Page:Weird Tales Volume 14 Issue 3 (1929-09).djvu/31

 "Stand not there like a paralyzed bullfrog and offer excuses. Hasten to the kitchen and bring mustard and hot water, quickly. In addition to heat prostration, this poor child lies poisoned to the point of death with wooden alcohol. Already her pulse has almost vanished. Quick, my friend; rush, fly; even now it may be too late!"

Our preparations were made with feverish haste, but the little Frenchman's worst predictions were fulfilled. Even as I bent to administer the mixture of mustard and water which should empty the fainting woman's system of the deadly wood alcohol, her breast fluttered convulsively, her pale lids drew half-way open, disclosing eyes so far rolled back that neither pupil nor iris was visible, and her blanched, bloodless lips fell flaccidly apart as her chin dropped toward the curve of her throat and the fatuous, insensible expression of the newly dead spread over her pallid countenance like a blight across a stricken flower.

"Hélas, it is finished!" de Grandin rasped in a furious whisper. "Let those who sponsor such laws as those which make poisonous liquor available accept responsibility for this poor one's death!"

He was still swearing volubly in mingled French and English as we walked down the flagstone pathway from the house, and in the blindness of his fury all but collided with an undersized, stoop-shouldered man who paused speculatively on the sidewalk a moment, then turned in at the entrance to the yard and sauntered toward the cottage.

"Pardonnez-moi, Monsieur," de Grandin apologized, stepping quickly aside, for the other made no move to avoid collision, "it is that I am greatly overwrought, and failed to

"Morbleu, Friend Trowbridge, the ill-mannered canaille has not the grace to acknowledge my amends. It is not to be borne!" He wheeled in his tracks, took an angry step after the other, then stiffened abruptly to a halt and paused irresolute a second, like a bird-dog coming to a "point." With an imperative, half-furtive gesture he bade me follow, and stepped silently over the grass in the wake of the discourteous stranger.

we ascended the path and crept up the porch steps, tiptoeing across the veranda to the open window letting into the room of death. The Frenchman's raised finger signaled me to halt just beyond the line of light shining through the midnight darkness, and we paused in breathless silence as a soft, suave voice inside addressed the stricken husband.

"Good evening, sir," we heard the stranger say, "you seem in trouble. Perhaps I can assist you?"

A heart-wrenching, strangling sob from young Sattalea was the only answer.

"Things are seldom as bad as they seem," the other pursued, his words, pronounced in a sort of silky monotone, carrying distinctly, despite the fact that he spoke with a slight lisp. "When ignorant quacks have failed, there are always others to whom you can turn, you know."

Another sob from the prostrated husband was his sole reply.

"For instance, now," the visitor murmured, almost as though speaking to himself, "two witless charlatans just told you that your love is dead—so she is, if you wish to accept their verdict, but"

"Monsieur," de Grandin stepped across the window-sill and fixed his level, unwinking stare on the intruder, "I do not know what game it is you play; but I make no doubt you seek an unfair advantage of this poor young man. It were better for you that you went your way in peace, and that immediately; else"

"Indeed?" the other surveyed him with a sort of amused contempt. "Don't you think it's you who'd best