| Transcriber's note: Inconsistent hyphenation in the original text has been preserved.Obvious typographical errors have been corrected. |
AUTHOR OF "DR. FU-MANCHU"
THIRD EDITION
METHUEN & CO. LTD.
36 ESSEX STREET W.C.
LONDON
First Issued in this Cheap Form (Second Edition) July 14th, 1921 ThirdEdition 1921
This Book was First Published (Crown 8vo) October 24th, 1918
PAGE | |
| PART I | |
| AT LOWER CHARLESWOOD | 1 |
| PART II | |
| FLAMBY IN LONDON | 85 |
| PART III | |
| THE KEY | 173 |
TO THE SLAVES OF THE POMEGRANATE,
SONS OF ADAM AND DAUGHTERS OF EVE,
WHO DRINK AT THE FOUNTAIN OF LIFE,
THIS CHALICE IS OFFERED AS A LOVING-CUP.
It was high noon of a perfect summer's day. Beneath green sun blinds,upon the terrace overlooking the lawns, Paul Mario, having finished hislunch, lay back against the cushions of a white deck-chair and studiedthe prospect. Sloping turf, rose-gay paths, and lichened brick steps,hollowed with age, zigzagging leisurely down to the fir avenue, carriedthe eye onward again to where the river wound its way through verdantbanks toward the distant town.
A lark wooed the day with sweet music. Higher and ever higher rose thelittle sun-worshipper, pouring out his rapturous hymn to Apollo.Swallows, who but lately had crossed the battlefields of southernEurope, glided around Hatton Towers, describing mystic figures in theair, whilst the high feeble chirping of the younger generation soundedfrom the nests beneath the eaves. Amid the climbing roses bees werebusy, their communal labours an object-lesson for self-seeking man; andalmost at Mario's feet a company of ants swarmed over the yet writhingbody of an unfortunate caterpillar, who had dropped from an apple-treeto fall a prey to that savage natural law of death to the weak. Theharsh voice of a sentinel crow spoke2 from a neighbouring cornfield, anda cloud of dusky marauders took the air instantly, and before the sharpcrack of the farmer's fowling-piece came to confirm the warning. In thehush of noon the tones of some haymakers at their patriarchal labours ina meadow beyond the stream were clearly audible—and the atmosphereconstantly vibrated with remote booming of guns on the Western front.<