tea in those days.

_Dr. Herd._ (_seems hurt_). Every visit was duly put down in the ledger
and charged for--as poor little SENNA will tell you.

_Hilda._ Little SENNA? Oh, Dr. HERDAL, I believe there is a bit of the
troll left in you still!

_Dr. Herd._ (_laughs a little_). No, no; my conscience is perfectly
robust--always was.

_Hilda._ Are you quite _quite_ sure that, when you went indoors with
dear Mrs. SOLNESS that afternoon, and left me alone with my Master
Builder, you did not foresee--perhaps wish--intend, even a little,
that----H'm?

_Dr. Herd._ That you would talk the poor man into clambering up that
tower? You want to drag _Me_ into that business now!

_Hilda_ (_teasingly_). Yes, I certainly think that then you went on
exactly like a troll.

_Dr. Herd._ (_with uncontrollable emotion_). HILDA, there is not a
corner of me safe from you! Yes, I see now that _must_ have been the way
of it. Then I _was_ a troll in that, too! But isn't it terrible the
price I have had to pay for it? To have a wife who----. No, I shall
never roll a pill again--never, never!

_Hilda_ (_lays her head on the stove, and answers as if half asleep_).
No more pills? Poor Doctor HERDAL!

_Dr. Herd._ (_bitterly_). No--nothing but cosy commonplace grey powders
for a whole troop of children.

_Hilda_ (_lively again_). Not _grey_ powders! (_Quite seriously._) I will
tell you what you shall make next. Beautiful rainbow-coloured powders
that will give one a real grip on the world. Powders to make everyone
free and buoyant, and ready to grasp at one's own happiness, to _dare_
what one _would_. I will have you make them. I will--I _will!_

_Dr. Herd._ H'm! I am not quite sure that I clearly understand. And then
the ingredients--?

_Hilda._ What stupid people all of you pill-doctors are, to be sure!
Why, they will be _poisons_, of course!

_Dr. Herd._ Poisons? Why in the world should they be _that_?

_Hilda_ (_without answering him_). All the thrillingest, deadliest
poisons--it is only such things that are wholesome, nowadays.

_Dr. Herd._ (_as if caught by her enthusiasm_). And I could colour them,
too, by exposing them to rays cast through a prism. Oh, HILDA, how I
have needed you all these years! For, you see, with _her_ it was
impossible to discuss such things. [_Embraces her._

_Mrs. Herd._ (_enters noiselessly through hall-door_). I suppose,
HAUSTUS, you are persuading Miss WANGEL to start by the afternoon
steame