THE TRUTH UNALLOYED

The lowly home where Ethel had pa.s.sed the previous night was as a palace compared with this structure of beach-provided boards and shingles, over the threshold of which she was ushered, supported on the arm of her protector, Doctor Gifford Garnet. As she stepped over the sill, she had a sense of apprehension, that ran over her flesh like chills. They were the physical expression of fright. She was downright afraid of this dark, dank, dungeon-like room. Her emotion was emphasized by a realization that her escort was a mentally unbalanced, drug-mad man.

Ethel, realizing something of the danger in her environment, had set herself to carry a bold demeanor. She would not let the man know either her fears or her suspicions. She meant to a.s.sume toward him an air of confidence.

There was a single window in the room, which had a wooden shutter, swung on leather hinges. This was closed, so effectively that not a particle of light filtered in from outside. It was only by the illumination through the open door that any light entered. Ethel hobbled across the room to the window, and threw open the shutter.

The setting sun threw its rays freely into the interior of the shack, as the girl looked about her. She saw tiers of bunks on either side. In the center of the room were a table and some rough chairs. An oil lamp stood upon the table. In a corner of the room were a cook-stove and the ordinary utensils for cooking. A curious conglomeration showed on some shelves at one side. In some of the bunks, there were blankets. Ethel regarded those blankets with satisfaction. They would mean warmth for the night, should she be compelled to spend it here.

The Doctor's nerves did not improve. While the girl dropped down to rest on one of the uncomfortable chairs, he walked the floor to and fro in silence. His muscles were twitching, and his eyes were wide-lidded, though the pupils were only pin-points.

Ethel watched him closely. Now, when at last her suspicions were aroused, she studied as if for her own salvation every aspect of this man, whom at first she had looked on as her savior, but now regarded with a dread unspeakable.

At last, to relieve the tension of her terror, she requested the Doctor to go out to look for a sail or any craft that he might hail. He went obediently enough. As soon as he had left the room, she moved her seat so that she could watch him.

He walked hurriedly to the boat, where, using water from the jug, he prepared another measure of the drug and shot it into his arm. When he had done this, he raised the vial that had held the pellet of morphia, and stared at its emptiness with affrighted eyes. Then, at last, with a cry of utter despair, he cast the bit of gla.s.s into the sea. The watcher understood that he had used the last atom of the drug. The knowledge filled her with new dismay. She had already learned something as to what must be the tortures of the drug-addict deprived of his supply.

After vainly scanning the horizon for a few minutes, Garnet returned to the hut, carrying the girl's blankets in one hand, the water jug in the other. When he had set the jug by the stove, he went to the cleaner-looking of the bunks, where he deftly arranged the blankets for his patient.

The sight of his preparations brought an increase of Ethel's distress at the prospect of a night to be pa.s.sed in the company of the distraught man there before her. In her misery, she murmured pa.s.sionate prayers for the coming of her lover to save her from the unknown perils of the night. Her situation seemed to her desperate beyond endurance. Yet, she could not fly from it by reason of her injured ankle. She had no recourse but to remain inactive, helpless, in an agony of dread. She could not take comfort from the thought that the man had always treated her with scrupulous respect. Now, he was no longer sane, and his past courtesy could offer no promise for the future. Had she but known, she might have been comforted by the fact that the long-continued secret indulgence in morphia had killed in him every desire and pa.s.sion save one--a mad craving for the drug itself, and for more, and more.

Ethel urged the Doctor to share with her the food provided for them by Mr. Goodwin. But he refused, declaring that he was too greatly worried over the misfortune in which she was involved. The girl then decided that she would not dare to sleep while the crazed man was present with her. She determined to remain in her seat. She was so worn with fatigue that she did not dare lie down on the comfortable blanket, where she would be unable to resist falling asleep. So she sat huddled in a mood of sick misery, while the Doctor ceaselessly paced to and fro the length of the hut, like a wild beast caged.

Presently, Garnet halted, and insisted that Ethel should lie down in the bunk to rest. This she refused to do, and she persisted in her refusal when urged a second and a third time. But, after her third refusal, Garnet regarded her with an expression of utter despair. Then he spoke, in a changed voice, shaken with emotion.

"Miss Marion, I believe that you have become afraid of me!"

Having uttered the words, he sank down heavily on one of the vacant chairs. His breath came hard and fast. He seemed like a man about to suffer a stroke of apoplexy. Then, suddenly, he burst into tears.

The man's loud sobbing stirred the girl's sympathies. She even felt a little guilty, since her conduct had caused this final outburst of wretchedness. She was eager to soothe him. Certainly, he could not be dangerous now. She hobbled across the room toward him.

But the physician ceased his sobs at her approach. He sat erect and by a brusque gesture checked her advance. He spoke to her in a toneless voice.

