CHAPTER XIV
THE COUGHING HORROR
I
leapt up in bed with a great start.
My sleep was troubled often enough in those days which immediately followed our almost miraculous escape from the den of Fu-Manchu; and now, as I crouched there, nerves aquiver—listening—listening—I could not be sure if this dank panic which possessed me had its origin in nightmare or in something else.
Surely a scream, a choking cry for help, had reached my ears; but now, almost holding my breath in that sort of nervous tensity peculiar to one aroused thus, I listened, and the silence seemed complete. Perhaps I had been dreaming....
"Help! Petrie! Help!..."
It was Nayland Smith in the room above me!
My doubts were resolved; this was no trick of an imagination disordered. Some dreadful menace threatened my friend. Not delaying even to snatch my dressing-gown, I rushed out on to the landing, up the stairs, bare-footed as I was, threw open the door of Smith's room and literally hurled myself in.