How
he reached there at last I do not know--he must have been in some
station-house until daylight; but when I saw him, his pitiable
suffering and alarmed face made my heart ache. He had killed his
wife! He, or the wine he found at Mr. Birtwell's? Which?"
Doctor Hillhouse was nervous and excited, using stronger language
than was his wont.
"And I," he added, before Doctor Kline could respond--"I went to the
party also, and the sparkle and flavor of wine and spirit of
conviviality that pervaded the company lured me also--not weak like
Archie, nor with a shattered self-control like Mr. Ridley--to drink
far beyond the bounds of prudence, as my nervous condition to-day
too surely indicates. A kind of fatality seems to have attended this
party."
The doctor gave a little shiver, which was observed by Doctor Kline.
"Not a nervous chill?" said the latter, manifesting concern.
"No; a moral chill, if I may use such a term," replied Doctor
Hillhouse--"a shudder at the thought of what might have been as one
of the consequences of Mr. Birtwell's liberal dispensation of wine."
"The strain of the morning's work has been too much for you, doctor,
and given your mind an unhealthy activity," said his companion. You
want rest and time for recuperation."
"It would have been nothing except for the baleful effects of that
party," answered the doctor, whose thought could not dissever itself
from the unhappy consequences which had followed the carousal (is
the word too strong?) at Mr.
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