Lord bless you! I've had it until I thought I should jump
through the roof. Laudanum's a first-class thing, but I can tell you
of something better--jerk 'em out, that's my recipe," he said, with an
odd little smile. "Of course every one to their notion, and if you say
laudanum--and nothing else--why it's laudanum you shall have; but
remember it's powerful. Why, ten drops of it would cause--death."

"How many drops did you say?" asked Daisy, bending forward eagerly.
"I--I want to be careful in taking it."

"Ten drops, I said, would poison a whole family, and twenty a
regiment. You must use it very carefully, miss. Remember I have warned
you," he said, handing her the little bottle filled with a dark liquid
and labeled conspicuously, "Laudanum--a poison."

"Please give me my change quickly," she said, a strange, deadly
sickness creeping over her.

"Certainly, ma'am," assented the obliging little man, handing her back
the change.

Daisy quite failed to notice that he returned her the full amount she
had paid him in his eagerness to oblige her, and he went happily back
to compounding his drugs in the rear part of the shop, quite
unconscious he was out the price of the laudanum.

He was dreaming of the strange beauty of the young girl, and the smile
deepened on his good-humored face as he remembered how sweetly she had
gazed up at him.

Meanwhile Daisy struggled on, clasping her treasure close to her
throbbing heart. She remembered Ruth had pointed out an old shaft to
her from her window; it had been unused many years, she had said.

"The old shaft shall be my tomb," she said; "no one will think of
looking for me there."

Poor little Daisy--unhappy girl-bride, let Heaven not judge her
harshly--she was sorely tried.

"Mother, mother!" she sobbed, in a dry, choking voice, "I can not live
any longer. I am not taking the life God gave me, I am only returning
it to Him. This is the only crime I have ever committed, mother, and
man will forget it, and God will forgive me. You must plead for me,
angel-mother. Good-bye, dear, kind Uncle John, your love never failed
me, and Rex--oh, Rex--whom I love best of all, you will not know how I
loved you. Oh, my love--my lost love--I shall watch over you up
there!" she moaned, "and come to you in your dreams! Good-bye, Rex, my
love, my husband!" she sobbed, holding the fatal liquid to her parched
lips.

The deep yawning chasm lay at her feet. Ten--ay, eleven drops she
hastily