Year: 1872

Hurd was watching him with her heart
in her throat, for, as she told me, she
felt that the decisive moment had come.
There was something in the gray Pallor
in the doctors rigid face that told her
of desperate purpose in the mans
soul.


He lifted the glass on the right of the
tray and gave it to his wife.


Drink it, DEAR" he said, cit is a pan
acea for all evils. I also am going to
| take a glass OF it !" and he pointed to 8
glass still on the tray.
Mrs. Spencer accepted it, and was
| putting it to her lips, when Mrs. Hurd
| interrupted.


s'If you will bring her tuu bier OF
water, doctor; Mrs. Spencer complains
that the cordial leaves a bad taste in
her mouth, and my old bones are SO full
of rheumatism that it nearly kills me to
go down stairs"


The doctor turned and bent on her a
look as if he would read her through.
But she kept her face passive. If he
had any suspicious her manner quieted
them, and, putting down the glass, he
left the room. Then Mrs. Hurd changed
the position of the glasses.


When he came back-and he was
gone but a moment-the nurse stood

Mrs. Spencer was laying back in her
chair with her eyes closed.


Again he lifted the glass-this time
it was the one intended for himself
and placed it at the lips of his wife.
She drank the contents, swallowed a
little of the water he had brought her
and thanked him in her sad, seeming
way.


"Now, for my own cordial" said he,
with affected gayety. 81 indulge in
something little stronger" and as he
spoke he tossed off the mixture.


at made me stone cold to my fingers
ends to see him do it," said Mrs. Hurd,
relating the circumstances to me; "but,
Heaven is my witness, l felt not a twinge
of conscience. 1 argued like this: If
it was a simple cordial, as he said, it
would do him no harm. If it was poi
son, his blood would be upon his own
sinful head"


He went to bed half an hour after
complaining of fatigue. In the morning g
they found him deadl


1 was called TO the post nsortena exam
ination, and we discovered in the stom-
ach of the deceased a sufficient quantity
of the deadliest poison known to
modern science to kill half a dozen
men.


My brother physicians agreed that the
man was insane, and had probably taken
the dose in one of his unsettled fits of
mind. 1 did not dispute them, but
even before Mrs. Hurd told her story
had my own theory in regard to his
death.


There was no public exposure, how
ever. Mrs. Hurd and 1 agreed that it
would profit no one to make the affair





sci.


Miss Melrosc, in spite of my convic-
ton that she had been an active party in
the conspiracy against Mrs. Spencer's
life, could not help pitying. Such a
miserable, worn and haggard face as
hers have never seen; and when they
buried DIR. Spencer she was confined to
her chamber with brain fever.


I attended her in her illness, but
although she recovered her health, she
never was herself again. She was a
harmless maniac whose delight was in
gathering flowers and decorating the
doctors grave with them.


She is living still, and still gathers
flowers and lays them on that grave,
singing to herself meanwhile sort of
low incarnation, which no one ever pre-
tends to understand.


Not until Mrs. Spencer had been
many days my wife, and the faithful
Mrs. Hurd slept under the violets, did
Alicia ever know the perfdy of her for
mer husband.


And when I told her, after the first
shock was over, she crept into my arms
and whispered:


"But if it had not been for James
crime, I should not have found y ou, Her
bert. So good sometimes does come out
of eyiln