Dorothy then set about restoring Jack's mother, and with the first
breath of returning consciousness she fled from the room and up to her
own.
She was just about to seize her hat and cloak, and to dash out into the
street, in the mad hope of overtaking him, all heedless of little
Pearl's cry, as she woke from her sleep and held out her hand, when
there came a sudden knock upon the door.
It was the colored maid.
"If you please, ma'am, you are wanted in Miss Staples' room."
"I--I can not go now," cried Dorothy, incoherently. "I have an urgent
errand that I must attend to at once."
"But you must come, madame," said the girl, slowly, but very
impressively.
"It is impossible," returned Dorothy, attempting to pass her by. "Every
moment of my time is precious."
"But madame must go to the sick-room," reiterated the girl so earnestly
that Dorothy paused.
"I will look in at the sick-room one moment," she said. "Then you--you
must not detain me."
Suddenly she turned and asked:
"Do you know whether Mr. Garner is in the house?"
"He is in the library, ma'am."
"You are sure?" gasped Dorothy.
"Quite sure, ma'am. He also has had a message to come to the sick-room.
I stopped and gave it to him myself on my way here."
Thus assured that he had not yet left the house, Dorothy breathed a
great sigh of intense relief.
"I--I do not mind going to the sick-room with you now," she whispered,
in a low, unsteady voice; and, all unconscious of what was to accrue
from it, Dorothy followed her companion from the room and up to Jessie's
chamber.
The silence of death was upon all things as she parted the silken
_portieres_ and entered the room where the sick girl lay, white and
gasping, upon the couch.
The two doctors made way for her, motioning her to advance to the couch.
"Oh! she is not dying--not dying?" gasped Dorothy, with a wild wail of
terror. "You must not tell me that!"
"Are you so very much surprised?" asked Doctor Crandall, slowly and
impressively.
"Oh, she must not die---she must not die!" she cried. "Where is all your
vaunted skill if you can not save her life?"
"Man can work against the skill of man," significantly replied Doctor
Crandall, "but not against the will of Heaven."
"But is she dying?" wailed Dorothy, grasping the ice-cold hands.
"She shall not die if we can save her," simultaneously echoed both
doctors.
They uttered the words in so strange a tone that Dorothy turned and
looked at them in wonder.
At that moment Mr. Garner entered the room. His face was still very
pale, but he was outwardly calm.
He was just in time to catch the last words, and he stepped up hurriedly
to the doctor ere he could utter another word to Dorothy.
"Do you say that my betrothed is dying?" he cried, hoarsely, flinging
himself on his knees beside the couch, on the side opposite to where
Dorothy was.
"What we have to say had better be deferred for a few moments, until he
is more calm and better able to bear the shock," said Doctor Schimpf,
nodding in the direction where Mr. Garner knelt prostrated with grief.
Dorothy had become strangely calm, and both doctors noticed that she
intently watched the actions of young Mr. Garner.
"I think I have unearthed the secret of the whole affair," whispered
Doctor Crandall to his friend. "Watch the gaze Mrs. Brown is bending
upon the betrothed lover of the girl who lies sick unto death!"
He motioned the doctor back into the recess of the bay-window.
"Let me finish my story here," he whispered under his breath. "This is
what I would say: This strange woman in the black dress loves Mr.
Garner. Ah! you start, my friend. So did I when the thought first
flashed across my mind. Within the last few moments this thought has
settled into a conviction. She is the only one interested in the death
of Miss Staples. Look carefully into the chain of evidence I present to
you, and you will have the same opinion that I have formed, no doubt.
"In the first place, as we both know, Miss Staples' sudden attack of
illness dated from a few days after this mysterious young woman crossed
this threshold.
"Who she is, or whence she came, no one seems to have been clever enough
to find out.
"She has come and gone from this house, alone, and at all hours, no one
questioning her movements.
"She has taken full charge of the patient, from midnight until early
morning, and each forenoon our patient seems to have grown alarmingly
worse. We have both discovered the presence of arsenic, which has been
administered to her.
"And now last, but by no means least, I have been observing this
mysterious woman with keen scrutiny. I could stake my life upon it she
wears a wig, that her complexion is a 'made-up' one. By this you will
understand me to say that the lines we see traced upon her face are the
work of art, not time. The eyes covered by those blue glasses are bright
as stars. In short, she is not the middle-aged personage that she
appears, but is a young woman, or rather a fiend incarnate, in disguise.
"I propose within the next few moments to lay the matter before Mr.
Garner, and to gain his sanction to compel her to throw off this
disguise before she leaves this room, to confront her with the evidence
of her crime, and to force her to make a full confession at the bedside
of her would-be victim."
"I quite agree with your plan," assented the other. "But there is one
precaution which we must not forget: the key must be turned in the lock
and removed, if you would have your bird securely caged. Delays are
dangerous. Let Mr. Garner be told the terrible truth without a moment's
delay, and we will rest the case wholly with him."
Without attracting attention, Doctor Crandall called Mr. Garner into the
recess of the bay-window, while Doctor Schimpf engaged Dorothy in
conversation to pass the time away.
To attempt to describe Jack Garner's astonishment, which gradually
deepened into the most intense horror as the terrible story was unfolded
to him, can better be imagined than described.
"Jessie suffering from the effects of poison?" he gasped, incredulously.
"Great Heaven! how can I believe such an uncanny tale? Miss Staples has
not an enemy in the whole world, I am sure. No one could have a motive
in attempting to put her out of the way."
"Will you answer one question?" said the doctor, looking earnestly at
the young man.
"Anything which you may ask," quickly returned the other.
"Did you ever have any other sweetheart than Miss Staples? Did any other
woman ever love you in the past?"
For a moment Jack hesitated, and his fair, handsome face flushed; then
he frankly raised his eyes and met the keen gaze fixed upon him.
"I have no hesitancy in acknowledging that I did have a romance in my
life before my betrothal to poor Jessie. But she knew about it from
beginning to end."
"Did you give this girl up for Miss Staples? Pardon me for asking such a
direct question, but your answer is vitally important."
The handsome face into which the old doctor gazed grew very white, and
the lines about the firm mouth deepened into an expression of pain.
"My little sweetheart disappeared one day with a handsomer man than I,"
he said, huskily, "and from that time to this I have never looked upon
her false but fair face."
"Did she love you in those days?" was the next query.
"I wonder that you can ask the question," said Jack, with a touch of
haughty bitterness. "Does it look very much as though she loved me when
she ran away with another man? On the contrary, any one could see that,
in pursuing the course she did toward me, she must have detested me. I
never saw this Mrs. Brown before we engaged her as a companion to my
mother, nor has Jessie, I am sure. I am completely at sea," Jack added,
"and therefore I leave the matter entirely with you. If Jessie is dying
of slow poison, I beseech you to discover the perpetrator of the deed,
at any cost--aye, and though it takes every dollar of my fortune, the
wretch shall be punished to the full extent of the law."