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Chapter 5 of the Serial:
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THE MONSTER MEN
  by Edgar Rice Burroughs
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Chapter 5, TREASON

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On their return to camp after her rescue Virginia
talked a great deal to von Horn about the young giant
who had rescued her, until the man feared that she was
more interested in him than seemed good for his own plans.

He had now cast from him the last vestige of his
loyalty for his employer, and thus freed had determined
to use every means within his power to win Professor
Maxon's daughter, and with her the heritage of wealth
which he knew would be hers should her father,
through some unforeseen mishap, meet death before
he could return to civilization and alter his will,
a contingency which von Horn knew he might have to consider
should he marry the girl against her father's wishes, and
thus thwart the crazed man's mad, but no less dear project.

He realized that first he must let the girl fully
understand the grave peril in which she stood,
and turn her hope of protection from her father to himself.
He imagined that the initial step in undermining
Virginia's confidence in her father would be to narrate
every detail of the weird experiments which Professor
Maxon had brought to such successful issues during
their residence upon the island.

The girl's own questioning gave him the lead he needed.

"Where could that horrid creature have come from that
set upon me in the jungle and nearly killed poor Sing?"
she asked.

For a moment von Horn was silent, in well simulated
hesitancy to reply to her query.

"I cannot tell you, Miss Maxon," he said sadly,
"how much I should hate to be the one to ignore your
father's commands, and enlighten you upon this and
other subjects which lie nearer to your personal
welfare than you can possibly guess; but I feel that
after the horrors of this day duty demands that I must
lay all before you--you cannot again be exposed to the
horrors from which you were rescued only by a miracle."

"I cannot imagine what you hint at, Dr. von Horn,"
said Virginia, "but if to explain to me will
necessitate betraying my father's confidence
I prefer that you remain silent."

"You do not understand," broke in the man, "you cannot
guess the horrors that I have seen upon this island,
or the worse horrors that are to come.  Could you dream
of what lies in store for you, you would seek death rather
than face the future.  I have been loyal to your father,
Virginia, but were you not blind, or indifferent,
you would long since have seen that your welfare
means more to me than my loyalty to him--
more to me than my life or my honor.

"You asked where the creature came from that attacked
you today.  I shall tell you.  It is one of a dozen
similarly hideous things that your father has created
in his mad desire to solve the problem of life.
He has solved it; but, God, at what a price
in misshapen, soulless, hideous monsters!"

The girl looked up at him, horror stricken.

"Do you mean to say that my father in a mad attempt to
usurp the functions of God created that awful thing?"
she asked in a low, faint voice, "and that there are
others like it upon the island?"

"In the campong next to yours there are a dozen others,"
replied von Horn, "nor would it be easy to say which
is the most hideous and repulsive.  They are grotesque
caricatures of humanity--without soul and almost without brain."

"God!" murmured the girl, burying her face in her hands,
"he has gone mad; he has gone mad."

"I truly believe that he is mad," said von Horn, "nor could
you doubt it for a moment were I to tell you the worst."

"The worst!" exclaimed the girl.  "What could be worse
than that which you already have divulged?  Oh, how could
you have permitted it?"

"There is much worse than I have told you, Virginia.
So much worse that I can scarce force my lips to frame
the words, but you must be told.  I would be more
criminally liable than your father were I to keep
it from you, for my brain, at least, is not crazed.
Virginia, you have in your mind a picture of the
hideous thing that carried you off into the jungle?"

"Yes," and as the girl replied a convulsive shudder
racked her frame.

Von Horn grasped her arm gently as he went on,
as though to support and protect her during the shock
that he was about to administer.

"Virginia," he said in a very low voice, "it is your
father's intention to wed you to one of his creatures."

The girl broke from him with an angry cry.

"It is not true!" she exclaimed.  "It is not true.
Oh, Dr. von Horn how could you tell me such a cruel
and terrible untruth."

"As God is my judge, Virginia," and the man reverently
uncovered as he spoke, "it is the truth.  Your father
told me it in so many words when I asked his permission
to pay court to you myself--you are to marry Number
Thirteen when his education is complete."

"I shall die first!" she cried.

"Why not accept me instead?" suggested the man.

For a moment Virginia looked straight into his eyes as
though to read his inmost soul.

