"I am sorry to say I did," he answered, shaking his head.
"What powder is that?" asked Geoffery.
"It is scarcely fair to form a judgment on so small a portion," replied the Doctor, "but it certainly resembles arsenic."
Geoffery looked very hard at him; he returned the look, for a moment only, then dropped his eyelids, and compressed his lips, as though he feared his thoughts would assume the shape of words, and escape from them unbidden.
"What can be the meaning of all this, Doctor!" said Geoffery, after a pause of some duration.
"I don't know, sir—I don't know," replied the Doctor, hastily, and almost angrily.
"There seems to be no comment necessary," observed Geoffery. "Yet," he added, after another pause, "the only possible solution is too horrible to be thought of."
"Quite so, sir, quite so!" replied the Doctor. "I wish," he subjoined, shortly after, "that any other medical man but myself had been called in."
"That, too, was strange!" said Geoffery, turning towards the table: "what object could Mr. Arden, or Sir Alfred, rather, as we must now call him I suppose, have had in attempting to rinse that glass?"
"It is impossible to say," replied the Doctor.