ent at the crucial moments. Now, this story rested entirely on the
evidence of Sir John Bell and the nurse, and if it was true I must be
mad as well as bad, since a doctor of my ability would well know that
under the circumstances he would very probably carry contagion, with the
result that a promising professional career might be ruined. Moreover,
had he determined to risk it, he would have taken extra precautions in
the sick-room to which he was called, and this it was proved I had not
done. Now the statement made by me before the magistrates had been put
in evidence, and in it I said that the tale was an absolute invention
on the part of Sir John Bell, and that when I went to see Lady Colford
I had no knowledge whatsoever that my wife was suffering from an
infectious ailment. This, he submitted, was the true version of the
story, and he confidently asked the jury not to blast the career of
an able and rising man, but by their verdict to reinstate him in the
position which he had temporarily and unjustly lost.

In reply, the leading counsel for the Crown said that it was neither
his wish nor his duty to strain the law against me, or to put a worse
interpretation upon the facts than they would bear under the strictest
scrutiny. He must point out, however, that if the contention of his
learned friend were correct, Sir John Bell was one of the wickedest
villains who ever disgraced the earth.

In summing up the judge took much the same line. The case, that was of a
character upon which it was unusual though perfectly allowable to found
a criminal prosecution, he pointed out, rested solely upon the evidence
of Sir John Bell, corroborated as it was by the nurse. If that
evidence was correct, then, to satisfy my own ambition or greed, I had
deliberately risked and, as the issue showed, had taken the life of a
lady who in all confidence was entrusted to my care. Incredible as such
wickedness might seem, the jury must remember that it was by no means
unprecedented. At the same time there was a point that had been scarcely
dwelt upon by counsel to which he would call their attention. According
to Sir John Bell's account, it was from his lips that I first learned
that my wife was suffering from a peculiarly dangerous ailment. Yet, in
his report of the conversation that followed between us, which he gave
practically verbatim, I had not expressed a single word of surprise and
sorrow at this dreadful intelligence, which to an affec