No doubt Slattin knew that this gaunt, eager-eyed Burmese commissioner
was vested with ultimate authority in his quest of the mighty Chinaman
who represented things unutterable, whose potentialities for evil were
boundless as his genius, who personified a secret danger, the extent
and nature of which none of us truly understood. And, learning of
these things, with unerring Semitic instinct he had sought an opening
in this glittering Rialto. But there were _two_ bidders!

"You think he may have sunk so low as to become a creature of
Fu-Manchu?" I asked, aghast.

"Exactly! If it paid him well I do not doubt that he would serve that
master as readily as any other. His record is about as black as it
well could be. Slattin is, of course, an assumed name; he was known as
Lieutenant Pepley when he belonged to the New York Police, and he was
kicked out of the service for complicity in an unsavoury Chinatown
case."

"Chinatown!"

"Yes, Petrie, it made me wonder, too; and we must not forget that he
is undeniably a clever scoundrel."

"Shall you keep any appointment which he may suggest?"

"Undoubtedly. But I shall not wait until to-morrow."

"What!"

"I propose to pay a little informal visit to Mr. Abel Slattin
to-night."

"At his office?"

"No; at his private residence. If, as I more than suspect, his object
is to draw us into some trap, he will probably report his favourable
progress to his employer to-night!"

"Then we should have followed him!"

Nayland Smith stood up and divested himself of the old
shooting-jacket.

"He _has_ been followed, Petrie," he replied, with one of his rare
smiles. "Two C.I.D. men have been watching the house all night!"

This was entirely characteristic of my friend's farseeing methods.

"By the way," I said, "you saw Eltham this morning. He will soon be
convalescent. Where, in Heaven's name, can he--"

"Don't be alarmed on his behalf, Petrie," interrupted Smith. "His life
is no longer in danger."

I stared, stupidly.

"No longer in danger!"

"He received, some time yesterday, a letter, written in Chinese, upon
Chinese paper, and enclosed in an ordinary business envelope, having a
typewritten address and bearing a London postmark."

"Well?"

"As nearly as I can render the message in English it reads: 'Although,
because you are a brave man, you would not betray your correspondent in
China, he has been discovered. He was a mandarin, and as I cannot write
the name of a traitor, I may not name him. He was executed four days
ago. I salute you and pray for your speedy recovery.--FU-MANCHU.'"

"Fu-Manchu! But it is almost certainly a trap."

"On the contrary, Petrie, Fu-Manchu would not have written in Chinese
unless he were sincere; and, to clear all doubt, I received a cable
this morning reporting that the Mandarin Yen-Sun-Yat was assassinated
in his own garden, in Nan-Yang, one day last week."