"Thank the gods, that hard-headed vixen of a Lylie won't want me to kiss her!" he reflected as he went. "Ah, there's a woman might have been some help to me if I'd met her in the shoes of Isabel or of this Sophie. Lucius, my son, you are playing a very risky game, but the stakes are worth it. Ten thousand pounds, a fresh country--and entirely new women!" V THE LOVE-POTION Two weeks after Crandon's departure the first instalment of serpentine beads arrived for Sophie. There was no concealing the fact, and Sophie replied to her father's suave inquiries that the beads were a keepsake from a friend. Enclosed with them was a tiny packet of white powder, on which was written "Powder to clean the pebbles," and this Sophie secreted at once. A few days later the Squire was unwell with a violent headache and bilious attack resulting from too much port and smuggled brandy the night before--Sophie suggested that she should make him a dish of tea. In the night he was taken with violent sickness, but by the next day he had not only recovered from that but apparently actually benefited by it, as it had cured him of the result of his orgy. Next day, to continue the cure, Sophie again sent him up some tea, but this time the Squire thought it tasted odd, and Hester, on bearing away the dish, finding that the rare beverage was left untouched, hid it in the scullery and drank it that evening. She was soon taken with violent pains and sickness and a raging thirst, and it was in this condition that Lylie found her. "My life, Hester, what have 'ee got?" asked Lylie. "The pains of death, I do think," gasped Hester. "Oh, oh!" Lylie looked at her unsympathetically. "Simme you'm whist wi' en," she observed, "scrawlen' like that. Some bad you do look, though, there's no denyen'." "I'm dyen'!" wailed Hester. Sophie, who had come into the kitchen, heard the commotion, and went into the scullery. "Why, Hester, what ails you?" she exclaimed. "Lylie, what has happened?" "'Tes the pains o' death, she do say," replied Lylie, "but 'tes nawthen but to be in the bed and somethen' hot that she needs." "She must get to bed at once. Here, Lylie, you take her arm that side and I'll take this. She's getting quieter." Indeed, the worst spasms were over: Hester, weak and exhausted, was put to bed, and Sophie, her dislike of the girl forgotten in compassion, sent up weak broth and white wine whey. Late that evening as Lylie sat with the Squire, he asked her what all the noise had been about. "'Tes that maid Hester," said Lylie indifferently, "she'd taken somethen' that went agen her and was vomiten' all evenin'. Some bad she did vomit, and Miss and I had to get her overstairs to the bed." The Squire stirred in his chair and very slowly brought his eyes round to Lylie. "What time did the sickness take her?" he asked.