|
Main
- books.jibble.org
My Books
- IRC Hacks
Misc. Articles
- Meaning of Jibble
- M4 Su Doku
- Computer Scrapbooking
- Setting up Java
- Bootable Java
- Cookies in Java
- Dynamic Graphs
- Social Shakespeare
External Links
- Paul Mutton
- Jibble Photo Gallery
- Jibble Forums
- Google Landmarks
- Jibble Shop
- Free Books
- Intershot Ltd
|
books.jibble.org
Previous Page
| Next Page
Page 64
"When this man's clothing was searched," observed the Coroner,
"a box of pills was found, Dr. Ransford, on which your writing
appears. Had you been attending him--professionally?"
"Yes," replied Ransford. "Both Collishaw and his wife. Or,
rather, to be exact, I had been in attendance on the wife, for
some weeks. A day or two before his death, Collishaw
complained to me of indigestion, following on his meals. I
gave him some digestive pills--the pills you speak of, no
doubt."
"These?" asked the Coroner, passing over the box which
Mitchington had found.
"Precisely!" agreed Ransford. "That, at any rate, is the box,
and I suppose those to be the pills."
"You made them up yourself?" inquired the Coroner.
"I did--I dispense all my own medicines."
"Is it possible that the poison we have beard of, just now,
could get into one of those pills--by accident?"
"Utterly impossible!--under my hands, at any rate," answered
Ransford.
"Still, I suppose, it could have been administered in a pill?"
suggested the Coroner.
"It might," agreed Ransford. "But," he added, with a
significant glance at the medical men who had just given
evidence. "It was not so administered in this case, as the
previous witnesses very well know!"
The Coroner looked round him, and waited a moment.
"You are at liberty to explain--that last remark," he said at
last. "That is--if you wish to do so."
"Certainly!" answered Ransford, with alacrity. "Those pills
are, as you will observe, coated, and the man would swallow
them whole--immediately after his food. Now, it would take
some little time for a pill to dissolve, to disintegrate, to
be digested. If Collishaw took one of my pills as soon as he
had eaten his dinner, according to instructions, and if poison
had been in that pill, he would not have died at once--as he
evidently did. Death would probably have been delayed some
little time until the pill had dissolved. But, according to
the evidence you have had before you, he died quite suddenly
while eating his dinner--or immediately after it. I am not
legally represented here--I don't consider it at all necessary
--but I ask you to recall Dr. Coates and to put this question
to him: Did he find one of those digestive pills in this
man's stomach?"
The Coroner turned, somewhat dubiously, to the two doctors who
had performed the autopsy. But before he could speak, the
superintendent of police rose and began to whisper to him, and
after a conversation between them, he looked round at the
jury, every member of which had evidently been much struck by
Ransford's suggestion.
"At this stage," he said, "it will be necessary to adjourn. I
shall adjourn the inquiry for a week, gentlemen. You will--"
Ransford, still standing in the witness-box, suddenly lost
control of himself. He uttered a sharp exclamation and smote
the ledge before him smartly with his open hand.
"I protest against that!" he said vehemently. "Emphatically,
I protest! You first of all make a suggestion which tells
against me--then, when I demand that a question shall be put
which is of immense importance to my interests, you close down
the inquiry--even if only for the moment. That is grossly
unfair and unjust!"
"You are mistaken," said the Coroner. "At the adjourned
inquiry, the two medical men can be recalled, and you will
have the opportunity--or your solicitor will have--of asking
any questions you like for the present--"
Previous Page
| Next Page
|
|