of the
greatest living experts on poisons, I believe."

"And he's a great friend of Mary's," put in Cynthia, the irrepressible.

John Cavendish frowned and changed the subject.

"Come for a stroll, Hastings. This has been a most rotten business. She
always had a rough tongue, but there is no stauncher friend in England
than Evelyn Howard."

He took the path through the plantation, and we walked down to the
village through the woods which bordered one side of the estate.

As we passed through one of the gates on our way home again, a pretty
young woman of gipsy type coming in the opposite direction bowed and
smiled.

"That's a pretty girl," I remarked appreciatively.

John's face hardened.

"That is Mrs. Raikes."

"The one that Miss Howard----"

"Exactly," said John, with rather unnecessary abruptness.

I thought of the white-haired old lady in the big house, and that vivid
wicked little face that had just smiled into ours, and a vague chill of
foreboding crept over me. I brushed it aside.

"Styles is really a glorious old place," I said to John.

He nodded rather gloomily.

"Yes, it's a fine property. It'll be mine some day--should be mine
now by rights, if my father had only made a decent will. And then I
shouldn't be so damned hard up as I am now."

"Hard up, are you?"

"My dear Hastings, I don't mind telling you that I'm at my wit's end for
money."

"Couldn't your brother help you?"

"Lawrence? He's gone through every penny he ever had, publishing rotten
verses in fancy bindings. No, we're an impecunious lot. My mother's
always been awfully good to us, I must say. That is, up to now. Since
her marriage, of course----" he broke off, frowning.

For the first time I felt that, with Evelyn Howard, something
indefinable had gone from the atmosphere. Her presence had spelt
security. Now that security was removed--and the air seemed rife
with suspicion. The sinister face of Dr. Bauerstein recurred to me
unpleasantly. A vague suspicion of every one and everything filled my
mind. Just for a moment I had a premonition of approaching evil.

CHAPTER II. THE 16TH AND 17TH OF JULY

I had arrived at Styles on the 5th of July. I come now to the events
of the 16th and 17th of that month. For the convenience of the reader
I will recapitulate the incidents of those days in as exact a manner as
possible. They were elicited subsequently at the trial by a process of
long and tedious cross-examinations.