"By jing!" he cried, "I'm on that. Bet you a quid--But, no. You'd
hardly lay against your own opinion. Just wait a tick. I'll bring 'em."
Furneaux stared fixedly at the table while his host was absent. His
conscience was not pricking him with regard to an unmerited slur on the
country chemists of Great Britain. All is fair in love and the detection
of crime, and he simply had to get hold of those bottles by some daring
yet plausible ruse.
"Now--I wonder!" he muttered, as Elkin's step sounded on the stairs.
"There you are!" grinned the horse-dealer. "Take a dose of the last one.
It'll stir your liver to some tune."
Furneaux drew the corks out of both bottles, and sniffed the contents.
Then he tasted, with much tongue-smacking.
"Um!" he said. "Stale laudanum, for a start. I expected as much. Bought
by the gallon and sold by the drop. Is that the dogcart with my
pictures?"
"Yes."
"Hail your man. He can give me a lift."
"But there's lots of things I want to ask you--"
"Probably. I'm here to put questions, not to give information. I've gone
a long way beyond the official tether already. If you've a grain of
sense, and I think you're not altogether lacking in that respect, you'll
keep a close tongue, and act on the tips thrown out.
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