"
Just then Mr. Shaynor returned alone and stood coughing his heart out on
the mat.
"Serves you right for being such a fool," said young Mr. Cashell, as
annoyed as myself at the interruption. "Never mind--we've all the night
before us to see wonders."
Shaynor clutched the counter, his handkerchief to his lips. When he
brought it away I saw two bright red stains.
"I--I've got a bit of a rasped throat from smoking cigarettes," he panted.
"I think I'll try a cubeb."
"Better take some of this. I've been compounding while you've been away."
I handed him the brew.
"'Twon't make me drunk, will it? I'm almost a teetotaller. My word! That's
grateful and comforting."
He sat down the empty glass to cough afresh.
"Brr! But it was cold out there! I shouldn't care to be lying in my grave
a night like this. Don't _you_ ever have a sore throat from smoking?" He
pocketed the handkerchief after a furtive peep.
"Oh, yes, sometimes," I replied, wondering, while I spoke, into what
agonies of terror I should fall if ever I saw those bright-red danger-
signals under my nose. Young Mr. Cashell among the batteries coughed
slightly to show that he was quite ready to continue his scientific
explanations, but I was thinking still of the girl with the rich voice and
the significantly cut mouth, at whose command I had taken charge of the
shop. It flashed across me that she distantly resembled the seductive
shape on a gold-framed toilet-water advertisement whose charms were
unholily heightened by the glare from the red bottle in the window.
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