Brood of the Witch-Queen by Sax Rohmer (the top 100 crime novels of all time .TXT) 📕

removed it secretly at night to our own tent. Before we commenced the task of unwrapping it, Sir Michael⁠—the most brilliant scholar of his age⁠—had proceeded so far in deciphering the papyrus, that he determined to complete his reading before we proceeded further. It contained directions for performing a certain process. This process had reference to the mummy of the child.”

“Do I understand⁠—?”

“Already, you are discrediting the story! Ah! I can see it! but let me finish. Unaided, we performed this process upon the embalmed body of the child. Then, in accordance with the directions of that dead magician⁠—that accursed, malignant being, who thus had sought to secure for himself a new tenure of evil life⁠—we laid the mummy, treated in a certain fashion, in the King’s Chamber of the Méydûm Pyramid. It remained there for thirty days; from moon to moon⁠—”

“You guarded the entrance?”

“You may assume what you like, Rob; but I could swear before any jury, that no one entered the pyramid throughout that time. Yet since we were only human, we may have been deceived in this. I have only to add, that when at the rising of the new moon in the ancient Sothic month of Panoi, we again entered the chamber, a living baby, some six months old, perfectly healthy, solemnly blinked up at the lights which we held in our trembling hands!”

Dr. Cairn reseated himself at the table, and turned the chair so that he faced his son. With the smouldering cigar between his teeth, he sat, a slight smile upon his lips.

Now it was Robert’s turn to rise and begin feverishly to pace the floor.

“You mean, sir, that this infant⁠—which lay in the pyramid⁠—was⁠—adopted by Sir Michael?”

“Was adopted, yes. Sir Michael engaged nurses for him, reared him here in England, educating him as an Englishman, sent him to a public school, sent him to⁠—”

“To Oxford! Antony Ferrara! What! Do you seriously tell me that this is the history of Antony Ferrara?”

“On my word of honour, boy, that is all I know of Antony Ferrara. Is it not enough?”

“Merciful God! it is incredible,” groaned Robert Cairn.

“From the time that he attained to manhood,” said Dr. Cairn evenly, “this adopted son of my poor old friend has passed from crime to crime. By means which are beyond my comprehension, and which alone serve to confirm his supernatural origin, he has acquired⁠—knowledge. According to the Ancient Egyptian beliefs the Khu (or magical powers) of a fully-equipped Adept, at the death of the body, could enter into anything prepared for its reception. According to these ancient beliefs, then, the Khu of the high priest Hortotef entered into the body of this infant who was his son, and whose mother was the Witch-Queen; and today in this modern London, a wizard of Ancient Egypt, armed with the lost lore of that magical land, walks amongst us! What that lore is worth, it would be profitless for us to discuss, but that he possesses it⁠—all of it⁠—I know, beyond doubt. The most ancient and most powerful magical book which has ever existed was the Book of Thoth.”

He walked across to a distant shelf, selected a volume, opened it at a particular page, and placed it on his son’s knees.

“Read there!” he said, pointing.

The words seemed to dance before the younger man’s eyes, and this is what he read:

“To read two pages, enables you to enchant the heavens, the earth, the abyss, the mountains, and the sea; you shall know what the birds of the sky and the crawling things are saying⁠ ⁠… and when the second page is read, if you are in the world of ghosts, you will grow again in the shape you were on earth.⁠ ⁠…”

“Heavens!” whispered Robert Cairn, “is this the writing of a madman? or can such things possibly be!” He read on:

“This book is in the middle of the river at Koptos, in an iron box⁠—”

“An iron box,” he muttered⁠—“an iron box.”

“So you recognise the iron box?” jerked Dr. Cairn.

His son read on:

“In the iron box, is a bronze box; in the bronze box, is a sycamore box; in the sycamore box, is an ivory and ebony box; in the ivory and ebony box, is a silver box; in the silver box, is a golden box; and in that is the book. It is twisted all round with snakes, and scorpions, and all the other crawling things.⁠ ⁠…”

“The man who holds the Book of Thoth,” said Dr. Cairn, breaking the silence, “holds a power which should only belong to God. The creature who is known to the world as Antony Ferrara, holds that book⁠—do you doubt it?⁠—therefore you know now, as I have known long enough, with what manner of enemy we are fighting. You know that, this time, it is a fight to the death⁠—”

He stopped abruptly, staring out of the window.

A man with a large photographic camera, standing upon the opposite pavement, was busily engaged in focusing the house!

“What is this?” muttered Robert Cairn, also stepping to the window.

“It is a link between sorcery and science!” replied the doctor. “You remember Ferrara’s photographic gallery at Oxford?⁠—the Zenana, you used to call it!⁠—You remember having seen in his collection photographs of persons who afterwards came to violent ends?”

“I begin to understand!”

“Thus far, his endeavours to concentrate the whole of the evil forces at his command upon this house have had but poor results: having merely caused Myra to dream strange dreams⁠—clairvoyant dreams, instructive dreams, more useful to us than to the enemy; and having resulted in certain marks upon the outside of the house adjoining the windows⁠—windows which I have sealed in a particular manner. You understand?”

“By means of photographs he⁠—concentrates, in some way, malignant forces upon certain points⁠—”

“He focuses his will⁠—yes! The man who can really control his will, Rob, is supreme, below the Godhead. Ferrara can almost do this now. Before he has become wholly proficient⁠—”

“I understand, sir,” snapped his son grimly.

“He is barely of age, boy,” Dr. Cairn said, almost in