The Mystery of the Four Fingers

by Fred M. White

"Oh, you rave," Zary went on. "I am the heir of the ages. A thousand years of culture, of research, of peeps behind the veil, have gone to make me what I am. Your scientists and your occult researchers think they have discovered much, but, compared with me, they are but as children arguing with sages. Before the letter was written, the spirits that float on the air had told me of its coming. I have only to raise my hand and you wither up like a drop of dew in the eye of the sunshine. I have only to say the word and you die a thousand lingering deaths in one—but for such cattle as you the vengeance of the Four Fingers is enough. You shall die even as the Dutchman died, you shall perish miserably with your reason gone and your nerves shattered. If you could see yourself now as I can see you, with that dreadful look of fear haunting your eyes, you would know that the dread poison had already begun its work. The third warning came to you last night, the message that you should get your affairs in order and be prepared for the inevitable. The Dutchman is no more, his foul wretch of a wife died, a poor wreck of a woman, bereft of sense and reason."

"This is fine talk," Fenwick stammered. "What have you against me that you should threaten me like this?"

Zary raised his hand aloft with a dramatic gesture; his great round black eyes were filled with a luminous fire.

"Listen," he said. "Listen and heed. I am the last of my race, a race which has been persecuted by the alien and interloper for the last three centuries. Time was when we were a great and powerful people, educated and enlightened beyond the dreams of to-day. Our great curse was the possession of large tracts of land which contained the gold for which you Eastern people are prepared to barter honor and integrity and everything that the honest man holds dear. For it you are prepared to sacrifice your wives and children, you are prepared to cut the throat of your best friend. When you found your heart's desire in my country, you came in your thousands, and by degrees murders and assassination worked havoc with my tribe. It was not till quite recently that there came another man from the East, a different class of creature altogether. I am alluding to your late brother-in-law, George Le Fenu. He sought no gold or treasure; he came to us, he healed us of diseases of which we knew no cure. And in return for that we gave him the secret of the Four Finger Mine. It was because he had the secret of the mine and because he refused to share it with you that you and the Dutchman, with the aid of his foul wife, killed him."

"It's a lie," Fenwick stammered. "George Le Fenu suffered nothing at my hands. It was the young man Evors."

"It is false," Zary thundered. His eyes were dark, and in a sudden flood of fury he reached out a long thin hand and clutched Fenwick by the collar. "Why tell me this when I know so well how the whole thing happened? I can give it you now chapter and verse, only it would merely be a waste of breath. I declare as I stand here with my hand almost touching your flesh that I can scarcely wait for the vengeance, so eager am I to extract the debt that you owe to George Le Fenu and his children."

By way of reply, Fenwick dashed his fist full into the face of Zary. The latter drew back just in time to avoid a crushing blow; then his long thin arms twisted about the form of his bulky antagonist as a snake winds about his prey. So close and tenacious, so wonderfully tense was the grip, that Fenwick fairly gasped for breath. He had not expected a virile force like this in one so slender. A bony leg was pressed into the small of his back—he tottered backward and lay upon the mossy turf with Zary with one bony hand at his throat, on the top of him. It was all so sudden and so utterly unexpected that Fenwick could only gasp in astonishment. Then he became conscious of the fact that Zary's great luminous eyes were bent, full of hate, upon his face. A long curved knife gleamed in the sunshine. Very slowly the words came from Zary.

"I could finish you now," he whispered. "I could end it once and for all. It is only for me to put in action the forces that I know of, and you would utterly vanish from here, leaving no trace behind. One swift blow of this knife—"

"What are you doing?" a voice asked eagerly. "Zary, have you taken leave of your senses? Release him at once, I say."

Very slowly Zary replaced the knife in his pocket and rose to his feet. There was not the least trace of his recent passion—he was perfectly calm and collected, his breathing was as even and regular as it had been before the onslaught.