There was a suggestion of laughter in the husky voice, now, of a sort of contemptuous banter. But Cairn stolidly shook his head and forced a smile. "Many thanks; but it's too early." He stood up and began to walk about the room, inspecting the numberless oddities which it contained. The photographs he examined with supercilious curiosity. Then, passing to a huge cabinet, he began to peer in at the rows of amulets, statuettes and other, unclassifiable, objects with which it was laden. Ferrara's voice came. "That head of a priestess on the left, Cairn, is of great interest. The brain had not been removed, and quite a colony of Dermestes Beetles had propagated in the cavity. Those creatures never saw the light, Cairn. Yet I assure you that they had eyes. I have nearly forty of them in the small glass case on the table there. You might like to examine them." Cairn shuddered, but felt impelled to turn and look at these gruesome relics. In a square, glass case he saw the creatures. They lay in rows on a bed of moss; one might almost have supposed that unclean life yet survived in the little black insects. They were an unfamiliar species to Cairn, being covered with unusually long, black hair, except upon the root of the wing-cases where they were of brilliant orange. "The perfect pupae of this insect are extremely rare," added Ferrara informatively. "Indeed?" replied Cairn. He found something physically revolting in that group of beetles whose history had begun and ended in the skull of a mummy. "Filthy things!" he said. "Why do you keep them?" Ferrara shrugged his shoulders. "Who knows?" he answered enigmatically. "They might prove useful, some day." A bell rang; and from Ferrara's attitude it occurred to Cairn that he was expecting a visitor. "I must be off," he said accordingly. And indeed he was conscious of a craving for the cool and comparatively clean air of Piccadilly. He knew something of the great evil which dwelt within this man whom he was compelled, by singular circumstances, to tolerate. But the duty began to irk. "If you must," was the reply. "Of course, your press work no doubt is very exacting." The note of badinage was discernible again, but Cairn passed out into the _mandarah_ without replying, where the fountain plashed coolly and the silver _mibkharah_ sent up its pencils of vapour. The outer door was opened by the Oriental servant, and Ferrara stood and bowed to his departing visitor. He did not proffer his hand. "Until our next meeting. Cairn, _es-selam aleykum_!" (peace be with you) he murmured, "as the Moslems say. But indeed I shall be with you in spirit, dear Cairn." There was something in the tone wherein he spoke those last words that brought Cairn up short. He turned, but the doors closed silently. A faint breath of ambergris was borne to his nostrils. CHAPTER V THE RUSTLING SHADOWS