n't strike him again. See, you've ripped his flesh until he is
covered with blood! Strike me if you must strike someone--for with
all my heart and soul I love him!"

CHAPTER V

_Fumbling Hands_

Now Bentley was beginning to realize to the full the horrible thing
that had befallen himself and Ellen Estabrook. He knew something else,
too. It had come to him when he had heard Ellen's words next
door--telling Barter that she loved the creature Barter was beating,
which she thought was Lee Bentley. That creature was Lee Bentley; but
only the earthly casement of Lee Bentley. The ruling power of
Bentley's body, the driving force which actuated his body, was the
brain of an ape.

As for Bentley himself, that part of him of which he thought when he
thought of "I," to all intents and purposes, to all outer seeming, had
become an ape. His body was an ape's body, his legs were an ape's,
everything about him was simian save one thing--the "ego," that
something by which man knows that he is himself, with an individual
identity. That was buried behind the almost non-existent brow of an
ape.

In all things save one he was an ape. That thing was "Bentley's"
brain. In all things save one that creature in the room with Ellen
Estabrook was Bentley. Bentley, driven to mad behavior by the brain of
an ape!

The horror of it tore at Bentley, as he still thought of himself.

"If I were to get out of this cage," he told himself voicelessly, "and
were to enter that room with Ellen, she would cower into a corner in
terror. She would fly to the arms of that travesty of 'me,' for she
thinks it is 'I' in there with her because it _looks_ like me."

Now that Ellen was beyond his reach, more beyond his reach than if she
had been dead, he realized how much she meant to him. In the few mad
hours of their association they had come to belong to each other with
a possessiveness that was beyond words. Thinking then that the
travesty in there with her--with Bentley's body--was really Bentley,
to what lengths might she not be persuaded in her love? It was a
ghastly thing to contemplate.

* * * * *

But what could Bentley do? He could not speak to her. If he tried she
would race from him in terror at the bellowing ferocity of his voice.
How could he tell her his love when his voice was such as to frighten
the very wild beasts of the jungle?

Yet....

How could he allow her to remain with that other Bentley--that