William Le Queux

“ But when, my dear Lanner-Brown, you have read this plain, matter-of-fact and yet remarkable narrative of my amazing life, it will be for you yourself to judge whether it be best, in the public interest, to suppress it and destroy the manuscript, or whether you will risk the condemnation, which must be hurled upon you by the public and the whole medical profession, and publish it as a warning to others who may, by their expert scientific knowledge, be led into similar temptation. ”

“ Then came the gradual onset of the symptoms of my drug.
This evil thing paralyses the muscular system, but leaves the nervous system untouched, and given in the right dose it affects the voluntary muscles first, leaving the involuntary, that is those of the heart and principal organs which this system governs, unaffected for the time being.
Imagine, then, Anderson, his red head damp, and clammy with the sweat of fear, his eyes moving quickly and with a terrified expression, his breath coming in short, sobbing gasps, lying on the thick skin rug in front of the little fire-place. ”

“ Sir Geoffrey has, as you know, left everything to him, with the exception of a life-income to me and a miserable pittance to you. Oh, what an injustice, and a shame!—to a lout like that—it maddens me, Anthony!"
"But why, mother?"
"The will is this: if Francis survives his father practically everything is his, to do as he likes with—and we must go. You know he hates me! But if your half-brother died first, Anthony, the estate would be yours."
"That's no good to me, mother," answered the young man. "Francis is as strong as a horse, so it's evidently settled. ”

“ Ah! how easily, my dear Brown, will an evil woman, in these days of rapid living, buy a man's life! If you had only seen half of the ugly side of matrimony as I have seen it you would be appalled and thank your stars you are a bachelor.
Five hundred pounds is surely good pay for a moment's forgetfulness. Therefore we smiled at each other in perfect agreement, and I ascended the stairs and visited my patient.
A very bad chill and swollen throat, I pronounced it to be.
"My dear Mr. Auberon," I said, "don't worry in the least. I hear you are troubling yourself over business affairs. ”

“ I placed the cheque in my pocket, highly satisfied with my morning's work. I was to release a patient, and a good fellow, from an ugly situation, and rid society of a person who was extremely undesirable—a man who had blackmailed many of his City friends on previous occasions.
Strange, my dear friend, how money tumbles unexpectedly into my hands just at the very moment that I require it! But there, I suppose if one is unscrupulous, and not cursed by too delicate a conscience, one can always earn a decent income in my profession. ”

“ Manne-Martyn better, and it was not long before I decided that her drunken, drug-smoking husband should not cumber the earth very much longer.
If I did carry out my decision, I could not hide from myself the fact that I had a very difficult and even dangerous proposition before me.
There are some folks who, however objectionable, however vile they may appear to be in the eyes of the unbiased observer, have someone whose outlook is blind as to their faults; someone who makes every excuse for their shortcomings and will, at every turn, allocate the blame to every source except the right one. ”

“ It is a curious fact, but one never forgets a smell in the way one loses a name, or a face. The nose is the most reliable of organs. It cannot forget, but always recognizes any odour out of the common which has once been smelt; and this perfume, even to the present day, brings back to me the memory of my bare, untidy lodgings off Tottenham Court Road on that last day of my freedom from serious and worldly affairs.
The letter was written in a feminine hand, neat but unformed, and concluded with a bold masculine signature: "Horatio Augustus Featherson." ”

“ Mr. Crosswell did that? By accident."
"Done by intention, and with his fist. But this is nothing; see here," and tearing open the lace on her chest, she showed me just below the throat another mark more recent, more severe, and more extensive.
"He is brutal, and I cannot live with him any longer," she cried. "Not only does he strike me and hurt me in every way, but he suspects me of being untrue to him." ”

“ Little did he know that his skill and enthusiasm for the game was keeping him from terrors of which no ordinary person has ever dreamt. It is, doubtless, a good thing for many people that toxicologists like myself are rare, and that the science and art of poisoning is an almost unknown cult.
I fancy that I won a few more games than my opponent in the long run, but he was a very strong player.
I well remember our last evening's chess, and I have never ceased to regret, although I was a thousand pounds richer for it, the untimely death of Mr. Humphrey Friende. ”

“ A mother, jealous, vindictive and greedy for wealth; a mother who loved her own son and hated her husband's child had brought this about—and, I felt sure, a son who suspected his mother.
I pictured her that night when Francis arrived, desperate and half-insane, going to the tower-room with this pin, its point prepared with the curare poison, and sewing it into the pillow, feeling sure that the young officer would die before his father, and that her son would become Sir Anthony Laurence. ”

“ On arriving at the house, I left the car well inside the ramshackle old gate, and went right into the long, low sitting-room.
On a shaky and ancient horse-hair sofa lay the miser, partly dressed. An expression of extreme agony—the fearful pain of angina—was on his face. The attack was a bad one—he might possibly die without assistance. Good! "He is very bad," I said to Polly. "I think I can relieve him for the time being, but I want a prescription made up. Will you go to the chemist, and get it?"
"Yes, doctor, but what about uncle?" ”

“ The imminence of danger acted like a cold-water douche upon my infatuation, to say nothing of the girl's altered attitude.
The position was a most serious one, and had to be faced promptly. My wife grew rapidly worse during the day; nothing would stop the sickness, and my good old medical friend shook his head. "This is the last straw, as it were, d'Escombe," he said to me when he came downstairs. "I'm afraid she can't rally." And as he said it I caught a look on Estelle's face which made me finally decide on carrying out an idea which I had had in my mind for the last hour. ”

“ I do not wish to eulogize my appearance as it then was, for after all, good looks are only worth what they will bring to the pocket, and depend upon the country and surroundings in which one lives; a man or woman passing as handsome in one continent may be looked upon as positively ugly in another. It all depends on the standard of beauty in the immediate market.
A smartly-dressed housemaid showed me to the presence of Mr. Featherson, who, immaculately dressed, was sitting reading in a cosily furnished smoking-room. ”

