ated that," he said, with a contemptuous glance at the still
body of the man at their feet. "He was one of the creatures of your
father's mad experiments--the soulless thing for whose arms his insane
obsession doomed you. The thing at your feet, Virginia, was Number
Thirteen."

With a piteous little moan the girl turned back toward the body of the
young giant. A faltering step she took toward it, and then to the
horror of her father she sank upon her knees beside it and lifting the
man's head in her arms covered the face with kisses.

"Virginia!" cried the professor. "Are you mad, child?"

"I am not mad," she moaned, "not yet. I love him. Man or monster, it
would have been all the same to me, for I loved him."

Her father turned away, burying his face in his hands.

"God!" he muttered. "What an awful punishment you have visited upon me
for the sin of the thing I did."

The silence which followed was broken by Sing who had kneeled opposite
Virginia upon the other side of Bulan, where he was feeling the giant's
wrists and pressing his ear close above his heart.

"Do'n cly, Linee," said the kindly old Chinaman. "Him no dlead."
Then, as he poured a pinch of brownish powder into the man's mouth from
a tiny sack he had brought forth from the depths of one of his sleeves:
"Him no mlonster either, Linee. Him white man, alsame Mlaxon. Sing
know."

The girl looked up at him in gratitude.

"He is not dead, Sing? He will live?" she cried. "I don't care about
anything else, Sing, if you will only make him live."

"Him live. Gettem lilee flesh wounds. Las all."

"What do you mean by saying that he is not a monster?" demanded von
Horn.

"You waitee, you dam flool," cried Sing. "I tellee lot more I know.
You waitee I flixee him, and then, by God, I flixee you."

Von Horn took a menacing step toward the Chinaman, his face black with
wrath, but Professor Maxon interposed.

"This has gone quite far enough, Doctor von Horn," he said. "It may be
that we acted hastily. I do not know, of course, what Sing means, but
I intend to find out. He has been very faithful to us, and deserves
every consideration."

Von Horn stepped back, still scowling. Sing poured a little water
between Bulan's lips, and then asked Professor Maxon for his brandy
flask. With the first few drops of the fiery liquid the giant's
eyelids moved, and a moment later he raised them and looked about him.

The first face he saw was Virgini