The Air Pirate

"May I ask what you are doing?" I said after a time.

"I am dyeing your hair black, Sir John. The dye can be removed at any time. The appearance is absolutely natural. The drug I am using is not generally known. I procure it from a friend in the Honcho Dori at Yokohama, and also the liquid which has already changed your skin from blond to swarthy. I will treat your hands in a minute."

I suppose I was three-quarters of an hour under his ministrations before he stepped back and looked at me critically. "Part your hair in the centre, instead of at the side, wear a low collar instead of a high one, and spectacles – they can be of plain glass – and you need not have the slightest fear of recognition. In fact, Sir John, as far as outward appearance goes, you have already ceased to exist!"

There was a mirror over the mantel-shelf. I stood up and looked. It was marvellous! It was uncanny, too. A dark-haired, dark-skinned stranger leered out of the glass at me, and I turned away with mingled feelings of amazement and disgust.

"Do you drive an automobile?" the Japanese asked.

I jumped at the suddenness of the question, for my thoughts were far away. "Yes, I have a touring car of my own in a neighbouring garage."

"It will be better not to use it. We shall take one of Mr. Van Adams' cars. It is ready."

I laughed. "I've a lot to hear yet, you know, Mr. Danjuro, though I have placed myself in your hands without reserve. But you made very sure of me beforehand, didn't you?"

"It is Mr. Van Adams' command," he answered simply, and I reflected that here, indeed, was a man with a single soul.

"We shall leave London at midnight," he went on, "and drive through the whole of the night. I, also, am an expert chauffeur, and we can relieve each other."

"Thumbwood can drive, too. Of course we take him with us?"

"He will be of the greatest assistance. Now, Sir John, if you want to take a little sleep, now is the time. I should like to consult with your servant, if I may, and have a chat with him. We shall have a good deal to do with one another."

Strangely enough, I did feel drowsy, despite my excitement. A couple of hours' sleep would refresh me wonderfully, and I knew it.

"Very well; I think it is a good suggestion. Say for two hours."

"By all means. I will carry out some other arrangements meanwhile. You shall have full explanations later on, and I thank you sincerely for the confidence you have reposed in me."

While we were talking we had left the room and crossed the hall.

"A pleasant sleep," he said, politely opening the door for me. "We will go and have a look at Major Helzephron later on."

"What?" I shouted.

"He is in London. I have never seen him and I must certainly do so."

"In London?" I cried, a dozen conflicting thoughts crowding and crushing into my mind.

"… It is the reason that we leave London to-night."

Then he had shut the door on me and was gone. I had known him less than two hours. I was a man accustomed to rule, whose whole life was spent in giving orders, and I lay down on my bed like a lamb without a further question. And, what is more, I did exactly as Mr. Danjuro had said. I fell into a deep, dreamless sleep.

At a little after eight Mr. Danjuro and myself sat at dinner at the Restaurant Mille Colonnes. Most people know that expensive and luxurious home of epicures, with Nicholas, its stout and arrogant proprietor, and M. Dulac, its famous chef.

We sat in the south gallery, at the extreme end, against the wall. The electric lights in the roof above us had been extinguished, and our table was lighted by candles in red shades. Indeed, we sat in a sort of darkness which must have made us almost invisible to the other diners, most of whom sat in the longer arm of the gallery at right angles to our own.

We, on the contrary, could see everything. We could look over the gilded rail into the hall of the restaurant below, and every detail of the gallery on our own level was clear and distinct, though there was such a towering erection of flowers and ferns in the centre of our table that it obscured what would otherwise have been a perfect view.

I wore a low, turned-down collar and a dark flannel suit. Danjuro, also, had changed his clothes, and, in some real but indefinite way, his appearance. He wore a flannel suit and a straw hat, and also a necktie which I suddenly spotted as that of my old college, Christ Church, Oxford. But the extraordinary thing about him was that he seemed fifteen years younger.

He had promised to explain at the "Mille Colonnes." As we began upon the salted prawns and the stuffed olives he did so.

