“The unforeseen has come to pass. That which I have just witnessed God
never intended that mortal eyes should see. At the very thought of it my
body trembles and every nerve tingles as if from electric shock.
“Where is Lessman? Did the Bodymaster and his female accomplice perish
in the ruins of their own diabolical art? I hope so. It is better that
I—that all of us—die of starvation, locked as we are in this horrible
den, than that others should share the fate which has been meted out to
us.
“_Last night I am almost certain that we exchanged bodies—the Bodymaster
and I!_
“At least, my waking consciousness tells me that we did. Yet it is all so
hazy that I can remember only fragments of what happened. Perhaps I only
dreamed. I tell only what I can remember.
“At his command, I slunk from my narrow cell like a mangy, half-starved,
dope-filled circus lion from its cage. And, like the king of beasts,
beaten into servitude in the arena, I fawned at my master’s feet, ready
to do his bidding. Such is the state that I have reached. For my body
is not my own. It is his—his to do with as he wills. Fight as I may, an
unseen force compels me to do his bidding.
“They were together, he and Meta. From another door entered a girl—young,
beautiful, fair-haired. She is, I am certain, the woman who accompanied
me on that other occasion of which I have a recollection—the night I
found the blood upon my hand and knew that I had killed a man. I dream of
her nightly. She is Meta’s dupe. Like me, her mind is not yet a blank.
She entered slowly, reluctantly, as if every fiber in her body rebelled
against the awful crime in which she was to take a part, her great blue
eyes staring straight ahead.
“Like a woman who walks in her sleep, she approached Meta’s side. For
an instant they stood there—the fair-haired girl and the beautiful,
raven-tressed woman. Lessman’s hands hovered over them.
“She screamed! God in heaven, how she shrieked! Then the body of Meta
staggered to a nearby chair and dropped into its recesses.
“_And from the throat of the fair-haired girl with the angel’s face came
the voice of Meta!_
“‘_It is done!_’
“He, the Bodymaster, turned to me. My whole being fought within me
against the sacrilege which was being committed. As well attempt to stem
the oncoming tide. I felt my body in a convulsion. Something seemed to
be tearing at my very vitals. My mind reeled. My brain was filled with
fire. The face—the devilish, diabolical, mocking face of the Bodymaster
appeared before me. I could see nothing else. His baleful, gleaming eyes
seemed to burn into my very core. My body seemed to be hurled through
space.... Then came oblivion.
“I must have been unconscious but an instant. I stood leaning against
the table, my fingers pressed against my aching brow. Dazed, I passed
my hand across my face. I was bearded. _It was the face of Lessman, the
Bodymaster!_
“The clothes were his. _I was inhabiting his body!_
“My startled gaze turned across the room. To all intents and purposes it
was I who stood there, my arm about the waist of the golden-haired girl.
“I knew that it was not I—that it was Lessman, the Bodymaster, who
offered his foul caresses to the beautiful face upraised to his. I knew
that the rich red lips were not those of the girl whose slender body he
had defiled. It was Meta—Meta and Lessman, not the girl and I....
“A burst of rage swelled up within me. Something snapped. For an instant
a flood of red appeared before my eyes. I leaped forward, the lust for
killing within my brain.
“Lessman’s body is fat with nourishment, his muscles fed by good living,
while mine is half famished, ill-nourished, weak as a result of worry and
nerve strain.
“It was my own body I was punishing. Yet Lessman’s was the soul that
inhabited it. As a man sees his face in a mirror, so did I see my face
before me. I hurled my stolen body to the floor. Screaming with rage, I
showered blow after blow upon it. It writhed with pain.
“And all the time, within me, there was being waged a terrible struggle
for mastery. I felt the will of Lessman commanding me to desist. Yet the
love of a woman was stronger than his power. I gouged at the gleaming
eyes which stared up into mine, the while I choked at the throat—_my
throat_—which lay beneath my fingers.
“The woman was screaming. I knew that it was Meta who was cursing me, who
sought to pull me from my victim. Yet it was the body of the unnamed girl
I loved, her face contorted into a frenzy of malignancy, who showered
blow after blow upon my bared head....
“I awoke to find myself here in my cell again. My head aches. My face is
covered with bruises. My hair is matted with blood. Lessman must have
conquered. I wonder how fared the girl with the mass of shimmering,
golden hair. Surely, with all these bruises, it could not have been a
dream.”
_CHAPTER V._