Lord of the Lamia

Roy Glashan's Library
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OTIS ADELBERT KLINE

LORD OF THE LAMIA

Serialised in Weird Tales, Mar-May, 1935

This e-book edition: Roy Glashan's Library, 2025
Version Date: 2025-08-14
Produced by Matthias Kaether and Roy Glashan

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Weird Tales, March 1935, with first part of "Lord of the Lamia"

Otis Adelbert Kline has proved himself a master of many different kinds of stories—adventure, weird, detective, and pseudo-scientific tales. His published books include "Planet of Peril," "Prince of Peril," and "Maza of the Moon." He is also the author of an unusual motion picture, "The Call of the Savage." In the eery mystery story, "Lord of the Lamia," which begins in this issue, he weaves with skilful hands the threads of an amazing legend of old Libya into an astounding story of Egypt of the present day. We feel sure you will enjoy this story.

"There is no country in the whole world that hath in it more mar-
velous things or greater works than hath the land of Egypt."

Chapter 1. Saint's Miracle
Chapter 2. Drugged Sherbet
Chapter 3. A Very Strange Mummy
Chapter 4. Real or Unreal?
Chapter 5. Hagg Nadeem.
Chapter 6. The Visitation
Chapter 7. Kidnapped
Chapter 8. The Oasis
Chapter 9. Men or Jinn?
Chapter 10. The Stranglers
Chapter 11. Three-Cornered Combat
Chapter 12. The Cache
Chapter 13. Unweaving the Rainbow

CHAPTER 1
Saint's Miracle

JOHN TANE, archaeologist and explorer, fanned his youthful sun-bronzed features with his pith helmet, and with the tip of his polished oxford prodded the sleeping bowab, or doorkeeper, on the stone bench beside the door. The latter blinked drowsily, adjusted his red tarbush, and got to his feet.

The swarthy Egyptian doorkeeper answered affirmatively, then inquired respectfully: "You are Tane Effendi?"

"I am." Tane glanced curiously up at the mashrabiyeh windows that jutted out over the narrow street, then back at the door on which he deciphered the Arabic inscription: "O God." And below this: "The Excellent Creator is the Everlasting."

"My master is expecting you, effendi." The bowab swung the door open, and shouted to someone inside. "Ya Hasan. Tane Effendi comes." Then he stood respectfully aside, with a courteous: "Bismillah! Enter in the Name of Allah."

Stepping through the door, Tane found himself in a narrow passageway which turned first to the right, then to the left, before he reached the inner court, where a tall negro servant saluted him with the salam.

Tane entered a large room that was pleasantly cool after the glaring heat of the city streets. In the center of the tiled floor a fountain of marble and onyx splashed musically. Beyond it, at the far end, was an alcove, the three walls of which were fronted with cushioned diwans. On the middle one of these sat a short, corpulent man, with a round, moonlike face, a bristling blond mustache, and weak, watery eyes which squinted through thick-lensed glasses. He was smoking a narghile, and his costume was entirely oriental from skull-cap to cordovan slippers, yet the cast of his features was obviously Teutonic.

"Velcoom to Cairo, und to mein house, Herr Tane," he said, with an accent that matched his features.

"Greetings, Herr Doktor," replied Tane cordially, as he strode across the room. He kicked off his oxfords and seated himself, cross-legged, among the cushions.

"By all means." Tane tossed his helmet to one side and ran his fingers through his tousled mop of damp blond ringlets. Then his eyes strayed around the room, and he said: "So this is the place you are leasing to me for two hundred pounds a year. Not half bad, if this room is a fair sample."

The doctor clapped his hands, and a dark-skinned servant girl entered noiselessly through a curtained doorway.

Doctor Schneider turned to his guest. "You like it, eh? So do I. It is only because I need the money so badly to carry on my vork, dot I let it go."

"Digging for the mummy of some ancient princess, somewhere in the Libyan Desert, weren't you?"

The little pig-like eyes of the doctor flashed in sudden anger. "How did you know dot?" he demanded. "Somebody has been vot you call, shooting the mouth off."

"Saw it in the paper," Tane replied. "They said you had exhausted your resources searching for that mummy, and had failed."

Doctor Schneider's look of anger vanished. "Dot iss true," he admitted. "Yet mit the money you pay me for this place, I vill carry on, und in the end I vill vin. You haff brought the money? Yes?"

"First six months' rent in advance. I believe that was the bargain," Tane replied.

He drew from his inside pocket a heavy bag, which chinked musically as he placed it on the taboret.

Nothing loth, the doctor complied. Then he swiftly thrust the bag beneath his sash as Marjanah came in with a tray containing a steaming brass coffee-pot and two tiny cups. Behind her trudged a native boy, carrying a water-pipe, which he set before Tane.

WITH the amber mouthpiece between his lips, Tane inhaled deeply, and the pipe purred like a stroked cat. The boy turned the charcoal while Marjanah poured the coffee. Then both withdrew.

"Here." The doctor drew a folded paper from beneath his clothing and passed it to his visitor. "I don't vant my servants to know I'm getting so much money. Servants gossip, und news travels fast. Und the profession of robbery is an honorable vone among the Arabs —ven they can get avay mit it. I'll moofe out in the morning. By the vay, how soon do you get married?"

"My fiancée is due here in three weeks," replied Tane. "We expect to get married as soon as she arrives, and to spend our honeymoon rambling about Egypt, with this house as headquarters. Then we'll settle down here and I'll go to work on the excavations."

He was interrupted by the sound of chanting outside the latticed windows, which swiftly grew in volume:

The doctor rose and waddled to the window, swiftly followed by Tane. Six ragged blind men were walking slowly, chanting the Muslim profession of faith over and over. Behind them trudged two darwishes bearing the flags of their order. Then came an old white-bearded darwish, obviously a shaykh, a number of men, and a group of boys, one of whom carried a copy of the Koran on a small platform covered with an embroidered handkerchief. The boys were chanting in a higher and livelier tone than the blind men:

I extol the perfection of Him who hath created whatever hath form;
And subdued His servants by death;
Who bringeth to naught all His creatures with mankind;
They shall all lie in the graves.

Following the boys marched four pallbearers carrying a large coffin draped with a bright Kashmiri shawl. And behind the bier trooped half a dozen women, uttering piercing shrieks, and wailing: "O my master! O my lion! O camel of the house! O my father! O thou who brought my food and bore my burdens! O my misfortune!" at the tops of their voices.

"Must be the corpse of some great und holy darwish," said the doctor. "Maybe even a welee, a Muslim saint, that they are taking to the Bab en Nasr Cemetery." The procession continued on its way uninterrupted, until the bier was opposite the door of Tane's newly acquired house. Then the four pallbearers suddenly slumped to the ground, as if the weight of their burden had become intolerably heavy. Instantly the procession was thrown into confusion. Several of the marchers turned and tried to lift the coffin. But they appeared unable to budge it. A curious crowd quickly gathered, chattering and gesticulating, while the blind men, the boys, the darwishes and the mourners made zikker, by crying "Allah" over and over in rapid monotone.

In the meantime, the old shaykh had shouldered himself to a position beside the bier. He held up one hand for attention.

"There is no Majesty nor Might, save in Allah, the Great, the Glorious!" he cried. "It is plain that our deceased brother, on whom be God's mercy, does not wish to be buried in the Bab en Nasr Cemetery. Allah willing, I will now determine his true wishes."

So saying, he stooped, and tugged at one end of the coffin as if he would drag it toward the door of the house across the street. But it remained immovable. Puffing from his exertions, he now tried to point it toward another door on that side, but failed. "It is not in that direction," he panted. "We must try another." He walked around to the other side, and tugged again, this time in the direction of Tane's doorway. The coffin slid easily and smoothly in that direction.

"Alhamdolillah!" he exclaimed. "God be praised! We have learned our brother's wishes. Take up the coffin, men." With bewildered expressions on their perspiring faces, the pallbearers swung the coffin to their shoulders once more. In the meantime, the shaykh had hurried to the head of the line and turned the chanting blind men so that they now faced Tane's door. The bowab, who had been watching the proceedings with popeyed amazement, swung the door open and stepped back respectfully as the first of the procession entered.

CHAPTER 2.
Drugged Sherbet

BY the time Tane and the doctor reached the courtyard, the last of the funeral procession was marching in. The bier, on arriving opposite the doorway, again stopped, and the pallbearers crumpled to the ground once more. Immediately the din of the chanters and mourners was redoubled as they again made zikker: "Allah! Allah! Allah! Allah!" repeated endlessly.

The white-bearded darwish, spying the two men before the door, stepped toward them.

"I am Shaykh Ibrahim," he said in Arabic. "Which of you two is owner of the house?"

"I am the owner," Doctor Schneider replied, "but my friend, here, is its new master, for I have just leased it to him."

"Then this occasion is singularly fortunate for both of you," said Shaykh Ibrahim, "for our revered and holy brother, Nureddin Ismail, has miraculously chosen to honor your house as his tomb and shrine."

"Take care, mein friend," warned the doctor. "You are in the Muslim quarter and must conform to its customs. 'Ven in Rome, do as the Romans.'"

"But I leased a home from you, not a mausoleum," objected Tane. "Good God! You don't mean to say they are actually going to bury the old buzzard here!"

"Dot's yust exactly vot they are going to do," replied the doctor. "Und if you know vot's good for you, you von't try to stop them. It vould be safer to slap a hungry lion in the face."

He turned to the old shaykh, who had been watching them in evident bewilderment, and said in Arabic: "Ve are pleased and honored that the saintly Nureddin Ismail should designate this poor house as his last resting-place. Are you aware of the exact spot where the welee wishes to be buried?"

"Not yet," replied Shaykh Ibrahim, "but with the help of Allah we will soon locate it."

"Hell's bells!" fumed Tane. "I won't stand for it. Don't mind it so much myself, but think of bringing a young bride into a house with the corpse of that old desert rat."

"The corpse von't bother you. It will bring you luck. This is the body of a saint, und it is a miracle you are vitnessing."

"Miracle, my eye! You can give me back my money and take your lease. I'll find another house."

"Not so fast, mein friend," grunted the doctor, a glint of anger in his watery eyes. "The deal is made, und already I, myself, have arranged for other quarters. Vot vould I do mit two houses, I ask you? Be reasonable. I couldn't help this. Vot do they say in your American contracts? 'Not responsible for acts of God.' Dot's also in your lease, if you vill take the time to read it. Today you are my guest. Tomorrow I moofe out, und the house is yours."

While the two were talking, the old man had been busying himself about the coffin, attempting to drag it this way and that. Finally, when he pulled it toward the door which led to the reception room, it yielded, sliding easily over the tiles.

"Glory to God, to whom belong all Majesty and Might!" cried the shaykh. "Our pious brother has indicated his choice."

Once more the pallbearers took up their burden, proceeding directly into the reception room with it, while the chanters and mourners, now mingled indiscriminately, crowded in after them. When Tane and the doctor finally succeeded in getting into the packed room, they found the coffin deposited on the central diwan which crossed the back of the alcove.

"I'm afraid so," replied the doctor. "But it von't matter much. They'll vall it up und build a new diwan in front of the vall. Here come the masons, now."

While many willing hands removed mattresses, cushions, rugs, taborets and pipes from the alcove, the workmen mixed their mortar and brought in great heaps of bricks. Soon a substantial wall, reaching from one side of the alcove to the other, began to rise before the coffin.

"No reason vy ve should stay here," said the doctor, after they had watched the proceedings for some time. "Let's go upstairs." He opened a door on one side, which revealed a stairway leading upward. "Go ahead. I'll follow," he said.

TANE mounted the stairs, the doctor climbing heavily just behind him. At the top was a small landing, which led into a spacious room almost identical with the one they had just quitted.

"If I had a hareem," said the doctor, "this vould be the ladies' sitting-room, or majlis. But since I haff no hareem, it vill do as vell for us as the room below." He waddled to a door at the right and swung it open. "In here is your bedroom. Ven your servant comes mit your luggage I send him up. In the meantime, I have vork to do, if you will excuse me. Marjanah vill bring you a pipe und coffee, und ve haff dinner at eight."

"Thanks," Tane replied. "See you at dinner. And don't bother about the pipe. I think I'll take a nap. I'm dog-tired after my journey."

"All right. But I'll send you up a cold sherbet, anyvay. Or maybe you like something stronger."

Tane had scarcely divested himself of coat, tie and shoes, and stretched himself on the diwan, when Marjanah arrived, carrying a tray on which stood a tall slender glass filled with cracked ice and a pink liquid. He tasted it; it proved to be pomegranate juice sweetened with honey.

Shortly after he had finished his refreshing drink, the American sank into a deep slumber.

THE doctor, as soon as he had left Tane, waddled across the majlis, descended the stairs, and entered the reception room, where the masons already had the brick wall before the coffin shoulder-high. He passed thence through another doorway via a hallway to the kitchen, where Mustafa, his Turkish cook, was preparing a huge quantity of lamb, cut in small pieces and grilled on skewers, heaping platters of rice drenched with clarified butter, and immense quantities of bread.

A half-dozen other servants stood about, sampling the food, among them Marjanah. The doctor beckoned to her.

"Prepare a sherbet for mein guest," he said, "quickly!" Then he turned to Mustafa.

"Start sending the food into the courtyard," he ordered. "I vant to get this commotion over mit."

With voluble bursts of Turkish and Arabic, and much violent pushing and pulling, the cook soon got his fellow servants started toward the courtyard, staggering under huge platters of rice, grilled lamb, and bread.

Doctor Schneider watched them impatiently. Then he turned, as Marjanah came up with a tray on which was a small glass of pomegranate juice and honey.

"Here. Giff me that tray," he commanded. "Then get me a tall glass full mit cracked ice."

As soon as her back was turned, the doctor glanced slyly at Mustafa. The cook was busy over his stove. Quickly extracting a small phial from beneath his garments, the doctor emptied its contents into the sherbet. Then he concealed the phial and waited. Presently Marjanah returned with the glassful of cracked ice. Into this he emptied the smaller glass.

As the girl departed to do his bidding the doctor rubbed his pudgy hands together and looked after her with a smile of satisfaction. Then, after giving Mustafa minute instructions about dinner, he went out into the courtyard. The male members of the funeral cortege, together with the masons and their assistants, were seated about the platters of food which had been placed in the courtyard, eating ravenously. At the other side of the courtyard, the women were as busily engaged with a smaller consignment of meat, rice and bread.