"Miss Marion, when first you regained consciousness, you asked me to tell the story of your kidnapping. Owing partly to your condition at that time and partly to a certain dread of my own, I only gave you a part of the story. I promised to tell the rest later. That time has now arrived. I have waited for a moment when I should feel that you had lost confidence in me, for the moment when I should know that you no longer trusted me. I delayed because I hated to confess my weakness. I wished to appear before you still as a strong man. And let me a.s.sure you that you are not in any slightest danger from me. It is true, I am a nervous wreck. And yet, at this moment, my mind is clear. I realize that the time has come for me to make my confession to you. In the hope that it will render your judgment of me less harsh, I shall tell you my whole story. It begins back in the days when I was taking my course in the medical school."

Ethel was amazed over the change that had so abruptly taken place in the man. It seemed indeed that he had recovered, at least in some measure, his accustomed poise. He appeared less afflicted with nervousness in this new eagerness to talk. She returned to her chair and again seated herself. There she sat in rapt attention as she listened to the weird narrative of a great man's folly and degradation. As the tale unfolded, the girl's heart was like a lute swept by chords and dissonances of emotion. She was thrilled to horror, moved to strange sympathy; by turns fearful and sympathetic.

"I believe," the Doctor went on, "that I was a more than ordinarily hard-working student. Night after night I burned the midnight oil. I was ambitious to forge ahead. I was eager to finish my course and to begin the practice of the profession that I so deeply loved. I was possessed by a feeling that I had been created for this calling. I believed that I was destined to obtain eminence in my chosen career.

"Everything went well until I became friends with a certain young tutor in the university. He noticed that I was working hard, and that sometimes I would begin the day tired and depressed, when, naturally, my mind would not be as bright as it should be.... The man was a vampire of viciousness--only desirous to corrupt.... And I was an easy mark! The only excuse I have to offer is my age.

"This man was a drug-fiend. He used morphia slyly, knowing full well what the outcome must be. It was that hideous knowledge that made him eager to enchain others, even as he himself was enchained, so that he would not be alone in the final catastrophe.

"One day when I was in the dumps, he came to me, placed his hand on my shoulder, and said:

"Gifford, come with me. I want to make a new man out of you.' ... He did!--the kind of man you'll know me to be when my story is done.

"I went with him to his room. From a small bottle, he handed me a pellet, with instruction to swallow it. I must ask no question--merely return to my work, and see if it did not ease my labors. I did as directed. I found the promised relief--I could do wonders. Very soon, I became the leader of my cla.s.s. There were no questions asked. Whenever I felt depressed, I went to the tutor's room and he came to my rescue.

"It was nearly a month before I was certain what he was giving me. As you, Miss Marion, have trusted me as a friend, so I trusted this man.

One day I went back to this fellow for more 'Brain Food'--as I had innocently begun to term it. I had been accustomed to entering his room without knocking, but on this occasion the door was locked. He heard me rattling the k.n.o.b, and called out to know who was there. I shouted in answer and said it was Garnet after more Brain Food. He then unlatched the door and admitted me. His coat was off and one arm was bare. Upon a small stand was a hypodermic outfit. I was surprised, for I had never seen the fellow take medicine of any kind. He laughingly remarked that I was just in time--that he was not feeling quite himself and so was taking a little Brain Food 'the other way.'

"I guessed now that the drug I had been taking was indeed morphia. For a moment, I was startled and alarmed. But the fright was of short duration. I had already developed a craving for this thing that so helped me on with my work. The tutor bade me remove my coat, roll up my shirt-sleeve, and allow him to give me a little Brain Food in his way.

Needless to say, I did as he ordered. That was my first 'shot'.... Years ago, that man killed himself--perhaps in remorse for his crime against me and others corrupted by him."

The Doctor sat silent for a long minute in brooding contemplation over this beginning of the vice that had mastered him, and now threatened at last to destroy him.

"It was not long after this," he resumed, still with that toneless monotony of voice, "that I began my life-work. Sometimes, I would go for long periods without resorting to the needle. That has helped me in the deception of my patients. For long intervals, I could endure without the drug. Then, during periods of great mental strain and physical depression from all-night vigils, I would invariably fall back upon my old Brain Food. Occasionally, such a relapse would develop into what might be termed a morphia spree. It was at the time of my last spree that--to my destruction, and your discomfiture and suffering--I was called to treat you aboard _The Isabel_."

It seemed to Ethel that Doctor Garnet wearied of his long discourse. He now arose from his chair, and once again he began to pace the floor uneasily. It appeared that he was debating in his mind whether or not he should continue his narrative.

Ethel, moved to pity by the man's evident deep distress, suggested that he should put off the further telling until morning when he would be rested. She urged him to repose in one of the bunks until the morrow, after which she would listen to him again. But to this he objected, declaring that he had made up his mind to tell the whole story. Unless she should refuse to listen, he would continue. Ethel admitted her willingness to hear the remainder of the narrative.

