something suddenly caused him a violent start. The
murderer was bleeding.

The sculptor, spite of his command over himself, turned pale. At that
moment the head of Starke moved--clearly moved. It raised itself
convulsively for a single moment; its eyes rolled, and it gave vent to a
subdued moan of intense agony. Mr. Fiddyes fell fainting on the floor as
Dr. Carnell entered. It needed but a glance to tell the doctor what had
happened, even had not Peter just then given vent to another low cry.
The surgeon's measures were soon taken. Locking the door, he bore a
chair to the wall which supported the body of the malefactor. He drew
from his pocket a case of glittering instruments, and with one of these,
so small and delicate that it scarcely seemed larger than a needle, he
rapidly, but dexterously and firmly, touched Peter just at the back of
the neck. There was no wound larger than the head of a small pin, and
yet the head fell instantly as though the heart had been pierced. The
doctor had divided the spinal cord, and Peter Starke was dead indeed.

A few minutes sufficed to recall the sculptor to his senses. He at first
gazed wildly upon the still suspended body, so painfully recalled to
life by the rough venesection of the hangman and the subsequent friction
of anointing his body to prevent the adhesion of the plaster.

"You need not fear now," said Dr. Carnell; "I assure you he is dead."

"But he _was_ alive, surely!"

"Only for a moment, and even that scarcely to be called life--mere
muscular contraction, my dear sir, mere muscular contraction."

The sculptor resumed his labor. The body was girt at various
circumferences with fine twine, to be afterward withdrawn through a
thick coating of plaster, so as to separate the various pieces of the
mould, which was at last completed; and after this Dr. Carnell skilfully
flayed the body, to enable a second mould to be taken of the entire
figure, showing every muscle of the outer layer.

The two moulds were thus taken. It is difficult to conceive more ghastly
appearances than they presented. For sculptor's work they were utterly
useless; for no artist except the most daring of realists would have
ventured to indicate the horrors which they presented. Fiddyes refused
to receive them. Dr. Carnell, hard and cruel as he was, for kindness'
sake, in his profession, was a gentle, genial father of a family of
daughters. He received the casts, and at once consigned them to a
garr