"Look here, how much do you want to go?" asked Eves. ("I’ve got some change," he whispered to Templeton.) Then the man spoke. Winking and waving his pipe, he declared, hoarsely: "Here I be, and here I bide." "We’ll give you ten shillings," said Eves. "Here I be, and here I bide." "Oh, all right, bide away," said Eves, taking Templeton by the arm. "Rotten tobacco, ain’t it, Bob?" They returned to the other room and sat down. "We can’t starve him out," said Eves. "The beggar’s got grub enough for a week." "If we could only entice him out it would be all right," said Templeton, "because I believe I’ve read somewhere that a bailiff or whatever you call him can’t legally force his way into a house." "Well, only beer would entice that sort of bounder, and he’s got plenty of that. He’s a big hulk, but we _might_ manage to chuck him out." "Dangerous that. Even if we succeeded, we might find ourselves in court again." Eves stuck out his legs and pondered. Suddenly he sat up straight. "By Jove, I’ve got it!" he cried. "We’ll stink him out." "How do you mean? It would have to be a powerful stink to upset a fellow who can smoke that tobacco." "Of course; and I haven’t wasted my time in the lab, old man. I never took any interest in chemistry till I learnt how to make stinks. What about H2S? The very thing. Splendid! We’ve got the acid; all we want is—by Jove! where can we get some iron pyrites? That means another trip to Weymouth." "And you probably won’t get it there." "Hang it all; can’t we make it some other way?" "Wait a bit. Don’t you remember old Peters making it once by boiling sulphur with tallow? And he told us you get a more steady flow of gas that way. We’ve probably got all we want on the premises. But how are you going to get it into the room?" "We’ll have to find a way. Let’s go and investigate." Inquiry of Mrs. Trenchard elicited the information that her store cupboard ran along the whole length of the room in which Smail had made himself at home. The wall between them was rather thick, but it would certainly not be impossible to pierce a hole in it. "Splendid!" said Eves. "We can make the gas in the store cupboard, and pass it into the room through one of our tubes. Of course, we’ll have to lock the man in." "The gas won’t drive him out of the window," said Templeton. "In fact, if he keeps that open the smell will never be strong enough." "You may be sure the window won’t be open. A fellow of that sort revels in fug. No doubt he’ll take an afternoon nap to-morrow. That’ll be our time. He’ll wake up choking, and if I know my man he’ll make a dash for the window and tumble out into the open—by the way, I suppose the gas won’t actually poison him?" "No; the worst effect, I believe, is sickness and dizziness. We had better start boring our hole to-night, when he’s asleep. If we’re careful he won’t hear us." "We must get Mother Trenchard to take out her stores. Shall we tell her why?"