which Raymond and Clarke were sitting; that was all, except an
odd-looking chair at the furthest end of the room. Clarke looked at
it, and raised his eyebrows.

"Yes, that is the chair," said Raymond. "We may as well place it in
position." He got up and wheeled the chair to the light, and began
raising and lowering it, letting down the seat, setting the back at
various angles, and adjusting the foot-rest. It looked comfortable
enough, and Clarke passed his hand over the soft green velvet, as the
doctor manipulated the levers.

"Now, Clarke, make yourself quite comfortable. I have a couple hours'
work before me; I was obliged to leave certain matters to the last."

Raymond went to the stone slab, and Clarke watched him drearily as he
bent over a row of phials and lit the flame under the crucible. The
doctor had a small hand-lamp, shaded as the larger one, on a ledge
above his apparatus, and Clarke, who sat in the shadows, looked down at
the great shadowy room, wondering at the bizarre effects of brilliant
light and undefined darkness contrasting with one another. Soon he
became conscious of an odd odour, at first the merest suggestion of
odour, in the room, and as it grew more decided he felt surprised that
he was not reminded of the chemist's shop or the surgery. Clarke found
himself idly endeavouring to analyse the sensation, and half conscious,
he began to think of a day, fifteen years ago, that he had spent
roaming through the woods and meadows near his own home. It was a
burning day at the beginning of August, the heat had dimmed the
outlines of all things and all distances with a faint mist, and people
who observed the thermometer spoke of an abnormal register, of a
temperature that was almost tropical. Strangely that wonderful hot day
of the fifties rose up again in Clarke's imagination; the sense of
dazzling all-pervading sunlight seemed to blot out the shadows and the
lights of the laboratory, and he felt again the heated air beating in
gusts about his face, saw the shimmer rising from the turf, and heard
the myriad murmur of the summer.

"I hope the smell doesn't annoy you, Clarke; there's nothing
unwholesome about it. It may make you a bit sleepy, that's all."

Clarke heard the words quite distinctly, and knew that Raymond was
speaking to him, but for the life of him he could not rouse himself
from his lethargy. He could only think of the lonely walk he had taken
fifteen years ago; it was his