"Let me have time to consider it, Doctor," she replied.
"I do not know that I care for you in that way at all."

"Think of Number Thirteen," he suggested.  "It should
not be difficult to decide."

"I could not marry you simply to escape a worse fate,"
replied the girl.  "I am not that cowardly--but let me
think it over.  There can be no immediate danger, I am sure."

"One can never tell," replied von Horn, "what strange,
new vagaries may enter a crazed mind to dictate this
moment's action or the next."

"Where could we wed?" asked Virginia.

"The Ithaca would bear us to Singapore, and when we
returned you would be under my legal protection and safe."

"I shall think about it from every angle," she answered
sadly, "and now good night, my dear friend," and with a
wan smile she entered her quarters.

For the next month Professor Maxon was busy educating
Number Thirteen.  He found the young man intelligent
far beyond his most sanguine hopes, so that the
progress made was little short of uncanny.

Von Horn during this time continued to urge upon
Virginia the necessity for a prompt and favorable
decision in the matter of his proposal; but when it
came time to face the issue squarely the girl found it
impossible to accede to his request--she thought that
she loved him, but somehow she dared not say the word
that would make her his for life.

Bududreen, the Malay mate was equally harassed by
conflicting desires, though of a different nature, 
or he had his eye upon the main chance that was
represented to him by the great chest, and also upon
the lesser reward which awaited him upon delivery of
the girl to Rajah Muda Saffir.  The fact that he could
find no safe means for accomplishing both these ends
simultaneously was all that had protected either from
his machinations.

The presence of the uncanny creatures of the court of
mystery had become known to the Malay and he used this
knowledge as an argument to foment discord and mutiny
in the ignorant and superstitious crew under his
command.  By boring a hole in the partition wall
separating their campong from the inner one he had
disclosed to the horrified view of his men the fearsome
brutes harbored so close to them.  The mate, of course,
had no suspicion of the true origin of these monsters,
but his knowledge of the fact that they had not been
upon the island when the Ithaca arrived and that it
would have been impossible for them to have landed and
reached the camp without having been seen by himself or
some member of his company, was sufficient evidence to
warrant him in attributing their presence to some
supernatural and malignant power.

This explanation the crew embraced willingly, and with
it Bududreen's suggestion that Professor Maxon had
power to transform them all into similar atrocities.
The ball once started gained size and momentum as it
progressed.  The professor's ofttimes strange
expression was attributed to an evil eye, and every
ailment suffered by any member of the crew was blamed
upon their employer's Satanic influence.  There was but
one escape from the horrors of such a curse--the death
of its author; and when Bududreen discovered that
they had reached this point, and were even discussing
the method of procedure, he added all that was needed
to the dangerously smouldering embers of bloody mutiny by
explaining that should anything happen to the white men
he would become sole owner of their belongings,
including the heavy chest, and that the reward
of each member of the crew would be generous.

Von Horn was really the only stumbling block in
Bududreen's path.  With the natural cowardice of the
Malay he feared this masterful American who never moved
without a brace of guns slung about his hips; and it
was at just this psychological moment that the doctor
played into the hands of his subordinate, much to the
latter's inward elation.

Von Horn had finally despaired of winning Virginia by
peaceful court, and had about decided to resort to
force when he was precipitately confirmed in his
decision by a conversation with the girl's father.

He and the professor were talking in the workshop of
the remarkable progress of Number Thirteen toward a
complete mastery of English and the ways and manners
of society, in which von Horn had been assisting his
employer to train the young giant.  The breach between
the latter and von Horn had been patched over by
Professor Maxon's explanations to Number Thirteen
as soon as the young man was able to comprehend--in the
meantime it had been necessary to keep von Horn out of
the workshop except when the giant was confined in his
own room off the larger one.

Von Horn had been particularly anxious, for the furtherance
of certain plans he had in mind, to effect a reconciliation
with Number Thirteen, to reach a basis of friendship
with the young man, and had left no stone unturned
to accomplish this result.  To this end he had spent
considerable time with Number Thirteen, coaching him
in English and in the ethics of human association.

"He is progressing splendidly, Doctor," Professor Maxon
had said.  "It will be but a matter of a day or so when
I can introduce him to Virginia, but we must be careful
that she has no inkling of his origin until mutual
affection has gained a sure foothold between them."

