"What is it?" she whispered. "What is that choking smell?"
Ralph made no reply; he was holding his breath hard. There was a queer grinning smile on his face as he turned toward the window.
The fumbling clutching long hands rested for a moment on Ravenspur's forehead, and the next moment there was a sound of smashing glass, as with his naked fists Ralph beat in the lozenge-shaped windows.
A quick cool draught of air rushed through the room, and the figure on the bed ceased to struggle.
"Come in," said Ralph. "There is no danger now."
Marion entered. She was trembling from head to foot; her face was like death.
"What is it, what is it?" she cried. "Uncle Ralph, do you know what it is?"
"That is a mystery," Ralph replied. "There is some fiend at work here. I only guessed that the sickly odor was the cause of the mischief. You are better, sir?"
Ravenspur was sitting up in bed. The color had come back to his lips; he no longer struggled to breathe.
"I am all right," he said. His eyes beamed affectionately on Marion. "Ever ready and ever quick, child, you saved my life from that nameless horror."
"It was Uncle Ralph," said Marion. "I heard your cry, but Uncle Ralph was here as soon as I was. And it was a happy idea of his to break the window."
"It was that overpowering drug," said Ravenspur. "What it is and where it came from must always remain a mystery. This is a new horror to haunt me – and yet there were others who died in their beds mysteriously. I awoke to find myself choking; I was stifled by that sweet-smelling stuff; I could feel that my heart was growing weaker. But go, my child; you will catch your death of cold. Go to bed."
With an unsteady smile Marion disappeared. As she closed the door behind her, Ravenspur turned and grasped his son's wrist fiercely.
"Do you know anything of this?" he demanded. "You are blind, helpless; yet you were on the spot instantly. Do you know anything of this, I say?"
Ralph shook his head.
"It was good luck," he said. "And how should I know anything? Ah, a blind man is but a poor detective."
Yet as Ralph passed to his strange quarters, there was a queer look on his face. The long lean claws were crooked as if they were fastened about the neck of some enemy, some foe to the death.
"The hem of the mystery," he muttered. "Patience and prudence, and the day shall come when I shall have it by the throat, and such a lovely throat, too!"
CHAPTER IV
101 BRANT STREET
There was nothing about the house to distinguish it from its stolid and respectable neighbors. It had a dingy face, woodwork painted a dark red with the traditional brass knocker and bell-pull. The windows were hung with curtains of the ordinary type, the Venetian blinds were half down, which in itself is a sign of middle-class respectability. In the center of the red door was a small brass plate bearing the name of Dr. Sergius Tchigorsky.
Not that Dr. Tchigorsky was a medical practitioner in the ordinary sense of the word. No neatly appointed "pillbox" ever stood before 101; no patient ever passed the threshold.
Tchigorsky was a savant and a traveler to boot; a man who dealt in strange out-of-the-way things, and the interior of his house would have been a revelation to the top-hatted, frock-coated doctors and lawyers and City men who elected to make their home in Brant Street, W.
The house was crammed with curiosities and souvenirs of travel from basement to garret. A large sky-lighted billiard-room at the back of the house had been turned into a library and laboratory combined.
And here, when not traveling, Tchigorsky spent all his time, seeing strange visitors from time to time, Mongolians, Hindoos, natives of Tibet – for Tchigorsky was one of the three men who had penetrated to the holy city of Lassa, and returned to tell the tale.
The doctor came into his study from his breakfast, and stood ruminating, rubbing his hands before the fire. In ordinary circumstances he would have been a fine man of over six feet in height.
But a cruel misfortune had curved his spine, while his left leg dragged almost helplessly behind him, his hands were drawn up as if the muscles had been cut and then knotted up again.
Tchigorsky had entered Lassa five years ago as a god who walks upright. When he reached the frontier six months later he was the wreck he still remained. And of those privations and sufferings Tchigorsky said nothing. But there were times when his eyes gleamed and his breath came short and he pined for the vengeance yet to be his.
As to his face, it was singularly strong and intellectual. Yet it was disfigured with deep seams checkered like a chessboard. We have seen something like it before, for the marks were identical with those that disfigured Ralph Ravenspur and made his face a horror to look upon.
A young man rose from the table where he was making some kind of an experiment. He was a fresh-colored Englishman, George Abell by name, and he esteemed it a privilege to call himself Tchigorsky's secretary.
"Always early and always busy," Tchigorsky said. "Is there anything in the morning papers that is likely to interest me, Abell?"
"I fancy so," Abell replied thoughtfully. "You are interested in the Ravenspur case?"
A lurid light leapt into the Russian's eyes. He seemed to be strangely moved. He paced up and down the room, dragging his maimed limb after him.
"Never more interested in anything in my life," he said. "You know as much of my past as any man, but there are matters, experiences unspeakable. My face, my ruined frame! Whence come these cruel misfortunes? That secret will go down with me to the grave. Of that I could speak to one man alone, and I know not whether that man is alive or dead."
Tchigorsky's words trailed off into a rambling incoherent murmur. He was far away with his own gloomy and painful thoughts. Then he came back to earth with a start. He stood with his back to the fireplace, contemplating Abell.
"I am deeply interested in the Ravenspur case, as you know," he said. "A malignant fiend is at work yonder – a fiend with knowledge absolutely supernatural. You smile! I myself have seen the powers of darkness doing the bidding of mortal man. All the detectives in Europe will never lay hands upon the destroyer of the Ravenspurs. And yet, in certain circumstances, I could."
"Then, in that case, sir, why don't you?"
"Do it? I said in certain circumstances. I have part of a devilish puzzle; the other part is in the hands of a man who may be dead. I hold half of the bank-note; somebody else has the other moiety. Until we can come together, we are both paupers. If I can find that other man, and he has the nerve and the pluck he used to possess, the curse of the Ravenspurs will cease. But, then, I shall never see my friend again."
"But you might solve the problem alone."
"Impossible. That man and myself made a most hazardous expedition in search of dreadful knowledge. That formula we found. For the purposes of safety, we divided it. And then we were discovered. Of what followed I dare not speak. I dare not even think.
"I escaped from my dire peril, but I cannot hope that my comrade was so fortunate. He must be dead. And, without him, I am as powerless as if I knew nothing. I have no proof. Yet I know quite well who is responsible for those murders at Ravenspur."
Abell stared at his chief in astonishment. He knew Tchigorsky too well to doubt the evidence of his simple word. The Russian was too strong a man to boast.
"You cannot understand," he said. "It is impossible to understand without the inner knowledge that I possess, and even my knowledge is not perfect. Were I to tell the part I know I should be hailed from one end of England to the other as a madman. I should be imprisoned for malignant slander. But if the other man turned up – if only the other man should turn up!"
Tchigorsky broke into a rambling reverie again. When he emerged to mundane matters once more he ordered