The hour was late, and all the shops were closed except the drug stores that stood open by night as well as by day, always at the service of the sick and suffering. Even these, with their great red and green lights glowing abroad like friendly beacons to those who were drifting on the perilous seas of sickness and disease, were mostly deserted to-night, and in this one, where that unlooked-for customer entered, the weary clerk dozed at his post, and her sharp, eager young voice roused him from a disconnected dream. He sprang to his feet and looked at her, but his sleepy eyes did not take in at first all the misery of that beautiful young face. “What can I do for you, miss?” he inquired, with a tone of irrepressible admiration in his voice; and the girl reiterated her formula impatiently: “A phial of laudanum, please.” Then he looked at her more closely. He saw the misery in the great, heavy black eyes, with the purple shadows lying darkly beneath them, saw how awfully white and anguished was the lovely face with its perfect features, sharpened and refined by keen suffering. He hesitated before he complied with her request. “We do not usually sell poisons without a doctor’s prescription. Have you one?” he inquired. She looked at him imploringly, and clasped her delicate hands together. “No, I have not, but for God’s sake do not refuse me,” she cried, almost wildly. “I _must_ have the laudanum! I am suffering so much, and it will still this terrible pain.” She pressed her clenched hands against her pale cheek with a suppressed groan. The dawning suspicions of the drug clerk were instantly diverted by her expressive movement. “Oh, if it is the toothache, all right,” he said. “Here it is, miss. A few drops on a bit of cotton will soon relieve you; be careful not to use too much.” She caught it quickly from his hand with a sudden low, hysterical laugh. “Thank you a thousand times,” she said. “Oh, yes, I will be very careful; but it is not the toothache, it is the heartache I am going to cure.” She murmured the last words in an undertone and hurried toward the door before she had done speaking. He saw her pause in the doorway an instant, saw her pull the stopple quickly from the little phial, then she put the deadly drug to her lips, drained the last drop, and threw the empty vessel far from her upon the pavement. All seemed to pass in an instant of time, and before the horrified clerk recovered from the trance of horror with which he beheld her terrible deed, she stepped quickly out into the street, and disappeared in the gloom and darkness of the inclement night. “Great heaven!” gasped the clerk, springing forward in hot pursuit.