er I am gone. I know that
you will heed my wishes?"

The intense sadness of his eyes made my heart sink; I could only grip
his hand and remain silent.

"Thank you; I was sure I might count on your devotion. Now, tell me,
doctor, you have examined me carefully, have you not?"

I nodded.

"In every way known to medical science?"

I nodded again.

"And have you found anything wrong with me,--I mean, besides this
bullet, anything abnormal?"

"As I have told you, your eyesight is defective; I should like to
examine your eyes more thoroughly when you are better."

"I shall never be better; besides it isn't my eyes; I mean myself, my
soul,--you haven't found anything wrong there?"

"Certainly not; the whole city knows the beauty of your character and
your life."

"Tut, tut; the city knows nothing. For ten years I have lived so much
with the poor that people have almost forgotten my previous active life
when I was busy with money-making and happy in my home. But there is a
man out West, whose head is white and whose heart is heavy, who has not
forgotten, and there is a woman in London, a silent, lonely woman, who
has not forgotten. The man was my partner, poor Jack Evelyth; the woman
was my wife. How can a man be so cursed, doctor, that his love and
friendship bring only misery to those who share it? How can it be that
one who has in his heart only good thoughts can be constantly under the
shadow of evil? This charge of murder is only one of several cases in my
life where, through no fault of mine, the shadow of guilt has been cast
upon me.

"Years ago, when my wife and I were perfectly happy, a child was born to
us, and a few months later, when it was only a tender, helpless little
thing that its mother loved with all her heart, it was strangled in its
cradle, and we never knew who strangled it, for the deed was done one
night when there was absolutely no one in the house but my wife and
myself. There was no doubt about the crime, for there on the tiny neck
were the finger marks where some cruel hand had closed until life went.

"Then a few years later, when my partner and I were on the eve of
fortune, our advance was set back by the robbery of our safe. Some one
opened it in the night, someone who knew the combination, for it was the
work of no burglar, and yet there were only two persons in the world who
knew that combination, my partner and myself. I tried to be brave when
these things happened, but as my li