SYMPTOMS OF MADNESS.
Cassie was taken to her room in the hotel. It was necessary to carry
her over on a stretcher, for she found she could not walk. Havener
carried one end of the stretcher, while Frank was at the other. Old Dan
walked at the side, holding the girl's hand, and mumbling his shame,
his regret, his love.
Occasionally Havener ground his big teeth together and muttered
something under his breath. At the hotel he took her in his arms. As he
lifted her from the stretcher she cried out with pain.
"My side, Ross--my side!" she gasped.
"Oh, that miserable whelp!" grated the stage manager.
She lay on her bed, looking white and weak when the paint had been
removed from her face by the aid of cocoa butter, soap and water. With
folded arms, Havener stood and gazed down at her, his bosom heaving.
The other women of the company came and did all they could for her. The
men came to the door to ask some questions.
"How did it happen?" they inquired.
"A brute did it!" answered Havener, and old Dan shrank and cowered in a
corner.
"A--a brute?" faltered the physician. "A--a man?"
"Yes."
"Why don't you have him arrested? Why don't you have him punished?"
"Oh, he shall be punished!" declared the stage manager. "He shall get
what he merits!"
Old Dan trembled.
"Where is he?"
"I don't know."
The old actor looked up in surprise.
"But you know him--you know his name?"
"Yes; his name is Sargent."
Cassie's father half started up, and then dropped back on his chair,
gasping.
The doctor said it was impossible to tell how much Cassie was hurt, but
he left some medicine to be taken internally and some liniment to be
applied to the bruises.
When he was gone, old Dan came and grasped Havener by the hand.
"It was' kind of you--kind of you!" burst from the lips of the old
actor. "I thought--I thought----"
"I know what you thought," said Havener. "You are Cassie's father. For
her sake I shielded you, but if you ever lift your hand to her again,
I'll----"
"Ross, Ross," cried the girl, "stop! Don't threaten him! He is my
father!"
"Oh, my little sunshine--my poor child!" sobbed old Dan, falling on
his knees at the bedside. "Can you forgive me? Can you forgive your
miserable old father?"
"There, there, pop!" she said, reaching out her thin hand and putting
it on his gray hair. "Don't you know I forgive you? It wasn't you; it
was the whisky."
"And he gave it to me--he told me where Merriwell had hid it!" said the
old actor, glad to shift the responsibility.
"He did it to hurt Merriwell," said Havener, grimly; "but that makes
him none the less responsible."
Lillian Bird came in and sat beside the bed, and, as soon as possible,
Havener made an excuse to go out. Five minutes later Frank found the
stage manager in his room.
Havener was loading a revolver!
"What are you doing?" asked Merry, in surprise.
"Getting ready," was the grim answer, as the man slipped the cartridges
into the cylinder.
"Getting ready?" repeated Frank, wonderingly.
"Yes."
"For what?"
"Trouble."
"What kind of trouble?"
"I'm going gunning."
Frank understood now.
"Oh, come, Havener!" he cried, "you can't mean that----"
"Just that!" said Havener, grimly. "I'm going gunning for a man!"
"That is folly, man! You must know what it means!"
"It means that Sargent gets what he deserves!"
"It means that you wreck your own life--that you may be hanged for
murder!"
"Oh, what's the odds! My life doesn't amount to anything! The girl is
done for. I know it. She'll never recover from this."
"What makes you think that?"
"I feel it--I know it! The morphine--she is using it again. It will
kill her in the end, if she doesn't die from the treatment she received
to-night."
"She won't die from that."
"You don't know. You didn't see the look on that doctor's face. I
understood his meaning when he said he could not tell just how bad she
was hurt. He knows, but he would not say."
"He knows what?"
"That she is injured internally--that she will not recover."
Frank was shocked.
"Havener, Havener!" he cried, "you can't be right about this! You must
be mistaken! You have imagined what is not true."
The desperate man shook his head gloomily.
"No," he declared, "it is not imagination. I feel it in my heart. I
shall not let that whelp get away! His life shall pay for her life!
For it was he who murdered her!"
Frank looked into Havener's eyes, and what he saw there made him
shudder. It seemed that the man was insane for the time.
"Wait," Merry urged--"wait and see. Cassie may be all right in the
morning."
"I'll take no chance of letting him get away. It is useless to talk to
me, Merriwell. My mind is made up. I shall shoot him on sight!"
"And be arrested within the hour. Do you know what that will mean for
Cassie?"
"What will it mean?"
"You, Havener, will be the one to kill her. The bullet you fire at
Sargent will go straight to her heart!"
The wild light in the stage manager's eyes turned to a look of horror.
He sank down on a chair and sat there, staring at Frank--staring,
staring, staring.
"Now you see it, Havener," Merriwell went on. "You must hold your
hand--you must not do this thing."
"Perhaps you are right," came huskily from the half-crazed man. "I had
not thought of it that way. I must wait till she is dead. Till she is
dead!" he moaned. "Ah, Merriwell, you do not know how I have loved that
girl! And now she is going to die!"
"We'll hope not--we'll pray that she does not, Havener."
"We'll pray! No! I've never prayed in my life! I don't know how. But
you--Cassie told me you prayed. Merriwell, pray for her--pray for me!
There is hell in my heart to-night! I never felt this way before. When
I came in there and found my little girl so still and limp--gods! it
seemed that something snapped in my head! Since then there has been a
buzzing and ringing in my ears. Sometimes it seems that I can hear a
great river of blood rushing through my head. I don't know what ails
me!"
"You are all wrought up over this affair, Havener; you need time to
cool down."
"To cool down! Ha, ha! As if I could cool down if I thought of it! My
little sweetheart knocked down and beaten in a most brutal manner!
Why, the thought is enough to make a devil of anybody! I won't search
for Sargent, but let him keep out of my sight! Let him beware! I shall
shoot him on sight!"
Havener was on his feet now, pacing wildly up and down the small room,
his eyes blazing, his face flushed.
Looking at him, Frank wondered if the seeds of madness were not
sprouting in his system.
Again Merry talked to him; again he did his best to soothe the man.
"Go to Cassie," he urged. "Stay by her a while."
"Not now--not now!" breathed Havener, hoarsely. "The sight of her will
stir me up again. I must not see her for a time."
Then he flung himself at full length on the bed, and Frank slipped out,
leaving him there.