f a mutiny. And now the
sudden opening of a door sets him shaking, and a dropped tongs gives him
palpitations. Are we not the strangest kind of beings?

Fred was a little better during the day, and even seemed in a dull
sort of way to recognise his sister, who brought him flowers in the
afternoon. Towards evening his temperature sank to 101.5@, and he
fell into a kind of stupor. As it happened, Dr. Porter came in about
supper-time, and I asked him if he would step up and have a look at my
patient. He did so, and we found him dozing peacefully. You would hardly
think that that small incident may have been one of the most momentous
in my life. It was the merest chance in the world that Porter went up at
all.

Fred was taking medicine with a little chloral in it at this time. I
gave him his usual dose last thing at night; and then, as he seemed to
be sleeping peacefully, I went to my own room for the rest which I badly
needed. I did not wake until eight in the morning, when I was roused
by the jingling of a spoon in a saucer, and the step of Miss Williams
passing my door. She was taking him the arrowroot which I had ordered
over-night. I heard her open the door, and the next moment my heart
sprang into my mouth as she gave a hoarse scream, and her cup and saucer
crashed upon the floor. An instant later she had burst into my room,
with her face convulsed with terror.

"My God!" she cried, "he's gone!"

I caught up my dressing-gown and rushed into the next room.

Poor little Fred was stretched sideways across his bed, quite dead. He
looked as if he had been rising and had fallen backwards. His face was
so peaceful and smiling that I could hardly have recognised the worried,
fever-worn features of yesterday. There is great promise, I think, on
the faces of the dead. They say it is but the post-mortem relaxation of
the muscles, but it is one of the points on which I should like to see
science wrong.

Miss Williams and I stood for five minutes without a word, hushed by the
presence of that supreme fact. Then we laid him straight, and drew the
sheet over him. She knelt down and prayed and sobbed, while I sat on
the bed, with the cold hand in mine. Then my heart turned to lead as I
remembered that it lay for me to break the news to the mother.

However, she took it most admirably. They were all three at breakfast
when I came round, the general, Mrs. La Force, and the daughter. Somehow
they seemed to know all that I had to