intelligence--"Is it in this room?"

He thought he saw a fluttering assent in the dimming eyes. The pulse
under his fingers was as fine and small as a silk thread.

There arose in Doctor James's brain and heart the instincts of his other
profession. Promptly, as he acted in everything, he decided to learn the
whereabouts of this money, and at the calculated and certain cost of a
human life.

Drawing from his pocket a little pad of prescription blanks, he
scribbled upon one of them a formula suited, according to the best
practice, to the needs of the sufferer. Going to the door of the inner
room, he softly called the old woman, gave her the prescription, and
bade her take it to some drug store and fetch the medicine.

When she had gone, muttering to herself, the doctor stepped to the
bedside of the lady. She still slept soundly; her pulse was a little
stronger; her forehead was cool, save where the inflammation of the
bruise extended, and a slight moisture covered it. Unless disturbed, she
would yet sleep for hours. He found the key in the door, and locked it
after him when he returned.

Doctor James looked at his watch. He could call half an hour his own,
since before that time the old woman could scarcely return from her
mission. Then he sought and found water in a pitcher and a glass
tumbler. Opening his medicine case he took out the vial containing the
nitroglycerine--"the oil," as his brethren of the brace-and-bit term it.

One drop of the faint yellow, thickish liquid he let fall in the