and Smith, glassy-eyed,
and with consciousness ebbing from him instant by instant, stood there,
a realization of Leighton's "Athlete," his arms rigid as iron bars even
after Fu-Manchu's servant hung limply in that frightful grip.

In his last moments of consciousness, with the blood from his wounded
head trickling down into his eyes, he pointed to the stick which I had
torn from the grip of the dacoit, and which I still held in my hand.

"Not Aaron's rod, Petrie!" he gasped hoarsely--"the rod of
Moses!--Slattin's stick!"

Even in upon my anxiety for my friend, amazement intruded.

"But," I began--and turned to the rack in which Slattin's favorite cane
at that moment reposed--had reposed at the time of his death.

Yes!--there stood Slattin's cane; we had not moved it; we had disturbed
nothing in that stricken house; there it stood, in company with an
umbrella and a malacca.

I glanced at the cane in my hand. Surely there could not be two such in
the world?

Smith collapsed on the floor at my feet.

"Examine the one in the rack, Petrie," he whispered, almost inaudibly,
"but do not touch it. It may not be yet...."

I propped him up against the foot of the stairs, and as the constable
began knocking violently at the street door, crossed to the rack and
lifted out the replica of the cane which I held in my hand.

A faint cry from Smith--and as if it had been a leprous thing, I dropped
the cane instantly.

"Merciful God!" I groaned.

Although, in every other particular, it corresponded with that which I
held--which I had taken from the dacoit--which he had come to substitute
for the cane now lying upon the floor--in one dreadful particular it
differed.

Up to the snake's head it was an accurate copy; but the head lived!

Either from pain, fear or starvation, the thing confined in the hollow
tube of this awful duplicate was become torpid. Otherwise, no power
on earth could have saved me from the fate of Abel Slattin; for the
creature was an Australian death-adder.

CHAPTER XI. THE WHITE PEACOCK

Nayland Smith wasted no time in pursuing the plan of campaign which he
had mentioned to Inspector Weymouth. Less than forty-eight hours after
quitting the house of the murdered Slattin, I found myself bound along
Whitechapel Road upon strange enough business.

A very fine rain was falling, which rendered it difficult to see clearly
from the windows; but the weather apparently had little effect upon the
commerc