“Don’t tell me it was ever any worse than this!” Miss Summers exclaimed.  But Thoburn went on.  The card-players stopped to listen, but Mr. Sam was still staring at something on the floor.

“I tell you, the spring is losing its virtue, and, like a woman, without virtue, it is worthless.”

“But interesting!” Mr. Sam said, and stooped down.

“Consider,” went on Mr. Thoburn, standing and holding his glass to the light, “how we are at the mercy of this little spring!  A convulsion in the bowels of the earth, and its health-giving properties may be changed to the direst poison.  How do we know, you and I, some such change has not occurred overnight?  Unlikely as it is, it’s a possibility that, sitting here calmly, we may be sipping our death potion.”

Some of the people actually put down their glasses and everybody began to look uneasy except Mr. Sam, who was still watching something I could not see.

Mr. Thoburn looked around and saw he’d made an impression.  “We may,” he continued, “although my personal opinion of this water is that it’s growing too weak to be wicked.  I prove my faith in Mother Nature; if it is poisoned, I am gone.  I drink!”

Mr. Sam suddenly straightened up and glanced at Miss Summers.  “Perhaps I’m mistaken,” he said, “but I think there is something the matter with Arabella.”

Everybody looked:  Arabella was lying on her back, jerking and twitching and foaming at the mouth.

“She’s been poisoned!” Miss Summers screeched, and fell on her knees beside her.  “It’s that wretched water!”

There was pretty nearly a riot in a minute.  Everybody jumped up and stared at the dog, and everybody remembered the water he or she had just had, and coming on top of Mr. Thoburn’s speech, it made them babbling lunatics.  As I look back, I have a sort of picture of Miss Summers on the floor with Arabella in her lap, and the rest telling how much of the water they had had and crowding around Mr. Thoburn.

“It seems hardly likely it was the water,” he said, “although from what I recall of my chemistry it is distinctly possible.  Springs have been known to change their character, and the coincidence—­the dog and the water—­is certainly startling.  Still, as nobody feels ill—­”

But they weren’t sure they didn’t.  The bishop said he felt perfectly well, but he had a strange inclination to yawn all the time, and Mrs. Biggs’ left arm had gone to sleep.  And then, with the excitement and all, Miss Cobb took a violent pain in the back of her neck and didn’t know whether to cry or to laugh.

Well, I did what I could.  The worst of it was, I wasn’t sure it wasn’t the water.  I thought possibly Mr. Pierce had made a mistake in what he had bought at the drug store, and although I don’t as a rule drink it myself, I began to feel queer in the pit of my stomach.

Mr. Thoburn came over to the spring, and filling a glass, took it to the light, with every one watching anxiously.  When he brought it back he stooped over the railing and whispered to me.