The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer Page A

finding passage
through the cracks in the crazy flooring, which had fallen about
me-for the death trap had reclosed, I suppose, mechanically.
    My saturated garments were dragging me down, and now I could
hear the flames hungrily eating into the ancient rottenness
overhead. Shortly that cauldron would be loosed upon my head. The
glow of the flames grew brighter… and showed me the half-rotten
piles upholding the building, showed me the tidal mark upon the
slime-coated walls-showed me that there was no escape!
    By some subterranean duct the foul place was fed from the
Thames. By that duct, with the outgoing tide, my body would pass,
in the wake of Mason, Cadby, and many another victim!
    Rusty iron rungs were affixed to one of the walls communicating
with a trap-but the bottom three were missing!
    Brighter and brighter grew the awesome light the light of what
should be my funeral pyre-reddening the oily water and adding a new
dread to the whispering, clammy horror of the pit. But something it
showed me… a projecting beam a few feet above the water… and
directly below the iron ladder!
    "Merciful Heaven!" I breathed. "Have I the strength?"
    A desire for laughter claimed me with sudden, all but
irresistible force. I knew what it portended and fought it
down-grimly, sternly.
    My garments weighed upon me like a suit of mail; with my chest
aching dully, my veins throbbing to bursting, I forced tired
muscles to work, and, every stroke an agony, approached the beam.
Nearer I swam… nearer. Its shadow fell black upon the water, which
now had all the seeming of a pool of blood. Confused sounds-a
remote uproar-came to my ears. I was nearly spent… I was in the
shadow of the beam! If I could throw up one arm…
    A shrill scream sounded far above me!
    "Petrie! Petrie!" (That voice must be Smith's!) "Don't touch the
beam! For God's sake DON'T TOUCH THE BEAM! Keep afloat another few
seconds and I can get to you!"
    Another few seconds! Was that possible?
    I managed to turn, to raise my throbbing head; and I saw the
strangest sight which that night yet had offered.
    Nayland Smith stood upon the lowest iron rung… supported by the
hideous, crook-backed Chinaman, who stood upon the rung above!
    "I can't reach him!"
    It was as Smith hissed the words despairingly that I looked
up-and saw the Chinaman snatch at his coiled pigtail and pull it
off! With it came the wig to which it was attached; and the ghastly
yellow mask, deprived of its fastenings, fell from position! "Here!
Here! Be quick! Oh! be quick! You can lower this to him! Be quick!
Be quick!"
    A cloud of hair came falling about the slim shoulders as the
speaker bent to pass this strange lifeline to Smith; and I think it
was my wonder at knowing her for the girl whom that day I had
surprised in Cadby's rooms which saved my life.
    For I not only kept afloat, but kept my gaze upturned to that
beautiful, flushed face, and my eyes fixed upon hers-which were
wild with fear… for me!
    Smith, by some contortion, got the false queue into my grasp,
and I, with the strength of desperation, by that means seized hold
upon the lowest rung. With my friend's arm round me I realized that
exhaustion was even nearer than I had supposed. My last distinct
memory is of the bursting of the floor above and the big burning
joist hissing into the pool beneath us. Its fiery passage, striated
with light, disclosed two sword blades, riveted, edges up along the
top of the beam which I had striven to reach.
    "The severed fingers-" I said; and swooned.
    How Smith got me through the trap I do not know-nor how we made
our way through the smoke and flames of the narrow passage it
opened upon. My next recollection is of sitting up, with my
friend's arm supporting me and Inspector Ryman holding a glass to
my lips.
    A bright glare dazzled my eyes. A crowd surged about us, and a
clangor and shouting drew momentarily nearer.
    "It's the engines coming," explained Smith, seeing my
bewilderment. "Shen-Yan's is in flames. It