“Poisoned?” she gasped, and started back as though struck, while her rapid glances went from face to face, resting longest on the countenance of Captain Poland. It was as though, in this great emergency, she looked to him for comfort more than to the old doctor who had ushered her into the world.
“I am sorry to have to say it, Viola, but such is the case,” went on the family physician. “Your father was poisoned. But the kind of poison we have not yet determined.”
“But who gave it to him?” she cried. “Oh, it doesn't seem that any one would hate him so, not even his worst enemy. And he had so many friends-too many, perhaps.”
“We don't know that any one gave him the poison, Viola,” said Dr. Lambert, gently. “In fact, it does not seem that any one did, or your father would have known it. Certainly if any one had tried to make him take poison there would have been a struggle that he would have mentioned. But he died of poison, nevertheless.”
“Then there can be but one other explanation,” she murmured, and her voice was tense and strained. “He must have—”
“We fear he took it himself,” blurted out Dr. Baird, in spite of the warning look cast at him by his colleague.
“Oh, I won't believe that! It can't be true!” cried Viola, and she burst into a storm of sobs. Dr. Lambert placed his arms about her.
“Tell me it isn't true, Uncle Add! Tell me it isn't true!” she sobbed.
The three men, looking at one another—Dr. Lambert's glance coming over the bowed head of Viola—said nothing for a few moments. Then as her sobs died away, and she became calmer, the old physician said:
“You must not take on so, Vi. I know it is hard, but you must meet the issue squarely. At the same time you must realize that even the most suspicious circumstances may be explained away. While it does look as though your father had deliberately taken the poison, it may easily be established by an investigation that it was an accident—an accident of which even your father was ignorant.”
“There are so many poisons that do not manifest themselves for a long time—often days—after they are taken, that there is every chance of proving this to have been an accident.”
“Then there must be an investigation!” was Viola's quick decision. There were still tears in her eyes, but she looked through them now, as through a veil that must be torn aside. “I can not believe that my father was a—a suicide—” she halted at the awful word. “I will not believe it!” she went on more firmly. “It can not be true!”
Hardly had she uttered the last word than a figure passed through the hall, flitting past the half-opened door of the little room where Viola stood with the three men.
“Who is there?” she called sharply, for she had spoken rather loudly, and she did not want any of the servants to hear. “Who is there?”
“It is I—Minnie,” was the answer. “Dear Viola, I have come to see if I could do anything. I rang and rang, but no one answered the bell, and, as the door was open, I walked in.”
“I'm afraid I didn't close it when I let you in,” said Captain Poland to Dr. Lambert.
“Dear Viola!” said Minnie Webb, as she placed cheek against that of her friend. “Is there anything I can do in your terrible trouble? Please let me do something!”
“Thank you, Minnie. You are very kind. I don't know. We are in such distress. Tell me—” and Viola seemed to nerve herself for some effort. “Tell me! Did you hear what I said just now—as you passed the door?”
“Do you mean about not believing that your father was a suicide?” asked Minnie, in a low voice.
“Yes.”
“I—I heard you.”
“Then the only thing you can do is to help me prove otherwise,” said Viola. “That would be the greatest help. It can't be true, and we want that made plain. Father never killed himself. He was not that kind of man. He did not fear death, but he would not go deliberately to meet it. It is not true that he killed himself!” and Viola's voice seemed to ring out.
A strange look came over the face of Minnie Webb. There was a great pity shining in her eyes as she said:
“I—I am sorry, Viola, but—but I am afraid it may be true.”
“What! That my father committed suicide?”
“Yes,” whispered Minnie. “I—I'm afraid it may be true!”
CHAPTER V. HARRY'S MISSION
Minnie Webb's announcement affected her four hearers in four different ways. It shocked Viola—shocked her greatly, for she had, naturally, expected kindly sympathy and agreement from her friend.
Dr. Baird, who had involuntarily begun to twist his small mustache at the entrance of Miss Webb, looked at her in admiration of her good looks and because she upheld a theory to which he felt himself committed—a theory that Mr. Carwell was a plain out-and-out suicide.
Dr. Lambert was plainly indignant at the bald manner in which Minnie Webb made her statement, and at the same time he had pity for the ignorance of the lay mind that will pronounce judgment against the more cautious opinions of science. And this was not the first poisoning case with which the aged practitioner had dealt.
As for Captain Poland, he gazed blankly at Miss Webb for a moment following her statement, and then he looked more keenly at the young woman, as though seeking to know whence her information came.
And when Viola had recovered from her first shock this was the thought that came to her:
“What did Minnie know?”
And Viola asked that very question—asked it sharply and with an air which told of her determination to know.
“Oh, please don't ask me!” stammered Minnie Webb. “But I have heard that your father's affairs are involved, Viola.”
“His affairs? You mean anything in his—private life?” and the daughter of Horace Carwell—“Carwell the sport,” as he was frequently called—seemed to feel this blow more than the shock of death.
“Oh, no, nothing like that!” exclaimed Minnie, as though abashed at the mere suggestion. “But I did hear—and I can not tell where I heard it—that he was involved financially, and that, perhaps—well, you know some men have a horror of facing the world poor and—”
“That can't be true!” declared Viola stoutly. “While I do not know anything about my father's financial affairs, I know he had no fear of failure—no fear of becoming poor.”
“I do not believe he would have feared to face poverty if there was need. But there was not, I'm sure. Minnie, who told you this?”
“I—I can not tell!” said Minnie, with a memory of the insinuating manner in which LeGrand Blossom had spoken. Bearing in mind her promise to him not to mention the matter, she began to wish that she had not spoken.
“But you must tell!” insisted Dr. Lambert. “This amounts to an accusation against a dead man, and you owe it to Viola to give the source of your information.”
“No, Doctor, I can not! Please don't ask me, Viola. Oh, I shouldn't have spoken, but I thought only to help you solve the problem.”
“You have only made it harder, unless you tell us more,” said Dr. Lambert gently. “Why can not you tell us, Miss Webb?”
“Because I—I