “I
know for a fact that Sir Lionel’s rivals—I might safely call them
enemies—have been watching him closely—notably Professor Zeitland.”
“Professor Zeitland died in London a fortnight ago.”
“What!”
“You hadn’t heard? We had the news in Cairo. Therefore, _he_ can be
ruled out.”
There was a short interval whilst the waiter got busy, and then:
“As I remember poor Barton,” Petrie mused, “he was always surrounded by
clouds of strange servants. Are there any in your camp?”
“Not a soul,” I assured him. “We’re a very small party. Sir Lionel,
myself, Ali Mahmoud, the headman, Forester, the chemist—I have
mentioned him before; and the chief’s niece, Rima, who’s our official
photographer.”
I suppose my voice changed when I mentioned Rima; for Petrie stared at
me very hard, and:
“Niece?” he said. “Odd jobs women undertake nowadays.”
“Yes,” I answered shortly.
Petrie began to toy with his fish. Clearly his appetite was not good. It
was evident that repressed excitement held him—grew greater with every
mile of our journey.
“Do you know Superintendent Weymouth?” he asked suddenly.
“I’ve met him at the club,” I replied. “Now that you mention it, I
believe Forester knows him well.”
“So do I,” said Petrie, smiling rather oddly. “I’ve been trying to get
in touch with him all day.” He paused, then:
“There must be associations,” he went on. “Some of you surely have
friends who visit the camp?”
That question magically conjured up a picture before my mind’s eye—the
picture of a figure so slender as to merit the description serpentine,
tall, languorous; I saw again the brilliant jade-green eyes, voluptuous
lips, and those slim ivory hands nurtured in indolence. . . . Madame
Ingomar.
“There is one,” I began—I was interrupted.
The train had begun to slow into Wasta, and high above those curious
discords of an Arab station, I had clearly detected a cry:
“Dr. Petrie! A message for Dr. Petrie.”
He, too, had heard it. He dropped his knife and fork and his expression
registered a sudden consternation.
§ 4
As Petrie sprang to his feet, a tall figure in flying kit came rushing
into the dining car, and:
“Hunter!” Petrie exclaimed. “Hunter!”
I, too, stood up in a state of utter bewilderment.
“What’s the meaning of this?” Petrie went on.
He turned to me, and:
“Captain Jameson Hunter, of Imperial Airways,” he explained—“Mr. Shan
Greville.”
He turned again to the pilot.
“What’s the idea, Hunter?” he demanded.
“The idea is,” the airman replied, grinning with evident enjoyment,
“that I’ve made a dash from Heliopolis to cut you off at Wasta! Jump to
it! You’ve got to be clear of the train in two minutes!”
“But we’re in the middle of dinner!”
“Don’t blame me. It’s Superintendent Weymouth’s doing. He’s standing by
where I landed the bus.”
“But,” I interrupted, “where are we going?”
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