"I suppose," the Doctor continued, still in that dead level of monotonous recitation, "at the time that I boarded the yacht that you were suffering so greatly from your injured ankle that you did not detect my deplorable condition. Of course, I should not have gone in answer to your call. But I realized that you were alone, and I had explicit instructions from your father to care for you. So, duty called me. Then, after administering to you a sedative of extra strength, in the next instant I injected more of the death-dealing drug into my own arm. From that moment, the Doctor Garnet that you knew and trusted became a Mr. Hyde. Gifford Garnet did not wish to do you harm----"

"But----"

"But Mr. Hyde became obsessed with an insane desire to have you--a young woman absolutely pure in heart--to have you enjoy with him the wonderful sensations derived from the hideous drug to which he was subject."

The revelation, shocking as it was, brought a profound relief to the listening girl. The confession shone like a sun through the mists of fear that had fallen upon her. She listened now in a mood, not of fright, but all of pity.

"I told you when you asked me about the fate of the kidnappers that the ring leader had escaped. That was the truth. He did escape. But he's here to-night, a prisoner--a confessed criminal, in your hands, Miss Marion.

"I drugged the man in charge of the yacht. Then I chained him to the engine. When he aroused from his stupor, I had everything ready for the yacht's sailing. I forced the man to answer the bells as given from the bridge, under penalty of death. The most of the time I kept you under the influence of my drug. Much of the trip is a blank to me. Why we were not swallowed up in the great waters of the Atlantic, I cannot understand. It must have been, Miss Marion, that G.o.d stretched out His Arm to save you.... At the time the yacht struck and was destroyed, I was a raving maniac.

"Then, somehow, I once again became sane. That was while I watched an old fisherman, who rescued you from the pounding seas.

"At last, I remembered the man chained to the engine. It was fear of him that made me flee. When the kindly old fisherman went in search of a physician for your sake, I was wild with the desire of flight. I could see always the accusing eyes of that man there in the depths of the sea, staring up at me--his murderer!... So, I took you and fled with you in the tender."

Ethel looked at the man, whom she had known and trusted as the family physician, with widened eyes of horror. This trusted friend, by his own avowal, was not only thief and kidnapper--he was a murderer!

CHAPTER XXI

SEALED ORDERS

Doctor Garnet, seeing the effect made upon the girl by the conclusion of the story, did not approach her or try to relieve her, as had been his wont. At the moment he felt himself too low, too despicable, to lay his hands on this fair girl, even as a physician. Moreover, he knew that it would not be long ere she recovered her calm. Indeed, only a few minutes elapsed before Ethel had pa.s.sed through the crisis of her emotion. Her mind clear again, she stared at the man with an unconcealed repugnance, under which he cringed. She thought with dismay of the dreadful thing Doctor Garnet had done. She even wondered now with new distress as to what her friends must have thought concerning her secret departure. It seemed to her that the truth was too fantastic a thing to be credited by the world at large. It would scoff at this explanation of a young girl's sailing for days with a man, practically alone, on her own yacht. She shuddered at thought of the slanders sure to be her portion. How her father would grieve over this disgrace of his daughter! How Roy----Appalled, she thrust the terrifying thought from her mind.... And there was the murder of the caretaker! Would the public not believe her an accomplice, by consent at least, in that forcible holding of him to the engine?

Ethel's thoughts veered to Roy again. But, now, there was something of comfort in her musing. It occurred to her that he at least would believe the truth, though all the rest of the world should mock at it as a lie.

Besides, there was the message she had thrown into the sea for him, which she had seen picked up by the fisherman. There was no doubt in her mind now that Roy had received it. There came a little glow of courage in her heart as she reflected that even at this very moment he was searching desperately for her.... Had she been outside the cabin just then, she might have seen the lights of _The Hialdo_, on which her lover was being carried to Beaufort, there to receive the news of her having left Ichabod's Island alive.

A new courage for herself left her free to feel compa.s.sion toward the miserable being who had done her such grievous wrong. She could guess in some measure from the man's lined and haggard face and twitching body how great was his suffering and remorse. From the fact that he had made such a full confession of his guilt, she knew that he would make every rest.i.tution in his power. Sympathy for him, added to sympathy for herself, proved too much for her self-restraint. Woman-like, she hid her face in her arms outstretched on the table, and wept.

After a little while, the fit of weeping ended. The girl brushed away the tears, and again sat erect. Then, for a long time, neither she nor the man opposite her moved or spoke. What, indeed, was there for her to say to him who had made her his victim? She had not the heart to reproach him. She could find no word of comfort. It seemed to her that there could be no a.s.suagement of his misery--that he were better dead.

If he lived, he must be a fugitive from justice, or, if captured, he must be tried and condemned for murder. Or he might end his days in a mad-house. Surely, death were preferable.