Pharos, The Egyptian by Guy Boothby (reading rainbow books .txt) 📖

accompanies me."

"You must be mad to think of such a thing!" I cried, Valerie's name producing a sudden change in my behaviour toward him. "How can she possibly do so? Remember how ill she is. It would be little short of murder to move her."

"It will be nothing of the kind," he replied. "When I want her she will rise from her bed and walk down stairs and go wherever I bid her, looking to all appearances as well and strong as any other woman in this town."

"By all means let us go to England then," I said, clutching eagerly at the hope he held out. "Though how you are going to manage it I do not know."

"You shall see," he said. "Remember, you have never known me fail. If you would bear that fact in mind a little oftener, you would come nearer a better appreciation of my character than that to which you have so far attained. However, while we are wasting time talking, it is getting late, and you have not dined yet. I suppose it is necessary for you to eat, otherwise you will be incapable of anything?"

"I could not touch a thing," I answered in reply to his gibe. "You will not therefore be hindered by me. But how can we go out and leave Valerie behind in her present condition?"

"I shall give her an opiate," he said, "which will keep her sleeping quietly for the next three or four hours. When she wakes she will be capable of anything."

He thereupon left the room, and upward of a quarter of an hour elapsed before he rejoined me. When he did, I noticed that he was dressed for going out. I immediately picked up my hat and stick and followed him down stairs. Once in the street, Pharos started off at a smart pace, and as soon as he reached the corner, near the first chemist's shop I had visited that afternoon, turned sharply to his left, crossed the road, and entered a bye lane. The remainder of the journey was of too tortuous a description for me to hope to give you any detailed account of it. Up one back street and down another, over innumerable canals, we made our way, until at last we reached a quarter of the town totally distinct from that in which our hotel was situated. During the walk Pharos scarcely spoke, but times out of number he threw angry glances at me over his shoulder when I dropped a little behind. Indeed, he walked at such a pace, old man though he was, that at times I found it extremely difficult to keep up with him. At last, entering a dirtier street than any we had so far encountered, he stopped short before a tall, austere building which from a variety of evidences had seen better days, and might a couple of centuries or so before have been the residence of some well-to-do merchant. Mounting the steps, he rapped sharply upon the door with his stick. A sound of laughter and the voice of a man singing reached us from within, and when Pharos knocked a second time the rapidity of the blows and the strength with which they were administered bore witness to his impatience. At last, however, the door was opened a few inches by a man who looked out and inquired with an oath what we wanted.

"I have come in search of Captain Wisemann," my companion answered. "If he is at home, tell him that if he does not receive Monsieur Pharos at once, he knows the penalty. Carry him that message and be quick about it. I have waited at this door quite long enough."

With an unintelligible grunt the man departed on his errand, and it was plain that the news he brought had a sobering effect upon the company within, for a sudden silence prevailed, and a few moments later he returned and begged us with comparative civility to enter. We did so, and followed our guide along a filthy passage to a room at the back of the dwelling, a magnificent chamber, panelled with old oak, every inch of which spoke of an age and an art long since dead. The dirt of the place, however, passes description. Under the _regime_ of the present owner, it seemed doubtful whether any attempt had ever been made to clean it. The ceiling was begrimed with smoke and dirt, cobwebs not only decorated the cornices and the carved figures on the chimneypiece, but much of the panelling on the walls themselves was cracked and broken. On the table in the centre of the room was all that remained of a repast, and at this Pharos sniffed disdainfully.

"A pig he was when I first met him, and a pig he will remain to the day of his death," said Pharos, by way of introducing the man upon whom we were calling. "However, a pig is at all times a useful animal, and so is Wisemann."

At this moment the man of whom he had spoken in these scarcely complimentary terms entered the room.

I have elsewhere described the Arab who met Pharos at the Pyramids, on the occasion of my momentous visit, as being the biggest man I had ever beheld in my life, and so he was, for at that time I had not the pleasure of Herman Wisemann's acquaintance. Since I have seen him, however, the Arab has, as the Americans say, been compelled to take a back place. Wisemann must have stood six-foot nine if an inch, and in addition to his height his frame was correspondingly large. Though I am not short myself, he towered above me by fully a head. To add to the strangeness of his appearance, he was the possessor of a pair of enormous ears that stood out at right angles to his head. That he was afraid of Pharos was shown by the sheepish fashion in which he entered the room.

