Page:Weird Tales volume 32 number 05.djvu/22

532 the shouts of those above, as they realized my escape. Directly ahead was a faint glow—scarcely more than a less impenetrable darkness—that I was certain would lead to some street beyond. A bullet whizzed past my head, but I had broken into a wild dash, and a moment later found myself on a narrow, dimly-lit lane.

The dark outlines of some structure on the right showed where it ended, but directly ahead a vacant lot of brush and weeds stretched away to an outline of lights. Across this I tore at breakneck speed. A solitary figure appeared on the street, shouted at me, and ran after me still shouting. But I took no notice of him save to dash on faster. I heard his shouts long after I lost sight of him.

At the far end of the weeds a narrow street showed the lights of several shops and stores. Two iron lines told of a car track, and even as I halted, there came the sound of distant rumbling.

Pausing, I listened for some noise that might warn of pursuit, but no sound came from the blackness behind me, and the street ahead was temporarily deserted.

For several squares I ran swiftly, then turning into a little all-night cafe, in the lavatory I removed the grime of the adventure. When I emerged a few minutes later it was to discover a taxi traveling slowly along the street, and in less than an hour I was safe in my hotel room once more.

was that I escaped the first trap of The Wolf, and for a time at least was unmindful of the pitfalls ahead; though could I have seen into that black future, I doubt whether I would have considered my escape so fortunate.

The following noon the Drockland sailed, and America disappeared in the blue; but as I boarded the steamer, I failed to notice the strange pair who watched me from the upper deck, failed to see the hatred on those two faces, nor did I know of the plot that even then was being hatched to keep me from Dakar.

During the following days at sea I must have passed them many times, but as their faces were ever from me, I paid no attention to them. But surely there was enough to occupy me in the lazy days that followed. Watching the mounting white-caps from a deck chair in the sunlight or seeing the play of the moonbeams on the distant rolling water, I could think of nothing but the mystery that was mine.

In the name of sanity, among what manner of weird humans had a fickle fate now thrown me? Here I was bound for the interior of the great Sahara, in search of the mummy of one whose purple-sailed and silver-oared barge had cut the waters of the Nile two thousand years ago, one whose loveliness had charmed the heart of Cæsar in the days of Roman conquest. I was an employee in the service of a dark-eyed beauty who had calmly informed me that she knew that famed enchantress in those dim and distant days!

Manuel De Costa was another mystery. Who was this man who would not halt at murder to gain what he wanted: an age-old Egyptian parchment whose authenticity had been doubted by so many? He had readily admitted it had brought him halfway around the world, but the glib Spaniard did not strike me as being an archeologist, or one who would journey anywhere without a definite reason. No; there must be something else