The Washington times., 1913-04-16
CHAPTER Nv.-(Continued)

<A'n6 SOOhob oecioeo upon
was. frankly admit. in ac-
cordance with my own selfish
interests. But believed
honestly and sincerely, that it ac-
corded with her best interests, too"
II have no difficulty in believing
that" said /. land l do really appreci-
ate the difficulties of your situation"
He laughed grimly. Not yet you
don't" he said. Il thought they were
difficult enough at the beginning, but
that was nothing to what happened
within the first week of my attendance
upon her."
He paused there and drew a long,
rather unsteady, breath. III try not
to harrow you with Details he said.
But what happened was that Miss
Meredith had a violent maniacal out
break, during which she said positively
that she had killed her niece"
i didn't dare look at effrey. 1 felt,
rather than saw, the sudden relaxa-
ton Of nis body in the chair that told
-. who knew him SO well, the in
tensity with which his mind had been
waiting for Crows next words.
Il tried as best l could 20 get de-
tails. But all i could get, beyond the
bare assertion I killed her, | know
she is dead! / killed her myself" was
the apparently senseless statement. I
killed her with a pin
Il confess I didn't know wnat to do
! had never gone back on ner own
unsupported statement that Claire had
died of smallpox, and / was still IN
clined to think il likely that that was
true. But, of course, l couldn't let il
has mi f.aI .~.,k.
friends in Paris. and asked them TO
get the official version OF Claire Mere
dith's death.
when Miss Meredith herself had
recovered fTpm the attlcG and was
specifically sane again. ] made an
effort to bring up the subject and get
some details from her. But IL was
evident that that wouldn't do. For
was SO intimately associated with the
source of her delusions that any ap-
proach TO the subject seemed to bring
them back,
but. after what seemed an inter
minable while, j got word from Paris
the girl had died during a serious
epidemic of the disease, having been
taken. as soon as II was diagnosed in
her case. out of Miss Meredith's care
altogether and conveyed to the pest
house. There wasn't the faintest ir-
regularity about ii, nor, so far as L
could see. any opportunity for any
irregularity. My friends had a copy
of the death certificate made and sent
TO me.
That was a great relief, of course:
but IL left me still in the dark as to
what i was most anxious to get at
namely, the source of Miss Merediths s
delusion. She rarely mentioned Claire
Though, from occasional remarks she
dropped, gathered that they had not
got on well together, and that the an
tipathy between them had grown with
the years.
Miss Meredith's attitude toward her
lose has always struck me as being
one of remorse rather than of regret
as IL. in her sanest moments, she
still felt herself responsible for
Ciaire's death. For some reason or
other. that was the thing that was
preying on her mind, and l felt that
i must discover the source of the de-
fusion in order to remove il.
"It was by the merest chance in the
world that ] did discover IL. ] WAS
turning over the contents of her
e.r.ng-box one day. in a search for
some papers she had directed me 20
finL, when / came upon a photograph
Of CIaire-a print from the same