with regard to one point, and that poor young creature, so full of life and beauty only twenty-four hours ago, is really drifting into the other world. In that case it cannot be wrong to use any means for her restoration. I will fetch what you require, Mr. Halifax, and join you in the sick room in a moment."
He ran downstairs and I quickly returned to my patient.
I was relieved to find that the beautiful child was no longer seated on the bed; his anxious vigil had probably proved too much for his tender years, and he was now doubtless calmly asleep in his cot in another room. I bent over my patient—I felt she was my patient now—and I determined not to leave a stone unturned to bring her back to life. I wanted to discover if there were any odour of opium on her breathing.
I could not find any, but the more I looked at her, the more sure I was that this illness was an unnatural one, and that the poor young woman who lay before me had been poisoned by either accident or design.
I felt myself growing hot with indignation. What kind of man was Dr. Ogilvie? Why was he absent at such a critical moment? Why did the servants look so queer and troubled; and last, but not least, why was I myself for the first time in all my medical experience actually suffering from an attack of nerves?
I felt through and through my being that something horrible had been done in this room, and I much wondered whether the strong restoratives which I meant to employ would be in time to be of the least use.
Dr. Roper entered the room, and we began our task. The first thing was to remove what portion of the poison still remained in the patient's stomach. The electric battery was then brought into force and artificial respiration resorted to. For a long time we worked without any apparent result.
One glance at the contents of the stomach-ump had caused Dr. Roper to turn so white that I thought he would have to be helped out of the room, but he speedily recovered himself and assisted me with a will and determination which showed that his opinion now fully coincided with my own.
The two nurses were like trained automatons in our hands.
There was a strange silence about our doings. We made little or no noise as we fought through the long hours of the night that awful fight with Death.
Towards morning a noise in the silent street caused Dr. Roper to utter a hurried, thankful exclamation, and to my unbounded delight had an effect on my patient.
She opened her eyes, gave a faint smile, looked full at the old doctor, and murmuring her husband's name, closed them again.
"Ogilvie has returned," said Dr. Roper, glancing at me. "Thank Heaven! Whatever detained him can now be explained. Those were his horse's footsteps which you heard just now clattering up to the door."
"And Mrs. Ogilvie is better," I said. "I have every hope that she will do now. I dare not leave her for a little, but you might go down and acquaint Dr. Ogilvie with what has occurred during his absence."
"With what we have found?" began Dr. Roper. "No, no, he is an old friend—that must be another man's task."
"Hush," I said, "Mrs. Ogilvie is becoming more conscious each minute. We must be careful; she is very weak." I looked towards the bed as I spoke.
My patient now lay with her eyes wide open. They were still dim from the effect of the drug, but the unnatural ghastly colour had left her cheeks, and her breathing was quicker and more regular.
"Stay with her," I whispered to the old doctor. "You have but to administer restoratives at short intervals; I will see Dr. Ogilvie myself, and quickly return."
I left the room. I expected to see my host mounting the stairs, and hurrying with what speed he could to his wife's sick room.
Instead of that there was commotion and alarm. Alarm on the faces of some maidservants who, with hot haste, were hurrying downstairs. Voices raised to a shrill pitch of terror and distress sounded from the hall. There were hurrying steps, the confusion caused by doors being opened hastily and banged again regardless of sound. Dr. Ogilvie was nowhere to be seen. What was he doing? Why had he remained absent so long and at such a critical time, and, above all things, why had he returned now to turn the quiet house into noise and confusion?
Mrs. Ogilvie was better, certainly, but her heart had undergone a severe strain, and any undue agitation might undo all our night's work, and cause the feeble, fluttering breath to cease.
I ran downstairs quickly.
"Hush! hush!" I said. "I must beg of you all to be quiet! Where is Dr. Ogilvie? I must speak to him immediately."
The servant who had let me into the house the day before now came forward. He was
