Sax Rohmer

“ Carey's perplexity was evident. "He has a very pale skin, hasn't he?" he asked. "Some women seem to find him fascinating."
"Damn it! He is fascinating!" Torrington cried. "But in the same way that a purple rattlesnake would be fascinating—or a new kind of poisonous spider. You see, Carey, I wasn't quite referring to the colour of his skin, but to its quality. Hell!"—he rested his elbow on the mantelpiece—"it's unnatural with that hair. But I suppose it would be difficult to make my point clear to you; it's by way of being rather a technical one."
"But what was the matter with Trepniak?" ”

“ Now, he ran quickly through to the outer room, and drawing aside the heavy curtains looked down into the street, his heart beating rapidly. It was two o'clock in the morning but the neighbouring club was still open and he had hoped that Jasmine, relenting, had called for him. In this anticipation a disappointment awaited him.
It was an A. C. car which stood below, so that for a moment he thought that his dream had come true. ”

“ Carey replied. "Every agent in London had tried to let it, I believe."
"Well, one of them has evidently succeeded," said Torrington; "de Trepniak lives there now, my lad. And, by Jove!"—he whistled—"money is evidently no object. It is decorated like a Hollywood studio set."
"Is Trepniak ill?" Carey asked.
Torrington nodded vigorously, staring in a perplexed fashion.
"Yes. His butler, or rather an extraordinary person who looked like the chief eunuch of the Shah of Persia, or a missing bit of the Russian Ballet, 'phoned for me about half an hour ago. How he found me, God knows! ”

“ Carey shook his head.
"No," Torrington murmured, "but the name of Gühl is one to conjure with in my trade. The greatest pathologist of his generation, my lad, or of any other generation. He died in Leipzig in the second year of the war, at an advanced age: he was well over eighty. Three of his works are classics. This one, open on Trepniak's table, I had never seen before, but it was covered with marginal notes, possibly in the Professor's hand; and fastened down upon a slab was a small lizard, which Trepniak had been engaged in dissecting."
"Alive?" ”