Waddling across the court, the doctor saluted his guests as he passed them. Then he entered the reception room where Shaykh Ibrahim sat before the walled and plastered tomb, performing the office of mulakkin, or instructor of the dead.

"O servant of God!" he was saying. "O son of a handmaid of God! Know that tonight there will come down to thee two angels commissioned respecting thee. When they say to thee, 'Who is thy Lord?' answer them, 'God is my Lord,' in truth; and when they ask thee concerning thy Prophet, say to them, 'Mohammed is the Apostle of God,' with veracity; and when they ask thee ——"

"Enough, mein friend," interrupted Doctor Schneider. "Vy go on mit this farce, ven only you and I are left in the room? Let us get down to business."

"Waha! You are right," replied the shaykh. "Those dogs and sons of dogs have all deserted the service at the first smell of meat. No better than hyenas and jackals are they, for they hold the comforts of the flesh to be greater than the blessings of the spirit."

"Vell, vat of it? They did yust vat ve vanted them to do. You are sure everything is all right —that the coffin is unopened?"

"Dot's enough. I belief you. For each virtuous deed is a reward. You haff done vell. I promised you fifty pounds. Here is your gold."

The shaykh greedily reached for the bag which the doctor passed to him, and emptying the clinking contents in his lap, made a swift count.

"I was reduced to beggary by the fees of the mourners," he said, after he had replaced the last gold piece in the bag.

"Another pound for them, und it is the last," the doctor told him, flipping him another gold piece. "Go, now, und partake of the food mit the others. Then get them out of mein house as soon as you can. I haff vork to do."

CHAPTER 3
A Very Strange Mummy

WHEN John Tane awoke, the full moon was shining down on him through the ornate lattice of the mashrabiyeh window, making intricate shadow patterns on the diwan and floor. He sat up with a start, and was instantly aware of a headache and a feeling of nausea, accompanied by a peculiar bitter taste and a mighty thirst.

He glanced at the luminous dial of his wrist-watch. Nearly midnight! He had slept eight hours. Instantly he realized that only one thing could have produced this long sleep with its disagreeable after-effects. He had been drugged. But by whom? And for what purpose?

Someone, he noticed, had drawn a coverlet over him. And on looking around the room he discovered that his baggage had been delivered. That meant that his Arabian servant, Ali, had been here. Perhaps he was sleeping in the majlis outside his door. Softly he called: "Ali."

Shirtless and shoeless, he rose and walked to the door, his feet making no sound on the thick rug. The majlis was lighted only by the moon, but he easily made out the form of a man lying on a mattress beside the door. A closer inspection revealed the hatchet-like features and thin wiry form of his servant, Ali.

Tane shook the sleeper —gently at first, then with considerable violence. But he was unable to awaken him. Evidently Ali, also, had been drugged, and quite heavily.

As he stood, nursing his splitting head and wondering what it all meant, Tane heard the sound of somebody running rapidly on the floor below, followed by a thud and a groan. Then there was a sound as of someone dragging a heavy body across the floor. Obviously, there was deviltry afoot, and he and his servant had been drugged in order that they might not see or hear what was going on. Swiftly and soundlessly he bounded to the stairway and descended to the reception room. Like the upper rooms, it was unlighted save by the rays of the moon, but a faint yellow light filtered between two silken curtains that hung before one of the doorways. And from behind the curtain there came a strange muttering in a tongue that seemed vaguely familiar. Suddenly he recognized it as ancient Egyptian.

Pushing the curtains aside, he crept along the hallway behind them until he came to the door of a room through which the yellow light streamed and from which the sounds emanated. The light, he saw, came from two short, thick candles set in a paneled niche in the wall. The panels had been pushed to the right and left, revealing a dark opening, before which stood a tall thin man with a scraggy gray beard and a prominent hooked nose that gave him a hawk-like look, dressed in the costume of a Persian of rank and wealth. In his hand he held a yellow scroll which he was reading aloud by the light of the two candles.

Except that the cushions and coverlets on one of the diwans were in disarray, Tane saw no sign of a struggle. He wondered if this man were an intruder, who had come to read some ancient litany for the departed welee.

His sentence remained unfinished, for at the first sound of his voice the hawkfaced man dropped the scroll and turned, regarding him with glittering eyes. Then his lean, claw-like hand shot down and came up with a short loaded club which had been thrust beneath his sash. With a cat-like agility most remarkable in a man of his years, he sprang straight for Tane.

The American stepped nimbly to one side, barely in time to avoid a vicious blow. Then he leaped in, seized the Persian's arm, and clamped on a bone-crushing wrist lock. Instantly the weapon clattered to the floor. Tane immediately shifted his hold, drew the arm of his attacker up over his right shoulder, and heaved. The hawk-faced man described a sweeping arc, and alighted in front of the doorway with considerable violence.

Tane bent and retrieved the club, then stood awaiting a renewal of the attack. But to his surprise, his antagonist, who had sprung to his feet and drawn a wicked-looking knife, suddenly darted out of the door and down the hall. The American followed, but was barely in time to see the hawk-nosed one dash across the reception room and out into the courtyard.

FURTHER pursuit being useless, Tane returned to the lighted room and, impelled by curiosity, went up to the niche to examine the scroll which the old man had been reading. Instead of paper, parchment, or papyrus, it was of thin beaten gold, on which the hieroglyphic characters were embossed and painted with lacquer. He instantly recognized the characters as very ancient, apparently belonging to the second or third dynasty. They were so battered, and so much of the lacquer had cracked off, that reading them was quite difficult; so he pronounced the words aloud to make sure of the sound and sense of each:

Rekh nefer st'er t'et-a ten au atef-a neter nejer
Re au mut-a heqt nebt taui Pilatra—

O fortunate man! Sleeping, I speak to you. I am the daughter of the beautiful god Re, and Pilatra, Royal Princess of the Two Lands. Being less than goddess, I must sleep, but being more than woman, I never die, and blessed indeed are you who awaken me. For though all Libya once bent beneath my scepter, you now have the power to make me your slave, for ever—

Tane read on and on, but beyond this point, though he was able to pronounce the words by means of the phonetic symbols, he could not understand them. Evidently they constituted a mystic formula, couched in some ancient and long-forgotten language.

So absorbed had he been with the ancient scroll that he had noticed no other details. Now, however, as he laid it down, he turned his attention to the dark opening at the rear of the niche. Just inside the opening, he was surprised to see the side of a coffin, the lid of which had been removed and tilted back against a newly built brick wall behind it. Why, it was the rear of the wall the masons had built that afternoon! And this must be the coffin of Nureddin Ismail! The panels of the niche in this room had opened into the alcove of the reception room. Now they opened into the tomb of the welee.

Impelled by curiosity, Tane leaned forward and peered into the coffin. Then he exclaimed in amazement. For it contained, instead of the shrouded corpse of an old darwish, a richly gilded and lacquered mummy-case, the lid of which was fashioned and colored in the likeness of the swathed form of a slender girl, with lovely, youthful features crowned by a royal diadem that was fronted with a golden uraeus.

Instantly, the archaeologist in Tane came to the fore. This, he realized, was a rare find, such as might not be turned up again in a century of searching. Eager to examine the mummy, he carefully lifted the cover, and leaned it back against the lid of the coffin. Then he gasped in astonishment. For instead of a mummified human being, he saw only a long, rope-like thing which stretched from one end of the mummy-case to the other, swathed in musty linen wrappings that were brown with age. At the head-end of the case, the tip of the thing entered a jewel-encrusted golden crown, fronted by a uraeus similar to the one depicted on the lid.

Wondering what could be wrapped in the cerements, he loosened and began unwinding those at the head end. So weakened were they by the dry rot of countless ages, that despite the utmost care, they broke and fell apart at almost every turn. Beneath them were stronger wrappings, which he also unwound, revealing the scaly head and body of a large haje, or African cobra, in so perfect a state of preservation that the black and yellow coloring of its gleaming scales was as bright as that of a healthy, living specimen.

Tane was not surprised to find a serpent swathed in mummy wrappings, for he knew that the ancient Egyptians embalmed and buried many of their sacred beasts, birds and reptiles, as well as favorite household pets. But he was surprised to find it in so perfect a state of preservation, and in a coffin which had obviously been constructed for the mummy of a royal princess, with its head in a jeweled golden crown which might once have graced the fair brow of the lovely being whose likeness was depicted on the lid.

Carefully, he slid the diadem from beneath the serpent head, and held it up beside one of the candles for a detailed examination. The uraeus and framework were of solid gold, exquisitely wrought, and studded with gems, the most brilliant of which were two sparkling emeralds that formed the eyes of the serpent. Only fragments remained of the cloth lining and plumes —the "two feathers of truth" —which, like the cerements of the serpent, had reached a state of extreme fragility.

Some tiny hieroglyphics graven inside the framework and containing a royal cartouche, caught his eye. He read:

Wrought for the great goddess Lamia, holy and beautiful Queen of All Libya, Daughter of the Sun and Mistress of Life and Death, by the least of her slaves, Mena the goldsmith.

Scarcely had he finished reading these lines when a rustling sound attracted his attention. Turning, he started in surprise and alarm, at sight of a large black-and-yellow cobra crawling out upon the ledge of the niche. Knowing how deadly the bite of a haje can be, he leaped back instinctively in an effort to get out of reach of those terrible fangs. At this, the snake slithered down from the ledge and glided swiftly toward him, knocking over and extinguishing one of the candles as it did so.

Wildly, he looked about him for some avenue of escape, but he could see none, for already the reptile was between him and the doorway. In his defenceless position, he used the only weapon within reach, the short club which he had taken from the hawk-nosed intruder, throwing it with all his might. Straight for the serpent's head flew the loaded billy, yet the snake avoided it with ease, and came on. Desperate, Tane hurled the only remaining thing he might use as a weapon —the heavy golden crown.

Though his aim was good, the serpent once more dodged the throw, and the crown rolled out beneath the hangings that curtained the doorway. Fearful of those deadly fangs, he again leaped back, but this time his feet encountered an unexpected obstruction. He fell over backward, alighting on the floor in front of a diwan.

Then two things happened simultaneously. The remaining candle in the niche sputtered out, and a hollow groan sounded from the diwan behind him.

CHAPTER 4
Real or Unreal?

TANE scrambled TO his feet, and strove to see the creature that menaced him. But there was no window in the room to admit the moonlight, and his eyes could not penetrate the darkness. From the direction in which he had seen the serpent, he heard an ominous rustling, which grew fainter, and presently ceased. This led him to believe that the reptile had coiled and was ready to strike. In the meantime, there came the sound of heavy, labored breathing from the diwan, followed by another groan.

Suddenly he remembered a box of safety matches in his trousers pocket, and lighted one. The first thing the circle of yellow light revealed was the object which had tripped him. It was a man's leg, projecting from beneath a pile of rugs and pillows on the diwan. He held the match high above his head until it burned his fingers, as he strained his eyes into the gloom for sight of the serpent. But it had disappeared.

Lighting another match, he turned his attention to the person on the couch. Swiftly, he pulled away the rugs and cushions, revealing the rotund form and porcine features of Doctor Schneider. The doctor's face was streaked with blood from a cut on his forehead, and he was breathing heavily.

"You!" Tane exclaimed, staring down at the doctor in amazement. "What happened?"

"A robber," groaned the doctor. "He took mein gold und broke mein head. There is a lamp on that taboret. Light it, und help me to the bathroom. I must have vater und a bandage."

"There's a big haje loose in the house," he said, as he helped the doctor to arise. "We'll have to watch our step."

"I saw it crawl out of the niche. By Jove! I must have unwrapped it myself. There was a snake swathed in mummy-cloth and I thought it was dead. Good joke on me."

"Good joke! Gott im Himmel! If only it vas a joke! But neffer mind. Help me to the bathroom."

Tane assisted the doctor to arise. Then, juggling the lamp with one hand, and supporting the injured man with the other, he led him across the room and through the doorway, meanwhile keeping a sharp lookout for the venomous haje.

"Second door to the right," grunted the doctor. "Ach, mein head! It goes round like a pinwheel."

There was a well-stocked medicine cabinet in the bathroom, and Tane, after mixing the doctor a stiff drink of brandy and water, applied an antiseptic and deftly bandaged his head.

"I feel better, now," said Doctor Schneider, when Tane had finished. "Better haff a drink, yourself. You look as if you need one."

"You said it." Tane poured out three fingers, and took his brandy neat. "Maybe it will help to clear my head. Somebody drugged my sherbet. And my servant, Ali, sleeps as if he, also, had been drugged."

"It must haff been an inside chob," said the doctor. "Someone learned I had all that gold, und planned to rob me. But tell me vot happened before you found me. Did you catch sight of the robber?"

"I chased an old, hawk-nosed Persian out of the place," Tane replied. "He was reading from a golden scroll before the niche, behind which the mummy-case was so cleverly concealed this afternoon."

"Scroll? Mummy-case?" The doctor appeared puzzled. "But tell me, mein friend, had he finished reading the scroll when you appeared?"

"I don't think so. In fact, I'm quite sure he hadn't, for he was still on the part I could understand. There were a number of words that must have been in some pre-dynastic dialect, which I could not understand."

"I not only saw a mummy-case, but there was a mummified serpent in it, and a golden diadem. I unwrapped the serpent. And it, or another, later crawled out of the niche, knocked over one of the candles, and came toward me. I was examining the diadem at the time, and first tried to stop the snake by hurling the club of the Persian. I missed, and so threw the only thing I had at hand —the crown. The serpent dodged, one of the candles burned out, and then I heard you groan."

"Vell. The first thing ve better do iss look for that snake. It von't be safe for any of us to sleep mit it crawling around the house. I haff a couple of simitars hanging on the vall of the reception room. Ve'll get them und look around." Cautiously, they made their way to the reception room. The doctor took down two crossed simitars from the wall and handed one to Tane. Then he lighted another lamp.

"Suppose you look in the courtyard," he said, "vile I search in the back of the house. Say, vat about that crown you threw at the haje?"

"Funny ve didn't see it. But neffer mind. I look for it, also. If you see or hear anything strange, call me —schnell!"

