A few evenings after his return from Amsterdam, Philip, who had taken cold, complained of not being well.

“Not well!” cried the old man, starting up; “let me see—­yes, your pulse is very quick.  Amine, your poor husband is very ill.  He must go to bed, and I will give him something which will do him good.  I shall charge you nothing, Philip—­nothing at all.”

“I do not feel so very unwell, Mynheer Poots,” replied Philip; I have had a bad headache certainly.”

“Yes, and you have fever also, Philip, and prevention is better than cure; so go to bed, and take what I send you, and you will be well to-morrow.”

Philip went upstairs, accompanied by Amine; and Mynheer Poots went into his own room to prepare the medicine.  So soon as Philip was in bed, Amine went downstairs, and was met by her father, who put a powder into her hands to give to her husband, and then left the parlour.

“God forgive me if I wrong my father,” thought Amine; “but I have my doubts.  Philip is ill, more so than he will acknowledge; and if he does not take some remedies, he may be worse—­but my heart misgives me—­I have a foreboding.  Yet surely he cannot be so diabolically wicked.”

Amine examined the contents of the paper:  it was a very small quantity of dark brown powder, and, by the directions of Mynheer Poots, to be given in a tumbler of warm wine.  Mynheer Poots had offered to heat the wine.  His return from the kitchen broke Amine’s meditations.

“Here is the wine, my child; now give him a whole tumbler of wine, and the powder, and let him be covered up warm, for the perspiration will soon burst out, and it must not be checked.  Watch him, Amine, and keep the clothes on, and he will be well to-morrow morning.”  And Mynheer Poots quitted the room, saying, “Good-night, my child.”

Amine poured out the powder into one of the silver mugs upon the table, and then proceeded to mix it up with the wine.  Her suspicions had, for the time, been removed by the kind tone of her father’s voice.  To do him justice as a medical practitioner, he appeared always to be most careful of his patients.  When Amine mixed the powder, she examined and perceived that there was no sediment, and the wine was as clear as before.  This was unusual, and her suspicions revived.

“I like it not,” said she; “I fear my father—­God help me!—­I hardly know what to do—­I will not give it to Philip.  The warm wine may produce perspiration sufficient.”

Amine paused, and again reflected.  She had mixed the powder with so small a portion of wine that it did not fill a quarter of the cup; she put it on one side, filled another up to the brim with the warm wine, and then went up to the bedroom.

On the landing-place she was met by her father, whom she supposed to have retired to rest.

“Take care you do not spill it, Amine.  That is right, let him have a whole cupful.  Stop, give it to me; I will take it to him myself.”