The Hand of Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer

Book Details

The indestructible evil genius, Dr. Fu Manchu, has returned to complete his plan for world domination and to become Master of all mankind. Only Nayland Smith and Dr. Petrie stand in his way.

The Hand Of Fu-Manchu (1917) – Being a New Phase in the Activities of Fu-Manchu, the Evil Doctor
Chapter I – The Traveler From Tibet
Chapter II – The Man With The Limp
Chapter III – “Sâkya Mûni”
Chapter IV – The Flower Of Silence
Chapter V – John Ki’s
Chapter VI – The Si-Fan Move
Chapter VII – Chinatown
Chapter VIII – Zarmi Of The Joy-Shop
Chapter IX – Fu-Manchu
Chapter X – The Tûlun-Nûr Chest
Chapter XI – In The Fog
Chapter XII – The Visitant
Chapter XIII – The Room Below
Chapter XIV – The Golden Pomegranates
Chapter XV – Zarmi Reappears
Chapter XVI – I Track Zarmi
Chapter XVII – I Meet Dr. Fu-Manchu
Chapter XVIII – Queen Of Hearts
Chapter XIX – “Zagazig”
Chapter XX – The Note On The Door
Chapter XXI – The Second Message
Chapter XXII – The Secret Of The Wharf
Chapter XXIII – Arrest Of Samarkan
Chapter XXIV – Café De L’Egypte
Chapter XXV – The House Of Hashish
Chapter XXVI – “The Demon’s Self”
Chapter XXVII – Room With The Golden Door
Chapter XXVIII – The Mandarin Ki-Ming
Chapter XXIX – Lama Sorcery
Chapter XXX – Medusa
Chapter XXXI – The Marmoset
Chapter XXXII – Shrine Of Seven Lamps
Chapter XXXIII – An Anti-Climax
Chapter XXXIV – Graywater Park
Chapter XXXV – The East Tower
Chapter XXXVI – The Dungeon
Chapter XXXVII – Three Nights Later
Chapter XXXVIII – The Monk’s Plan
Chapter XXXIX – The Shadow Army
Chapter XL – The Black Chapel

Afterward – The Filmography of Fu-Manchu

Arthur Henry “Sarsfield” Ward (1883-1959), better known as Sax Rohmer, was a prolific English novelist. He is best remembered for his series of novels featuring the master criminal Dr. Fu-Manchu.

Ward was born in Birmingham, England to a working class family. He got his start in writing as a poet, songwriter, and comedy sketch writer for music hall performers.

Ward began using the pen name “Sax Rohmer” when he began writing the Fu-Manchu stories in 1912. After the success of The Insidious Dr. Fu-Manchu in 1913, Rohmer followed with The Return of Dr. Fu-Manchu in 1916 and The Hand of Fu-Manchu followed in 1917.

The Hand of Fu-Manchu has 27 illustrations.

Files:

1. HandOfFuManchu.epub

Excerpt: The Hand of Fu-Manchu

Chapter I

The Traveler From Tibet

“WHO’S there?” I called sharply.

I turned and looked across the room. The window had been widely opened when I entered, and a faint fog haze hung in the apartment, seeming to veil the light of the shaded lamp. I watched the closed door intently, expecting every moment to see the knob turn. But nothing happened.

“Who’s there?” I cried again, and, crossing the room, I threw open the door.

The long corridor without, lighted only by one inhospitable lamp at a remote end, showed choked and yellowed with this same fog so characteristic of London in November. But nothing moved to right nor left of me. The New Louvre Hotel was in some respects yet incomplete, and the long passage in which I stood, despite its marble facings, had no air of comfort or good cheer; palatial it was, but inhospitable.

I returned to the room, reclosing the door behind me, then for some five minutes or more I stood listening for a repetition of that mysterious sound, as of something that both dragged and tapped, which already had arrested my attention. My vigilance went unrewarded. I had closed the window to exclude the yellow mist, but subconsciously I was aware of its encircling presence, walling me in, and now I found myself in such a silence as I had known in deserts but could scarce have deemed possible in fog-bound London, in the heart of the world’s metropolis, with the traffic of the Strand below me upon one side and the restless life of the river upon the other.

It was easy to conclude that I had been mistaken, that my nervous system was somewhat overwrought as a result of my hurried return from Cairo—from Cairo where I had left behind me many a fondly cherished hope. I addressed myself again to the task of unpacking my steamer-trunk and was so engaged when again a sound in the corridor outside brought me upright with a jerk.

A quick footstep approached the door, and there came a muffled rapping upon the panel.

This time I asked no question, but leapt across the room and threw the door open. Nayland Smith stood before me, muffled up in a heavy traveling coat, and with his hat pulled down over his brows.

“At last!” I cried, as my friend stepped in and quickly reclosed the door.

Smith threw his hat upon the settee, stripped off the great-coat, and pulling out his pipe began to load it in feverish haste.

“Well,” I said, standing amid the litter cast out from the trunk, and watching him eagerly, “what’s afoot?”

Nayland Smith lighted his pipe, carelessly dropping the match-end upon the floor at his feet.

“God knows what is afoot this time, Petrie!” he replied. “You and I have lived no commonplace lives; Dr. Fu-Manchu has seen to that; but if I am to believe what the Chief has told me to-day, even stranger things are ahead of us!”

I stared at him wonder-stricken.

“That is almost incredible,” I said; “terror can have no darker meaning than that which Dr. Fu-Manchu gave to it. Fu-Manchu is dead, so what have we to fear?”

“We have to fear,” replied Smith, throwing himself into a corner of the settee, “the Si-Fan!”

I continued to stare, uncomprehendingly.

“The Si-Fan——”

“I always knew and you always knew,” interrupted Smith in his short, decisive manner, “that Fu-Manchu, genius that he was, remained nevertheless the servant of another or others. He was not the head of that organization which dealt in wholesale murder, which aimed at upsetting the balance of the world. I even knew the name of one, a certain mandarin, and member of the Sublime Order of the White Peacock, who was his immediate superior. I had never dared to guess at the identity of what I may term the Head Center.”

He ceased speaking, and sat gripping his pipe grimly between his teeth, whilst I stood staring at him almost fatuously. Then—

“Evidently you have much to tell me,” I said, with forced calm.

I drew up a chair beside the settee and was about to sit down.

“Suppose you bolt the door,” jerked my friend.

I nodded, entirely comprehending, crossed the room and shot the little nickel bolt into its socket.

“Now,” said Smith as I took my seat, “the story is a fragmentary one in which there are many gaps. Let us see what we know. It seems that the despatch which led to my sudden recall (and incidentally yours) from Egypt to London and which only reached me as I was on the point of embarking at Suez for Rangoon, was prompted by the arrival here of Sir Gregory Hale, whilom attaché at the British Embassy, Peking. So much, you will remember, was conveyed in my instructions.”

“Quite so.”

“Furthermore, I was instructed, you’ll remember, to put up at the New Louvre Hotel; therefore you came here and engaged this suite whilst I reported to the chief. A stranger business is before us, Petrie, I verily believe, than any we have known hitherto. In the first place, Sir Gregory Hale is here——”

“Here?”

“In the New Louvre Hotel. I ascertained on the way up, but not by direct inquiry, that he occupies a suite similar to this, and incidentally on the same floor.”

“His report to the India Office, whatever its nature, must have been a sensational one.”

“He has made no report to the India Office.”

Excerpt From: Sax Rohmer. “The Hand of Fu-Manchu.”