CHAPTER I.

BEFORE TAKING.

"There's a fortune in it!"

"For the bottlemakers."

"If for them, then what for us? We shan't want more bottles than we can sell. Besides, we can make our own bottles if it comes to that. Cost of bottle, contents, cork, label, and all, one penny. Selling price, eightpence. Sale, at a moderate estimate, one million bottles a year. How does that figure for a profit?"

"It figures nicely. But give me facts. How long do you suppose it will take us to reach that sale?"

"No time. The name will sell it! 'Aunt Jane's Jalap!' There isn't an old woman in England who, seeing those words staring her in the face, won't press a longing hand to her inside."

"Outside, I presume, you mean. But no matter."

Hughes placed the bottle on the table. He looked at it with loving eyes. Then he shook his head.

"There's only one thing we want."

"Customers?"

"Testimonials! There's something in it. I know there is."

"Not much, perhaps, but still something."

"That bottle, sir, contains a remedy for all known diseases, and all unknown ones, for all that I can tell. In fact, I have a suspicion that it is to the unknown diseases that it will come as the greatest blessing. Patent medicines generally do. Those mysterious maladies which, up to the advent of 'Aunt Jane's Jalap,' have baffled all the resources of medical science. Give me a day or two and I will prove it. I will bring you testimonials which will make your hair stand up on end, and--" He paused, looking me fixedly in the face--"all genuine."

That evening I had a small dinner-party. It was rather an occasion. The suggestion, I am bound to admit, had come from Margaret.

"My dear George, it's the easiest thing in the world, and you could do it nicely! Why don't you ask us to dinner? Aunt and I, and old Pybus to round it off." Square it off, I suspect she meant, because, of course, that would make four with me. But I didn't correct her. "And then you and I could look over the house together--after dinner."

So I asked them. And they came. Old Pybus said he would be delighted. I don't care for Pybus myself, but Mrs. Chalmers does, and this was an occasion on which her taste had to be consulted rather than mine. And during dinner I began on "Aunt Jane's Jalap."

"Well, it's all settled with Hughes."

I addressed myself to Margaret.

"What about?"

"'Aunt Jane's Jalap.'"

Mrs. Chalmers put down her spoon. This was while the soup was on.

"'Aunt Jane's Jalap!' Whatever's that?"

"The new patent medicine--the coming boom. You must know that my friend Francis Hughes has a wonderful old nurse, and this wonderful old nurse has the most wonderful medicine, which she used to administer to all her charges. Hughes has obtained the receipt from her."

"How much did he give her for it? Half-a-crown?"

I crushed Pybus.

"That is a private matter, but _rather_ more than half-a-crown."

As a plain statement of fact he hadn't given her anything as yet. But, of course, we should both of us see that she made a good thing of it when the sale got up.

"I need scarcely observe what fortunes have been made in patent medicines."

"And lost in them, my boy."

This was just like Pybus--but I let it pass.

"Millions, literally millions, have been made, and, I may safely say, that none of them can compare with 'Aunt Jane's Jalap.'"

"Have you tried the stuff upon yourself?"

"No, Pybus, I have not. I am ready at any time to try it upon you. Well, Hughes has supplied the medicine, and I am going to supply part of the capital."

"What part?"

"That is another private matter, Pybus. Sufficient, I trust, to bring the matter before the public eye."

"Don't you think the name is rather a funny one?--'Aunt Jane's Jalap!'"

This was hard, coming from Margaret.

"My dear Margaret, the name is half the battle. Hughes thinks it's a splendid one."

"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 glasses."

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-glassful, to be taken immediately after meals. Mrs. Chalmers, allow me to offer you a glass 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 passing the house, and took it--till I knew better--for drains.

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

"But, George, I assure 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 glass. I immediately wished I hadn't. The others drained their glasses. 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 pass 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 basement; 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_ circumstances 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 pass 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."

"Margaret," groaned Mrs. Chalmers, "I insist upon your coming home."

"Aunt, what is the use of going home?"

"You haven't got a book in the house, Lucas, treating of poisons?"

"I wish you wouldn't talk like that, Pybus. It really is unfair. I quite perceive that I made a mistake in administering the dose after dinner; in fact, I am myself inclined to believe that I misunderstood Hughes, and that the dose ought to be administered before a meal."

"Good God!"

"Pybus!"

"I can't help it. I really cannot help it, sir. The idea of a reasonable person voluntarily swallowing such a concoction as that before his dinner is enough to make any man profane!"

"I don't think, Mr. Lucas," murmured Mrs. Chalmers, "that you have the least idea how ill I feel."

"My dear Mrs. Chalmers, if--if there is anything I can do for you." "Yes," said Pybus, "another bottle."