Page:Arthur B Reeve - The Dream Doctor.djvu/377

 doubt you have noticed the mousey odour in this room. As little as one part of conine to fifty thousand of water gives off that odour—it is characteristic.

"I have proceeded with extraordinary caution in my investigation of this case," he went on. "In fact, there would have been no value in it, otherwise, for the experts for the people seem to have established the presence of conine in the body with absolute certainty."

He paused and we waited expectantly.

"I have had the body exhumed and have repeated the tests. The alkaloid which I discovered had given precisely the same results as in their tests."

My heart sank. What was he doing—convicting the man over again?

"There is one other test which I tried," he continued, "but which I can not take time to duplicate to-night. It was testified at the trial that conine, the active principle of hemlock, is intensely poisonous. No chemical antidote is known. A fifth of a grain has serious results; a drop is fatal. An injection of a most minute quantity of real conine will kill a mouse, for instance, almost instantly. But the conine which I have isolated in the body is inert!"

It came like a bombshell to the prosecution, so bewildering was the discovery.

"Inert?" cried Kilgore and Hollins almost together. "It can't be. You are making sport of the best chemical experts that money could obtain. Inert? Read the evidence—read the books."

"On the contrary," resumed Craig, ignoring the