She looked startled.  Her ordinarily inscrutable face betrayed everything, though it was averted from the rest of us and could be seen only by Kennedy.  She knew the truth that she strove to repress; she was afraid of herself.

“It is dangerous,” she murmured, “to be with a person who pays attention to such little things.  If every one were like you, I would no longer breathe a syllable of my dreams.”

She was sobbing now.

What was back of it all?  I had heard of the so-called resolution dreams.  I had heard of dreams that kill, of unconscious murder, of the terrible acts of the subconscious somnambulist of which the actor has no recollection in the waking state until put under hypnotism.  Was it that which Kennedy was driving at disclosing?

Dr. Ross moved nearer to Mrs. Maitland as if to reassure her.  Craig was studying attentively the effect of his revelation both on her and on the other faces before him.

Mrs. Maitland, her shoulders bent with the outpouring of the long-suppressed emotion of the evening and of the tragic day, called for sympathy which, I could see, Craig would readily give when he had reached the climax he had planned.

“Kennedy,” exclaimed Masterson, pushing aside Dr. Ross, as he bounded to the side of Mrs. Maitland, unable to restrain himself longer, “Kennedy, you are a faker—­nothing but a damned dream doctor—­in scientific disguise.”

“Perhaps,” replied Craig, with a quiet curl of the lip.  “But the threads of the typewriter ribbon, the alignment of the letters, the paper, all the ‘fingerprints’ of that type-written note of suicide were those of the machine belonging to the man who caused the soul-wound, who knew Madeline Maitland’s inmost heart better than herself—­because he had heard of Freud undoubtedly, when he was in Vienna—­who knew that he held her real love still, who posed as a patient of Dr. Ross to learn her secrets as well as to secure the subtle poison of the cobra.  That man, perhaps, merely brushed against Price Maitland in the crowd, enough to scratch his hand with the needle, shove the false note into his pocket—­ anything to win the woman who he knew loved him, and whom he could win.  Masterson, you are that man!”

The next half hour was crowded kaleidoscopically with events—­the call by Dr. Leslie for the police, the departure of the Coroner with Masterson in custody, and the efforts of Dr. Ross to calm his now almost hysterical patient, Mrs. Maitland.

Then a calm seemed to settle down over the old laboratory which had so often been the scene of such events, tense with human interest.  I could scarcely conceal my amazement, as I watched Kennedy quietly restoring to their places the pieces of apparatus he had used.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, catching my eye as he paused with the tintometer in his hand.

“Why,” I exclaimed, “that’s a fine way to start a month!  Here’s just one day gone and you’ve caught your man.  Are you going to keep that up?  If you are—­I’ll quit and skip to February.  I’ll choose the shortest month, if that’s the pace!”