“ Why prolong the agony and leave the girl penniless? No; you and she can many, you can buy a practice, and I shall die satisfied—but it must be this week."
"What do you mean?" I queried.
"Mean," said he, "mean—why, I intend that you shall help me. A little digitalin, followed by some morphia, a hypodermic syringe—and all is settled. You can sign the certificate, and Gwen—bless her heart!—gets the money. But not a word to her, mind. She must never know." ”

“ You ask why, Laurence? For this reason. I had decided that Dr. Toillet should die of sea-sickness, induced, of course, by his previous illness, as in health he was a good sailor, and the injection I gave was certain to cause obstinate vomiting, and would also seriously affect his heart. But it all had to appear very natural; life on ship-board being so narrow and confined that every soul knows practically every detail of the life and doings of everybody else. ”

“ Know your drug, know your dose, and know its effect, and you can, with the aid of your hypodermic, play with men and women just as you please. The world itself is but a plaything in the hands of the clever practitioner who specializes in toxicology. ”

“ Nothing is so delightful to the busy man, if he is a decent sailor and not in search of constant and varied excitement, as a long sea voyage. The absence of the postman is, perhaps, the most delightful point of all—no daily worries, nothing to answer, no bills to make you shudder and rush to the tantalus. If you are also a keen chess and card player, then the life, for a few months, is ideal. ”

“ I was very disgusted when I saw Fernie, dressed in irreproachable black, open the door for me, and I did not fail to notice the look, both suspicious and impertinent, which he gave me. Nanson was sitting in an arm-chair in his gorgeously furnished bedroom, and I was surprised to see the change which two weeks had made in him.
"Where the devil have you been all this long time, d'Escombe?" he inquired. "I'm very seedy. My brain's queer, I don't seem to be able to think logically, and my money matters are all in a muddle. ”

“ It was Rita's voice. What had happened?
I started for the door, and then, "Martha, Martha, come quickly," the voice of the housemaid came from below.
The old servant listened for a second or two, and then another scream resounded through the house, and turning to me, she said hurriedly:
"Will you excuse me for one moment, doctor? Somebody is hurt, I'm afraid. It sounds like young Mrs. Martyn."
"All right, run along quickly and see," I answered, but I felt upset, and hardly knew what to do. Had Rita really hurt herself? Surely those cries of pain were not simulated. ”

“ Rowe, would you be kind enough to run into the hotel, and ask two strong waiters to bring along a chair to carry me inside? I daren't put my foot to the ground."
Rowe, evidently not too pleased, started off to do as he was asked.
The moment he was out of sight, Featherson's face changed its expression. "Here, d'Escombe, quick!" he said, speaking in a half whisper. "If you love Ella—and I believe you do—help me now. That man's a detective, one of the shrewdest. The jewels are in a wooden ventilator, in the corridor by my bedroom. Now listen." ”

“ I always hate to see a woman really cry; I don't mean the trickle of tears and the red nose which can be produced almost at will, such as you see in the pit of the theatre, but the heart-breaking tears of absolute despair. ”

“ And how many times, too, has a woman sniggered provocatively when I have held my stethoscope upon her bared breast.
But enough! You know me sufficiently well to be aware that I am only a ladies'-man when I have a distinct purpose in view. The medical man who allows himself to fall beneath the blandishments of his patients of the opposite sex is instantly a lost soul. ”

“ The nurse, after awhile, sent for me. "You must come and listen to her," she said. "She talks about the most awful things. What is curare?"
Then, Brown, the light suddenly dawned upon me. I was a theoretical student of toxicology, and knew as much about poison, and more, than most men. My thoughts at once went back to that gruesome, unnatural figure on the bed in the tower-room. Francis had died of poison—and that poison was undoubtedly curare! ”

“ I asked, glancing at the closed door.
"What can she suspect?" queried my patient. "No, my dear fellow, don't have any such misgivings. You are quite safe. I leave the whole matter entirely to you. He must be silenced, and you alone can do it. But what means do you intend to employ?"
"Ah! You must leave all details to me, Mr. Farnell," I said firmly. "In such a difficult and serious case one must provide for every contingency, however remote. Davies means mischief, hence he is just as wary as ourselves." ”

“ Thus, when my father died suddenly, and with him my income, the chances I possessed of becoming a practitioner of medicine had apparently disappeared, for what he did leave was only just enough to keep my mother and sisters in genteel poverty.
"What the devil am I fit for?" I asked my friend Aitkin one day. "I might become a billiard-marker, or a racing tout; but I'm not fit for much else. I really am a most useless beggar." ”

“ Nobody dreams that I practise a special—a very special—branch of it, namely toxicology. Yes, I practise it as other men practise bone-setting or surgical operations. I know my drugs, I know my doses, and, best of all, I know the effects—all by practise. But, unfortunately, the patients I have been compelled to practise upon till I had attained proficiency have, in many cases, been carried to their grave, and there interred upon my own certificate.
But I was telling you of the boy Ronald Snell, who was with me that night in the Empire. ”

“ He was a little, fat, fussy man, with gold eye-glasses and short, bristly grey hair—you know the type, old chap.
"What's this I hear?" he inquired.
"Sir Geoffrey has just died suddenly, doctor," answered the nurse. "But this man whom I sent to fetch Lieutenant Laurence says that he is dead also—or if not, convulsed and seriously ill. There is evidently something horrible the matter. Will you see? You can do nothing for Sir Geoffrey himself, and this man"—nodding towards the shivering Roberts—"is useless."
"Eh, what?—young Francis dead? What do you mean?" ”