LANTERN in one hand and simitar in the other, Tane opened the door and stepped out into the courtyard. Here the moonlight was so bright that the lamp was superfluous, except in the darker corners, where he poked about cautiously with the simitar. After making a complete examination of the courtyard, he stepped into the entryway. At the second turn, he came upon the body of a man, lying with arms outflung. It was Wardan, the bowab. Tane bent over him. One look convinced him that the doorkeeper was dead. His tarbush was lying on the tiles, and the back of his shaven head was crushed in, as if by some heavy instrument. The door stood slightly ajar, and Tane closed and bolted it. Then he made his way back to the reception room. It was untenanted, but the glint of lamplight from the hallway told him that there was someone in the other room. Parting the curtains, he traversed the hallway and entered the room, where he found the doctor staring at the niche.

"Wardan dead! Poor devil. Then he vasn't in on the robbery plot. Say, vot's all this cock-und-bull story you haff been telling me about mummy-cases und snakes und crowns? There vas no crown lying in the hallvay. Und vere is the golden scroll? I found the club all right, in here on the floor —a deadly thing loaded mit lead. But you couldn't haff seen a mummy-case behind these panels. Look."

Tane looked. Instead of the dark opening behind the panels, he now saw a solid brick wall. He looked closer. It was not the new wall put up by the masons that afternoon, but a very old wall, which evidently had stood for many generations. And it fitted so tightly against the back of the niche that nothing much thicker than a sheet of paper could have been inserted between it and the sliding panels.

Tane leaned over and tapped the wall with his knuckles. Then, setting down the lamp, he flung his entire weight against it, pressing with both hands. But it was as solid as the house itself.

"It appears, mein friend," said the doctor, gravely, "that the drug you were given made you see strange visions. Hashish, maybe, eh?"

"But I tell you I saw and touched all those things. They were real. I handled them. I read the scroll."

"Tactile impressions are as easily imagined as visual," replied the doctor. "You can see for yourself that you couldn't possibly haff looked into any opening behind the niche, unless you haff X-ray eyes und can look through a vall. Und even so, you vouldn't haff X-ray hands that could reach through the vall. No, mein friend, you are the victim of a drug-dream —a hallucination. Better forget that part of it when you talk to the police. I'll have to notify them, on account of Wardan's death. Just tell them you chased out a robber who had slain Wardan, knocked me unconscious, und robbed me."

"You vait here," said the doctor. "I'll go und call the police. Und don't try to make them believe that drug-dream, or ve are liable to be accused of murder."

The doctor took one of the lamps and went out. As soon as the echo of his footsteps had died away, Tane took up his lamp and once more went to the niche. Again he examined the brick wall and the sliding panels. But he could find nothing to indicate that they had not been in this same position for generations. Presently he thought of the candles which had been burning on each side of the niche. Each had been in a small brass tray, but one, he recalled, had been upset by the serpent. There should be some tallow on the ledge. A careful examination revealed none. Then he looked above the places where the candles had stood. Above each was a spot which was considerably darker than the surrounding wood. He rubbed one of the spots, and his finger came away with a smudge of greasy carbon. So there had been two candles burning there, after all. But what had become of them? And what had happened to interpose a solid brick wall against the back of the niche during the time he had been exploring the courtyard?

As he was about to return to his seat on the diwan, he noticed a white splotch on the floor. Bending, he picked it up. It was a piece of tallow which had spattered from the overturned candle. At the sound of approaching footsteps, he thrust this meager bit of evidence into his pocket, resumed his seat on the diwan, and lighted a cigarette.

CHAPTER 5
Hagg Nadeem

DOCTOR SCHNEIDER waddled into the room, followed by four burly native policemen.

"There is the hashisbin!" he said in Arabic, pointing a pudgy finger at Tane. "Overpower him quickly, for he is very dangerous. He slew Wardan mit a single blow, und came near to killing me."

Tane sprang to his feet, and lashed out with both fists as the four husky natives pounced upon him. His first blow found a brown face, and its owner staggered back to crash against the opposite wall. His second caught another policeman in the midriff, and doubled him up, left him gasping for breath. But the other two each caught an arm, and their combined weight bore him down upon the diwan.

The American pretended to go limp. Then he suddenly wrenched his right arm free. The man on his left still clung, but a short-arm punch to the point of the jaw broke his hold, and he slumped to the floor. Again the man on his right seized his arm, but he drove a crashing left hook to the fellow's ear, tore his arm from the clutching brown hands, and leaped to his feet.

At this instant, a tall, lean, hatchet-faced Arab appeared in the doorway. It was Ali, and in his hand he held Tane's Colt forty-five.

Then he whirled, facing the five men in the room. "Hands up, all of you," he ordered, "or I'll shoot, and shoot to kill."

Sheepishly, the four policemen raised their hands. But the doctor paid no attention to the command.

"Himmel! Vould you murder me?" the doctor cried, elevating his pudgy hands with surprising alacrity.

"A moment ago you accused me of being a murderer," Tane replied. "I might be tempted to live up to the name. Steady!" His gun muzzle swung toward one of the policemen whose hands were wavering downward, and once more they became stiffly perpendicular.

"Now, doctor," said Tane, "what's this all about? And why did you accuse me of murder after I drove off your attacker and bound up your wound? You'd better come clean, or ——"

The sentence remained unfinished, for at that instant he suddenly felt something hard prodding him in the back, and a low, well-modulated voice from behind him said: "I'd advise you to drop that gun."

Tane dropped the forty-five. There was nothing else for him to do. As the heavy weapon thudded down on the rug, the pressure on his back was removed. Then the curved handle of a Malacca cane flashed out from behind him, hooked the pistol, and dragged it back.

"And now, effendi, you will walk to the diwan and seat yourself beside Doctor Schneider," continued the suave voice.

Tane walked obediently to the diwan, turned, and sat down beside the doctor. Then a man, evidently an Egyptian, stepped through the curtained doorway. He was slender, of medium height, with dreamy brown eyes and a closely cropped, jet-black beard. He wore a green turban and a brown burnoose which was open in front, revealing a gold-embroidered white kamis, confined at the waist by a scarlet sash. Tane judged him to be about forty years of age. In one hand he carried a Malacca stick, and in the other, the American's revolver. And Tane suddenly realized that he had been neatly tricked —forced to drop his weapon by the prod of a walking-stick.

"At your service, as always, Doctor Schneider," said the Egyptian, politely, with a profound bow. "I happened to be passing, and heard the sound of a shot. The door was ajar, so I came in to investigate. And now, perhaps, you will acquaint me with the cause of this disturbance, as well as the reason why four of my men have been held up at the point of a gun in your house."

Tane had heard of Hagg Nadeem. And the reports he had heard had been so many, so varied, so tinted with superstition, and so utterly preposterous, that he had almost come to regard the man as a purely mythical figure. Not only was he said to be an dim, a Muslim holy man, learned in the Koran and the faith of al Islam, and a hagg who had made the prescribed pilgrimage to Medina and Mecca, but he was also an Oxford graduate, and well informed in the sciences and the arts. Among his own people, many revered him for his piety and religious learning. Others condemned him as a jinni in league with Shaitan the Damned, a necromancer, a worshipper of Egypt's ancient and terrible gods, and a practiser of both white and black magic. Though he bore no official title, soldiers, police, and other public servants, both military and civil, bowed to his authority without question. And it was whispered that he was a member, if not the actual chief, of the secret police of the country.

For a moment, the German seemed too stunned with amazement to reply to the query of the Egyptian. But the latter persisted.

"I haff already made mein explanation to these four bolicemen," grunted the doctor, at length. "That man," indicating Tane, "killed my bowab mit a club, und tried to brain me. I escaped him, und called the bolice."

"One moment, effendi," said Nadeem. "Permit me to finish questioning him." He turned once more to Doctor Schneider. "You say this man tried to kill you. Why?"

"He vas drug-crazed —mit hashish, probably. Don't know vere he got hold of it. I calmed him down, took the club avay from him, und vent und bound up my head. Then I called the bolice. Ven they tried to arrest him he fought like a fiend. Then his servant came und gave him the pistol, und ven I vouldn't put up my hands, he took a shot at me. The bullet vent through my cap, as you can see." He pointed to the punctured bit of headgear behind him.

"Here's the club," continued the doctor, tossing the loaded billy at the feet of the Egyptian. "He told some vild, harebrained story about candles burning in the niche, an ancient scroll of solid gold, und a mummy-case mit a snake in it. I had to humor him in his murderous mood, of course, but I didn't belief him. Hashish makes men see queer things."

"I rented the house from Doctor Schneider yesterday afternoon," Tane replied. "Paid him six months' rent in advance. He was to move out in the morning."

"I see. Sorry, Mr. Tane, but I'm afraid I'll have to place you under arrest. This, I take it, is your servant. Since you are partly disrobed, I'll permit you to send him up for such clothing and other articles as you require, with two of my men as an escort."

"This is a damned outrage," fumed Tane. "You'll hear from my Government on this, and don't forget it."

HAGG NADEEM smiled sweetly, seemingly unimpressed. While Tane gave orders to Ali, Hagg Nadeem lighted a cigarette and strolled carelessly about the room, as if there were nothing there that particularly interested him. Yet Tane, somehow, felt that his searching brown eyes were taking in every detail.

Ali returned in a few minutes with the required things, and deftly assisted his master in making himself presentable.

"Since your servant is not accused, he may remain here and look after your things," said the hagg. "And now, if you are ready, we will start."

He turned to Doctor Schneider. "You will be expected to appear before the kadi, to prefer charges against this gentleman in the morning," he told him. "Come, Mr. Tane."

As they passed through the outer door, Tane noticed that the grisly object which had once been Wardan the bowab had been removed —probably by his relatives.

They traversed several narrow, deserted streets in silence. Then Nadeem said: "Though I grieve to confess it, our jail is rather a filthy place. Most of the malefactors brought there crawl with vermin, and they are none too clean. I'm afraid it will be very disagreeable for you."

"I was about to suggest," continued the hagg, "that you spend the night in my home —let us say, as my guest. Under guard, of course."

"No imposition, I assure you. It will be a pleasure. After all, you have not yet been proved a murderer —only accused. It may be that you are entirely innocent of even any complicity in the matter."

They strode on again for some moments without conversation. Then the Egyptian paused before a doorway, and rapped sharply with his Malacca. A sleepy bowab opened the door. "Here is my house," said the hagg. "Bismillah. Enter in the Name of Allah."

"Praise His Name," replied Tane, in answer to the Arabic politeness, and stepped inside, followed by his host and the four guards.

CHAPTER 6
The Visitation

IN its arrangement, the house of Hagg Nadeem was quite similar to the one Tane had rented some hours before, but much more luxuriously appointed. As he sat in the reception room, sipping a sherbet and smoking one of his host's long oriental cigarettes, his eyes strayed from one to another of the priceless objects of antique art which the room contained.

"I had not heard that, among other things, you were a connoisseur of antiques," said Tane.

"These things? Mere trifles. Some day, inshallah, I will show you my private museum." He smiled his sweet, dreamy smile. "But now, effendi, I should be infinitely obliged to you if you would relate to me, in detail, everything that happened after you called on Doctor Schneider yesterday afternoon, to rent his house. I know that you are weary, and need rest. At the same time, please realize that you are accused of a serious crime. If you are innocent, the quickest way you can aid me in learning the truth is by telling all you know."

"I have nothing to conceal, though some of the things I have to relate may sound fantastic —even unbelievable," Tane replied.

The American related his story in detail —his payment of the gold to Doctor Schneider, his awakening near midnight with the unmistakable signs of having been drugged, his encounter with the hawk-nosed Persian, the incident of the scroll, the mummy-case and the serpent, his finding of the injured doctor, and the latter's subsequent treachery.

"Did you tell Doctor Schneider that you had read the scroll aloud over the mummy-case and then unwrapped the haje?" asked Nadeem when he had finished.

"I did," Tane replied, "but he evidently thought that part of it all a hashish dream. He almost succeeded in convincing me that this was the case, also —would have done so, in fact, if it hadn't been for this." Reaching into his pocket, he produced the bit of candle wax he had found on the floor and passed it to his host.

"Looks genuine enough," he said. "I'll have it analyzed and checked microscopically, though, to make sure."

"This," said the hagg, "is evidently a bit of one of the candles used by the high priests of a certain secret sect of ancient times, when practising a branch of their black art —specifically that of raising the dead. These candles were made from the fat of virgins secretly sacrificed before the crocodile god, Sebek. This fat was mixed with beeswax in which had been incorporated several potent drugs and a compound of aromatic resins, gums and essential oils."

"Good Lord!" exclaimed Tane. "You don't mean that innocent young women were actually slaughtered to make these candles! Why, I have been studying the ancient records for years, and never heard of such a thing. If this is true, I'll have to admit that you are far better informed than I on the doings of the ancient Egyptians, despite my years of study and research."

"There are reasons why I should be so informed," replied Nadeem, passing him the gold-and-ivory cigarette box. "It happens that I am directly descended from a high priest of Sebek. Despite the fact that I am a Muslim, a believer in the one true God, as have been my ancestors for many generations, the ancient documents of my forebears have been passed down from seventh son to seventh son intact. It appears that I have been the first of the line with the temerity to break the ancient seals and examine them, since the conversion of the family to the faith of al Islam."

Tane selected and lighted a cigarette. "You have no idea," he said, "how intensely interesting all this is to me. I presume that none but a seventh son of a seventh son of your house would be permitted to examine the documents."

Nadeem smiled his sweet, pensive smile. "Unfortunately, that is quite true. In fact, there is an ancient curse laid upon the custodian who allows them to fall into alien hands —a curse which would bring a horrible doom not only upon the desecrator, but upon my family in all its branches."

Nadeem shrugged. "I should dislike to test its power. There have been numerous instances, within your memory and mine, in which people have suffered death, sudden and inexplicable, after defying such a curse. It will be a long time before the world forgets what happened to the desecrators of the tomb of Tutankh-Amen, son of Amen-hetep the Fourth, which was protected by such a curse."

"It is my belief that these, and all other similar instances, can be traced to natural causes," said Tane.

"Has it ever occurred to you that such a curse might operate through natural channels?"

"In many things the ancients were better informed than are we," Nadeem said. "And while I grant you that there is nothing really supernatural, that all things must take place in accord with the laws of Nature, or Allah, it is my belief that these ancient priests and master magicians —the genuine adepts —were in possession of a number of scientific truths which gave them tremendous power over the uninitiated, and which have not been rediscovered by our modern scientists. I do not claim that they really understood all the natural laws they put into effect in performing their so-called miracles and feats of magic. However, they had much leisure for study and experiment, and learning that certain causes produced certain mysterious effects, made use of them."

