The Shadow of Fu-Manchu Read Free Page A

fishy.”
    His way of speech had a quality peculiarly English, and he had a tendency to drawl. Nothing in his manner suggested that Morris Craig was one of the most brilliant physicists Oxford University had ever turned out. He retrieved the elusive cigarettes and lighted one.
    Michael Frobisher remained where he had dropped down, on a chair just inside the door. But he was regaining color. Now he pulled a cigar from the breast pocket of his tweed jacket.
    “The blasted doctors tell me I eat too much and smoke too much,” he remarked. His voice always reminded Craig of old port. “But I wouldn’t want to live if I couldn’t do as I liked.”
    “Come to that in a minute,” growled Frobisher. “First—what news of the big job?”
    “Getting hot. I think the end’s in sight.”
    “Fine. I want to talk to you about it.” He snipped the end of his cigar. “How’s the new secretary making out?”
    “A-I. Knows all the answers. Miss Lewis was a sad loss, but Miss Navarre is a glad find.”
    “Well—she’s got a Paris degree, and had two years with Professor Jennings. Suits me if she suits you.”
    Craig’s boyishly youthful face lighted up.
    “Suits me to nine points of decimals. Works like a pack-mule. She ought to get out of town this week-end.”
    “Bring her along up to Falling Waters. Few days of fresh air do her no harm.”
    “No.” Craig seemed to be hesitating. He returned to his desk. “But I shouldn’t quit this job until it’s finished.”
    He resumed his glasses and studied the remarkable diagram pinned to the drawing board. He seemed to be checking certain details with a mass of symbols and figures on a large ruled sheet beside the board.
    “Of course,” he murmured abstractedly, “I might easily finish at any time now.”
    The wonder of the thing he was doing, a sort of awe that he, the humble student of nature’s secrets, should have been granted power to do it, claimed his mind. Here were mighty forces, hitherto no more than suspected, which controlled the world. Here, written in the indelible ink of mathematics, lay a description of the means whereby those forces might be harnessed.
    He forgot Frobisher.
    And Frobisher, lighting his cigar, began to pace the office floor, often glancing at the absorbed figure. Suddenly Craig turned, removing his glasses.
    “Are you bothered about the cost of these experiments, Mr. Frobisher?”
    Frobisher pulled up, staring.
    “Cost? To hell with the cost! That’s not worrying me. I don’t know a lot about the scientific side, but I know a commercial proposition when I see one.” He dropped down into an armchair. “What I don’t know is this.” He leaned forward, his heavy brows lowered: “Why is somebody tracking me around?”
    “Tracking you around?”
    “That’s what I said. I’m being tailed around. I was followed to my club today. Followed here. There’s somebody watching my home up in Connecticut. Who is he? What does he want?”
    Morris Craig stood up and leaned back against the desk.
    Behind him a deep violet sky made a back-cloth for silhouettes of buildings higher than the Huston. Some of the windows were coming to life, forming a glittering regalia, like jewels laid on velvet.
    Dusk was falling over Manhattan.
    “Astoundin’ state of affairs,” Craig declared—but his smile was quite disarming. “Tell me more. Anyone you suspect?”
    Frobisher shook his head. “There’s plenty to suspect if news of what’s going on up here has leaked out. Suppose you’re dead right—and I’m backing you to be—what’ll this thing mean to Huston Electric?”
    “Grateful thanks of the scientific world.”
    “Damn the scientific world! I’m thinking of Huston’s.”
    Morris Craig, his mind wandering in immeasurable space, his spirit climbing the ladder of the stars toward higher and more remote secrets of a mysterious universe, answered vaguely.
    “No idea. Can’t see at the moment how it could be usefully applied.”
    “What are