She snapped her fingers oddly, and looked up at me from under her lashes. “Why do you question me if you think that everything I say is a lie?”
It was a lesson in logic—from a woman! I changed the subject.
“Tell me what you came here to do,” I demanded.
She pointed to the net in my hands.
“To catch birds; you have said so yourself.”
“What bird?”
She shrugged her shoulders.
And now a memory was born within my brain; it was that of the cry of the nighthawk which had harbingered the death of Forsyth! The net was a large and strong one; could it be that some horrible fowl of the air—some creature unknown to Western naturalists—had been released upon the common last night? I thought of the marks upon Forsyth’s face and throat; I thought of the profound knowledge of obscure and dreadful things possessed by the Chinaman.
The wrapping, in which the net had been, lay at my feet. I stooped and took out from it a wicker basket. Karamaneh stood watching me and biting her lip, but she made no move to check me. I opened the basket. It contained a large phial, the contents of which possessed a pungent and peculiar smell.
I was utterly mystified.