The men obeyed their employer"s command, little dreaming it was an innocent man they were consigning to a living tomb.
It was an hour afterward ere consciousness returned to Jay Gardiner. For a moment he was dazed, bewildered; then the recollection of the encounter, and the terrible blow he had received over the temple, recurred to him.
Where was he? The darkness and silence of death reigned. The air was musty. He lay upon a stone flagging through which the slime oozed.
Like a flash he remembered the words of Jasper Wilde.
"Take him to my private wine-cellar until I have time to attend to him."
Yes, that was where he must be--in Wilde"s wine-cellar.
While he was cogitating over this scene, an iron door at the further end of the apartment opened, and a man, carrying a lantern, hastily entered the place, and stood on the threshold for a moment.
Doctor Gardiner saw at once that it was Jasper Wilde.
"Come to, have you?" cried Wilde, swinging the light in his face. "Well, how do you like your quarters, my handsome, aristocratic doctor, eh?"
"How dare you hold me a prisoner here?" demanded Jay Gardiner, striking the floor with his manacled hands. "Release me at once, I say!"
A sneering laugh broke from Wilde"s thin lips.
"_Dare!_" he repeated, laying particular stress upon the word. "We Wildes dare anything when there is a pretty girl like beautiful Bernardine concerned in it."
"You scoundrel!" cried Jay Gardiner, "if I were but free from these shackles, I would teach you the lesson of your life!"
"A pinioned man is a fool to make threats," sneered Wilde. "But come, now. Out with it, curse you! Where is Bernardine?--where have you hidden her?"
"I refuse to answer your question," replied Jay Gardiner, coolly. "I know where she is, but that knowledge shall never be imparted to you without her consent."
"I will wring it from your lips, curse you!" cried Wilde, furiously. "I will torture you here, starve you here, until you go mad and are glad to speak."
"Even though you _kill_ me, you shall not learn from my lips the whereabouts of Bernardine Moore!" exclaimed Jay Gardiner, hoa.r.s.ely.
As the hours dragged their slow lengths by, exhausted nature a.s.serted itself, and despite the hunger and burning thirst he endured, and the pain in his head, sleep--
"Tired Nature"s sweet restorer--balmy sleep"--
came to him.
Suddenly the door opened, and Jasper Wilde, still carrying a lantern, looked in.
"It is morning again," he said. "How have you pa.s.sed the night, my handsome doctor? I see the rodents have not eaten you. I shouldn"t have been the least surprised if they had. I a.s.sure you, I wonder they could have abstained from such a feast."
"You fiend incarnate!" cried Jay Gardiner, hoa.r.s.ely. "Remove these shackles, and meet me as man to man. Only a dastardly coward bullies a man who can not help himself."
"Still defiant, my charming doctor!" laughed Wilde. "I marvel at that. I supposed by this time you would be quite willing to give me the information I desired."
Jay Gardiner could not trust himself to speak, his indignation was so great.
"_Au revoir_ again," sneered Wilde. "The day will pa.s.s and the night will follow, in the natural course of events. To-morrow, at this hour, I shall look in on you again, my handsome doctor. Look out for the rodents. Bless me! they are dashing over the floor. I must fly!"
Again the door closed, and with a groan Jay Gardiner could not repress, he sunk to the floor, smiting it with his manacled hands, and wondering how soon this awful torture would end.
CHAPTER XXIX.
During the long hours of the night which followed, Jay Gardiner dared not trust himself to sleep for a single instant, so great was his horror of the rodents that scampered in droves across the damp floor of the cellar in which he was a prisoner.
He felt that his brain must soon give way, and that Jasper Wilde would have his desire--he would soon be driven to insanity.
He thought of Bernardine, who was waiting for him to return to her, and he groaned aloud in the bitterness of his anguish, in the agony of his awful despair.
The manacles cut into his flesh, for his wrists had swollen as he lay there, and the burning thirst was becoming maddening.
"Great G.o.d in Heaven! how long--ah, how long, will this torture last?"
he cried.
In the midst of his anguish, he heard footsteps; but not those for which he longed so ardently. A moment later, and Jasper Wilde stood before him.
"Now let me tell you what my revenge upon the beautiful Bernardine will be for preferring _you_ to myself. I shall marry her--she dare not refuse when I have her here--that I warrant you. As I said before, I shall marry the dainty Bernardine, the cold, beautiful, haughty Bernardine, and then I shall force her to go behind the bar, and the beauty of her face will draw custom from far and near.
"Nothing could be so revolting to her as this. It will crush her, it will kill her, and I, whose love for her has turned into hate--yes, deepest, deadly hate--will stand by and watch her, and laugh at her. Ha!
ha! ha!"
With a fury born of madness, Doctor Gardiner wrenched himself free from the chains that bound him, and with one flying leap was upon his enemy and had hurled him to the floor, his hand clutching Wilde"s throat.
"It shall be death to one or other of us!" he panted, hoa.r.s.ely.
But he had not reckoned that in his weak condition he was no match for Jasper Wilde, who for the moment was taken aback by the suddenness of the attack.
That the encounter would have ended in certain death to Jay Gardiner, in his exhausted state, was quite apparent to Jasper Wilde; but in that moment fate intervened to save him. Hardly had the two men come together in that desperate death-struggle, ere the startling cry of "Fire!" rang through the building.
Jasper Wilde realized what that meant. There was but one exit from the cellar, and if he did not get out of it in a moment"s time, he would be caught like a rat in a trap. Gathering himself together, he wrenched himself free from the doctor"s grasp, and hurling him to the floor with a fearful blow planted directly between the eyes, sprung over the threshold.
Wilde paused a single instant to shout back:
"I leave you to your fate, my handsome doctor! Ha! ha! ha!"
But fate did not intend Jay Gardiner to die just then, even though he sunk back upon the flags with an awful groan and fully realized the horror of the situation.
That groan saved him. A fireman heard it, and in less time than it takes to tell it, a brawny, heroic fellow sprung through the iron door-way, which Wilde in his mad haste had not taken time to close.
A moment more, and the fireman had carried his burden up through the flames, and out into the pure air.