Scott looked down at the splinter of glass. "So that was how you meant to do it, hey?"
"Yes, that was how I meant to do it. And don't you let me get hold of it again, and don't you send me to that damned hospital of yours, unless you want murder done. I've had about as much as I can stick. I won't be herded with a mob of filthy jail-birds. Keep off—if you lay a finger on me I'll bash your brains out against that wall!"
Scott with absolute fearlessness stepped forward and caught his wrist.
"Drop that stool—drop it! That's better. Now, listen to me. I'm not going to leave you here—wait! I've not done—and I'm not going to send you to hospital either. You'll go to the padded cell."
"The padded cell?" echoed Gardiner, "the padded cell? I never thought of that. You have some sense in your head, Scott. See here"—his face had changed, relaxed into something like humanity; he seized the doctor's hand and spoke rapidly, earnestly—"I'm sane for the moment; for heaven's sake listen to what I say! Five minutes ago I was crazy to kill myself. Five minutes hence I shall want to again, and if by any hook or crook I can, I shall. So you put me in that padded cell, and you keep me there! Don't you let me out—don't you let me out on any pretext whatever! I shall beg and pray you, I shall howl like all the devils in hell, I shall invent excuses I haven't the ingenuity to imagine now, but whatever I say or do, don't you listen! It's these next twelve hours I'm afraid of. If you'll keep me in there, hermetically sealed, till to-morrow morning, I shall be all right. Will you do it?" Scott did not answer; he had drawn him towards the window, and was looking and looking into his eyes as if he would have probed his inmost soul. "It's a risk? Yes, but it's that either way. Let me go down fighting, Scott!" Still no reply. "You a Christian and afraid!" Gardiner scoffed.
"No, I'm not afraid," said the little man curtly. He released him. "I'll do it."
"You will? You swear you won't let me go?"
"My word's my bond."
He went out. The prisoner fell back on his pallet and threw his arm across his eyes. "Now I've done it!" he murmured with a long breath. "Now I've burned my boats! Are you satisfied, Lettice? My life for yours: is it a fair exchange? You always wanted this—well, fair or not, it's the best I can do...."
The padded cell, for weak-minded criminals, resembles on a large scale one of those lined work-boxes which young ladies used in the seventies, except that stout yellow canvas takes the place of quilted satin. Padding a yard thick covers walls and floor. There is a small window under the ceiling; a squint, as usual, in the door; and another, high up, commanding every corner of the cell. No furniture, not so much as a bed.