“It is about that Miss Brandt! You seem pretty intimate with her! You must stop it at once. You must have nothing more to do with her.”
Margaret’s eyes opened wide with distress.
“But, Doctor Phillips, for what reason? I don’t see how we could give her up now, unless we leave the place.”
“Then leave the place! You mustn’t know her, neither must Miss Leyton. She comes of a terrible parentage. No good can ever ensue of association with her.”
“You must tell me more than this, Doctor, if you wish me to follow your advice!”
“I will tell you all I know myself! Some twelve or thirteen years ago I was quartered in medical charge of the Thirteenth Lances, and stationed in Jamaica, where I knew of, rather than knew, the father of this girl, Henry Brandt. You called him a doctor—he was not worthy of the name. He was a scientist perhaps—a murderer certainly!”
“How horrible! Do you really mean it?”
“Listen to me! This man Brandt matriculated in the Swiss hospitals, whence he was expelled for having caused the death of more than one patient by trying his scientific experiments upon them. The Swiss laboratories are renowned for being the foremost in Vivisection and other branches of science that gratify the curiosity and harden the heart of man more than they confer any lasting benefit on humanity. Even there, Henry Brandt’s barbarity was considered to render him unfit for association with civilised practitioners, and he was expelled with ignominy. Having a private fortune he settled in Jamaica, and set up his laboratory there, and I would not shock your ears by detailing one hundredth part of the atrocities that were said to take place under his supervision, and in company of this man Trawler, whom the girl calls her trustee, and who is one of the greatest brutes unhung.”
“Are you not a little prejudiced, dear Doctor?”
“Not at all! If when you have heard all, you still say so, you are not the woman I have taken you for. Brandt did not confine his scientific investigations to the poor dumb creation. He was known to have decoyed natives into his Pandemonium, who were never heard of again, which raised, at last, the public feeling so much against him, that I am glad to say that his negroes revolted, and after having murdered him with appropriate atrocity, set fire to his house and burned it and all his property to the ground. Don’t look so shocked! I repeat that I am glad to say it, for he richly deserved his fate, and no torture could be too severe for one who spent his worthless life in torturing God’s helpless animals!”