"You are now Mr. Johns, an Oxford tutor, Sir John. I am a young Japanese gentleman, my own name will serve, whom you are coaching. We are going into the country with this disguise. It is one which will easily account for your being in the company of an Asiatic gentleman, and which you will have no difficulty in sustaining."

It was, indeed, a simple and excellent plan for avoiding undue curiosity. I said so, and then: "Now perhaps you will tell me where we are going. I have my ideas…"

"We are going west," he answered gravely. "To Cornwall."

My heart beat fast. It was what I wanted him to say. "To the home of Helzephron?"

"Yes. For it is there we shall be in the very centre of the web. In those far western solitudes, despite the recent opening up of the Duchy to tourists, there are still vast spaces of lonely moorland and unvisited coast where one may walk for half a day and meet no living soul. There is a great Hinterland between the little town of St. Ives and the Land's End that for all practical purposes is unknown and unexplored. Later on, I will show you certain maps… It is in one of the remotest spots of all that Major Helzephron has his house. I tell you, Sir John," he continued, with a sort of passion, "that in those lost and forgotten solitudes, where England stretches out her granite foot to spurn the Atlantic, strange secrets lie hid to-day! On those grey and lonely moors, where the last Druids practised their mysterious rites, and which are still covered with sinister memorials of the past, lies the explanation of the terror which is troubling the world! There, and there only, shall we discover the secrets of the air, and – if human skill and determination are of any avail – Miss Constance Shepherd!"

An obsequious waiter came with iced consommé. He was followed by the great Nicholas himself, bulging out of his buttoned frock-coat – Nicholas never wore evening dress – who bowed low and had a whispered confabulation with Danjuro.

I remarked on this unusual honour. "I do what I wish here," the Japanese replied. "It is, of course, through Mr. Van Adams. I hold this place in the hollow of my hand – as you will presently see!"

He gave one of his rare and weary smiles, and then said quietly: "Please do not get up or move. Major Helzephron has just come into the gallery!"

I could not have moved. His words turned me to stone.

"I felt sure," he went on, "that for a day or two Helzephron would show himself in London. Knowing what we know – or at least suspect – such a move was a certainty. He is in the habit of coming here. He booked his usual seat at this restaurant, and his usual box at the Parthenon Theatre – and for reasons obvious to you and me, if to no one else in the world! I confess to an anxiety to look upon this man."

"You have had this corner darkened?" I said quickly. "No one can see us here?"

"Not clearly. And Helzephron would not know who we are if he did see us. But, as he is sure to come upon us in Cornwall, it is better to take no risks. To that end I have had a little device arranged for us which proved of great service to me once in Chicago."

He bent forward to the mass of ferns and flowers in the centre of the table, disarranging the greenery at its base. At once a green-painted tube became visible, and then a slanting mirror, the size of a postcard.

"What on earth is that?" I whispered.

"An adaptation of the periscope!" he replied, taking a magnifying glass from his pocket, adjusting it, and bending over the mirror. "The lens is focussed upon Helzephron's table. With this magnifier I enlarge the image in the mirror. Ah! So that is the honourable gentleman!"

A faint hissing noise came from him. His face stiffened into fixed and horrible intentness as he stared through his magnifier at the little oblong of mirror.

"Shi-ban, Go-ban, hei!" he muttered. "There are two, then. I expect the younger man is the Honourable Herbert Gascoigne, of whom we have heard!"

The hissing noise continued, the ecstasy of attention did not relax for two or three minutes.

At last Danjuro looked up. His face, which had seemed carved out of jade, relaxed.

"Will you take my seat?" he said politely, handing me his reading-glass. "A little drama will commence in a few minutes. It will interest you!"

I gave him a glance of interrogation as we exchanged chairs.

"We shall be in Cornwall to-morrow, and in advance of our friends," he whispered. "But, in order that we may carry out our preliminary inquiries quite undisturbed, I have thought out a little plan by which, if all goes well, Major Helzephron will be detained in London for a day or two – you will see."

Trembling with eagerness I stared down at the mirror.