"Perhaps you had better return to the house," he said, looking him
squarely in the eyes.
The other's face blanched.
"You don't mean, sir--you don't mean...."
"Brace up!" said Smith, laying his hand upon his shoulder.
"Remember--he chose to play with fire!"
One wild look the man cast from Smith to me, then went off,
staggering, toward the farm.
"Smith--" I began.
He turned to me with an impatient gesture.
"Weymouth has driven into Upminster," he snapped; "and the whole
district will be scoured before morning. They probably motored here,
but the sounds of the shots will have enabled whoever was with the car
to make good his escape. And--exhausted from loss of blood, its
capture is only a matter of time, Petrie."
CHAPTER XVII
ONE DAY IN RANGOON
Nayland Smith returned from the telephone. Nearly twenty-four hours
had elapsed since the awful death of Burke.
"No news, Petrie," he said shortly. "It must have crept into some
inaccessible hole to die."
I glanced up from my notes. Smith settled into the white cane
armchair, and began to surround himself with clouds of aromatic smoke.
I took up a half-sheet of foolscap covered with pencilled writing in
my friend's cramped characters, and transcribed the following, in
order to complete my account of the latest Fu-Manchu outrage:
"The Amharun, a Semitic tribe allied to the Falashas, who have been
settled for many generations in the southern province of Shoa
(Abyssinia), have been regarded as unclean and outcast, apparently
since the days of Menelek--son of Suleyman and the Queen of
Sheba--from whom they claim descent.
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