Christine departed on her errand and soon returned, bringing with her two bottles, the smallest of which was labeled “Solution of Morphia—­POISON.  Dose for an adult, ten drops;” while the largest Was simply inscribed “Sulphuric Ether.”  These she placed on the chimney-piece, and then proceeded to arrange the cushions of the lounge and to draw the curtains.  “I will now leave madame to her repose,” she said.  “Does madame need anything more?”

“No, I shall want nothing more,” was the reply.  The door closed upon the maid’s retreating form, and Mrs. Rutherford instantly shot the bolt.

She cast a sad and wistful glance around the dainty room and on its glittering contents. “J’etais si bien ici,” she said regretfully.  “I had found here the existence which suited me, and now the end has come.  It is not in my nature to remain satisfied with a life of poverty and respectability, and I will not return to one of degradation and vice.  But, after all, what does it matter?  My fate would have found me sooner or later, and this soft couch is better than a hospital bed or the slabs of La Morgue:  this draught is more soothing than the cold waters of the Thames or the Seine.  Life is no longer a game that is worth the candle:  let us extinguish the lights and put the cards away.”

She took up the phial of morphia, drew the little sofa nearer to the fireplace and extended herself upon it.  The daylight faded from the sky and night came, and with the night came sleep—­a sleep whose dream was of Eternity, and whose wakening light would be the dawn of the resurrection morning.

“Accidental death” was the verdict of the coroner and the newspapers, and, in fact, of the world in general—­a conclusion much assisted by the evidence of Christine, who testified that her mistress was in the habit of using narcotics and anaesthetics in large quantities to relieve the pain of the neuralgic headaches from which she was a constant sufferer.  Society said, “How sad!  Dreadful, is it not?” and went on its way—­not exactly rejoicing, for the death of Mrs. Rutherford deprived its members of her long-promised, long-talked-of Shrove-Tuesday ball, and consequently the gay world mourned her loss very sincerely for a short time; in fact, till a well-known leader of fashion announced her intention of giving a fancy-dress party on the night thus left vacant, whereupon Society was consoled, and Mrs. Rutherford’s sad fate was forgotten.

Only two persons—­Horace Rutherford and his mother—­suspected that her death was not an accidental one; but they guarded their secret carefully, and Clement Rutherford will never learn that his dead wife was other than the innocent English girl she represented herself to be.  Walter Nugent wrote a pathetic letter to Mrs. Rutherford, begging that a lock of his lost and now forgiven darling’s hair might be sent to him; and it cost Horace a sharp pang of regret when he substituted for the black, wavy tress furnished by Clement a golden ringlet purchased from one of the leading hairdressers of New York.