"I told her to make her mind quite easy on the score of the future. You understand what I mean?" "She does not want an inquest?" "Precisely." "That is unfortunate, for I will not certify." "What!" cried Paulton, leaning still farther forward, "you will not certify as to the cause of death? What do you mean?" He shivered, and looked apprehensively at the body reclining on the couch. "I don't know what the cause of death was." "She said spasmodic asthma." "A disease that very, very rarely kills." "I thought that, on the contrary, it was most fatal." "No. In a paroxysm of coughing, something in the head or chest may give way, but asthma itself does not kill." An uneasy expression came into the young man's face, and, looking straight into the doctor's eyes, he said: "And in this case what do you think killed?" "It is impossible to say until after the inquest. I found on the floor this"--he held a bottle up in his hand. "It is a two-ounce bottle, empty; it contained chloroform. There is chloroform spilt all over the beard, shirt, and waistcoat." "But perhaps the chloroform was administered for the relief of the dead man?" "Perhaps so," said Santley, rising; "we shall find out all at the inquest. I'm off to bed now. Let nothing be stirred here. Good-night." As Dr. Santley turned away from the gate of Crescent House, Paulton's coachman came up and the young man was relieved. He walked home straight and went to bed. It was past four by this time, and after the excitement of the night there was little chance of the young man closing his eyes. His life up to this had been barren of adventure, and here was he now plunged into the middle of an affair which would be town talk in twenty-four hours. It was quite plain to him, from Santley's manner, that the latter did not think the man had died a natural death, and it was almost as plain he did not think it was a case of accidental poisoning or suicide. Gradually, as time went by, it seemed to narrow itself down to one question: Did or did not that superb woman----? But no; the mere question was a hideous libel! He wished he could go to sleep; but sleep would not come. He tossed and tumbled until he felt feverish. In the heat and hurry of events a few hours old he had not had time for thought; now he had time for thought, but he did not want to think. True, he had no personal interest in that silent room out of which he had stepped a little while ago, but it haunted him, and lay before his imagination, lighted up with a fierce light which made every object in it stand out with painful sharpness.