“I say! It’s too bad,” the young man exclaimed sympathetically. “I wish I knew what to do for you. Where can that ambulance be?” He laid one hand on the sick man’s hot brow, and held his arm with the other. “Easy now!” he exclaimed, as the right arm began whirling. “There! Steady! It’s going off.”
Instead of closing his eyes, as he had done after the previous attacks, and relapsing into coma, the sick man made an immediate effort to speak.
“Co-come here,” he articulated faintly. “Important, very important.”
He groped feebly for his inner pocket.
“You want me to take out this bundle?” Brainard asked, laying his hand on the bulky wallet.
The man made an affirmative sign, and kept his eyes steadily on Brainard while the latter gently extracted the pocketbook.
“You—you will do something for me?” the stranger said more distinctly than he had hitherto spoken, as if urgency were clearing his mind. “You can—you can start to-night?”
“I’m not very busy,” the young man said, with a laugh. “I guess I could start for Hong-Kong on a few minutes’ notice.”
“Not Hong-Kong,” the old man labored forth literally. “You’re honest?”
It was said in a tone of self-conviction rather than of question.
“Oh, I guess so,” the young man answered lightly. “At least, what’s called honest—never had a chance to steal anything worth taking!” He added more seriously, to quiet the sick man, who seemed to be laboring under excitement, “Tell me what you want done, and I’ll do my best to put it through for you.”
The sick man’s eyes expressed relief, and then his brow contracted, as if he were summoning all his powers in a final effort to make a clogged brain do his urgent will.
“Lis-lis-listen,” he murmured. “No—no, write—write it down,” he went on, as Brainard leaned forward.
Brainard looked about his bare room for paper, but in vain. He felt in his pockets for a stray envelope, then drew from his overcoat a roll of manuscript. He glanced at it dubiously for a moment, then tore off the last sheet, which had on one side a few lines of typewriting. With a gesture of indifference, he turned to the sick man and prepared to take his message.
“All ready,” he remarked. “I can take it in shorthand, if you want.”
“Sev-en, thir-ty-one, and four. Sev-en, thir-tyone, and four. Sev-en, thir-ty-one, and four,” he repeated almost briskly.
Brainard looked at him inquiringly, and the stranger whispered the explanation: “Combi-na-tion pri-vate safe—understand?” Brainard nodded.
“Where?”
“Office—San Francisco.”
The young man whistled.
“That’s a good ways off! What do you want me to do there?”
“Take everything.”
“What shall I do with the stuff? Bring it here to New York?” the young man inquired, with growing curiosity.
The sick man’s blue eyes stared at him steadily, with a look of full intelligence.
“I shall be dead then,” he mumbled.
“Oh, I hope not!” Brainard remarked.
But with unflinching eyes, the sick man continued:
“You must have—pow-er—pow-er of attorney.”
He brought the words out with difficulty, not wasting his strength by discussing his chances of recovery. He was evidently growing weaker, and Brainard had to bend close to his lips in order to catch the faint whisper, “Take it down!”
And with his face beginning to twitch, and the convulsive tremors running over his body, the sick man summoned all his will and managed to dictate a power of attorney in legal terms, as if he were familiar with the formula. When he had finished, his eyes closed, and his lips remained open. Brainard dropped his paper and felt for the sick man’s heart. It was still beating faintly.
After a few moments, the eyes opened mistily, and again the man made an effort to collect himself for another effort.
“What shall I do with the stuff?” Brainard inquired.
“Ge-get it out of the country. Take it to—to Ber-Ber-Ber—”
“Bermuda?” Brainard suggested.
“Berlin!” the sick man corrected with a frown. As if to impress his messenger with the seriousness of his work, he added, “If you don’t get away, they’ll—kill you.”
“Oh!” Brainard exclaimed, impressed.
The blue eyes examined the young man steadily, as if they would test his metal. Then, satisfied, the man murmured:
“Quick—must—sign—quick! Now!” he concluded, as his face began to twitch.
Brainard handed him a pen, and held his right arm to steady him while he scrawled his name—“H. Krutzmacht.” The sick man traced the letters slowly, patiently, persisting until he had dashed a heavy line across the t’s and another beneath the name; then he dropped the pen and closed his eyes.
When another moment of control came to him, he whispered uneasily:
“Witness? Must have witness.”
“We’ll find some one—don’t worry,” the young man replied lightly. “The ambulance man, when he comes, if he ever does come!”
Brainard did not yet take very seriously the idea of starting that night for San Francisco to rifle a safe.
“Mo-mo-money,” the voice began, and the eyes wandered to the fat wallet which Brainard had deposited on the table.
Brainard lifted the wallet.
“Plen-plen-plenty of mon-money!”
“I understand,” the young man replied. “There’s enough cash for the journey in here.”
As he laid the wallet down, there was the welcome sound of feet in the passage outside, and with an exclamation of relief the young man flung open the door. The ambulance surgeon was there with an assistant and a stretcher. With a muttered explanation for his delay, the doctor went at once to the sick man and examined him, while Brainard told what he knew of his strange guest.
“Tries to talk all the time—must be something on his mind!” he said, as another convulsion seized the sick man. “Been doped, I should say.”
“Looks like brain trouble, sure,” the ambulance surgeon remarked, watching the stranger closely. “He can’t last long that way. Well, we’d better hustle him to the hospital as soon as we can.”
They had the sick man on the stretcher before he had opened his eyes from his last attack. As they lifted him, he mumbled excitedly, and Brainard, listening close to his lips, thought he understood what was troubling him.
“He wants that paper witnessed,” he explained. “I forgot—it’s something he dictated to me.”
“Well, hurry up about it,” the surgeon replied carelessly, willing to humor the sick man. “Here!”
Brainard dipped his pen in the ink-bottle and handed it to the surgeon, who lightly dashed down his signature at the bottom of the sheet, without reading it.
“Now are we ready?” the doctor demanded impatiently.
But the blue eyes arrested Brainard, and the young man, stooping over the stretcher, caught a faint whisper: