blood on his mouth and about
his beard.

Barton drew near and touched him: the man only groaned.

"How am I to help you out of this?" said the surgeon, carefully
examining his patient, as he might now be called. A little close
observation showed that the man's arms were strapped by buckles into the
fans, while one of his legs was caught up in some elastic coils of the
mechanism.

With infinite tenderness, Barton disengaged the victim, whose stifled
groans proved at once the extent of his sufferings and of his courage.

Finally, the man was free from the machine, and Barton discovered that,
as far as a rapid investigation could show, there were no fatal injuries
done, though a leg, an arm, and several ribs were fractured, and there
were many contusions.

"Now I must leave you here for a few minutes, while I go round to the
police-office and get men and a stretcher," said Barton.

The man held up one appealing hand; the other was paralyzed.

"First hide all _this,_" he murmured, moving his head so as to indicate
the fragments of his engine. They lay all confused, a heap of spars,
cogs, wheels, fans, and what not, a puzzle to the science of mechanics.
"Don't let them know a word about it," he said. "Say I had an
accident--that I was sleep-walking, and fell from a window--say anything
you like, but promise to keep my secret. In a week," he murmured
dreamily, "it would have been complete. It is the second time I have
just missed success and fame."

"I have not an idea what your secret may be," said Barton; "but here
goes for the machine."

And, while the wounded man watched him, with piteous and wistful eyes,
he rapidly hid different fragments of the mechanism beneath and among
the heaps of rubbish, which were many, and, for purposes of concealment,
meritorious.

"Are you sure you can find them all again?" asked the victim of
misplaced ingenuity.

"Oh yes, all right," said Barton.

"Then you must get me to the street before you bring any help. If they
find me here they will ask questions, and my secret will come out."

"But how on earth am I to get you to the street?" Barton inquired, very
naturally. "Even if you could bear being carried, I could not lift you
over the boarding."

"I can bear anything--I will bear anything," said the man. "Look in my
breast, and you will find a key of a door in the palings."

Barton looked as directed, and, fastened round the neck of the
sufferer by a leather shoe-tie, he