He was grandly dramatic as he uttered these words, but, marvelling as he did at what he had heard, the Judge was not yet ready to yield. This iteration of the fact that he claimed Agnes, aroused the father's antagonism, and, in an almost equally imperious tone, he sprang to his feet and cried:
"No! She is mine! I am her father, and she is mine! All mine! I deny your claim, and Wizard though you be, I defy you!"
The two men glared at each other for a moment, and then the Doctor spoke suddenly.
"You defy me! Ha! Ha! Ha!" His laugh rang through the chamber with a weird sound. "Agnes is yours! Ha! Ha! Ha!" Again the laugh, prolonged and piercing. In an instant his manner changed. Grasping the Judge by the arm, he said: "Come with me!" then half dragged him towards, and through the door that led into the laboratory.
CHAPTER X.
THE BETROTHAL.
The Judge offered very slight resistance as Doctor Medjora urged him forward, and even in the pitchy darkness of the laboratory he made no effort to free himself. He was no coward, and in defying this man whom so many feared, he showed that he feared no man.
The Doctor went straight to the trap-door, and began to descend the stairway. His reason for having no light in the laboratory was, that he did not wish the Judge to know by what way they went down. As the trap-door was open, he would not suspect its existence; all that he would be able to recall would be that they had descended a flight of stairs. Should he enter the laboratory, at some future time, he would be unable to discover the way to the crypt below.
But it was not to the temple of Æsculapius that the Doctor now led his companion. He had decided not to divulge that secret to any other person, besides Leon. Mr. Barnes, it is true, had been taken into the crypt, but by hypnotic suggestion the Doctor had eradicated all recollection of that visit. You will remember that on the night when the Doctor had controlled Mr. Barnes by making him sleep, he had subsequently taken him through an old wine cellar. This vault still existed, though it had been remodelled at the time when the new house was built.
It was into this secret chamber that the Doctor now took the Judge. Closing the door behind him, he touched a button, and an electric lamp illumined the apartment.