"Yes."
"That's really all?... I'm asking for your own sake, mind you. The dose will be in proportion, you know."
"As near as I can tell—it's all. Maybe now and then it's more——"
Suddenly he started up, flinging off the sheet.
"Damn you! You little hell-cat! Damn you!" he cried. "You're worming it out of me for your own ends. You're lying!"
"You're lying, and you know it!" said Anne Harding sternly. "Here—keep still while I prepare this. You'll soon know whether I'm lying or not when I've given it to you. It doesn't lie."
He closed his eyes, feeling that he lay in the very bilge-water of existence. A woman—a scrawny little hireling—had him, Cecil Chesney, in her power. Had made him confess. Was about to deal mercy out to him with a drug. He could have howled with the Chaldean: "Cursed be the day that I was born and the hour wherein I was conceived!"
Then into his loathed flesh slipped suddenly the little sting of steel—sweeter than the kiss of first love to the innocent.