[Illustration "Climb out of that chair, and let me out of this house"]

"This door is locked," said Wilmot.

"You are a prisoner in this house."

"I am, am I?"

Quick as lightning he had drawn and levelled at the legless man an
automatic pistol of the largest calibre. The legless man did not move an
inch, change expression, or take his eyes from Wilmot's.

Wilmot advanced till only the table separated them. "You will," he said,
"climb out of that chair, and let me out of this house, walking in
front of me."

The legless beggar appeared to consider the matter. There was silence.
Wilmot shifted the position of his feet, and the floor boards under
them creaked.

Blizzard appeared to have made up his mind. He spread his hands on the
table as if to help himself out of his chair. The palm of his right
hand, unknown to Wilmot, covered an electric push-button.

"Perhaps," said Blizzard, "you won't be in such a hurry to go after you
hear that Miss Barbara Ferris is also a prisoner in this house--"

In horror and bewilderment Wilmot allowed the muzzle of his automatic to
swerve. In that moment the palm of the legless man's right hand pressed
upon the button, and the square of the floor upon which Wilmot stood
dropped like the trap of a gallows, and he fell through the opening
into darkness.

He was neither stunned nor bruised, and he began to grope about for the
pistol which in the sudden descent had been knocked from his hand. The
only light came from the open trap in the floor above. Something fell
softly at his feet; he picked it up. It was a cloth, saturated with
chloroform. He flung it from him, and began with a new haste to grope
and fumble for his pistol.

Another cloth fell, and another. Distant and ugly laughter fell with
them. More cloths, and already the air in the place reeked with
chloroform.

He no longer knew what he was looking for, and when at last his hand
closed upon the stock of the automatic, he did not know what it was that
he had found.

Another cloth fell.

XLIII

He came to in a narrow iron bed, weak, nauseated, and handcuffed. He
could rub his feet together, but he could not separate them. He had been
dreaming about Barbara--horrible dreams. His first conscious thought was
that she, too, was a prisoner in the house of Blizzard, and that somehow
or other he must save her. Having tried in vain to break the bright,
delicate-looking handcuffs, he tried in vain to think calmly. Hou