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Rh "Isn't he wonderful, Henry?" he murmured. "Thinks of everything; staff work marvellous. But you nearly had a bad lapse then, didn't you?  It really would have been embarrassing for you if my corpse had deposited itself with a dull thud on the corns of the police."

"I'm interested in quite a number of things, Captain Drummond," said Lakington slowly, "but they all count as nothing beside one—getting even with you. And when I do …" He dropped the revolver into his coat pocket, and stood motionless, staring at the soldier.

"Ah! when!" mocked Drummond. "There have been so many 'whens," Henry dear. Somehow I don't think you can be very clever. Don't go—I'm so enjoying my heart-to-heart talk. Besides, I wanted to tell you the story about the girl, the soap, and the bath. That's to say, if the question of baths isn't too delicate."

Lakington paused as he got to the skylight.

"I have a variety of liquids for bathing people in," he remarked. "The best are those I use when the patient is alive."

The next instant he opened a door in the skylight which Hugh had failed to discover during the night, and, climbing down a ladder inside the room, disappeared from view.

"Hullo, old bean!" A cheerful shout from the ground made Hugh look down. There, ranged round Peterson, in an effective group, were Peter Darrell, Algy Longworth, and Jerry Seymour. "Birds'-nestin'?"