“The highest possible appreciation.... My public position alone ... sufficient reward ... in its way a link between ... provinces ... our great Empire ... daughter ... daughter ... daughter....” Then almost inaudibly “... nations.” For perhaps five minutes the Great Statesman was silent, and his breathing was so regular that he might have been asleep. “Will he go to sleep, doctor?” whispered Lady Repton. Scipio Knickerbocker shook his head. “He’ll be less rattled every minute, Ma’am,” was his pronouncement, and once again he proved his science by the justice of his prognostication. Sir Charles stood up, a little groggy, leant one hand on the back of a chair, took a deep breath, stood up more strongly, and said at last in a voice still weak but quite clear:-- “Thank you sir. How can I thank you? I seem to remember”--he passed his hand over his forehead--“I seem to remember some one telling me that you were born,--though I assure you it is impossible for us in England to distinguish it,--in one of our Britains Overseas. Sir, an action such as that which you have just done--a good deed if I may call it so,” he went on more loudly, seizing Scipio’s right hand between both of his, “is a cement of Empire! I will never forget it, never! Will you excuse me a moment sir, while I speak to Lady Repton?” With his best and most winning smile Sir Charles asked this question of Scipio, who for the tenth or eleventh time that evening, bowed with a kink in the fourteenth vertebra. He drew his wife into the hall. “I suppose he wants payment on the spot, doesn’t he, Maria? These specialists usually do.” “Yes dear,” said Lady Repton, her old awe returning with his changed mood. “Yes dear, I’m afraid he does ... he ... in fact, I’m afraid I promised it him.” “How much?” said Sir Charles sternly. “Well dear, it doesn’t matter, does it? I’ll pay.” “But it does matter. It matters a great deal, Maria. It all comes out of _my_ pocket in the long run. How much did he stipulate for?” “A hundred pounds,” said Lady Repton. “Oh come,” said Sir Charles, greatly relieved. “A hundred! That’s a good lot. How often will he come for that?” “He won’t want to come again, dear,” said Lady Repton. “What!” said Sir Charles, “a hundred pounds for that?” “My dear--if you knew the difference!” said Lady Repton. “Yes, yes, I know,” he said impatiently, “the pain’s gone. It can’t be helped, and of course ninety’s a broken sum. He’d have taken fifty, Maria. I ought to have seen to this myself,” he added. And so, the matter settled, he returned. “You’ll allow me to leave you one moment with her ladyship,” he said in his most winning manner. Then suddenly, “_Good_-night,” and with a warm grasp of the hand Sir Charles left them. Lady Repton was moved beyond words. She put into the young man’s hand a packet of notes which she had carefully prepared. “It is nothing,” she said, “it is nothing for what you have done, but oh, doctor, will it last?”