Nayland Smith’s pen scratched on.  My glance strayed from our Semitic caller to his cane, lying upon the red leather before me.  It was of most unusual workmanship, apparently Indian, being made of some kind of dark brown, mottled wood, bearing a marked resemblance to a snake’s skin; and the top of the cane was carved in conformity, to represent the head of what I took to be a puff-adder, fragments of stone, or beads, being inserted to represent the eyes, and the whole thing being finished with an artistic realism almost startling.

When Smith had tossed the written page to Slattin, and he, having read it with an appearance of carelessness, had folded it neatly and placed it in his pocket, I said: 

“You have a curio here?”

Our visitor, whose dark eyes revealed all the satisfaction which, by his manner, he sought to conceal, nodded and took up the cane in his hand.

“It comes from Australia, Doctor,” he replied; “it’s aboriginal work, and was given to me by a client.  You thought it was Indian?  Everybody does.  It’s my mascot.”

“Really?”

“It is indeed.  Its former owner ascribed magical powers to it!  In fact, I believe he thought that it was one of those staffs mentioned in biblical history—­”

“Aaron’s rod?” suggested Smith, glancing at the cane.

“Something of the sort,” said Slattin, standing up and again preparing to depart.

“You will ’phone us, then?” asked my friend.

“You will hear from me to-morrow,” was the reply.

Smith returned to the cane armchair, and Slattin, bowing to both of us, made his way to the door as I rang for the girl to show him out.

“Considering the importance of his proposal,” I began, as the door closed, “you hardly received our visitor with cordiality.”

“I hate to have any relations with him,” answered my friend; “but we must not be squeamish respecting our instruments in dealing with Dr. Fu-Manchu.  Slattin has a rotten reputation—­even for a private inquiry agent.  He is little better than a blackmailer—­”

“How do you know?”

“Because I called on our friend Weymouth at the Yard yesterday and looked up the man’s record.”

“Whatever for?”

“I knew that he was concerning himself, for some reason, in the case.  Beyond doubt he has established some sort of communication with the Chinese group; I am only wondering—­”

“You don’t mean—­”

“Yes—­I do, Petrie!  I tell you he is unscrupulous enough to stoop even to that.”

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!