288 The Diary of a Drug Fiend
I couldn’t see the joke, but it was the biggest joke in
the world.
“It’s really awfully kind of you, my dear Mr. Platt,”
I said with unction, feeling that I was cast for the star
part in some stupendous comedy.
“The obligation is entirely on my side,” returned
my guest. ‘‘ You have no idea how your kind approval
has set my mind at ease.”
I took another sniff. I was fainting away into an
inexpressible ecstasy. I re-corked the bottle and put
it in my pocket, thanking Platt profusely.
“ T can’t imagine your mind being ill at ease,’’ I went
on with a note of irony, which was. however, absolutely
genial. I was friends with every one in the world. “ If
there was ever a man with a conscience void of offence
toward God and man, that man is surely Jabez Platt.”
“Ah, conscience, conscience,” he sighed. ‘‘ You
have no idea, Sir Peter, how it has tormented me of
late. The moral responsibility, the appalling moral
responsibility.”
“Whatever it is,’’ I answered, “ you are certainly
the man to shoulder it.”
“* Well,” he said, “ I think I may say without boasting
that I trust I have never tried to shirk it. Your approval
has absolved me of the last shred of hesitation. I must
explain, my dear Sir Peter, that I have always been a
poor man. The service of humanity demands many
sacrifices from its devotees, and I assure you that in that
bottle there lies not only, as I now feel assured, the
salvation of mankind from one of its direst dangers,
but an enormous fortune.”
He leant forward and tapped my knee with his fore-
finger. |
““ An enormous fortune,” he repeated in awed tones.
And then lowering his voice still further, ‘‘ Enough,
more than enough, for both of us.”
“Why, how do I come in?” I asked in surprise,
while a little thrill of avarice tickled my heart-strings.
I reflected that what with one thing or another, I