"And if that should not occur?" questioned von Horn.

"I should prefer that they mated voluntarily," replied
the professor, the strange gleam leaping to his eyes at
the suggestion of possible antagonism to his cherished
plan, "but if not, then they shall be compelled by
the force of my authority--they both belong to me,
body and soul."

"You will wait for the final consummation of your
desires until you return with them to civilization,
I presume," said von Horn.

"And why?" returned the professor.  "I can wed them
here myself--it would be the surer way--yes, that is
what I shall do."

It was this determination on the part of Professor
Maxon that decided von Horn to act at once.  Further,
it lent a reasonable justification for his purposed act.

Shortly after their talk the older man left the workshop,
and von Horn took the opportunity to inaugurate the
second move of his campaign.  Number Thirteen was sitting
near a window which let upon the inner court, busy with
the rudiments of written English.  Von Horn approached him.

"You are getting along nicely, Jack," he said kindly,
looking over the other's shoulder and using the name
which had been adopted at his suggestion to lend a more
human tone to their relations with the nameless man.

"Yes," replied the other, looking up with a smile.
"Professor Maxon says that in another day or two I may
come and live in his own house, and again meet his
beautiful daughter.  It seems almost too good to be
true that I shall actually live under the same roof
with her and see her every day--sit at the same table
with her--and walk with her among the beautiful trees
and flowers that witnessed our first meeting.  I wonder
if she will remember me.  I wonder if she will be as
glad to see me again as I shall be to see her."

"Jack," said von Horn, sadly, "I am afraid there
is a terrible and disappointing awakening for you.
It grieves me that it should be so, but it seems only
fair to tell you, what Professor Maxon either does not know
or has forgotten, that his daughter will not look with
pleasure upon you when she learns your origin.

"You are not as other men.  You are but the accident of
a laboratory experiment.  You have no soul, and the
soul is all that raises man above the beasts.  Jack,
poor boy, you are not a human being--you are not even
a beast.  The world, and Miss Maxon is of the world,
will look upon you as a terrible creature to be shunned--
a horrible monstrosity far lower in the scale of creation
than the lowest order of brutes.

"Look," and the man pointed through the window toward
the group of hideous things that wandered aimlessly
about the court of mystery.  "You are of the same breed
as those, you differ from them only in the symmetry of
your face and features, and the superior development of
your brain.  There is no place in the world for them,
nor for you.

"I am sorry that it is so.  I am sorry that I should
have to be the one to tell you; but it is better that
you know it now from a friend than that you meet the
bitter truth when you least expected it, and possibly
from the lips of one like Miss Maxon for whom you might
have formed a hopeless affection."

As von Horn spoke the expression on the young man's
face became more and more hopeless, and when he had
ceased he dropped his head into his open palms, sitting
quiet and motionless as a carven statue.  No sob shook
his great frame, there was no outward indication of the
terrible grief that racked him inwardly--only in the
pose was utter dejection and hopelessness.

The older man could not repress a cold smile--it had
had more effect than he had hoped.

"Don't take it too hard, my boy," he continued.
"The world is wide.  It would be easy to find a thousand
places where your antecedents would be neither known
nor questioned.  You might be very happy elsewhere and
there a hundred thousand girls as beautiful and sweet
as Virginia Maxon--remember that you have never seen
another, so you can scarcely judge."

"Why did he ever bring me into the world?" exclaimed
the young man suddenly.  "It was wicked--wicked--
terribly cruel and wicked."

"I agree with you," said von Horn quickly, seeing
another possibility that would make his future plans
immeasurably easier.  "It was wicked, and it is still
more wicked to continue the work and bring still other
unfortunate creatures into the world to be the butt
and plaything of cruel fate."

"He intends to do that?" asked the youth.

"Unless he is stopped," replied von Horn.

"He must be stopped," cried the other.  "Even if
it were necessary to kill him."

Von Horn was quite satisfied with the turn events had taken.
He shrugged his shoulders and turned on his heel toward
the outer campong.

"If he had wronged me as he has you, and those others,"
with a gesture toward the court of mystery, "I should
not be long in reaching a decision."  And with that he
passed out, leaving the door unlatched.

