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"See if you can find the trap," whispered Smith; "light your lamp."
I directed the ray of the pocket-lamp upon the floor, and there at my
feet was a square wooden trap. As I stooped to examine it, I glanced
back, painfully, over my shoulder--and saw Nayland Smith tiptoeing
away from me along the passage toward the light!
Inwardly I cursed his folly, but the temptation to peep in at that
little window proved too strong for me, as it had proved too strong
for him.
Fearful that some board would creak beneath my tread, I followed; and
side by side we two crouched, looking into a small rectangular room.
It was a bare and cheerless apartment with unpapered walls and
carpetless floor. A table and a chair constituted the sole furniture.
Seated in the chair, with his back toward us, was a portly Chinaman
who wore a yellow, silken robe. His face, it was impossible to see;
but he was beating his fist upon the table, and pouring out a torrent
of words in a thin, piping voice. So much I perceived at a glance;
then, into view at the distant end of the room, paced a tall, high-shouldered
figure--a figure unforgettable, at once imposing and
dreadful, stately and sinister.
With the long, bony hands behind him, fingers twining and intertwining
serpentinely about the handle of a little fan, and with the pointed
chin resting on the breast of the yellow robe, so that the light from
the lamp swinging in the center of the ceiling gleamed upon the great,
dome-like brow, this tall man paced somberly from left to right.
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