"The exact address?" demanded Smith.

"Cafe de l'Egypte. But the hashish is only sold upstairs, and no one
is allowed up that isn't known personally to Ismail."

"Who is this Ismail?"

"The proprietor of the cafe. He's a Greek Jew of Salonica. An old
woman used to attend to the customers upstairs, but during the last
few months a young one has sometimes taken her place."

"What is she like?" I asked eagerly.

"She has very fine eyes, and that's about all I can tell you, sir,
because she wears a yashmak. Last night there were two women there,
both veiled, though."

"Two women!"

Hope and fear entered my heart. That Karamaneh was again in the
power of the Chinese Doctor I knew to my sorrow. Could it be that
the Cafe de l'Egypte was the place of her captivity?

CHAPTER XXIV

CAFE DE L'EGYPTE

I could see that Nayland Smith counted the escape of the prisoner but
a trivial matter by comparison with the discovery to which it had led
us. That the Soho cafe should prove to be, if not the headquarters at
least a regular resort of Dr. Fu-Manchu, was not too much to hope. The
usefulness of such a haunt was evident enough, since it might
conveniently be employed as a place of rendezvous for Orientals--and
furthermore enable the cunning Chinaman to establish relations with
persons likely to prove of service to him.

Formerly, he had used an East End opium den for this purpose, and,
later, the resort known as the Joy-Shop. Soho, hitherto, had remained
outside the radius of his activity, but that he should have embraced
it at last was not surprising; for Soho is the Montmartre of London
and a land of many secrets.

"Why," demanded Nayland Smith, "have I never been told of the existence
of this place?"

"That's simple enough," answered Inspector Weymouth. "Although we knew
of this Cafe de l'Egypte, we have never had the slightest trouble
there. It's a Bohemian resort, where members of the French Colony,
some of the Chelsea art people, professional models, and others of
that sort, foregather at night. I've been there myself as a matter of
fact, and I've seen people well known in the artistic world come in.
It has much the same clientele as, say, the Cafe Royal, with a rather
heavier sprinkling of Hindu students, Japanese, and so forth. It's
celebrated for Turkish coffee."

"What do you know of this Ismail?"

"Nothing much. He's a Levantine Jew."

"And something more!" added Smith, surveying himself in the