"I can't think of any application of natural law which would explain my weird experience of this evening," said Tane. "I would prefer to believe that the greater part of it was a drag dream, but the presence of the carbon spots in the top of the niche and a bit of candle wax on the rug is evidence that at least part of the experience was real. It is difficult for me to believe that a serpent, dead for five thousand years, should suddenly come to life and crawl away because of the reading of a bit of mummery over it, accompanied by the burning of two candles made from the fat of virgins. That's too preposterous for any sane man to swallow."

"A true scientist," said Hagg Nadeem, "weighs every fact with which he comes in contact before drawing a conclusion. If he is in search of truth, he can not afford to ignore a single fact, however absurd or illogical it may seem. In this case, you are basing your assumption on the hypothesis that it was a real haje you saw and handled, when what you actually saw may have been something entirely different, temporarily assuming the shape of a haje."

"I know. Lamia, by Keats. His picture of Lamia, the brightly colored female serpent that transforms herself into a beautiful girl, conforms to the ancient belief —or superstition, if you will —of the deadly, beautiful creatures called Lamias, half woman, half serpent, who visited men in their sleep, sometimes to make love to them, sometimes to drain them of their vitality, and often, in the end, to slay them, drinking their blood or devouring their flesh."

"A superstition undoubtedly evoked by the desire dreams of some ancient, lovelorn swains," said Tane.

"Not necessarily. It is recorded that one of these creatures once ruled all Libya. In fact, her name was Lamia, and that is why all such have subsequently been called 'Lamias'."

"I've heard of that, also," Tane told him. "It is said that, to this day, Greek mothers frighten their children into obedience by mentioning her name."

"Precisely. And it seems that a belief which has endured so persistently through the ages must have some foundation in fact. Perhaps there were, and are, such things as Lamias."

"At least the ancient scroll and crown I saw, if I really saw them, seem to confirm the fact that there was once a queen of Libya by that name, who claimed to be the daughter of a god and a royal princess."

"That is true." Hagg Nadeem snuffed his cigarette and stood up. "And it follows that since you read the scroll and unwrapped the serpent, you may have an opportunity to learn whether there was or is such a creature, and if so, whether she will live up to the promise made on the scroll, to become the slave of the man who awakens her. I will leave you, now, to a well-earned rest. Since I can not invite you up into my hareem, this will serve as your bedroom. Sleep as late as you like. The guards and servants will have orders not to disturb you. If you have need of anything, clap your hands. And I'll see you tomorrow. Just now, I have important work to do. Hadrak."

AS soon as his host disappeared through the doorway, the American went to the window and peered out. A sentry, with rifle and fixed bayonet, paced just below him. He went to the courtyard door and looked through the interstice between the curtains. Another guard stood there. A third door led into a narrow hallway, lighted by the yellow rays of a brass lamp. And seated at the end of the hall with every evidence of alertness was a third armed guard.

Returning to the diwan, Tane sat down. He decided that an attempt to escape would be foolish, futile, and dangerous. After all, where could he go to help his case in any way? To escape to the American consulate now would do him no good, even if it were possible of accomplishment. He would be traced and compelled to return to answer the murder charge, anyway. The diwan was most inviting, and he was very tired and exceedingly sleepy. With a yawn, he began to undress. A few moments later, clad only in his shorts, he blew out the light and settled down among the cushions and coverlets. Shortly thereafter, he fell asleep.

It seemed to Tane that he had scarcely closed his eyes in slumber, when he suddenly became wide awake. The moon had set, and the room was shrouded in that deceptive darkness which precedes the dawn, the various objects looming up as bulky shadows. He could see nothing amiss, yet he had an inexplicable premonition of danger —of some alien presence in the room. He held his breath and listened. A faint rustling sound came from the mashrabiyeh window, and he strained his eyes through the gloom to learn the cause. Suddenly he detected a movement, a wriggling sinuous motion through one section of the lattice. Good Heaven! It was a snake —a huge, mottled haje with scales that gleamed dully!

He strove to cry out, but could not make a sound. Then he tried to sit up, preparatory to running out the door and calling the guard, but found that he could not so much as move a finger. Such experiences had been his before, in dreams, but this, he was convinced, was no dream. The snake slithered down from the lattice and disappeared in the gloom beneath the window. The rustling sound now continued on the floor, and the fact that Tane could no longer see the reptile, made its approach immensely more terrifying. Again he made a desperate attempt to shout or move, but in vain. A cold sweat bedewed his forehead, and he was oppressed by a feeling of suffocation. The suspense of lying there, waiting for death to strike him from the shadows, was horrible, enervating. He almost wished the haje would sink its venomous fangs into his flesh and end it all. It was thus that the incomparable Cleopatra had found swift surcease from her troubles, ages before.

In breathless silence he waited for that hooded head to rear itself above the edge of the diwan. But instead of the serpent's head he was suddenly aware of something light-colored, and faintly luminous, moving upward from the floor. It was a pair of plumes —the two feathers of truth! They nodded above a diadem, fronted by a uraeus with glittering jeweled eyes. And beneath the diadem, there slowly materialized the face and form of the girl he had seen depicted on the lid of the mummy-case. She appeared to be draped in something white and filmy, which revealed every line of her slender, perfect figure.

"Who are you? What are you?" he tried to ask. But his voice would not function. He could not so much as whisper.

Although he could not hear his own voice, the figure seemed to hear it —or read his thoughts —for she answered him, her voice low and musical. And the language she used was that of ancient Egypt.

"Don't you know me, lord of my awakening? I am Lamia, once proud Queen of Libya, and now —your slave. I am still weak, for this is the first night, and so I can not serve you yet. But I will gain strength in the manner you and all adepts know, and then you may command my service and my power. You are in great danger, my master —such danger as will tax our combined efforts to thwart. I go now, to gain strength, but I will return and watch over you."

Slowly, soundlessly, she sank downward until only the nodding plumes showed above the rim of the diwan. Then these disappeared. Shortly thereafter there was a rustling sound at the window. He caught a flash of gleaming scales on a serpentine body that wriggled swiftly through the lattice-work.

For some time Tane lay there, listening. But the only sounds that came to his ears were the heavy tread of the sentry below the window, and the occasional matutinal crowing of the restless cocks of the neighborhood. Suddenly he discovered that he could move once more. He sat up, found his matches, and lighted the lamp. Its yellow rays shone to every corner of the room and revealed —nothing.

Sleep, he found, was impossible. He smoked cigarette after cigarette in a fruitless effort to soothe his jangled nerves. Presently, after what seemed ages of waiting, the dawn came. He blew out the lamp, settled down once more on the diwan, and presently fell into a troubled sleep.

CHAPTER 7
Kidnapped

TANE awoke and sat up, bathed in perspiration. He glanced at his watch. It was twelve o'clock, and the air quivered in the stifling noonday heat. Then a huge negro, who had been standing before one of the curtained doorways, said:

"Will I!" Tane leaped to his feet, and followed the black giant through the doorway, down a hallway, and into a modern, tiled bathroom. A cold tub and a brisk rub-down made him feel like a new man. The negro brought him shaving things, and when he had finished, came in with his clothing, freshly pressed. As soon as he was dressed, the black man said:

The servant conducted him back into the reception room. There he saw Hagg Nadeem seated on a diwan with a taboret before him.

"Aleykum salam," replied Nadeem. "Will you breakfast with me? I, too, have just arisen."

The Egyptian clapped his hands, and a servant entered with a huge tray containing iced watermelon, eggs, toast, grilled fish, and a pot of spiced, sweetened coffee.

"Bismillah," said the hagg, piously, as he attacked his watermelon. "With health and appetite."

For some time they addressed themselves to their food in silence, after the oriental custom. Then, after they had rinsed their hands beneath a ewer brought by a servant, dried them, and lighted cigarettes, Nadeem said:

"I just received some good news for you from the kadi. It seems that Doctor Schneider appeared this morning and withdrew his accusation of murder against you. He said that he, too, had been drugged last evening, in addition to the blow on the head, but that now, since his faculties are clearer, he believes your story about the Persian."

"Drugged. So that's it. I wondered why he acted so queerly last evening. By the way, I had a curious experience after I retired. Sort of a vision, or dream. I seemed to be awake, and yet I couldn't make a move or a sound."

"At midnight, in the full of the moon, you read the mystic incantation aloud over the mummy-case of the ancient Queen of Libya, by the light of two magic candles. Then you opened the case and unwrapped the mummy. It is prophesied in the ancient writings that the man who does these things becomes Lamia's lord."

"As real as this bit of candle wax, which is your only physical evidence. Yet small and insignificant as it is, it is enough to disprove the drug-dream theory, for such dreams do not materialize substance."

Tane looked at him in astonishment. "I can't believe it. I won't. It's all too incredible —too uncanny. Such things can't be."

"It may be that future developments will prove you wrong," said the hagg, solemnly. "We know nothing of the natures of these creatures called Lamias, or their powers or tenacity to life. Cold-blooded animals are notoriously difficult to kill, particularly serpents. There is an authentic record of a frog found alive in the wall of an old building, where it had been imprisoned without food or water for many years."

"But," said Tane, "assuming that a serpent did remain in a state of suspended animation for five thousand years, you still have the inexplicable phenomenon of that serpent changing to the semblance of a woman and returning to its original form, all in the course of a few moments."

"Even that," said Hagg Nadeem, "is not so difficult to believe as it might appear on first thought. I take it that you, like most scientists, hold to the theory of organic evolution."

"We use it as a working hypothesis," Tane replied. "Things happen as if it were true."

"Exactly. You believe that your ancestors in the dim and distant past were once reptiles."

"Even the science of embryology furnishes analogical proof of this. For, at one stage of its development, the human embryo resembles a young salamander."

"You will grant me, then, that the evolutionists believe a reptile gradually turned into a human being —say over a period of many millions of years. And the embryologists tell us that a reptilian form, under proper conditions, becomes a human form in the course of a few months."

"Then, effendi, I submit that there is but one difference between what your scientists tell us, and what you say you witnessed last night. That difference is 'time'. You saw, or appeared to see, a reptile become a human being. The evolutionists say this has happened. The embryologists say it still happens. Yet you did not believe the evidence of your senses because it happened so quickly."

"But," said Tane, "the girl appeared to change back to the serpent form once more."

"Why not? Combine two gases, oxygen and hydrogen, in the correct proportion, and under the proper conditions, and they become water. Treat the water with an electrical current, placing a receptacle over the anode and one over the cathode, and you reverse the process, for in the one you will find oxygen and in the other, hydrogen. The water has changed back to its original form. The time required for the change depends only on the dispatch with which the process is applied."

"Permit me to remind you," smiled Nadeem, "that your own scientists have offered nothing more than analogical proof for a biological theory which many of them believe religiously —the theory of evolution. However, time will reveal what is true and what is false. And in the meantime, let me warn you that your life is in grave danger. Here is the gun," handing him the forty-five, "which I took from you last evening. Keep it constantly within reach, and be ever on your guard."

"May I ask," queried Tane, "from whom or from what I am in danger? I have injured no one. Why should anyone wish to kill me?"

"You are Lord of the Lamia. Hence there are those who envy you and will try to supplant you. She will be your greatest protector, and will watch over you. But she is not invulnerable. I, too, shall watch, and do what I can. But you must help yourself. You have a saying: 'The Lord helps those who help themselves.' It will be wise for you to live up to it in this respect. I presume that you will want to get settled in your new home today, so I will not detain you longer. The doctor, I understand, moved out this morning. I will send a man with you to show you the way."

"I do have a devil of a lot to attend to —servants to hire, furnishings to buy, and all that. So, if you will excuse me, I'll be on my way."

"Good-bye. Thanks for the hospitality —and the warning," said Tane, as he followed the servant out the door.

Tane found his servant, Ali, seated on the bench beside the door of his empty house, smoking his chibouk. He dismissed his guide with a coin, and entered, Ali at his heels.

"There have been many people here seeking employment, sidi," said the Syrian, when they reached the reception room. "Also there came merchants with rugs, mattresses, pipes, utensils and other household articles, having heard that you had moved in without furniture. But I told them all to return later."

Tane sat down wearily on the edge of the cushionless diwan, and lighted a cigarette.

"We'll just camp here for today," he said. "Tomorrow will be time enough to see about servants and begin buying the furniture. Just get a couple of mattresses, a rug apiece, some food, and such utensils and dishes as you will need to prepare and serve it." He rose and handed his servant five pounds. "Lock the door as you go out, so I won't be disturbed by peddlers and job-hunters."

After he had finished his cigarette, Tane decided to have another look at the mysterious niche which had baffled him so completely, and to explore those parts of the house which he had not previously seen. He accordingly went through the now curtainless doorway, into the room where his strange adventures had taken place. Divested of its rugs and furnishings it had a bare and forbidding look, and despite the brightness of the noonday sun, he had, on entering it, an eery feeling of impending danger —of some lurking, sinister presence.

An examination of the niche revealed the same thing he had last seen —the ancient brick wall flush against the panels as before. But from behind that wall there now came, faintly but unmistakably, a charnel odor that was suggestive of the presence of an unembalmed corpse. So disagreeable was this effluvium that he was glad to close the panels again, pausing only to re-examine the points above where the candles had stood. To his surprise, he now found no carbon there, though he distinctly remembered having previously soiled his finger with soot in examining it. But no matter what he had seen in that niche before, his olfactory nerves convinced him that a corpse was now entombed within it.

Passing thence into the hallway once more, he came to the bathroom. Here, everything loose had been removed, and the mirror door of the medicine cabinet stood open, revealing its emptiness. He was about to go on, when a flash of color attracted his eye —a bright bit of something red and gold, which lay on the tile floor. Bending, he picked it up. It was a piece of wood, gilded and lacquered, which had evidently been split off an ancient mummy-case.

After minutely examining it, he dropped it into his pocket. It was undoubtedly part of a mummy-case —perhaps the very case he had viewed the night before.

Returning to the hallway, he walked on toward the kitchen. But suddenly, just as he stepped through the doorway, the thick smothering folds of a burnoose were thrown over his head, two pairs of powerful arms pinioned his, and he was tripped and thrown to the floor.

