."

I said no more for a time, sitting wiping the perspiration from my
forehead and watching my friend load his cracked briar with the
broadcut Latakia mixture.

"Smith," I said at last, "what was that horrible wailing we heard, and
what did Fu-Manchu mean when he referred to Rangoon? I noticed how it
affected you."

My friend nodded and lighted his pipe.

"There was a ghastly business there in 1908 or early in 1909," he
replied: "an utterly mysterious epidemic. And this beastly wailing
was associated with it."

"In what way? And what do you mean by an epidemic?"

"It began, I believe, at the Palace Mansions Hotel, in the cantonments.
A young American, whose name I cannot recall, was staying there on
business connected with some new iron buildings. One night he went to
his room, locked the door, and jumped out of the window into the
courtyard. Broke his neck, of course."

"Suicide?"

"Apparently. But there were singular features in the case. For
instance, his revolver lay beside him, fully loaded!"

"In the courtyard?"

"In the courtyard!"

"Was it murder by any chance?"

Smith shrugged his shoulders.

"His door was found locked from the inside; had to be broken in."

"But the wailing business?"

"That began later, or was only noticed later. A French doctor, named
Lafitte, died in exactly the same way."

"At the same place?"

"At the same hotel; but he occupied a different room. Here is the
extraordinary part of the affair: a friend shared the room with him,
and actually saw him go!"

"Saw him leap from the window?"

"Yes. The friend--an Englishman--was aroused by the uncanny wailing.
I was in Rangoon at the time, so that I know more of the case of
Lafitte than of that of the American. I spoke to the man about it
personally. He was an electrical engineer, Edward Martin, and he told
me that the cry seemed to come from above him."

"It seemed to come from above when we heard it at Fu-Manchu's house."

"Martin sat up in bed, it was a clear moonlight night--the sort of
moonlight you get in Burma. Lafitte, for some reason, had just gone to
the window. His friend saw him look out. The next moment with a
dreadful scream, he threw himself forward--and crashed down into the
courtyard!"

"What then?"

"Martin ran to the window and looked down. Lafitte's scream had
aroused the place, of course. But there was absolutely nothing to
account for the occurrence. There was no balcony,