The Montgomery advertiser., 1906-06-18
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brain feebier. and protracted my phys ical reaction my convaleseence for weeks All this time I knew myself to be mercfless in his hands. I mean, as regarded her. 1 knew that he was capable of any act in the way of per- nianently dividing us.p
 "You-you don't maen," I faltered, 'that--he couid--possibly--ha Killed herr Yes; I do mean just that. I mean that he did kill her"
 Good God!" escaped me.
 There. in that laboratory-near the library. where I killed him. . He made 1t all plain to me--by innu- endo. yet unnistakably. In the labora- tory, as I well knew, he had many deadly drugs Margaret, while was lying at deaths door. had stolen to see him with utmost secrecy and eau tion She had written him that she would come--and how. He met her at a certain gate (you don't know just where). and they went together to his special wing of the house. en- tered by a sort of semi-private door. There a long interview took place he admitted 1t. But she told him she would never give me up till I bade her to do so. She was a gentle girl. but with spirit that could be reused. lie must nave dIOuScu It, AtItTWdTu she felt faint and staggered to a sofa. He offered her something to drink. She took It."
 He told you this7'
 While I gasped the words my com panion nodded.
 He made 1t plain. He didn't put 1t as put It. Recollect he had lost his head. had driven him Into a fury. For myself. I think I was more horri- GA 4z- aN. nrt angry. Besides. I felt incredulous. too. told him that he was lying But If not. added. he should be held to strictest account. Slain people leave their corpses behind them. Thousands of pounds would be spent in finding Margaret's body. Tt cannot be so far from where we now stand I said :. oh. it shall be found-be sure of that!' My hand was on q bell-rope while spoke. I meant to summon the servants then and there. But had pricked him into the last spasm. so to speak, of wrathful folly.
 "'Stopl he said with kind of fog in his throat. and his twitching face ghastly. DO you remember that big mastiff, Dagmar, which we suspected of madness here at Thornbourne about three years ago, and which you your self ordered shot? Do you remember I laboratory for purposes, as I then stated. of examining the true state of her brain, a la Pasteur, and finding out whether or no rabies had really caused her sickness? Have you for got my professional pride as a chem ist when I afterward brought you into the laboratory and showed you small heap of fine, white ashes, hardly larger than two ordinary handfuls? na a yarxy iO fnr her breed and sex. You were aston- ished when I informed you that this was all that was left of her, and threw the ashes out of an open window for the breeze to scatter them. I had no great self admiration in the matter. Other chemists, less distinguished than I. have accomplished the same I wanted to test my own powers, and I did test them. That's all
 with this he walked instantly from the room. I sprang after him as the door closed. Then a great giddiness came over me and sank into a chair. Perhaps I swooned--memory is misty, right here. Anyway, when my facul- ties cleared I had, somehow, the most curious feelings. seemed no longer @ man: I had become a vengeance, Hence that second lapse of mine--so
 
 long. shrewd masquerade. let my self apparently slip back into the old idiot state. Do you ask why? The murder is my answer. But I could have 'staid sane.' you will say. cad killed Holme Dyott just as surely. True; yet then, there would very probably have been the scaffold."
 Your guardians crime was a black one, Lord Thornbourne. But now, when you have so unsparingly avenged 1t, I--I cannot doubt that grief (per- haps the sharpest remorse) must tinge your days"
 Grief? Remorse? I grudge every hour as it passes. I'd kill him over again a thousand times in each twen- ty-four. It was for this I feigned craziness. I didn't want them to hang me. That might have meant only an eternal blank, and if so 1t will come soon enough. Too soon. too soon," he added. with a sort of fiery plaintive- ness. Just to go on thinking 1t all