Page:The Galaxy, Volume 5.djvu/478

464 There was not a sound through the house. It was I who had received the doctor's directions for the night, and I knew that Jenny was to have her medicine at that hour. Could Miss Mason have fallen asleep? I strained my ears; the door of my room was open, but I could not hear the faintest stir, and, with every moment, the oppression with which I woke gained upon me horribly. I got up at last, stole across the entry, pushed the door of Jenny's room open very softly, and looked in. The night lamp burned rather dimly, but I still saw everything with distinctness. Miss Mason was standing by the bedside; she was in her night-dress; a gay striped shawl, which she seemed to have had about her, had fallen to her waist, and trailed along on the floor. Her cold blue eyes were blazing; there was a small scarlet spot in each of her wan cheeks. She held a phial, from which she was dropping a red liquid into a table spoon, and both her hands trembled. I took all this in at a glance, and I felt the inability to move which is common in nightmare. But, notwithstanding the spell, if I may call it so, which was on me, I took in all the surroundings of the room. Miss Mason had evidently been writing; her table stood, covered with papers, not far from the bed; I glanced mechanically past that to the bureau, where I had laid a letter which had come for Jenny from Jack that evening. This letter was gone! At the moment I noticed this fact. Miss Mason finished dropping the liquid; she set the phial on the stand, and bent over Jenny, who was in a heavy stupor, as if to give her the potion. At this motion the blood rushed to my brain. I recalled that the medicine to be given was in powders, not liquid; my eyes fastened upon the phial, which was of a curious shape, with a glass stopple; I recognized having seen it on Miss Mason's toilet-stand! A stifling, horrible conviction came over me. I struggled to stir. She had put her arm under Jenny's head; the spoon touched her lips. It seemed to me that I shrieked, but I suppose I really uttered only a feeble sound, as I staggered into the room. Miss Mason started back; the spoon fell; its contents dabbed the bed-spread, like blood; she pressed her hand to her side, and glared at me with the expression of a somnambulist.

"Thank God!" I gasped, "that I have spared you the commission of such a deed!"

She seemed to crouch away from me. Her features were distorted and rigid; her right hand clutched the fringe of the shawl about her, spasmodically.

"Miss Denby, save me!" she stammered out.

"What does this mean?" I asked.

"Yes; it was a mean act!" she replied, still as if she were not awake, though I believed she was affecting the manner.