be taken seriously, but you will admit that if a man doesn't know his own mind when he is verging toward middle age, he never will. But if I were only twenty-five, it would make no difference. I would marry you like a shot. I never have given a thought to marrying before. Girls don't interest me. They show their hand too plainly. I've always had a sort of ideal and you fill it."

It was characteristic of Mrs. Balfame's well-ordered mind that her intention to murder her husband did not intrude itself into this unique and provocative hour. She had never indulged in a passing desire to marry again, and hers was not the order of mind that somersaults. But she was willing to "let herself go," for the sake of the experience; for the first time in her twenty odd years of married life to loiter in a leafy shadowy street with a man who loved her and made no secret of it.

"I wonder?" She stared up at him, curiosity in her eyes.

"Wonder what?"

"If it is love?"

He laughed unmusically. "I am not surprised that you ask that question—you, who know no more of love than if you had been a castaway on a desert island since the age of ten. Never mind. I've planted a seed. It will sprout. Think and think again. You owe me that much—and yourself. I know that six months hence you will have divorced Dave Balfame, and that you will marry me as soon as the law allows."

"Never! Never!" She was laughing now, but with all the gay coquetry of youth, not merely the eidola of her own.

They had arrived at the gate of the Balfame Place, which faced the avenue and a large street lamp. She put the gate between them with a quicker movement than she commonly indulged in and held out her hand.

"No more nonsense! If I were young and free—who knows? But—but—forty-two!" She choked but brought it out. "Now go home and think over all the nice girls you know and select one quickly. I will make the wedding cake."

"Did you suppose I didn't know your age? This is Elsinore, and its inhabitants are five thousand. When you and I were born—of respectably eminent parentage—all Brabant County numbered few more."

He made no attempt to open the gate, but he raised her hand to his lips. Even in that rare moment he was conscious of a regret that it was such a large hand, and his head jerked abruptly as he flung out the recreant thought.

"I never shall change," he said. "And you are to think and think. Now go. I'll watch until you are indoors."

"Good night." She ran up the path, wondering if her tall slight figure looked as willowy as it felt. The mirror had often surprised her with the information that she looked quite different from the image in her mind. She also wondered, with some humour, why no one ever had discovered her apparently obvious charms before.

When she was in her bedroom and electricity replaced the mellow rays of street lamps shining through soft and whispering leaves, Mrs. Balfame forgot Dwight Rush and all men save her husband.

She took the vial from her bag and stared at it. In a moment a frown drew her serene brows together, her sweet, shallow, large grey eyes, so consistently admired by her own sex at least, darkened with displeasure. She was a bungler after all. How was the stuff to be administered? She racked her memory, but the casual explanation of Dr. Anna, uttered at least two years ago, had left not an echo. A drop in his eggs or coffee might be too little; more, and he might detect the foreign quantity.

She removed the cork and sniffed. It was odourless, but was it tasteless?

Obviously there was no immediate way of ascertaining save by experiment on Mr. Balfame. And even if it were tasteless, it might cook his blood, congest his face, burst his veins—she recalled snatches of Dr. Anna's dissertations upon "interesting cases." On the other hand, one drop might make him violently ill; the suspicions of any doctor might be aroused.

She must walk warily. Murder was one of the fine arts. Those that cultivated it and failed followed the victim or spent the rest of their lives within prison walls. Thousands, it was estimated, walked the earth unsuspected, unapprehensive, serene and content—contemptuous of failures and bunglers, as are the masters in any art. Mrs. Balfame was proudly aware that her rôle in life was success.

There was nothing to do but wait. She must have another cosy evening with her scientific friend and draw her on to talk of the poison. Ah! that made another precaution imperative.

She went to the cupboard in the bathroom, rinsed a small bottle, transferred the precious colorless fluid, refilled the vial with water and returned it to her bag. To-morrow or next day she would slip into Dr. Anna's house and restore it to its hiding place. The poison she secreted on the top shelf of the bathroom cupboard.

Reluctantly, for she was a prompt and methodical woman, she resigned herself to the prospect of David Balfame's prolonged sojourn upon the planet he had graced so ill. She went to bed, shrinking into the farther corner, but falling asleep almost immediately. Then, her hands having faltered, Fate borrowed the shuttle.

CHAPTER III

A fortnight passed before Mrs. Balfame found the opportunity for a chat with Dr. Anna.

On Saturday afternoons it was the pleasant custom of the flower of Elsinore to repair to the Country Club, a building of the bungalow type, with wide verandas, a large central hall, several smaller rooms for those that preferred cards to dancing, a secluded bar, a tennis court—flooded in winter for skating—and a golf links. It was charmingly situated about four miles from the town, with the woods behind and a glimpse of the grey Atlantic from the higher knolls.

The young unmarried set that danced at the Club or in the larger of the home parlours every night would have monopolised the central hall of the bungalow on Saturdays as well had it not been for the sweet but firm resistance of Mrs. Balfame. Lacking in a proper sex vanity she might be, but she was far too proud and just to permit her own generation to be obliterated by mere youth. Having no children of her own, it shocked her fine sense of the fitness of things to watch the subservience of parents and the selfishness of offspring. One of the most notable results of her quiet determination was that she and her friends enjoyed every privilege of the Country Club when the mood was on them, and that a goodly number of the men of their own generation did not confine their attentions exclusively to the bar, but came out and danced with their neighbours' wives. The young people sniffed, but as Mrs. Balfame had founded the Country Club, and they were all helpless under her inflexible will and skilful manipulation, they never dreamed of rebellion.

During the fortnight Mrs. Balfame had cunningly replaced the vial, the indifferent Cassie leaving the sitting-room at her disposal while she wrote a note reminding Dr. Anna of the promised list of war books, adding playfully that she had no time to waste in a busy doctor's waiting-room. In truth Dr. Anna was a difficult person to see at this time. There was an epidemic of typhoid in the county, and much illness among children.

However, on the third Saturday after the interrupted supper, as Mrs. Balfame was motoring out to the Club with her friend, Mrs. Battle, wife of the President of the Bank of Elsinore, she saw Dr. Anna driving her little runabout down a branching road. With a graceful excuse she deserted her hostess, sprang into the humbler machine, and gaily ordered her friend to turn and drive to the Club.

"You take a rest this