CHAPTER 8
The Oasis

TANE struggled fiercely but futilely in the clutches of his captors. They quickly found and removed his gun, and bound his wrists and ankles with ropes that bit painfully into the flesh. The cloak, which was strongly redolent of camel, was kept over his head. And with a knife pricking the flesh over his heart, one of his captors warned him that unless he kept silent he would be instantly slain. He was then rolled up in a rug, lifted to the shoulders of three men, and carried off.

He heard a door open, then guessed by the way he was being tilted, that his unknown captors were taking him down a stairway. He judged from their whispered conversation and the sounds of their footsteps that there were at least six of them. They walked on a level surface for some distance, then tilted him again, this time evidently carrying him up a stairway. Another door opened. A moment later, he was stowed away in what appeared to be a camel litter. A man seated in the litter with him pricked him with a knife and again warned him to be silent. Then he heard the cameleer alternately coaxing and cursing the beast, until it arose with many snorting, grunting protests. The litter gave a lurch, then settled down to a steady, swaying motion as the great beast started off.

At first Tane knew by the sounds about him that they were passing through the bazars, probably along the Sukten Nahhasi toward the Bab al Fotun, for he heard the mueddins calling the Faithful to the thur, or noon prayer, from the minarets of the many mosques clustered in this vicinity.

Some time later he heard a traveler inquire if this were the Bab al Hasaniyen, and a reply in the affirmative, which told him that he had passed out of Cairo and was probably on the Abbasiyeh Road. Where, he wondered, could his mysterious captors be taking him? And why? He had been a fool to allow himself to be caught thus off his guard. Hagg Nadeem had warned him. But who would have thought to find enemies hiding in his house? And how could they have gotten in with Ali guarding the door?

As he pondered these questions, he presently noticed that all road-sounds had ceased, and that the thudding of the camels' feet was muffled, as if with sand. Apparently, they had turned off the highway into the desert.

Tane's bonds, now perspiration-soaked, chafed and stung his wrists almost unbearably. And the stifling heat engendered a keen thirst that added to his torment. But the camel lurched on and on, hour after hour, until Tane's wrists and ankles grew numb and he sank into a half-smothered lethargy —a hideous nightmare of heat and thirst and torture.

Presently, when it seemed that he had reached the limit of his endurance, the endless swaying ceased, and Tane heard the cameleer's guttural "Ikh! Ikh!" as he commanded the beast to kneel. The animal lurched downward, grunted, and came to rest.

After Tane had been dragged from the litter and unrolled from the rug, the smothering cloak was removed from his head, and he saw his captors —six lean, dark-skinned, black-bearded Bedouins. One bent and unbound his ankles. Then two others caught him by the elbows, cruelly wrenching his bound wrists, and jerked him to his feet.

He swayed dizzily between the two kidnappers, and looked about him. They had halted at a small oasis, a shallow water-hole and a few palm trees, surrounded by the billowing sands of the Libyan Desert. Over beyond the water-hole a guard, silhouetted by the rays of the setting sun, leaned on a long rifle, watching a half-dozen camels. And near at hand a dozen of his fellows squatted about a campfire, smoking and chatting. Behind them was a large tent, the front wall of which had been raised to admit the evening breeze.

At this instant, the old man emerged from the tent. With a start, Tane recognized him as Shaykh Ibrahim, the darwish, who had conducted the funeral. With chin held high, he chanted the adan mughareb, the call to the sunset prayer. Instantly, all the ruffians except the camel guard and the two men who held Tane, rushed to the pool to make their wuddu ablutions. These finished, they faced Mecca, while the shaykh led them in prayer.

Prayers over, the old man rose from his rug, and, turning, entered the tent. Tane's two captors dragged him forward, and into the tent, at the back of which the old darwish was seated on a mattress, smoking the narghile from which he had weaned himself long enough to perform the pious office of imam. As the American was hauled up before the shaykh, the swarthy Bedouins crowded in behind him, and seated themselves on either side, along the tent walls. All glared at him with open hostility, and there were muttered imprecations of "Infidel! Christian!" and "Dog of a Frank!" Though his throat was parched and his tongue was so dry it rattled against the roof of his mouth, Tane knew better than to ask for a drink of water. These ruffians meant him no good; hence they would give him nothing either to eat or drink. For if they were to give either and then slay him they would violate their desert code —the law of the salt. He resolved to face it out boldly, asking nothing of them, and if need be, show these hard-bitten cutthroats than an American could die as bravely as any of them.

The old shaykh passed the flexible stem of his pipe to the man at his right, and squinted up at the tall young man standing before him.

"I have been informed that you are Lord of the Lamia," he said in Arabic. "Is this true?"

"You have meddled in an affair which does not concern you —have stolen a privilege and seized a power which does not belong to you —a privilege for which my comrades and I have fought and bled and labored. We demand that you renounce this power in our favor."

"The alternative," said the shaykh, slowly, "is death by impalement, a horrible, lingering death which can profit no one. I am sure you will prefer to give us back our Lamia, and leave this place, free and unharmed, with a present of a thousand gold pounds."

Tane knew full well that no true Muslim would break the triple oath: "Wallah! Tillah! Billah!" And he shuddered to think of the form of death reserved for him if he refused this demand, as he observed a man at his left carefully sharpening the end of a long stake. After all, what did this intangible, ephemeral creature called a Lamia mean to him? He was not sure that she was more than a drug-induced dream. And, no matter what she was, it would be a relief to be rid of her.

The shaykh swore first. He was followed by each of the men, even the camel guard, who was temporarily relieved from duty for the purpose, until all had pledged their irrevocable word to set Tane free with a camel and a thousand gold pounds as soon as he should transfer his lordship of the Lamia to the shaykh.

This ceremony completed, the old darwish clapped his hands, and one of the men brought a small taboret, which he set before his leader. On it was a box, which the old man opened, and from which he took two candles and a scroll. He set a candle on either side of the table, and placed the scroll in the center. At the same time one of Tane's captors slashed his bonds, and another placed a rug for him before the taboret.

"And now," went on Shaykh Ibrahim, "you will light the two candles and read the upper passage on the scroll, which summons the Lamia. When she appears, you will read the lower passage, which conveys her from you to me."

He handed Tane a box of matches, and the latter lit the two candles. By their yellow light, he made out two groups of hieroglyphic characters on the scroll.

"First bring me a drink of water," Tane requested. "My throat is so dry it is difficult for me to speak."

The water was brought and he drank slowly, meanwhile scanning the first group of hieroglyphics. In ancient Egyptian, they commanded Lamia, Queen of Libya, to appear before him. Of course she wouldn't appear, he thought. What then? What would these desperadoes do? Still, he was committed to this course. There was nothing for it but to go on with the ceremony.

Patiently, the shaykh waited until Tane had drained the last drop of water from the cup. Then he commanded:

Slowly, sonorously, Tane read the ancient words. He reached the end and paused expectantly. A hush had come over the entire assemblage. They, too, were waiting expectantly, and somewhat fearfully. For five minutes they waited soundlessly, but nothing happened. Then the old shaykh spoke.

"Dog!" he rasped. "You have betrayed us. You have not read the words correctly. We will give you one more chance. Read, and if the Lamia does not appear, I swear that we will hoist you on the stake."

"I have read them just as they are written here," Tane remonstrated. "However, I may have made some slight mistake in pronunciation. I'll try again."

Once more he pronounced the words of that ancient language. And once more, for some minutes, nothing followed but silence.

"O consort of camels and spawn of a disease!" shrieked the darwish. "Again you have betrayed us. Seize him, men, and place him upon the stake."

But before any of them could move to carry out the order of their leader, a strange thing happened. A tiny slit appeared in the tent wall behind Shaykh Ibrahim. Then a sinuous, glittering something wriggled through and with a swift dart fastened itself on the old man's wrist. For a moment it hung there in plain view of all; then as swiftly as it had come, it shot back through the opening and disappeared from view. The shaykh glanced at the hideous black-and-yellow thing that had clamped on his wrist —horrified unbelief written on his features. Then, as it withdrew, he collapsed soundlessly, his head sagging on the taboret between the two candles.

"She will slay us all," moaned another. A third man leaped up and ran shrieking from the tent. As he did so, the canvas wall was suddenly rent from top to bottom. Through the opening stepped the slender, regal figure Tane had seen in his dreams. She was enveloped from head to foot in a shimmering diaphanous veil that was like a phosphorescent mist, surrounding and but slightly dimming her lovely features and seductive curves. It was the first time Tane had seen her so beautiful.

But if the Bedouins were impressed by her loveliness, they did not linger to admire. As one man, they sprang to their feet and ran howling out into the night.

"Follow them, my lord," said the lovely apparition. "See that not one man remains on the oasis."

Though he was loth to tear his eyes from that witching vision, Tane obeyed. Standing before the door of the tent, he watched the Bedouins frantically mounting their camels and riding away, until no one remained. Then he turned and re-entered the tent. To his surprise, he found it deserted, save for the body of the old shaykh, whose grizzled head still rested on the taboret between the two guttering candles. With a muttered exclamation of amazement, he ran to the back of the tent and peered out through the slit in the wall. Behind it there was no one. Nothing but the tall, shadowy palm trees, their fronds rustling gently in the breeze. And beyond them, the rolling desert. From behind a distant dune he thought he heard the roar of a lion. Or was it an airplane motor? Sorely puzzled, he stood there, straining his eyes into the night. But he whirled, suddenly apprehensive, at sound of a human voice behind him.

Hagg Nadeem, wearing his green turban and brown burnoose, was standing in the middle of the tent, leaning on his Malacca stick and smiling his sweet, dreamy smile.

"Salam aleykum, effendi," he said, pleasantly. "You have come quite a way from home."

"So I was informed," replied the hagg. "Thinking you might not find it comfortable here, I came to take you back. No doubt you are hungry and thirsty. I have brought you food, and a thermos bottle of coffee."

"One moment, effendi. Patience is of Allah the Most High, but haste is of Shaitan the Stoned. First let me have a brief look around."

Swiftly the Egyptian strode over to where the shaykh's head lolled on the taboret. Stooping, he examined the man's wrist by the light of the sputtering candles. Tane, looking over his shoulder, saw two tiny punctures surrounded by a purple discoloration on the bony wrist. "Waha! Snake-bite!" he exclaimed. "Yes. It was a big black-and-yellow haje," Tane replied. "We all saw it quite plainly."

"That scum of the bazars I saw riding away must have seen something fearful to send them scurrying so swiftly."

"Still the careful scientist —the stubborn doubter —after all this! Your people have a saying that we believe only what we wish to believe, and it is evident that you do not wish to credit the evidence of your own eyes. However, in this case, I judge that you were not the only one who saw her."

"Hm." Nadeem raised the grizzled head of the shaykh and removed the parchment. "Ah! Interesting. They compelled you to read this, no doubt."

"Exactly. And they would have carried out the threat had you not complied. I know these ruffians. But come. There is no profit in lingering here any longer. You will be wanting that coffee and food. It is a long ride back to Cairo, but I have brought a swift, easy-gaited racing-camel with a comfortable litter. Or perhaps," with his dreamy smile, "I should have said that the camel brought me."

CHAPTER 9
Men or Jinn?

IT was well past midnight when Tane and Haag Nadeem, swaying wearily in their camel litter, entered the Bab al Fotun. Some fifteen minutes later the camel knelt before the American's doorway.

"Death hangs over your head, suspended on a thread thinner than that which supported the sword of Damocles," replied Nadeem, as Tane unlocked the door. "Shaykh Ibrahim represented only a minor menace. You have yet to deal with the most dangerous of your adversaries."

"Perhaps I could be better prepared to defend myself if you would tell me who they are," said Tane.

"That is just what I intend doing. But first, let us see if the house is clear of enemies."

Nadeem opened the door of the mandarah. All was dark within. Producing a flashlight from beneath his clothing, he projected a thin white beam into the room.

"Maskallah!" he exclaimed. "Well done, effendi. You have a most efficient servant. Already, he has furnished the reception room, and with considerable magnificence."

"What's that? Wait until I light the lamp. Why, this is amazing! I only gave him five pounds."

Tane quickly lighted an ornate brass lamp which the beam of Nadeem's flashlight had revealed hanging from the ceiling. Its mellow amber glow revealed the room completely furnished with a magnificence that would have done credit to a sultan's palace. And the air was fragrant with the odors of musk and sandalwood.

"Did you say five pounds?" queried the hagg. "If so, your man must be a wizard."

Tane stared at the rich tapestries and rare rugs that graced the walls, the brocaded door-curtains in which were woven golden threads, the thick, deep-piled rug on which they were standing, the diwans with their bright new mattresses and silken cushions, and the various taborets and articles of furniture which, collectively, must have cost a sizable fortune. To his astonishment he also saw that the wall which had been built in the alcove was torn out, and all traces of its presence obliterated. The diwans were restored as before, and a brazier of incense was smoldering in the niche.

"And these furnishings! Good Lord! Ali was always a sharp bargainer, but he must have mesmerized some merchant to get all this with the money he had with him."

Hagg Nadeem, meanwhile, parted the brocaded curtains that led to the hallway, and once more turning on his flashlight, shone it through the door of the next room.

"By my head and beard! The man is doubly a wizard!" he cried. "For this room is as richly furnished as the other."

"Well, there's only one way to find out," he said, finally. "We'll ask Ali. I suppose he is asleep upstairs."

THEY returned to the reception room, and Nadeem, with his flashlight, led the way up. Here, when Tane stepped into the room above, he once more gasped in amazement. For the majlis was furnished with even greater splendor than the rooms below.

"Here, what's this?" said Hagg Nadeem. His flashlight revealed the soles of a pair of cordovan slippers projecting from beneath a mattress on one of the diwans. Stiffly, Tane lighted the central hanging lamp, a priceless object of antique art, and hurried to the diwan. With the handle of his Malacca stick, Nadeem hooked the mattress and jerked it off the diwan. Beneath it lay Ali, shivering with fright, his head buried beneath his arms as if he would fend off a blow. Swiftly, he muttered the Takbir, the Testification of Faith, and the Fatihah, one after another.

"The fool thinks we are jinn," said Nadeem. "Iron is the talisman against the hosts of Jan ibn Jan, sultan of evil jinn. Something has frightened him half out of his wits."

"Clear out of them, I should say," said Tane. "Here, Ali," seizing his arm. "Look at me."

