"You saw nothing suspicious," interrupted Kennedy, "nothing in
the actions or manner of anyone in the room?"

"No, when I first entered I didn't suspect anything out of the
way. I had them send everyone into the next room, except Manton
and Phelps, and had the doors and windows thrown open to give her
air. Then when I examined her I detected what seemed to me to be
both a muscular and nervous paralysis, which by that time had
proceeded pretty far. As I touched her she opened her eyes, but
she was unable to speak. She was breathing with difficulty; her
heart action was weakening so rapidly that I had little
opportunity to apply restorative measures."

"What do you think caused the death?"

"So far, I can make no satisfactory explanation." The doctor
shrugged his shoulders very slightly. "That is why I advised an
immediate investigation. I did not care to write a death
certificate."

"You have no hypothesis?"

"If she died from any natural organic disorder, the signs were
lacking by which I could trace it. Everything indicates the
opposite, however. It would be hard for me to say whether the
paralysis of respiration or of the heart actually caused her
death. If it was due to poison--Well, to me the whole affair is
shrouded in mystery. The symptoms indicated nothing I could
recognize with any degree of certainty."