The Yellow Claw, Sax Rohmer [top 100 novels of all time .TXT] 📗

head thrown back and with his arms hanging out upon either side of the bunk, so that his listless hands rested upon the carpet. It was a tragic face; a high, intellectual brow and finely chiseled features; but it presented an indescribable aspect of decay; it was as the face of some classic statue which has long lain buried in humid ruins.

Soames shook himself into activity, and ventured to approach the bed. He moistened his dry lips and spoke:

“Good morning, sir”—the words sounded wildly, fantastically out of place. “Shall I prepare your bath?”

The sleeper showed no signs of awakening.

Soames forced himself to touch one of the thrown-back shoulders. He shook it gently.

The man on the bed raised his arms and dropped them back again into their original position, without opening his eyes.

“They... are hiding,” he murmured thickly... “in the... orange grove.... If the felucca sails... closer... they will”...

Soames, finding something very horrifying in the broken words, shook the sleeper more urgently.

“Wake up, sir!” he cried; “I am going to prepare your bath.”

“Don't let them... escape,” murmured the man, slowly opening his eyes—“I have not”...

He struggled upright, glaring madly at the intruder. His light gray eyes had a glassiness as of long sickness, and his pupils, which were unnaturally dilated, began rapidly to contract; became almost invisible. Then they expanded again—and again contracted.

“Who—the deuce are you?” he murmured, passing his hand across his unshaven face.

“My name is—Lucas, sir,” said Soames, conscious that if he remained much longer in the place he should be physically sick. “At your service—shall I prepare the bath?”

“The bath?” said the man, sitting up more straightly—“certainly, yes—of course”...

He looked at Soames, with a light of growing sanity creeping into his eyes; a faint flush tinged the pallid face, and his loose mouth twitched sensitively.

“Then, Said,” he began, looking Soames up and down... “let me see, whom did you say you were?”

“Lucas, sir—at your service.”

“Ah,” muttered the man, lowering his eyes in unmistakable shame—“yes, yes, of course. You are new here?”

“Yes, sir. Shall I prepare your bath?”

“Yes, please. This is Wednesday morning?”

“Wednesday morning, sir; yes.”

“Of course—it is Wednesday. You said your name was?”

“Lucas, sir,” reiterated Soames, and, crossing the fantastic apartment, he entered the bathroom beyond.

This contained the most modern appointments and was on an altogether more luxurious scale than that attached to his own quarters. He noted, without drawing any deduction from the circumstance, that the fittings were of American manufacture. Here, as in the outer room, there was no window; an electric light hung from the center of the ceiling. Soames busied himself in filling the bath, and laying out the towels upon the rack.

“Fairly warm, sir?” he asked.

“Not too warm, thank you,” replied the other, now stumbling out of bed and falling into the armchair—“not too warm.”

“If you will take your bath, sir,” said Soames, returning to the outer room, “I will brush your clothes and be ready to shave you.”

“Yes, yes,” said the man, rubbing his hands over his face wearily. “You are new here?”

Soames, who was becoming used to answering this question, answered it once more without irritation.

“Yes, sir, will you take your bath now? It is nearly full, I think.”

The man stood up unsteadily and passed into the bathroom, closing the door behind him. Soames, seeking to forget his surroundings, took out from a small hand-bag which he found beneath the bed, a razor-case and a shaving stick. The clothes-brush he had discovered in the bathroom; and now he set to work to brush the creased garments stacked in the armchair. He noted that they were of excellent make, and that the linen was of the highest quality. He was thus employed when the outer door silently opened and the face of Said looked in.

“Gazm,” said the Oriental; and he placed inside, upon the carpet, a pair of highly polished boots.

The door was reclosed.

Soames had all the garments in readiness by the time that the man emerged from the bathroom, looking slightly less ill, and not quite so pallid. He wore a yellow silk kimono; and, with greater composure than he had yet revealed, he seated himself in the armchair that Soames might shave him.

This operation Soames accomplished, and the subject, having partially dressed, returned to the bathroom to brush his hair. When his toilet was practically completed:

“Shall I pack the rest of the things in the bag, sir?” asked Soames.

The man nodded affirmatively.

Five minutes later he was ready to depart, and stood before the ex-butler a well-dressed, intellectual, but very debauched-looking gentleman. Being evidently well acquainted with the regime of the establishment, he pressed an electric bell beside the door, presented Soames with half-a-sovereign, and, as Said reappeared, took his departure, leaving Soames more reconciled to his lot than he could ever have supposed possible.

The task of cleaning the room was now commenced by Soames. Said returned, bringing him the necessary utensils; and for fifteen minutes or so he busied himself between the outer apartment and the bathroom. During this time he found leisure to study the extraordinary mural decorations; and, as he looked at them, he learned that they possessed a singular property.

If one gazed continuously at any portion of the wall, the intertwined figures thereon took shape—nay, took life; the intricate, elaborate design ceased to be a design, and became a procession, a saturnalia; became a sinister comedy, which, when first visualized, shocked Soames immoderately. The horrors presented by these devices of evil cunning, crowding the walls, appalled the narrow mind of the beholder, revolted him in an even greater degree than they must have revolted a man of broader and cleaner mind. He became conscious of a quality of evil which pervaded the room; the entire place seemed to lie beneath a spell, beneath the spell of an invisible, immeasurably wicked intelligence.

His reflections began to terrify him, and he hastened to complete his duties. The stench of the place was sickening him anew, and when at last Said opened the door, Soames came out as a man escaping from some imminent harm.

“Di,” muttered Said.

He pointed to the opened door of a second room, identical in every respect with the first; and Soames started back with a smothered groan. Had his education been classical he might have likened himself to Hercules laboring for Augeus; but his mind