"You damned murderous swine!" I heard in a repressed, savage undertone. "The knife failed, so now the cord has an innings! Go after your pal!" Releasing one hand from the neck of the limp figure, the speaker grasped the Chinaman by his loose, smock-like garment, swung him back, once--a mighty swing--and hurled him far out into the river as one might hurl a sack of rubbish! CHAPTER XXIII ARREST OF SAMARKAN "As the high gods willed it," explained Nayland Smith, tenderly massaging his throat, "Mr. Forsyth, having just left the docks, chanced to pass along Three Colt Street on Wednesday night at exactly the hour that _I_ was expected! The resemblance between us is rather marked and the coincidence of dress completed the illusion. That devilish Eurasian woman, Zarmi, who has escaped us again--of course you recognized her?--made a very natural mistake. Mr. Forsyth, however, made no mistake!" I glanced at the chief officer of the _Andaman_, who sat in an armchair in our new chambers, contentedly smoking a black cheroot. "Heaven has blessed me with a pair of useful hands!" said the seaman, grimly, extending his horny palms. "I've an old score against those yellow swine; poor George and I were twins." He referred to his brother who had been foully done to death by one of the creatures of Dr. Fu-Manchu. "It beats me how Mr. Smith got on the track!" he added. "Pure inspiration!" murmured Nayland Smith, glancing aside from the siphon wherewith he now was busy. "The divine afflatus--and the same whereby Petrie solved the Zagazig cryptogram!" "But," concluded Forsyth, "I am indebted to you for an opportunity of meeting the Chinese strangler, and sending him to join the Burmese knife expert!" Such, then, were the episodes that led to the arrest of M. Samarkan, and my duty as narrator of these strange matters now bears me on to the morning when Nayland Smith was hastily summoned to the prison into which the villainous Greek had been cast. We were shown immediately into the Governor's room and were invited by that much disturbed official to be seated. The news which he had to impart was sufficiently startling. Samarkan was dead. "I have Warder Morrison's statement here," said Colonel Warrington, "if you will be good enough to read it----" Nayland Smith rose abruptly, and began to pace up and down the little office. Through the open window I had a glimpse of a stooping figure in convict garb, engaged in liming the flower-beds of the prison Governor's garden. "I should like to see this Warder Morrison personally," snapped my friend. "Very good," replied the Governor, pressing a bell-push placed close beside his table. A man entered, to stand rigidly at attention just within the doorway. "Send Morrison here," ordered Colonel Warrington.