The Perfect Poison by Amanda Quick Page A

feel you must confide, sir, I assure you, it could never drive me to hate you.”
    “Wait until you hear what I am about to tell you before you judge.” Another violent cough interrupted Fergus. He gasped a few times and finally recovered his breath. “It concerns your great-grandfather, Erasmus Jones.”
    “What about him?” But a cold trickle of knowing slithered down Caleb’s spine.
    “You possess a talent very similar to his.”
    “I am aware of that.”
    “You also know that he went mad, set fire to his library and laboratory and jumped to his death.”
    “You think I face the same fate, sir,” he said quietly. “Is that what you are trying to tell me?”
    “Your great-grandfather was convinced that it was his talent that drove him mad. He wrote about it in his last journal.”
    “I have never heard that Erasmus Jones kept any journals.”
    “That is because he destroyed all but one of them in the fire. He was convinced that the vast amount of research he had done with the aid of his talent was meaningless. But he held back one journal because, in the end, he was still Erasmus Jones. He could not bear to destroy his own secrets.”
    “Where is this journal?”
    Fergus turned his head to look across the room. “You will find it in the hidden compartment of my safe along with another little volume, a notebook that he preserved with the journal. His son, your grandfather, gave them to me on his deathbed, and now I bequeath them to you.”
    “Have you read them?”
    “No. Neither did your grandfather. We couldn’t.”
    “Why not?”
    Fergus managed a snort. “Erasmus was Sylvester’s heir to the core. Like the old bastard, he invented his own private code for use in his journals. The notebook is also written in code. Neither your grandfather nor I dared show either book to anyone else in the family who might have been able to decipher it because we feared the secrets it might contain.”
    “Why did you and Grandfather keep the journal and the notebook?”
    Fergus looked up at him, his feverish eyes remarkably steady. “Because the first page of the journal is written in plain English. Erasmus addressed a message to his son and his future descendants. The note instructed them to preserve both volumes until such time in the future when another male with Sylvester’s talent appeared.”
    “Someone like me.”
    “Yes, I’m afraid so. Erasmus believed that the notebook contained the secret to recovering his sanity. He failed to discover that secret in time to save himself. He was convinced that sometime in the future one of his line would face the same crisis. He hoped that his descendant would be able to alter his own fate by solving the mysteries in that damned volume.”
    “What is the second volume?” Caleb asked.
    “According to Erasmus, it is Sylvester’s last notebook.”
     
     
     
    HE REMAINED BY his father’s bedside until dawn. Fergus opened his eyes just as the first light of day appeared.
    “Why the devil is it so damned hot in here?” he growled. He glared at the blaze on the hearth. “What are you trying to do? Burn down the house?”
    Stunned, Caleb pushed himself up out of the uncomfortable chair in which he had spent the night. He looked down into his father’s eyes and saw at once that they were no longer bright with fever. The crisis had passed. His father lived. A relief unlike anything he had ever experienced in his life cascaded through him.
    “Good morning, sir,” he said. “You gave us a bit of a scare during the past few days. How are you feeling?”
    “Tired.” Fergus rubbed the gray stubble on his chin with one hand. “But I do believe I’m going to live after all.”
    Caleb smiled. “So it appears, sir. Are you hungry? I’ll send downstairs for some tea and toast.”
    “And perhaps some eggs and bacon, as well,” Fergus said.
    “Yes, sir.” Caleb reached for the velvet bellpull hanging beside the bed. “Although you may have to do some persuasive