Von Horn went straight to the south campong and sought
out Bududreen.  Motioning the Malay to follow him they
walked across the clearing and entered the jungle out
of sight and hearing of the camp.  Sing, hanging
clothes in the north end of the clearing saw them
depart, and wondered a little.

"Bududreen," said von Horn, when the two had reached a
safe distance from the enclosures, "there is no need of
mincing matters--something must be done at once.  I do
not know how much you know of the work that Professor
Maxon has been engaged in since we reached this island;
but it has been hellish enough and it must go no
further.  You have seen the creatures in the campong
next to yours?"

"I have seen," replied Bududreen, with a shudder.

"Professor Maxon intends to wed one of these to his
daughter," von Horn continued.  "She loves me and we
wish to escape--can I rely on you and your men to aid
us?  There is a chest in the workshop which we must
take along too, and I can assure you that you all will
be well rewarded for your work.  We intend merely to leave
Professor Maxon here with the creatures he has created."

Bududreen could scarce repress a smile--it was indeed
too splendid to be true.

"It will be perilous work, Captain," he answered.
"We should all be hanged were we caught."

"There will be no danger of that, Bududreen,
for there will be no one to divulge our secret."

"There will be the Professor Maxon," urged the Malay.
"Some day he will escape from the island, and then we
shall all hang."

"He will never escape," replied von Horn, "his own
creatures will see to that.  They are already
commencing to realize the horrible crime he has
committed against them, and when once they are fully
aroused there will be no safety for any of us.  If you
wish to leave the island at all it will be best for you
to accept my proposal and leave while your head yet
remains upon your shoulders.  Were we to suggest to the
professor that he leave now he would not only refuse
but he would take steps to make it impossible for any
of us to leave, even to sinking the Ithaca.  The man
is mad--quite mad--Bududreen, and we cannot longer
jeopardize our own throats merely to humor his crazy
and criminal whims."

The Malay was thinking fast, and could von Horn have
guessed what thoughts raced through the tortuous
channels of that semi-barbarous brain he would have
wished himself safely housed in the American prison
where he belonged.

"When do you wish to sail?" asked the Malay.

"Tonight," replied von Horn, and together they matured
their plans.  An hour later the second mate with six
men disappeared into the jungle toward the harbor.
They, with the three on watch, were to get the vessel
in readiness for immediate departure.

After the evening meal von Horn sat on the verandah
with Virginia Maxon until the Professor came from the
workshop to retire for the night.  As he passed them he
stopped for a word with von Horn, taking him aside out
of the girl's hearing.

"Have you noticed anything peculiar in the actions of
Thirteen?" asked the older man.  "He was sullen and
morose this evening, and at times there was a strange,
wild light in his eyes as he looked at me.  Can it be
possible that, after all, his brain is defective?
It would be terrible.  My work would have gone for naught,
for I can see no way in which I can improve upon him."

"I will go and have a talk with him later," said von
Horn, "so if you hear us moving about in the workshop,
or even out here in the campong think nothing of it.
I may take him for a long walk.  It is possible that
the hard study and close confinement to that little
building have been too severe upon his brain and nerves.
A long walk each evening may bring him around all right."

"Splendid--splendid," replied the professor.  "You may
be quite right.  Do it by all means, my dear doctor,"
and there was a touch of the old, friendly, sane tone
which had been so long missing, that almost caused von
Horn to feel a trace of compunction for the hideous act
of disloyalty that he was on the verge of perpetrating.

As Professor Maxon entered the house von Horn returned
to Virginia and suggested that they take a short walk
outside the campong before retiring.  The girl readily
acquiesced to the plan, and a moment later found them
strolling through the clearing toward the southern end
of the camp.  In the dark shadows of the gateway
leading to the men's enclosure a figure crouched.
The girl did not see it, but as they came opposite it
von Horn coughed twice, and then the two passed on
toward the edge of the jungle.

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  End Chapter 5 -- THE MONSTER MEN. Get the next issue of RUNE'S RAG 
for the exciting continuation of this story by Edgar Rice Burroughs.
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  Edgar Rice Burroughs has influenced writers and readers for the past
three generations, with well over 100 million books produced because of 
his fertile imagination; this offering is a presentation to those who 
are unfamiliar with his work -- other than the TARZAN series.
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