Susan made no further remark just then, but proceeded to select and purchase a few copies of _The Family Herald_; she knew that if she waited a little longer, the old lady's gossiping instincts would compel her to tell all her story, even without any questioning. "Do you think, Miss," Mrs. Harris recommenced at last, "that a lady with everything she can have in the way of comfort around her, could get pale and melancholy and hardly ever speak a word to anyone for weeks, without any reason at all?" "No, I should think not--that is unless she is becoming mad," replied Susan. "Now that's exactly it, Miss! _Is_ she becoming mad, or is she ill-treated by her husband--it's one or the other--now which is it?" "Did you say that they quarrelled?" "I have spoken with the servants--they come over here to get a paper now and again. _They_ say there never was a kinder husband than the doctor--but they can't tell--it may be all his deceit like. I once read of a husband--he was a doctor too--and his wife began to ail; she got paler and thinner and weaker every day. He pretended to love her so much, and was so concerned about her, and he nursed her himself, and allowed none but himself to prepare her food. Well do you know, Miss, at last she died--and what do you think was discovered afterwards?" At this point of her narrative she put on her spectacles and looked steadfastly at Susan. "I really cannot imagine--what was it?" "He had been poisoning her all the time for her money--There!" whispered Mrs. Harris in a melo-dramatic voice. "Dear me! how shocking! you make my flesh creep. And do you really think that this Dr. Duncan is doing the same?" asked Susan, much amused at the old woman's folly. "No, no, Miss, don't go away and think I believe that," Mrs. Harris exclaimed in alarm; "all I say is that it's strange--very strange indeed." "And what do the servants think about it?" "They think that there's something wrong here," and she tapped her forehead. "The maid says she's got the horrors like. She's very afraid about her baby; she seems to think that there's some harm coming to it; she won't let it out of her sight, and when anyone comes into the room, she starts and trembles fearful. They say, Miss, that it's just as if she had a delusion that everyone wanted to murder the child. Now that ain't natural like, allowing for all a mother's affection." "It is indeed very strange," said Susan musingly; "but I must not waste your time any longer, Mrs. Harris--I am a sad gossip. Good morning to you, I will see you again soon." So this was Mary's vulnerable point. Susan had suspected as much. She fancied that it would not be very difficult to make use of this extreme anxiety of the mother for her child. As she came out of the shop she noticed an old woman, shabbily dressed in black and much bent with age, tottering feebly along the pavement on the opposite side of the street with a large basket on her arm.