"Spare me, O brave and handsome emir of the jinn," moaned Ali. "Spare the basest of your slaves."

Impatiently, Tane clutched his arm and jerked him erect. The Syrian looked at him as if scarcely crediting the evidence of his senses.

"Don't you know me, idiot?" snapped his master. "What kind of dope have you been taking?"

"Have they gone, sidi? Is it really you, or are you a jinni who has taken the form of my master?"

"Hagg Nadeem and I just came in," said Tane. "We saw no jinn, nor anyone else. Tell us what happened. And where did you get all these gorgeous furnishings?"

"The jinniyah. More beautiful was she than a houri from the Gardens of the Blessed; slender and graceful as a willow wand, with raven tresses, languorous dark eyes, a brow of alabaster, cheeks like newly ripened peaches, lips red as crushed pomegranates, teeth that were matched pearls ——"

"She wore a crown of gold with two nodding white plumes, fronted by a golden, jewel-eyed serpent. And a filmy veil enveloped her. She was accompanied by a host of afreets, marids and peris, who did her bidding."

"Apparently he means the soldiers, workmen, slaves and others depicted in the tomb paintings," said Nadeem. "This is most remarkable!"

"I had bought the mattresses and supplies in accordance with your instructions, sidi," said Ali, "and on finding you absent when I returned from the souk, concluded that you had gone out on some private business. I prepared dinner, and awaited your coming until quite late. But when, long after sunset, you did not appear, I ate the cold food, made wuddu, and prayed the prayer al aisha. I then placed a mattress in the reception room and sat down beside a lighted candle to smoke my chibouk. Suddenly I heard the sound of footsteps in the hallway. I arose, and was about to investigate, when the sultana of the jinn entered the room. Behind her trooped a horde of afreets and marids, bearing boxes and bales on their backs. And with her were two great black shaitans with swords in their hands and horns on their heads."

"Precisely. About an hour after I saw Lamia on the oasis. Yet it took us five hours to ride back on a swift racing-camel. It seems that there are two of her."

"The jinniyah pointed to me," continued the Syrian, "and said to the two black shaitans: 'Seize him, and see that he does not escape.' Whereupon they rushed at me, brandishing their simitars, and dragged me to my feet.

"'Throw these filthy vermin-nests into the street,' she ordered one of the marids, and pointed to the mattresses I had bought. Then she set about giving orders to the others, to tear out the new wall, carry out the coffin, install a rug here, a taboret there, a tapestry here, and a curtain there, and to hang a lamp so, until the place looked like the salamlik of a palace. Then she moved from room to room, doing likewise in each, until the house was completely furnished.

"When all was finished, her slaves melted away, one by one, until there remained but the two black shaitans. Then she, too, disappeared, and one of those ebon sons of Ibless hurled me to a diwan in the majlis. 'Wait here until I come for you,' he commanded. 'Try to leave, and you will be cut into cat-meat.' He put out the lamp, and I waited here in the darkness, afraid to leave and afraid to remain. Presently, hearing your voices and footsteps, I thought the two shaitans had returned for me, and certain that my end had come, hid beneath the mattress."

"Did I not know you for a man of veracity, I should call you a colossal liar," said Tane, "even though you have plenty of evidence. But since the house has been emptied of demons, see if you can find some coffee, sugar and charcoal in the kitchen, and if so, prepare us some ahhwi helwh."

"Most remarkable," smiled the hagg. "The lady seems to be looking out for your material interests, as well as defending your life."

"I still can't believe it all. It seems like a dream. I might, in time, have come to believe in such creatures as Lamia is supposed to be, but I can hardly credit her with bringing a host of her subjects with her through the ages, to raid the palace of some wealthy pasha and bring me the loot. That's just a bit too thick."

"Ah, well," said Hagg Nadeem, proffering his cigarette case, "it may be that this mystery, like the other, will eventually unravel itself."

At this instant, Ali entered with the coffee. For some time they sipped and smoked in silence. Then Nadeem rose.

"I must go, now," he said. "I presume you will want a bowab and a cook. Tomorrow, I will send you two men whom I can recommend. The bowab is a powerful and trustworthy Nubian who will make an excellent guard. The cook is a Touareg, who adheres to the blue veil of his people. But his culinary skill is most remarkable."

"One moment," said Tane, rising. "You forgot to tell me the names of the two powerful enemies I am to look out for."

"So I did. The first is Maksoud, the hawk-nosed Persian you found reading the scroll. The other is Doctor Schneider."

"Hadrak," interrupted the hagg with his pleasant smile. "And remember, it will be to your interest to believe."

"See the hagg to the street door, Ali, ordered Tane. "And don't forget to bolt it."

IT was not until Hagg Nadeem had gone, and Ali had returned, that Tane suddenly remembered the loss of his forty-five. Also, he recalled that he had forgotten to ask the hagg the location of the secret passageway, with which his enemies were obviously familiar. Locking the door, after all, had been but a futile gesture.

"Looks as if we're up against it, Ali," he said, as his servant entered the majlis. "Those cutthroats can walk in on us any time they please, and my gun is gone."

"The jinn hung two gold-hilted yatagans above the niche in the reception room, sidi," said Ali.

Tane took one, and removed it from its plush-covered sheath. It proved to be of excellent steel and splendid workmanship, with an edge of almost razor sharpness.

"Well! We're not so badly off for weapons, after all," he said. "I'm going to turn in, now, and you'd better do the same. Sleep here in the majlis, and if you hear the slightest sound, awaken me."

Tane parted the heavy gold-embroidered hangings and went into his room. He found his diwan furnished with a mattress, coverlets and silken cushions that might have graced the bed of an opulent emir. Not bothering to light a lamp, he dropped the hangings, and undressed in the moonlight. He was dead-tired, and that magnificently furnished couch was most inviting. As he tumbled in among the cushions Ali blew out the lamp in the majlis.

Placing the yatagan under the cover beside him, Tane settled down and tried to sleep. But it seemed that sleep was impossible. Presently, however, he heard the regular breathing of the Syrian in the next room, and shortly thereafter slipped into unconsciousness.

Tane's awakening was both sudden and unpleasant. There was something encircling his throat —something that bit painfully into the flesh and shut off his breath so quickly that his palate rattled. He had been lying on his side with his face toward the window, and instinctively tried to sit up. But he was immediately jerked back. Then two sets of knuckles pressed into his cervical vertebrae and the cord about his throat tightened relentlessly. He struggled spasmodically. The moonlit room seemed whirling about him, then turned to a maelstrom of black nothingness which he knew was the precursor of death.

CHAPTER 10
The Stranglers

WITH the awful realization that death was upon him, Tane suddenly recalled the yatagan at his side. Still on the borderline of consciousness, he grasped it, wrenched it from its sheath, and with all his remaining strength, drove the point straight back over his shoulder at his unseen assailant. It encountered something solid, there was a gurgling gasp behind him, and the weapon stuck. Then the strangling cord about his throat relaxed and the pressure of those boring knuckles ceased.

For more than a minute Tane lay there, struggling to get his breath. Gradually his vision cleared, and he sat up, swinging his feet over the edge of the diwan. They encountered the body of a man, lying on his back with the yatagan projecting upward from his face. The point had plunged through his right eye into the brain, and the blade had wedged in the bony orbit.

Suddenly Tane became conscious of the fact that there was a struggle going on in the majlis. He stood up dizzily. Then, placing his foot on the bearded face of his vanquished enemy, he wrenched the blade free and staggered to the door.

The moonlight revealed a sight that made his blood boil. Two assassins had dragged Ali from his diwan and spread-eagled him on the floor, each gripping a wrist. A third knelt on his back, holding a narrow strangling-cord which passed around the Syrian's throat, his knuckles pressing the helpless servant's cervical vertebrae.

With a shout of rage, Tane raised his yatagan and lurched toward them. The two men holding the Syrian's arms instantly sprang erect, and whipping out their simitars, charged the American. Ali was apparently too weak to struggle further, for he lay quietly, the third man still kneeling on his back.

Tane parried a vicious head-cut from the foremost assailant, and countered with a swift shoulder-cut which, only partly deflected, slightly wounded his opponent. But while the American's blade was still extended, the second assassin caught him unguarded with a swift neck-cut. Tane stepped back, but not far enough, and the point of the simitar raked his chest beneath his chin, making a long gash from which the blood spurted.

As he drew to avoid that blade, Tane saw something else —a sinuous, scaly something which darted up and fastened itself on the arm of the man who knelt on Ali's back. As he came on guard again, Tane saw the strangler topple, then pitch sideways and roll over on his back beside his victim.

Tane's two remaining opponents were circling now, to the right and left. Realizing that with this stratagem they would soon have him at their mercy, he reeled backward until his shoulders struck the wall. Had he been able to reach a corner he would have been better able to defend himself. As it was, the wall only afforded partial protection by keeping his enemies from getting behind him. Though he had recovered somewhat from the strangulation, he was losing blood rapidly, and felt himself growing weaker. Both his assailants seemed to realize this, and sprang in together to the attack.

By simultaneously dodging one blade and parrying the other, Tane was able to manoeuvre himself into position for a lunge at the fellow on his right. The man leaped back, easily avoiding his point, then grunted, dropped his simitar, and pitched to the floor. For the scaly, serpentine thing had suddenly flashed upward and attached itself to the calf of his leg.

Now left with but one enemy, Tane, despite his weakened condition, forced the fight. His strength was ebbing fast, and although he knew that he was a better swordsman than the man he faced, he realized that he must win quickly, if at all. He raised his blade, and brought it down in a sweeping moulinet, as if he would lay the fellow's head open. But as the simitar was raised to parry, he swiftly drew back his weapon and lunged straight for the hairy throat. The point went true to the mark, and the last enemy collapsed, strangling in his own blood.

But Tane had reached the limit of his endurance. He staggered toward Ali, and fell on his face. By exerting every ounce of his remaining strength, he managed to get to his hands and knees, and crawl to the side of his servant. With trembling fingers, he undid the cord that was twisted around Ali's neck. Then he collapsed beside him, conscious, but too weak even to sit up.

Suddenly he was aware, by the golden radiance which suffused the room, that someone had lighted a lamp. A soft musical voice was murmuring in his ear in the language of ancient Egypt, and the scent of an exotic perfume mingled with the tang of blood in his nostrils.

A small hand reached beneath his shoulder, assisting him to turn over, and dimly, through the swimming haze of his receding senses, he saw her. Behind her stood two giant negroes —or were they negroes? They wore the dress of harem guards of old Egypt —slaves who had been dust for five thousand years. And from each towering, woolly head sprouted a pair of horns.

From the negroes, Tane looked dazedly back at the slender, lovely girl who wore the ancient golden crown with its uraeus and nodding plumes. With deft, sure hands, she undid his slashed pajamas and examined the wound in his chest.

Instantly, one of the giant blacks knelt beside her, saying: "To hear is to obey, Majesty," and tendered a brass basin, in the center of which was a small sponge. She took it up, and the negro poured water on it from a brass ewer.

Gently she bathed the gaping wound. Then she called for ointment, bandages and gum, which the other black instantly tendered. The ointment, which had a pungent and not unpleasing smell, instantly stopped the bleeding and, at the same time, deadened the pain. Then she applied the bandages, fastening them in place with bits of the gum, which hardened almost instantly when exposed to the air.

"Later, my lord," she replied. "Do not worry about him. He is breathing, and unwounded." She arose. "Carry my lord to his couch," she ordered.

The two black giants lifted the six-foot American as easily as if he had been a child, and carried him into his bedchamber. The girl followed them, lighting the lamp in a manner which greatly puzzled him. For all he saw her do was point her index finger at it, whereupon it flamed up as if a match had been applied. After the two blacks had lowered Tane to the diwan, they stood back, one at the head and the other at the foot, with arms folded.

"Now attend to the other," she ordered them. "And, Anpu, bring me water and a cup."

As the two negroes departed to do her bidding, she knelt beside the diwan and laid her hand on Tane's forehead. "No fever," she murmured. "That is good."

Tane was thrilled by the touch of that soft, velvety palm, and by the look of concern in the big black eyes. Why, this girl was real —she was human! She must be. And yet, when he looked more closely, what he saw through the filmy veil she wore made him gasp. For the white skin of her arms and body was covered with tiny, glistening scales!

Anpu, the black giant, strode into the room carrying gugglet and cup, which he presented, kneeling, to the divine creature at Tane's side.

Then she took a tiny phial from a small pouch that hung at her jeweled girdle. Carefully, she dropped five drops of the bright red liquid it contained into the cup of water. Then she took the cup from the negro, and held it to Tane's lips.

Tane drank it off. He felt a pleasant, tingling sensation. Then it seemed that he was drifting away on a soft, billowy cloud —and oblivion claimed him.

CHAPTER 11
Three-Cornered Combat

WHEN Tane awoke, the slanting rays of the morning sun were streaming in through the mashrabiyeh window above his diwan. His first thought was of the slender, beautiful creature who had been beside him when he drifted into unconsciousness. She had disappeared as mysteriously as she had appeared, but the memory of her presence lingered. And Tane found that memory far more attractive than he cared to admit, even to himself. Was he falling in love? He, an engaged man, falling in love with this strange creature? Preposterous! And yet, when he compared her with Shirley Blane, his plump, vivacious, red-headed English fiancée, he realized that she drew him far more powerfully.

Why, this was madness! He must rid himself of this creature, somehow. What was this mysterious spell she had cast over him, with her languorous glances and her slim, dark beauty?

He sat up, and was instantly conscious of a stiffness across his chest. Looking down, he saw the bandages, fastened with amber-yellow gum, which she had applied. Strangely enough, the wound did not pain him. The effect of the ointment she had applied was little short of magical. The only soreness that remained was that of his throat, where the strangler's cord had come so close to finishing him.

He swung his bare feet over the edge of the diwan, then jerked the right one back with a start of surprise. It had come in contact with the stiffened fingers of a corpse. The dead strangler, evidently a Persian, lay where he had fallen, one eye staring glassily, the other a hideous, bloody mess.

Stepping gingerly over the cadaver, Tane strode across the deep-piled carpet into the majlis. There lay the other three assassins, Persians all, just as they had fallen. But Ali was sleeping heavily, and snoring most unmusically on his couch. Tane noticed a significant red line crossing his sharp Adam's apple, where the strangler's cord had been.