"Three years ago I called upon you," said Pharos, "and was kept waiting while you fuddled yourself with your country's abominable liquor. To-night I have been favoured with a repetition of that offence. On the third occasion I shall deal with you more summarily. Remember that! Now to business."

"If Herr Pharos will condescend to tell me what it is he requires of me," said the giant, "he may be sure I will do my best to please him."

"You had better not do otherwise, my friend," snapped Pharos with his usual acidity. "Perhaps you remember that on one occasion you made a mistake. Don't do so again. Now listen to me. I am anxious to be in London on Friday morning next. You will, therefore, find me a fast vessel, and she must leave to-night at midnight."

"But it is impossible to get into England," replied the man. "Since the outbreak of the plague the quarantine laws have been stricter even than they were before. Heinrich Clausen tried last week and had to return unsuccessful."

"How does Heinrich Clausen's failure affect me?" asked Pharos. "I shall not fail, whatever any one else may do. Your friend Clausen should have known better than to go to London. Land me on the coast of Norfolk and that will do."

"But it is eight o'clock now," the man replied, "and you say you wish to start at midnight. How am I to arrange it before then?"

"How you are to do it does not concern me," said Pharos. "All I know is that you must do it. Otherwise, well then the punishment will be the same as before, only on this occasion a little more severe. You can send me word in an hour's time, how, and where, we are to board her. I am staying at the Continental, and my number is eighty-three."

The man had evidently abandoned all thought of refusing.

"And the remuneration?" he inquired. "The risk will have to be taken into account."

"The price will be the same as on the last occasion, provided he lands us safely at the place which I shall name to him as soon as we are on board. But only half that amount, if, by any carelessness on his part, the scheme is unsuccessful. I shall expect to hear from you within an hour. Be careful, however, that your messenger does not arouse any suspicions at the hotel. We do not want the English authorities put upon their guard."

Wisemann accompanied us to the door, and bowed us out. After that we returned as quickly as possible to our hotel. My delight may be imagined on hearing from Pharos, who visited her as soon as he returned, that throughout the time we had been absent Valerie had been sleeping peacefully, and was now making as good progress toward recovery as he could desire.

At nine o'clock, almost punctual to the minute, a note was brought to Pharos. He opened it, and having read it, informed the man that there was no answer.

"Wisemann has arranged everything," he said. "The steamer Margrave of Brandenburg will be ready to pick us up in the river at the hour appointed, and in fifty hours from the first revolution of her screw we should be in England."

"And what would happen then?" I asked myself.



CHAPTER XVII.

When the sun rose on the following morning, nothing but green seas surrounded us, and the Margrave of Brandenburg was doing her best to live up to the reputation I soon discovered she possessed--namely, of being the worst roller in the North Sea trade. She was by no means a large craft, nor, as I soon remarked, was she particularly well found; she belonged to a firm of Altona Jews, and, as the captain was wont to say pathetically, "The only thing they did not grudge him was the right to do as much work on the smallest amount of pay on which it was possible for a man to keep body and soul together." The captain's nationality was more difficult to determine than that of his employers. He called himself an Englishman, but, unfortunately for this assertion, his accent belied him. In addition to English, he spoke German like a Frenchman, and French like a German, was equally at home in Russian--which, to say the least of it, is not a language for the amateur--Italian also, while in a moment of confidence he found occasion to inform me that he had served for three years on board a Spanish troop-ship, an assertion which would lead one to suppose that he was conversant with that language also. In point of fact, he was one of that curious class of sailor commonly met with outside the British mercantile marine, who, if you asked them, would find it difficult to tell you where they were born, and who have been so long at sea that one country has become like another to them, provided the liquor is good and they can scrape together a sufficient living out of it; and one flag is equal to another, provided, of course, it is not Chinese, which as everyone knows is no use to anyone, not even to themselves.

For the week, and more particularly for the forty-eight hours preceding our departure from Hamburg, I had been living in such a state of nervous tension that, as soon as we were once clear of the land, the reaction that set in was almost more than I could bear. The prophecy Pharos had given utterance to regarding Valerie had been verified to the letter. At the hour appointed for leaving, she had descended from her room, looking at first