"Who brings the message, Garry ?" "A servant--Miss Claridge's, my lord." An ironical look came into Eglington's eyes; then they softened a little.

In a moment he placed a jar of oxygen in the butler's hands.
"My compliments to Miss Claridge, and I am happy to find my laboratory of use at last to my neighbours," he said, and the door closed upon the man.
Then he came back thoughtfully.

Soolsby had not moved.
"Do you know what oxygen's for, Soolsby ?" he asked quizzically.
"No, my lord, I've never heerd tell of it." "Well, if you brought the top of Ben Lomond to the bottom of a coal-mine--breath to the breathless--that's it.
"You've been doing that to Mr.Claridge, my lord ?" "A little oxygen more or less makes all the difference to a man--it probably will to neighbour Claridge, Soolsby; and so I've done him a good turn." A grim look passed over Soolsby's face.

"It's the first, I'm thinking, my lord, and none too soon; and it'll be the last, I'm thinking, too.
It's many a year since this house was neighbourly to that." Eglington's eyes almost closed, as he studied the other's face; then he said: "I asked you a little while ago who was right and what was wrong when you came to see my father here fifteen years ago.

Well ?" Suddenly a thought flashed into his eyes, and it seemed to course through his veins like some anaesthetic, for he grew very still, and a minute passed before he added quietly: "Was it a thing between my father and Luke Claridge?
There was trouble--well, what was it ?" All at once he seemed to rise above the vague anxiety that possessed him, and he fingered inquiringly a long tapering glass of acids on the bench beside him.