Suddenly conscious of a persistent knocking on the street door, below, Tane thought at first to awaken his servant, then decided to let the poor fellow sleep, and hurried down to answer the summons himself.

Haag Nadeem, wearing his green turban, brown cloak and pensive smile, and leaning on his Malacca stick, was at the door. Behind him stood a large, broad shouldered negro.

"Es salant aleykum," greeted the hagg. "I have brought you Isa, the bowab I promised. The Touareg cook will be here in time to prepare the noonday meal."

"Thanks a lot," Tane replied. "Isa is hired, and may take charge of the door at once. Can you spare a few minutes?"

One by one, he examined the cadavers. "Two fell by the sword, and two by snake-bite," he pronounced. "Tell me about it."

Tane related his adventures of the night before, concluding with: "And now I suppose I'll be held for murder, manslaughter, or something of the sort."

He went to the window, and taking a small whistle from beneath his sash, raised it to his lips and blew a shrill blast. Instantly, there was a rush of footsteps below, then the sound of many men mounting the stairway. A moment later, twelve burly native policemen hurried into the room.

"To the rug shop of Maksoud, the Persian," Nadeem said, "and leave them there with the compliments of Tane Effendi."

"Prepare breakfast for two, Ali," Tane said, "and serve it in the mandarah—"

"For one, only, if you please," said Nadeem. "You'll excuse me, effendi, I'm sure, for I have breakfasted and some urgent business claims my attention."

"Why, of course, if you must go. But first, if you have time, I'd like you to show me that secret passageway."

He led the way down the stairway, through the reception room and down the hallway toward the kitchen. A few feet beyond the kitchen door he paused, reached up into a small niche for utensils, and removing several pots and pans, pulled the ledge outward. A section of the wall three feet wide and seven feet high instantly swung inward, revealing a flight of narrow stone steps.

Nadeem took out his flashlight and descended the steps, Tane following closely behind him. They descended to a narrow underground passageway, which led to another flight of steps that ascended steeply. Climbing these, the hagg slid back the bolt of a door, and Tane saw they were in the narrow gangway between his house and the one just south of it, with easy access to the street.

"No, effendi. I wish I did. But, for some time past, I have been watching it for reasons of my own, and have learned a few of its secrets."

They closed the door which, Tane observed, perfectly matched the surrounding wall and returned to the reception room.

"And now, effendi," said Nadeem, with his pensive smile, "I must leave you. I do not anticipate any danger for you today, but tonight, beware. Isa knows the Touareg cook, and will admit him when he arrives. He is absolutely trustworthy. Salam aleykum."

Tane finished his breakfast of toast, grilled lamb chops and coffee, which Ali had prepared, and lighting a cigarette, made his way back to the kitchen. Opening the door to the secret passageway, he lighted a lamp and went through to the opposite door. After a careful examination, he found and disconnected the lever which operated the bolt from the outside. Then he returned to the door which led into the kitchen. But he could find no way of fastening it so that it could not be opened from the stairway; so he sent Ali out for some bolts, lumber and tools with which he was able to fasten it, so that nothing short of a battering-ram could move it.

He had just finished, and was contemplating the result of his labors, when a strange figure shuffled into the kitchen. The newcomer was swathed in a flowing burnoose and head-cloth of many folds, and his features were covered by a blue veil.

"I am Akhamouk, the cook, sent by Hagg Nadeem," he said in Arabic, his voice harsh and rasping. "You are Tane Effendi?"

"As much of you as is visible," Tane replied. "You have honest eyes and capable-looking hands. But the main consideration is that the hagg recommended you. You're hired."

"Allah's bounty and his blessing upon you, sidi," rasped the veiled man, and he immediately set to work among the pots and pans.

Tane returned to the reception room and the efficient Ali promptly brought him a narghile, with charcoal glowing. As he puffed fragrant wisps of smoke from the purring, bubbling pipe, the American ruminated on the odd and extremely dangerous situation in which he found himself. Despite her strange appearances and disappearances, despite even the tiny scales he had seen on her shapely body, he could not bring himself to believe that the lovely creature who had been weaving in and out of the strange fabric of his experiences, was other than a real flesh-and-blood human like himself. Suddenly, he realized that this was what he wanted to believe, and that his attitude was far from impersonal and scientific. The facts, weigh them as he would, pointed to the Lamia theory. And a true scientist must find according to the facts, regardless of how preposterous the conclusion might seem. It was obvious that Doctor Schneider and Maksoud the Persian both believed in the reality of the Lamia. And Shaykh Ibrahim believed so devoutly and wanted her so intensely that he had given up his life in an effort to possess her.

Then there was Hagg Nadeem, the mystic, the inscrutable. Where did he fit into this outré jigsaw puzzle? He had admitted, just this morning, that he had been watching the house of Doctor Schneider for some time. Why? Had he, also, been interested in gaining possession of the Lamia?

TANE finished his narghile and prowled about the house, examining the rare fabrics and furnishings, every one of which was a valuable collector's piece in excellent condition.

Akhamouk cooked an excellent lunch, which Tane barely touched. Then he returned to a fresh narghile to ponder, and to make plans against the ominous coming of the night.

Isa, the new bowab, was armed with a heavy simitar and dagger. The Touareg, also, had a simitar and a pair of daggers. And he and Ali had their yatagans. Tane wore his, belted at his waist, and as evening approached, ordered the Syrian to do the same.

Dinner over, Tane again sought the solace of the water-pipe, and innumerable tiny cups of sirupy coffee. He resolved that this night he would remain awake. Tomorrow there would be time enough for sleep —if for him there was to be a tomorrow.

Midnight came without incident. Lighting a lamp, Tane made the rounds. Isa was sleeping on his mattress behind the street door. The Touareg was slumbering on the diwan in his small room just off the kitchen. And Ali, lying on his couch in the majlis, twitched in his sleep and muttered incoherently of jinn and houris.

Returning to the reception room, Tane refilled his pipe, and applying the charcoal, seated himself once more on the diwan. He had just gotten the tobacco well alight when he heard the sound of footsteps in the courtyard. Then the door swung open, and in waddled a rotund figure in burnoose and head-cloth, a corner of the latter drawn across the face. Despite the fact that the features were concealed, Tane recognized the figure and walk of Doctor Schneider.

The doctor advanced to the middle of the floor and stopped. Behind him marched a score of Bedouins, the lamplight glinting on the naked blades in their hands.

For a moment Tane was so astounded he was unable to speak. Then he gained the mastery of his voice.

"Good evening, Herr Doktor," he said, pleasantly. "This is an unexpected pleasure."

"So! You know me, eh? Vell, it don't matter, anyvay. You von't live long to do any talking." Throwing back the corner of his head-cloth, he glared down at the American. The Bedouins advanced menacingly, but the doctor bade them halt.

"You should ask! You robber! You snake-in-the-grass! You stole Lamia from me —me who vorked und slaved und fought to bring her here —und you ask vot it is all about! I haff brought the scroll und the magic candles, und if you do not summon her und turn her over to me, my men vill cut you into small pieces!"

Tane looked up in astonishment, at the sound of a strange voice. Maksoud, the hawk-nosed Persian, was just entering the reception room through the door used by the doctor and his Bedouins. And behind Maksoud there trooped a score of his countrymen, stout fellows all, with simitars in their hands.

"O dog, and son of a dog, you know full well what I want and what I will have! You purchased my interest in certain other things, and all that is settled between us. But the Lamia was half mine, and for my interest in her you paid me nothing. In the dead of night, you stole away from our desert camp with her, and hired the accursed Shaykh Ibrahim, may Allah not accept him, to bring her here in a funeral procession."

"Vell. Vat about you? Stole into mein house, broke mein head, und tried to raise her, yourself, before this American interfered, und cheated both of us."

"It is that, and one other score I have come to settle with the American," said Maksoud. "If he does not make me Lord of the Lamia, then will my men roast him in his own oven and feed his flesh to the jackals. As for you, depart in peace, leaving me this house, these furnishings and her, and I will consider the score settled between us."

"Not on your life, Maksoud. It is you who vill leave, not I. Come back tomorrow, und I vill see that the Lamia makes you more vealthy than the shah."

"Or, perhaps, that she sends me to paradise. No, traitor, I do not trust you. But if you will leave now, peaceably, I will swear by the triple oath—"

"Vot do I care for your triple oaths? Vy should I trust you, who do not trust me?"

Maksoud issued a swift order to his men in Persian. Two of them sprang for Tane. The rest charged the doctor and his Bedouins.

Whipping out his yatagan, Tane stepped up on the diwan with his back to the wall, and awaited the attack.

Before he crossed blades with his two assailants, he was surprised to see the doctor draw his own simitar and leap into the fray. A moment later, he and Maksoud were engaged in a deadly combat, while the blades of their men clashed around them, mingled with shouts, groans, and cries of: "Persian pigs who pray without washing! Heretics! Defilers!" from the Bedouins. And: "Horse-thieves and robbers! Schismatics! Scum of the desert!" from the Persians.

But Tane had no time to view the general mélée, for he found himself engaged with two skilled swordsmen, either of whom would have made a formidable antagonist for him alone.

CHAPTER 12
The Cache

TANE managed to parry the first blow of the swordsman on his right, and counter with a return cut that gashed the fellow's face. But in doing so, he was forced to catch the weapon of his other antagonist on a cushion he had snatched up from the diwan, and it proved but a poor shield. For though it softened the blow, the blade cut through and bit into the bone of his left arm so that it dangled uselessly.

Another moment and he must have succumbed, had it not been that, at this instant, a blue-veiled figure dashed in from the hallway and engaged one of his opponents. It was Akhamouk, the Touareg cook, who, fighting with simitar and dagger, instantly made the Persian on the right give ground.

Tane recovered and went after his remaining opponent, hammer and tongs. Then, at a shout from Maksoud, another Persian separated himself from the mélée, and once more Tane found himself between two assailants. But this time it was Ali who dashed to his rescue, suddenly popping out from behind the curtains that concealed the stairway. After that, the American quickly dropped his man with a blow that split the skull.

During a moment's breathing-space, Tane saw that more than half of the doctor's Bedouins were on the floor, and the others were rapidly giving ground before the superior ability of the fierce Persian swordsmen. These desert men were doughty fighters when mounted, but here, on foot, the Persian warriors had them at a disadvantage because they were out of their element.

There was another sharp command from Maksoud, and four more of his men left the general scrimmage to attack Tane, Ali and Akhamouk.

Ali was cursing as he fought, but the Touareg was taunting his foes —laughing, jesting as he slashed and parried. Soon but a small handful of the Bedouins remained. In the midst of them stood the doctor, bleeding from half a dozen wounds, and still striving to reach his opponent, Maksoud, with his blade, while the latter's men hemmed them in on all sides.

Suddenly Tane heard the shrill sound of a whistle beside him —a whistle that sounded strangely familiar. It seemed to issue from beneath the blue veil worn by the Touareg.

At the sound of that blast, Isa, the huge negro bowab, charged into the room swinging his long simitar. And behind him came a horde of native soldiers with rifles and fixed bayonets.

At sight of the rifles in the hands of the soldiers, the contestants instantly threw down their weapons and raised their hands in surrender.

Then, to Tane's astonishment, the Touareg tore off his veil, shed his huge burnoose and cumbrous head-cloth, and stood revealed, a slender, suave, smiling figure in a brown burnoose and green turban.

"Place those brawlers under arrest," ordered Nadeem. "See to the wounded, and carry the dead out into the courtyard."

He turned to Tane. "Come, effendi. You have a pretty bad arm. Let's go to the bathroom and I'll bind it up for you. I have some slight medical skill."

"Slight, did you say? You are modest. I understand you have the right to place an M. D. after your name. But whether it's true or not, I could stand some attention. The thing is beginning to throb like the very devil."

THE efficient Ali placed a lamp for them in the bathroom and departed to the kitchen to brew coffee.

"You certainly fooled me neatly," said Tane, when Nadeem was putting the final touches to his bandaged arm. "Why, you looked more like a Touareg than a Touareg does."

"One of my favorite disguises," smiled the hagg. "I pride myself on carrying it off rather well. But I have not fooled you half so badly as this Doctor Schneider has fooled me."

"Why, it must have been carried off by the 'jinn,' as Ali called them, when they brought in the furnishings and tore out the partition."

"No, it wasn't. I happened to know that the coffin they carried out of the alcove contained the badly defunct corpse of Wardan, the bowab, and nothing else worth mentioning. The doctor evidently exchanged the corpse for the mummy-case while I was taking you to my house."

Tane looked curiously at this slender, mysterious man, who knew so much and told so little.

"Very well, if it's a secret," he said. "Let's go up into the majlis for pipes and coffee. The reception room is a mess."

"For that mummy-case. It is concealed somewhere in this house. Of that I am positive. And in that place of concealment I expect to find something of the utmost importance to me."

"Wait! Hold everything! I have an idea." Tane suddenly fished in his pocket, and bringing out the gilded and lacquered sliver he had found in the bathroom two days before, handed it to the hagg.

Nadeem examined it intently for a moment. "Where did you find this?" he asked, excitedly.

"I picked it up right where you are standing, the day after I enjoyed your hospitality."

"Wallah! So the doctor brought it here. Then the entrance to the secret hiding-place that has eluded me for so long must be in this very room." Swiftly, excitedly, he began a detailed examination of every part of the bathroom. Presently he cried out triumphantly and pointed to a tiny bit of red lacquer adhering to the edge of the tiles where they met the bottom of the built-in tub.

"It's there, effendi," he shouted. "There beneath the tub. Now to discover the secret of the mechanism."

He examined the faucets, turned them, and water came forth. He closed them again and pulled on them, but nothing happened. Then his eye fell on the shower, fixed to the ceiling overhead. Stepping up on the edge of the tub, he grasped the shower and pulled. Instantly the tub began to rise.

Leaping to the tiles, Nadeem waited while the tub continued to travel upward until it stood about five feet above the floor on four thick iron pipes —evidently raised by hydraulic pressure. Beneath it, a flight of stone steps led downward into the darkness.

Snatching the lamp, Nadeem plunged down the steps, Tane at his heels. They found themselves in a large, square storeroom, stacked high with bales and boxes.

In the center of the room stood the mummy-case. But Nadeem did not even notice it. Instead, he rushed to one of the boxes, pried off the lid with his dagger, and reached inside. He pulled out a packet and tore it open, spilling part of its contents of dried leaves.

