“Oh, I think we can relieve the pain, sir,” said David cheerfully.

“Much obliged, David. Some beastly drug that 'll turn me into an idiot. No, thank ye, I 'll keep my wits if it 's all the same to you. Well, well, it 's all in the day's work, and I 'm not complaining, but Edward 'll get mortal tired of waiting for my shoes if I last three years. I doubt his patience holding out. He 'll be bound to hasten matters on. Think of the bad example I shall be for the baby-when it comes. Lord, David, what d' ye want to look like that for? I suppose they 'll have babies like other folk, and I 'll be a bad example for 'em. Edward 'll think of that. When he 's thought of it enough, and I 've got on his nerves a bit more than usual, he 'll put strychnine or arsenic into my soup. Oh, Edward 'll poison me yet. You 'll see.'

“Poor old Edward, it 's not much in his line,” said David with half a laugh.

“Eh? What about Pellico's dog then?”

“Pellico's dog, sir?”

“What an innocent young man you are, David-never heard of Pellico's dog before, did you? Pellico's dog that got on Edward's nerves same as I get on his nerves, and you never knew that Edward dosed the poor brute with some of his bug-curing stuff, eh? To be sure you did n't think I knew, nor did Edward. I don't tell everything I know, and how I know it is my affair and none of yours, Master David Blake, but you see Edward 's not so unhandy with a little job in the poisoning line.”

David's face darkened. The incident of Pellico's dog had occurred when he and Edward were schoolboys of fifteen. He remembered it very well, but he did not very much care being reminded of it. Every day of his life he passed the narrow turning, down which, in defiance of parental prohibitions, he and Edward used to race each other to school. Old Pellico's dirty, evil-smelling shop still jutted out of the farther end, and the grimy door-step upon which his dog used to lie in wait for their ankles was still as grimy as ever.