Frank Merriwell's Return to Yale Part 43

"You'd better speak respectfully."

"Well," stammered Miller, "I don't want to cause no offense, but you told me I could defend myself, and I ain't going to believe that Frank Merriwell was seriously hurt. I'm sorry for it if he was, and I won't do it again."

"Take him down and let him see the body of his victim!" said Baker, in a solemn tone.

Miller started so when he heard this that he almost fell out of the chain loop. The windla.s.s creaked, and he was set down on the floor.

Baker's command had set his fears going afresh, and he trembled so that he could hardly stand upright. A couple of students caught him by the arms and pushed rather than led him to one of the small rooms of the order.

A door was opened and Miller was forced inside. He gave a loud gasp when he entered, fell upon his knees, and beat his hands helplessly upon the floor.

CHAPTER XXIV.

HUMPERd.i.n.k TO THE RESCUE.

What Miller saw was this:

A room lighted by one solitary candle and rendered more gloomy by heavy curtains hanging before the windows; a cot bed was in the middle, and upon it was a body all covered over with the exception of the face, and the face above it was that of Frank Merriwell.

It need hardly be said here that Frank was as much alive at that moment as he had ever been in his life, but his face had been covered with chalk so as to resemble that of a dead man.

Miller was thoroughly convinced that Frank was dead, and he was not too frightened to realize that he had admitted having been the cause of it.

"Oh! what shall I do? What shall I do?" he groaned. "I never meant that it should be as bad as this!"

"It isn't a question of what you shall do," remarked Baker, sternly.

The other students had come into the room and now stood around, looking on solemnly. Not one of them so much as winked at another for fear that the spectacle would lose some of its force upon the mind of the frightened victim.

"The point is," continued Baker, "that you are not in a position to do anything; the question is, what shall we do?"

"He ought to have his head chopped off where he is!" muttered Bruce Browning, gruffly.

Miller started and edged away from the spot where he was kneeling.

"No!" exclaimed Baker, sternly; "that would be too easy; I should rather think that it would be better to boil him in a vat!"

"Or might burn him alive out on the marshes!" said another.

"I think a good straight forward hanging is the best thing for him!"

muttered Jack Diamond.

"Oh, for Heaven's sake, gentlemen!" groaned Miller, "don't let it be to-night. Give me a chance to make up for this!"

"How can you make up for it?" retorted Baker. "Do you know any way of restoring a dead person to life?"

"No, I don't, but I never would have gone to do it if I'd supposed that it would be serious, so help me, I never would!"

"I don't think that that makes any difference."

At this moment there was a stir in the room back of the students. Baker turned inquiringly.

One of the students who had really been present all the time now pretended to be coming in from the outside in a hurry.

"Prof. Humperd.i.n.k," said this student, "is on the way, and will be here in a minute or two."

"Ah!" responded Baker, in a tone of relief, "perhaps then that may make things better, for, of course, while we are bound to punish this man Miller, we want Merriwell restored to life if such a thing can be done."

"Humperd.i.n.k can do it if anybody can!" said Rowe.

"Do you mean to say, gentlemen," gasped Miller, "that there's a chance that Merriwell may be restored?"

"We can't tell until Humperd.i.n.k comes," responded Baker, solemnly.

"Haven't you ever heard of Humperd.i.n.k?"

"I don't think he buys his cigars at my store," responded Miller.

"No, he probably doesn't," responded Baker, significantly. "Humperd.i.n.k doesn't indulge in ordinary tobacco; he smokes the root of snake plants found in the wilds of Africa. One whiff of it for an ordinary man is fatal."

Miller stared in a way that showed he believed every word. He was not in a condition to doubt anything that was told to him.

That is one of the effects of hasheesh, but even without the drug it is more than likely that he would have believed everything said to him on this occasion.

"Humperd.i.n.k," continued Baker, "knows all the mysteries of nature. He has experimented with all poisons, and eats them as readily as the rest of us do ordinary food. In the old days he would have been called a magician. Really he's a very great scientist, and if there's any possible hope for Merriwell he'll know it. Ah! here he is."

At the moment when Miller had been taken into the room where Merriwell lay apparently dead, another student had slipped into the dressing-room of the little theatre, which was a part of the society's quarters, and had put on a long gown, white wig and beard, and concealed his eyes with dark gla.s.ses.

He now came tottering feebly across the room toward the students.

"What have ye here?" he asked in a high, cracked voice.

"One of the students has died, professor," responded Baker, in a tone of deep respect, "and the circ.u.mstances were so peculiar----"

"Dead, eh?" returned the "professor," stopping short in his walk, "then I can't do anything for him."

He turned about as if he would go away.

"Oh! don't give it up!" screamed Miller, "come in and give him something to bring him back to life; do it, I beg you, for my sake!"

"Your sake," sneered the "professor," "you are not worth the turn of a thumb!"

"Oh, but you don't know how much depends on it!" cried Miller.

"I don't know!" fairly shouted the professor. "I know everything! I know that you caused that young man's death; I know that you pushed him in front of a moving car; I know that you didn't mean to kill him, but that you would be glad to do so if you could do it safely; I know that you're a cold-hearted wretch!"