Produced by David Clarke, Mary Meehan and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net THE SINS OF SEVERAC BABLON By Sax Rohmer CASSELL AND COMPANY, LTD London, New York, Toronto & Melbourne First published _January 1914_. Popular Edition _February 1919_. CONTENTS 1. TO INTRODUCE MR. JULIUS ROHSCHEIMER 2. "THIRTY MEN WHO WERE ALL ALIKE" 3. MIDNIGHT--AND THE MAN 4. THE HEAD OF CAESAR 5. A MYSTIC HAND 6. THE SHADOW OF SEVERAC BABLON 7. THE RING 8. IN THE DRESSING-ROOM 9. ES-SINDIBAD OF CADOGAN GARDENS 10. KIMBERLEY 11. MR. SANRACK VISITS THE HOTEL ASTORIA 12. LOVE, LUCRE AND MR. ALDEN 13. THE LISTENER 14. ZOE DREAMS 15. AT "THE CEDARS" 16. THE LAMP AND THE MASK 17. THE DAMASCUS CURTAIN 18. A WHITE ORCHID 19. THREE LETTERS 20. CLOSED DOORS 21. A CORNER IN MILLIONAIRES 22. THE TURKISH YATAGHAN 23. M. LEVI 24. "V-E-N-G-E-N-C-E" 25. AN OFFICIAL CALL 26. GRIMSDYKE 27. YELLOW CIGARETTES 28. AT THE PALACE--AND LATER CHAPTER I TO INTRODUCE MR. JULIUS ROHSCHEIMER "There's half a score of your ancestral halls," said Julius Rohscheimer, "that I could sell up to-morrow morning!" Of the quartet that heard his words no two members seemed quite similarly impressed. The pale face of Adeler, the great financier's confidential secretary, expressed no emotion whatever. Sir Richard Haredale flashed contempt from his grey eyes--only to veil his scorn of the man's vulgarity beneath a cloud of tobacco smoke. Tom Sheard, of the _Gleaner_, drew down a corner of his mouth and felt ashamed of the acquaintance. Denby, the music-hall comedian, softly whistled those bars of a popular ballad set to the words, "I stood in old Jerusalem." "Come along to Park Lane with me," continued Rohscheimer, fixing his dull, prominent eyes upon Sheard, "and you'll see more English nobility than you'd find inside the House of Lords!" "What's made him break out?" the comedian whispered, aside, to Adeler. For it was an open secret that this man, whose financial operations shook the thrones of monarchy, whose social fetes were attended by the smartest people, was subject to outbursts of the kind which now saw him seated before a rapidly emptying magnum in a corner of the great restaurant. At such times he would frequent the promenades of music-halls, consorting with whom he found there, and would display the gross vulgarity of a Whitechapel pawnbroker or tenth-rate variety agent. "'S-sh!" replied the secretary. "A big coup! It is always so with him. Mr. Rohscheimer is overwrought. I shall induce him to take a holiday." "Trip up the Jordan?" suggested Denby, with cheery rudeness. The secretary's drooping eyelids flickered significantly, but no other indication of resentment displayed itself upon that impassive face. "A good Jew is proud of his race--and with reason!" he said quietly. "There are Jews and Jews."