Amusement Only Part 33

"But don't you think it makes one think of indigestion?"

"That's exactly what it's meant to do."

"Before, or afterwards?"

This, of course, was Pybus.

"Let those laugh who win. Wait till you see the name blazoned on every dead wall. Then you'll welcome 'Aunt Jane's Jalap' as a friend."

That dinner, I confess, was a little patent mediciney. More than once I rather wished that I had kept the subject out of it. Pybus told some pleasant and characteristic anecdotes about injurious effects of patent medicines. How he had known whole families killed by taking them. How more than half the infant mortality of Great Britain was owing to their unrestricted sale. How the habit of taking patent medicines was worse than the habit of dram drinking, and the why, and the wherefore, and so on. I could not, at my own table, take the man by the scruff of the neck and drop him from the first floor window.

But I know that Margaret didn't like it--and I didn't either. Mrs.

Chalmers seemed undecided. She herself swears by some noxious compound, which is absurdly named "Daddy's Delight," and which I know, by the mere smell of it, is nothing else but poison.

"Have you any of the stuff in the house?" she asked.

"I have a bottle of 'Aunt Jane's Jalap,' which is not stuff, my dear Mrs. Chalmers, but a most invaluable medicine. Hughes brought it this afternoon as a sample."

"Trot it out," said Pybus.

Pybus is fifty-five, if he is a day, but he uses the slang of a schoolboy. I was not going to act on such a hint as that, but when Mrs. Chalmers expressed a wish to look at it I fetched the bottle. It was a small black bottle, such as is used for "samples" of wines, about quarter-bottle size. I held it in my hand.

"This, ladies and gentlemen, is 'Aunt Jane's Jalap.' It is a name which I trust will soon be familiar in your mouths as household words.

This, however, is its first appearance on the scene, and I propose, to mark the importance of the occasion, that we drink to its success. I propose, ladies and gentlemen, that we drink to 'Aunt Jane's Jalap'

_in_ 'Aunt Jane's Jalap.' Brooks, bring four claret gla.s.ses."

I drew the cork.

"George, you don't mean that we're to drink the stuff?"

"I do, my dear Margaret, why not? The dose is a wine-gla.s.sful, to be taken immediately after meals. Mrs. Chalmers, allow me to offer you a gla.s.s of 'Aunt Jane's Jalap.'"

She sniffed at it.

"It has a very disagreeable smell."

That was good. I protest that I have smelt "Daddy's Delight" when I was pa.s.sing the house, and took it--till I knew better--for drains.

"Margaret, a gla.s.s of 'Aunt Jane's Jalap.'"

"But, George, I a.s.sure you that I never do take medicine."

"Some people's wine is no better than medicine. We drink that, and pretend we like it. Why not jalap?"

This was Pybus! As he had just before been making insinuations about my wine, the allusion was pointed. But the man's proverbial.

"No heeltraps--'Aunt Jane's Jalap'--with the honours!"

We all stood up. I drained my gla.s.s. I immediately wished I hadn't.

The others drained their gla.s.ses. I saw they wished they hadn't too. I do not think I ever tasted anything quite so nasty. I wished I had sampled it before. As it was, it took me by surprise, so much by surprise that my first impulse was to fly for shelter. It was like--well, the taste was really so exceedingly disagreeable that comparison fails me.

"It is a case of kill or cure," observed Pybus, with the most extraordinary expression of countenance I ever saw. "The man who takes much of that stuff will be killed if he isn't cured. Death for me, rather than 'Aunt Jane's Jalap'--if it _is_ jalap."

"It is rather pungent," I owned.

"I don't know about pungent," continued Pybus, who certainly seemed to be suffering; "but with ice pudding it's a failure."

"Never," declared Mrs. Chalmers, who was leaning back in her chair, and had her handkerchief in her hand, "never did I taste anything like it! Never! and after dinner, too!"

Margaret's feelings seemed for the moment to be too strong for speech.

I perceived the thing had been a failure. Still, I endeavoured to pa.s.s it off, which was difficult, for I myself felt really ill.

"Ah! it is to the after effects we must look forward."

"It is the after effects I'm thinking of," said Pybus.

That was almost more than I could bear; it was the after effects I was thinking of as well.

"Come, let's adjourn and have a little music."

"Have we finished the bottle of jalap?" inquired Pybus.

"I really must apologise; I confess I had no idea what a peculiar taste it had; it certainly is peculiar." Mrs. Chalmers put her handkerchief up to her eyes.

"And after dinner, too!"

We accompanied the ladies to the drawing-room, as well as we could.

Pybus went with Mrs. Chalmers, I took Margaret. As we went I whispered in her ear:

"Now, you and I can look over the house together."

"I am afraid, George, you must excuse me. I--I couldn't walk about just yet. Do take me to a chair!"

We had planned that we would examine the house together from attic to bas.e.m.e.nt; indeed, the whole affair had been got up for that express purpose. Everything was in apple-pie order and ready for inspection.

The servants were on the tiptoe of expectation. As we went, Margaret was to make suggestions for alterations which would fit the house for its mistress. And opportunities might arise for a little confidential intercourse. But, of course, I could not drag the girl about the place against her will. Love works wonders. But there _are_ circ.u.mstances which prove too strong.

The atmosphere of the drawing-room was depressing. It was no use my talking to Margaret, because she wouldn't talk to me. And general conversation seemed out of the question. So I tried another line.

"Pybus, give us a song." (Pybus thinks he can sing. He may have been able to--once.) "Here's 'Drink to me only.' That's a favourite of yours." (You should hear him sing it.) "Margaret will play the accompaniment."

"Lucas," he said, "Do you think, by any chance, that dose of jalap was too strong? I ask the question because I remember, when I was a boy, hearing of a family being poisoned by an overdose of jalap. In their case they took it by mistake. Though, judging from the taste of your jalap, I can't see how that could be. Still, if there is likely to be any danger it is as well that we should be prepared for it."

"Margaret," murmured Mrs. Chalmers, "let's go home."

"Why, aunt? It will pa.s.s off in time."

In time! At that moment I heartily wished that Hughes had been at Jericho before he induced me to dabble in his patent medicines. I always did hate them, even as a child.

"It is quite impossible," continued Pybus, "that the sensations which I am now experiencing are the ordinary and natural outcome of a dose of jalap."