The Penalty Part 43

The lure of Barbara, however, drew him aside from the direct path to Marrow Lane. He had resolved not to see her for a year, but thought it right to break through that resolution in order to tell her at first hand of Harry West's death. But the janitor told him that Miss Ferris had not been coming to the studio for a long time. She had had no word from her. She had left one day by the back stair without her hat; a little later the legless beggar had left by the front door. His expression had been enough to frighten a body to death. Yes, the boy had come one day in a taxicab and gone away with her things. He had refused to answer any questions. She had never thought very highly of him as a boy. No, the bust upon which Miss Ferris had been at work had not been removed. No, the gentleman could not see it. Orders were orders.... Yes, the gentleman could see it. After all there had been no orders recently.

She led the way upstairs, her hand tightly closed upon a greenback. She unlocked and flung open the door of Barbara's studio, remarking that nothing in it had been touched since that lady's departure.

Wilmot noticed much dust, an overturned chair, and then his eyes rose to the bust of Blizzard as to a living presence. The expression of that b.e.s.t.i.a.l fallen face made his spine feel as if ants were crawling on it.

And he turned away with disgust and hatred. "Oh, Barbs, Barbs, what a wrong-headed little darling you are!" But he added: "And Lord, what a talent she's got!"

Blizzard was not in his office. But he was upstairs and expected Mr.

Allen.

A girl who had been wonderfully pretty told Wilmot these things. She would have been wonderfully pretty still, for she was very young, if she had not looked so tired, so unhappy, so broken-spirited. Did Rose still love the man for whom she had betrayed her friends and her own better nature? Yes. But she had learned that she was no more to him than a plaything--to caress or to break as seemed most amusing to him. At first until the novelty of her had worn off he had shown her a sufficiency of brusque tenderness. Latterly as his great plans matured he had been all brute. Sometimes he made her feel that he was so surfeited with her love that he considered killing her.

Sideways, with eyes haunted by shame and tragedy, she gave the handsome bearded youth a look of compa.s.sion. "In here, please," she said.

The door closed behind Wilmot with an ominous click, and he found himself face to face with the legless beggar. In this one's eyes, seen above a table littered with pamphlets and writings, was none of that mock affability to which he had formerly treated Wilmot Allen. He looked angry, dangerous, poisonous. And he broke into a harsh, ugly laugh.

"It takes you," he said, "to rush in where angels fear to tread. Welcome to my parlor! What a fool! My G.o.d! You heard what Harry West had to say before he died, and you came straight here."

"I don't know how you know it. But I did talk to your son. I did hear what he said. And I came here to tell you. And to tell you that there will be no more dealings between us. I am going straight from here to tell the proper authorities what I know."

"Aren't you going to punch my face first? That's what you'd like to do.

It's in your eyes. But you're afraid."

"I am not afraid," said Wilmot, "and you know it."

For answer the legless man picked up a silver dollar from among the papers in front of him, and broke it savagely into four pieces.

"Afraid!" he said. "Afraid! Afraid!"

Wilmot took a step forward. "It would give me the greatest pleasure," he said quietly, "to knock your head off. Unfortunately you are a cripple."

Blizzard said nothing, and presently, white with anger and contempt, Wilmot turned and tried the handle of the door by which he had entered.

Blizzard laughed.

[Ill.u.s.tration "Climb out of that chair, and let me out of this house"]

"This door is locked," said Wilmot.

"You are a prisoner in this house."

"I am, am I?"

Quick as lightning he had drawn and levelled at the legless man an automatic pistol of the largest calibre. The legless man did not move an inch, change expression, or take his eyes from Wilmot's.

Wilmot advanced till only the table separated them. "You will," he said, "climb out of that chair, and let me out of this house, walking in front of me."

The legless beggar appeared to consider the matter. There was silence.

Wilmot shifted the position of his feet, and the floor boards under them creaked.

Blizzard appeared to have made up his mind. He spread his hands on the table as if to help himself out of his chair. The palm of his right hand, unknown to Wilmot, covered an electric push-b.u.t.ton.

"Perhaps," said Blizzard, "you won't be in such a hurry to go after you hear that Miss Barbara Ferris is also a prisoner in this house--"

In horror and bewilderment Wilmot allowed the muzzle of his automatic to swerve. In that moment the palm of the legless man's right hand pressed upon the b.u.t.ton, and the square of the floor upon which Wilmot stood dropped like the trap of a gallows, and he fell through the opening into darkness.

He was neither stunned nor bruised, and he began to grope about for the pistol which in the sudden descent had been knocked from his hand. The only light came from the open trap in the floor above. Something fell softly at his feet; he picked it up. It was a cloth, saturated with chloroform. He flung it from him, and began with a new haste to grope and fumble for his pistol.

Another cloth fell, and another. Distant and ugly laughter fell with them. More cloths, and already the air in the place reeked with chloroform.

He no longer knew what he was looking for, and when at last his hand closed upon the stock of the automatic, he did not know what it was that he had found.

Another cloth fell.

XLIII

He came to in a narrow iron bed, weak, nauseated, and handcuffed. He could rub his feet together, but he could not separate them. He had been dreaming about Barbara--horrible dreams. His first conscious thought was that she, too, was a prisoner in the house of Blizzard, and that somehow or other he must save her. Having tried in vain to break the bright, delicate-looking handcuffs, he tried in vain to think calmly. Hours pa.s.sed. n.o.body came. He worked himself gradually into a fever of impotent rage. Civilization slipped away from him. He was ready, if necessary, to fight with his teeth, to gouge eyes, to inflict any barbarous atrocity upon his enemy.

Gradually, for the air in the room was fresh, the feeling of sickness pa.s.sed away, and was succeeded by weakness and la.s.situde. As a matter of fact, being a strong man, in splendid health, he was faint from hunger.

But he did not know this.

An elderly woman came softly into the room. She wore a blue dress, a white ap.r.o.n, a white kerchief, white cuffs, a white cap. Her face was disfigured by a great brown protruding mole from which a tuft of hair sprouted; she had an expression of methodical kindness, but small shifting eyes in which was no honesty.

She carried a cup that smoked. She put the cup on a table, lifted Wilmot to a sitting position, as if he had been a child, and asked him if he was hungry.

For a moment he did not answer; he was getting used to the discovery that he had been undressed and was wearing a linen night-gown. Then he nodded toward the smoking cup.

"How do I know it isn't poisoned?"

"Come--come," said the woman, "you'd have gone out under the chloroform if that had been the intention. Better keep your strength up."

After a few spoonfuls of the soup, Wilmot suggested that he should prefer something solid.

The woman shook her head.

"If I'm to be kept alive," he said petulantly, "why not comfortably?"

"Nothing solid. That's the doctor's orders."

"Blizzard's?"

"No. The doctor."

"What doctor?"

"Why, Dr. Ferris."