"Hashish!" exclaimed Nadeem excitedly. "Bales of it! Boxes of it! Several tons of it, at the very least! The greatest hashish cache ever discovered by the secret police of any nation! And for this discovery and the apprehension of the smugglers, my friend, I owe much to you. But come, there is yet one thing to be done —one most important thing."

"I must rid you of Lamia —send her back to that long sleep from which you took her when you read the ancient scroll by the light of the two magic candles. I should destroy her, perhaps, for she is a terrible creature, a thing of evil, and so far as I can learn, the last of her kind to retain the corporeal link which makes her physical manifestation to mankind possible. But she has served my purpose well, and it would be base ingratitude on my part to destroy that last link for her."

"I love her more than life itself —more than anyone or anything on this earth."

Nadeem lighted one of his long cigarettes and puffed reflectively for a moment. "But are you not engaged to marry a charming English girl, a Miss Shirley Mason?"

"You are mad. Yet, after all, I might have expected this —the fatal charm of the Lamia is irresistible to mortal man, save to those few adepts and philosophers who really understand her."

"It were best," said Hagg Nadeem, "that I show you. I have the power to destroy her corporeal existence, but not to send her back to her long sleep unharmed. Only you can do that, for you are her lord. She sleeps now, as her labors have been arduous and her awakening was but recent."

CHAPTER 13
Unweaving the Rainbow

NADEEM raised the lid of the mummy-case with one hand, and held the lamp so that it lighted the interior. "Look," he said.

Tane peered inside, and saw a snake which looked exactly like the one he had first seen in the same case. It seemed to be in a torpor, its long scaly body coiled limply, its head resting inside the rim of the brilliant white-plumed diadem which Lamia had worn.

"She sleeps," he said, "but she knows. Very shortly now, she will materialize and attempt to defeat my plans. For corporeal life is very sweet to her, and she has not had a human lover for three thousand years, though at her last awakening she loved and destroyed many."

"I don't care who she is or what she is —human, reptile or demon —or whether she has had a million lovers and killed them all," said Tane vehemently. "I love her."

"Subhanullah!" he exclaimed. "There is none so blind as a fool in love. Well then, I'll test the integrity of your affection. Do you love her enough to keep her from being destroyed?"

"Very well. Then understand this. Either you will send her back to her long sleep, or I will destroy her utterly."

He paused suddenly and looked at the mummy-case. Little scuffling noises were coming from inside it.

Hurriedly he dragged two packing-boxes to positions at the head and foot of the coffin. Then he drew two candles from his pockets, and Tane recognized that they were identical in size, shape and color, with the ones he had first seen in the niche. After lighting the candles, the hagg drew a ring from his pocket —a massive ring of yellow gold in which was mounted a tremendous ruby that flashed like fire in the artificial light. And Tane saw that on the face of the ruby was engraved a great six-pointed star formed from two equilateral triangles, while in the central, six-sided space was a word written in characters, which he, linguist and archaeologist though he was, could not decipher.

The rustlings in the casket grew louder, there were some thumping sounds, and once Tane thought he heard a suppressed moan.

Nadeem now jerked a flexible golden scroll from beneath his garments and handed it to Tane.

"After I order her back," he said, "you must read this. If you do so, she will only return to her long sleep. And if you do not, I will annihilate her utterly, for I have the power, here." He tapped the great ruby on his finger significantly.

"Read it over now, and you will see that although it is a command, it is gently and politely worded."

He was interrupted by a sound from the mummy-case, as the lid suddenly heaved upward and crashed to the floor. Nadeem snatched the scroll from his hands as he looked toward the casket above the lid of which two dimpled white arms projected.

Tane stared, fascinated, as the nodding white plumes, the jeweled diadem, and then the lovely head and shoulders of Lamia appeared above the rim. She yawned prettily, stretched, and stood up, her clinging diaphanous garment revealing every ravishing charm of her slender, supple figure.

With pantherish grace, she stepped out of the casket, and pausing for a moment, smiled at Tane, completely ignoring the presence of the hagg.

And Tane, as he looked into those twin pools of loveliness, in whose depths were mirrored the sum total of all his desires and all his yearnings, forgot the presence of the Egyptian.

She did not advance, but stood there with arms held out to him, red lips tremulous, eyes starry, snowy bosom heaving.

"Take me, my lord," she pleaded. "Save me —keep me for yourself —and I will be your slave, always."

Mechanically, haltingly, yet drawn by a power which he could not resist, Tane stepped forward like a sleep-walker. And dimly, as in some elusive dream, he heard the voice of the hagg:

"Lamia, beloved!" he cried, and the cry was half a sob. Then he caught her to him, and was aware of a fiery pleasure in the touch of her slender body, her small firm breasts and the soft arms that clung around his neck. Eagerly he claimed her upturned lips, and found in them a passionate response that sent rivulets of fire surging through his veins and made him oblivious to all else.

For but a moment he was permitted to taste a bliss which had been vouchsafed to no other man of his day, but in that single moment he knew he had lived through an eternity of sweet passion. Then the voice of Nadeem broke sharply through to his consciousness.

"Enough, effendi. Release her if you would not have her destroyed in your arms."

Tane let her go and stepped back, then gasped in amazement at sight of the change which had suddenly taken place in the lovely apparition. She was looking at Hagg Nadeem, and the eyes that had been starry with love now gleamed with venomous hatred, the hands that had been gentle and caressing were drawn up like rending claws, and the white teeth were bared in a bestial snarl.

"Away, meddling magician!" she shrieked, and her voice broke like that of a hag. "Away, or you will die as died the others who opposed my will in ages past! Think you that you can frighten me with your puny delving into the black arts? You and your talisman-hawking brethren have no power over such as I."

"That is true," replied Hagg Nadeem, "but there is One who has power over all creatures, who has been called by many names, but whose real name is engraved on this ring which I wear."

He suddenly extended his right hand, exposing the great ruby on his finger. At sight of it Lamia paled, drew back trembling with fear.

"You can read it as well as I," he continued. "Would you like to hear it pronounced by an adept?"

She clapped her hands over her eyes as if to shut out the brilliance of that great ruby.

"I thought not," he replied, "for this is the seal ring of Sulayman Baalshem, Lord of the Name, the ring which gave him power over the beasts of the field and the fowls of the air, over men and angels and devils and jinn, and even over such creatures as you."

"A feeling of gratitude has prompted me to withhold your destruction," he said; "so I am permitting your lord to send you back to your long sleep, unharmed."

Tane took the scroll and opened it, glancing for a moment at the ancient characters. Then he read slowly, sonorously, in the language of ancient Egypt:

"Lamia, lovely slave of mine, daughter of the beautiful god Re, and of Pilatre, Princess of the Two Lands, I, your lord who bade you awaken, now bid you sleep once more. And by the power of the charm of Osiris, King of the Dead, conceived of the Lord of the Two Truths and known only to a chosen few, you will sleep on for ever, unless or until I, or another of my enlightenment, shall once more bid you awaken."

As he glanced up from his reading he was amazed to see that a change was already taking place in the slender figure before him. The tiny scales which he had once before noted on her white skin were rapidly enlarging. Her head was changing form, flattening above, elongating in front, and her arms and legs were shrinking. She took the diadem from her head and deposited it in the casket. Hagg Nadeem removed a small roll of linen bandage from a pocket and holding one end, tossed it to her so that it unrolled into a thin streamer.

She caught it in a rapidly shrinking hand, and suddenly rising on tiptoe like a ballet dancer, began whirling so rapidly that the long bandage formed a series of spiral loops around her, while her figure inside it was but a blur of motion.

"Farewell, dear lord," she called, her voice sunken to a hissing whisper. "You know it not, but I loved you before, love you still, and will love you through all eternity."

She was standing in the center of the mummy-case now, whirling with the speed of a spinning top. Swiftly the folds of the encircling linen drew closer together, until they formed a narrow, upright cylinder about two inches in diameter and four feet in height. Tane was reminded of a caterpillar spinning its cocoon. And like an inert cocoon, the cylinder presently ceased its whirling and dropped below the casket rim.

Tane sprang forward and saw the mummied serpent just as he had seen it when he had first opened the mummy-case, its head resting on the inner rim of the diadem. He spoke huskily.

"Tomorrow," replied Nadeem, "I will load her upon the back of a camel and return her to her secret tomb in the Libyan Desert."

"Only two men besides myself know the location of her tomb," said the hagg, "and these two will spend the rest of their natural lives behind prison bars."

"Precisely. For the past ten years I have been trailing the members of the biggest hashish syndicate this country has ever seen. Oh, I have caught the small fry, time and again. But I was never able to reach the principals. And until just recently I did not know who they were.

"Never mind how, but some time ago I discovered that this vast syndicate was controlled by two supposedly respectable individuals —Doctor Schneider the archaeologist, and Maksoud the Persian rug-dealer. I learned that these two men were close friends, closer than Damon and Pythias, and that they trusted each other, but no one else.

"Time and again I caught one or another of their subordinates with the deadly drug, and found ways to make them talk. But these petty criminals did not even know who paid them. I knew, but I had no legal proof. And I soon saw that unless I could find some means of separating these two fast friends —of making them hate each other —I should probably never be able to convict them or break up their illicit syndicate.

"I racked my brain for a plan, and it was while I was going through the ancient documents left me by my illustrious forebears that I hit upon a plan. Among the papyrus scrolls was one which told of the burial-place of the Lamia and the scroll which would awaken her. I knew that if these two fast friends were given something they could not divide it was inevitable that they should quarrel. The Lamia, more desirable than all the gold that either could amass, was something they could not divide.

"I made a copy of the scroll on some ancient blank papyrus and contrived to have it brought to the attention of the two friends when they were together, so there was no chance of either concealing the secret from the other. They took the Lamia from her ancient tomb, quarreled as I had foreseen, and as a result of that quarrel, Doctor Schneider bought out Maksoud's half-interest in the hashish syndicate, but beggared himself in paying for it.

"Of course he had this tremendous cache of the drug here, but my men were watching this place so closely that he did not dare attempt to dispose of any great quantity of it. In the meantime, he had stolen away from the desert camp with the mummy-case, and devised the ruse with which you are familiar for bringing it here.

"But he needed money to pay for the false funeral and other current expenses, and in leasing this house to you, accomplished the double purpose of obtaining the gold and directing suspicion away from his huge store of hashish, which, through a number of secret passageways known to him, he had the means of reaching at any time it pleased him to do so."

"The house is honeycombed with them. I knew all the old ones because it happened that the house was once the property of my family, and the old plans came into my hands. For instance, I can tell you that tonight the doctor and the Persian, finding the passageway through the kitchen blocked, came in through another which leads underground from one of their hiding-places and comes up under the fountain in the courtyard, which can be swung to one side by means of a pivot. But the bathroom was an innovation installed by the doctor. I should have been wise enough to look there first of all, but perhaps it was too obvious. Of course your coming on the scene was not within my calculations at all, but you worked along with me so well that it did not upset them. Had either the doctor or Maksoud become Lord of the Lamia, I should have been compelled to destroy her. But as things turned out, I am grateful both to you and her, and have refrained."

"God knows it was bad enough to have to send her back to that serpentine form," said Tane with a touch of bitterness, for every cell in his body still yearned for the lovely creature he had held in his arms.

"Come, come, my friend, you must be a true philosopher. You have escaped a great evil that would have destroyed your very soul."

"I can't help feeling that it would have been worth it," Tane retorted. "Besides, I'm afraid I am more of a poet than a philosopher, for I hold with Keats:

"Philosophy will clip an angel's wings,
Conquer all mysteries by rule and line,
Empty the haunted air, and gnomèd mine —
Unweave a rainbow—

"I can't recall the rest of it, but let that suffice —for you have unwoven my rainbow."

THE END

OTIS ADELBERT KLINE

LORD OF THE LAMIA

Serialised in Weird Tales, Mar-May, 1935

This e-book edition: Roy Glashan's Library, 2025
Version Date: 2025-08-14
Produced by Matthias Kaether and Roy Glashan

All original content added by RGL is proprietary and protected by copyright.

Click here for more books by this author

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1
Saint's Miracle

CHAPTER 2.
Drugged Sherbet

CHAPTER 3
A Very Strange Mummy

CHAPTER 4
Real or Unreal?

CHAPTER 5
Hagg Nadeem

CHAPTER 6
The Visitation

CHAPTER 7
Kidnapped

CHAPTER 8
The Oasis

CHAPTER 9
Men or Jinn?

CHAPTER 10
The Stranglers

CHAPTER 11
Three-Cornered Combat

CHAPTER 12
The Cache

CHAPTER 13
Unweaving the Rainbow

THE END

OTIS ADELBERT KLINE

LORD OF THE LAMIA

Serialised in Weird Tales, Mar-May, 1935 This e-book edition: Roy Glashan's Library, 2025 Version Date: 2025-08-14 Produced by Matthias Kaether and Roy Glashan All original content added by RGL is proprietary and protected by copyright. Click here for more books by this author

TABLE OF CONTENTS

CHAPTER 1 Saint's Miracle

CHAPTER 2. Drugged Sherbet

CHAPTER 3 A Very Strange Mummy

CHAPTER 4 Real or Unreal?

CHAPTER 5 Hagg Nadeem

CHAPTER 6 The Visitation

CHAPTER 7 Kidnapped

CHAPTER 8 The Oasis

CHAPTER 9 Men or Jinn?

CHAPTER 10 The Stranglers

CHAPTER 11 Three-Cornered Combat

CHAPTER 12 The Cache

CHAPTER 13 Unweaving the Rainbow

THE END

Serialised in Weird Tales, Mar-May, 1935

This e-book edition: Roy Glashan's Library, 2025
Version Date: 2025-08-14
Produced by Matthias Kaether and Roy Glashan

All original content added by RGL is proprietary and protected by copyright.

Click here for more books by this author

CHAPTER 1
Saint's Miracle

CHAPTER 2.
Drugged Sherbet

CHAPTER 3
A Very Strange Mummy

CHAPTER 4
Real or Unreal?

CHAPTER 5
Hagg Nadeem

CHAPTER 6
The Visitation

CHAPTER 7
Kidnapped

CHAPTER 8
The Oasis

CHAPTER 9
Men or Jinn?

CHAPTER 10
The Stranglers

CHAPTER 11
Three-Cornered Combat

CHAPTER 12
The Cache

CHAPTER 13
Unweaving the Rainbow