The Penalty Part 44

"Where is he? I want to speak to him."

"He isn't here. He's coming when everything's ready."

"Everything ready?" A nameless fear began to gnaw at Wilmot's vitals.

And at that moment the door swung open, and he saw, beyond the bulking head and shoulders of the legless man, a narrow iron table, white and shining, in a room all gla.s.s and white paint.

On the entrance of Blizzard, the woman took up the remains of the soup, and pa.s.sed noiselessly out of the room.

Blizzard climbed to the foot of Wilmot's bed, and sat looking at him. In his eyes there was a glitter of suppressed excitement. "When our last talk was interrupted," he said, "I had just told you that Miss Ferris is a prisoner in this house. You don't like the idea?"

Wilmot shuddered and made a convulsive effort to break the handcuffs. He struggled with them in desperate silence for nearly a minute.

"I might break them," said Blizzard, "but you can't. Try to be as reasonable as you can. Miss Ferris is in no immediate danger. I am going to let her go, if you and I can agree."

"What do you want _me_ to agree to?"

"I've had it in mind for a long time. It was why I relieved you of money cares, and sent you West. I wished to put you in a state of perfect health before trying an experiment of the utmost interest and value to science. Only your consent is now wanting. Upon that consent depends Miss Ferris's fate. Refuse and I leave your lover heart to imagine what that fate may be. She is absolutely in my power--absolutely. Do you know her writing?"

He smiled a little and held before Wilmot's eyes a sheet of note-paper.

"She has just written it," he said, "of her own free will."

Wilmot read: "I will marry you, as soon as I know that Wilmot Allen is out of your power and safe in life and limb."

A sort of ecstasy, half anguish and half delight, thrilled through Wilmot. The writing was unmistakably Barbara's--and she was ready to make that sacrifice for him!

"She sha'n't do that," he said, "so help me G.o.d. What must I do--to save her?"

"Young man," said the legless man, "you must give me your legs."

Wilmot was at first bewildered.

"My legs?"

"They are to be grafted on my poor old stumps," said Blizzard. "You won't die. You'll just be as I am now. And I--I," his eyes shone with an unholy light, "shall be as you are now--a biped--a real man--a giant of a man. You are going to consent?"

"How do I know that you will let Miss Ferris go?"

"You shall have news of her freedom and safety in her own writing."

"When I have that a.s.surance," said Wilmot, "I will consent to anything.

Any decent man would give his life for a woman--why not his legs? Is Dr.

Ferris to operate?"

"He will be the chief of three surgeons."

"But he won't cut off my legs. We're old friends. He--"

"Won't know you in that beard. I have told him that you are a murderer whom I have saved from the chair. That in grat.i.tude for this and for the further services of smuggling you out of the country and giving you a large sum of money--not forgetting the crying interests of science--you have consented to give me your legs. He will ask you if you consent to have your legs cut off, and you will nod your head without speaking--then when my old stumps have been prepared--you will be put under an anaesthetic--"

"First I must know that Miss Ferris is safe."

"Give me your word of honor that when you _know_ that she is--you will consent."

"I don't know what you have to do with honor," said Wilmot, "but I give my word."

"Then," said Blizzard, sliding to the floor, "I go to set Miss Ferris free."

XLIV

At first Barbara could not bear to tell her father, but at last her excitement and distress became so great that she had to tell him. In a few hours she had changed from a radiant person to one white, sick, and shadowed.

"I've seen that man," she said. "I was writing notes in the summer-house. He--"

"What man--Blizzard? Well?"

"I've promised to marry him. He has Wilmot Allen in his house--in his power. He told me that if I would marry him, he would let Wilmot go. If I wouldn't, he would kill him with indescribable tortures. I told him that I would marry him when I learned that Wilmot was safe. And so I will, and then I will kill myself. You've got to do something. I never knew till he was in this awful danger that in all the world there was never anybody for me but Wilmot--fool not to know it in time."

Dr. Ferris made her drink something that he mixed in a gla.s.s. In a few minutes her jumping nerves began to come into control.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "I've seen that man. I was writing notes in the summer house when he came".]

"Wilmot," said he, "will never consent to save himself at your expense.

And I think I can promise you that Blizzard will do nothing in this matter for some time. He is to undergo a very serious operation to-night. It has all been arranged. A man under obligation to Blizzard has consented to give his legs--I am to operate. Don't look at me like that, daughter. I have given my word that if I thought the thing could be done, I would do it. The man consents. There is no reason why I shouldn't. I would do more to undo what I have done, and in the interests of science."

"You don't understand. The man who _consents_ is Wilmot."

"Did Blizzard tell you so?"

"n.o.body has told me. I know it. He consents so that I may go free."

"Of course if Wilmot is the man--"

"You couldn't--you wouldn't do it to _him_, father."

"And you so in love with him, my dear! We must go to the police."

"No, we mustn't. He said that if we tried to play any tricks, we might get him, but never Wilmot, alive. Don't you see? Father, the man isn't fit to live. He's insane."

"Answer wanted, Miss Barbara." Bubbles entered hesitatingly, a note in his hand.

One glance at the superscription, and Barbara ripped open the envelope.

She read the note and her brows contracted with pain. "Read that, father."

Dr. Ferris read: