d Smith in the same position; and so the day
waned into evening, and dusk fell uneventfully.

In the corner of the big room by the empty fireplace, Nayland Smith lay,
with his long, lean frame extended in the white cane chair. A tumbler,
from which two straws protruded, stood by his right elbow, and a perfect
continent of tobacco smoke lay between us, wafted toward the door by the
draught from an open window. He had littered the hearth with matches and
tobacco ash, being the most untidy smoker I have ever met; and save
for his frequent rapping-out of his pipe bowl and perpetual striking of
matches, he had shown no sign of activity for the past hour. Collarless
and wearing an old tweed jacket, he had spent the evening, as he had
spent the day, in the cane chair, only quitting it for some ten minutes,
or less, to toy with dinner.

My several attempts at conversation had elicited nothing but growls;
therefore, as dusk descended, having dismissed my few patients, I
busied myself collating my notes upon the renewed activity of the Yellow
Doctor, and was thus engaged when the 'phone bell disturbed me. It was
Smith who was wanted, however; and he went out eagerly, leaving me to my
task.

At the end of a lengthy conversation, he returned from the 'phone and
began, restlessly, to pace the room. I made a pretense of continuing my
labors, but covertly I was watching him. He was twitching at the lobe of
his left ear, and his face was a study in perplexity. Abruptly he burst
out:

"I shall throw the thing up, Petrie! Either I am growing too old to cope
with such an adversary as Fu-Manchu, or else my intellect has become
dull. I cannot seem to think clearly or consistently. For the Doctor,
this crime, this removal of Slattin, is clumsy--unfinished. There are
two explanations. Either he, too, is losing his old cunning or he has
been interrupted!"

"Interrupted!"

"Take the facts, Petrie,"--Smith clapped his hands upon my table and
bent down, peering into my eyes--"is it characteristic of Fu-Manchu to
kill a man by the direct agency of a snake and to implicate one of his
own damnable servants in this way?"

"But we have found no snake!"

"Karamaneh introduced one in some way. Do you doubt it?"

"Certainly Karamaneh visited him on the evening of his death, but you
must be perfectly well aware that even if she had been arrested, no jury
could convict her."

Smith resumed his restless pacings up and down.

"You are very use