Minetti went out with the doctor, and came back shortly, carrying eggs and a bottle of vanilla extract and sugar. Fernet lay helpless, watching him bustling about. Finally the delicacy was made and set away in a pan of water to cool. At noon Minetti brought a blue bowl filled with custard to the bedside. It looked inviting, but Fernet shook his head. “I am not hungry,” he lied. The hunchback set the bowl down on a chair so that Fernet gazed upon it all day. The hunchback did not leave the room. He sat before the open window, reading from a thick book. Toward nightfall Fernet said to him: “What do you find so interesting?” Minetti darted a sardonic glance at his patient. “A book on _poison_. I did not realize that I had grown so rusty on the subject. Why, I remember scarcely enough to poison a field-mouse!” He rose and crossed over to the bedside. “Do you not feel ready for the custard?” Fernet cast a longing eye upon the yellow contents of the blue bowl. “No. To tell the truth, I never eat it.” Minetti shrugged. “But I should like a glass of water.” The hunchback drew water from the faucet. Fernet watched him like a ferret. “At least,” thought Fernet, “he cannot drop poison in the water secretly. It is well that I can see every move he makes at such a time. I should not like to die of thirst.” A little later Minetti removed the bowl and threw out its contents. Fernet looked on with half-closed eyes. “What better proof could I have?” he mused. “If the custard were harmless he would eat it himself. I must get away to-morrow.” But the next day he felt weaker than ever, and when the doctor came Minetti said, in answer to questions: “I made a delicious custard yesterday and he ate every bit.... An oyster stew? ... with milk? I shall see that he has it at noon.” “God help me!” muttered Fernet. “Why does he lie like this? I must get the doctor’s ear and tell him how things stand. I shall eat nothing—nothing! Thank Heaven I can drink water without fear.” At noon the oyster stew was ready. But Fernet would have none of it. “Oysters make me ill!” he said. Minetti merely shrugged as he had done the previous day, and set the savory dish upon a chair before the bed. It exuded tantalizing odors, until Fernet thought he would go mad with longing. Toward evening Minetti threw out the stew. And as before, when the doctor called the hunchback said: “He ate a quart of stew and there were plenty of oysters in it, I can tell you. Do you think that a chicken fried in olive-oil would be too hearty?”