"Say, I've seen that doctor, and he's given me something he wants her to take. Thinks it will put her all right in no time."
"And did you give it to her?" he asked, eagerly.
The honeyed voice grew sweeter. "Well, no; that's the trouble. You can't get her to take doctor's stuff, if she knows she's taking it. Got to get her on the sly. Once when she needed a tonic I used to watch round and put it in her tea. Bucked her up fine."
"And is that what you're going to do now?"
"Well, I would, only she'd be afraid of me. Watches me like a cat, don't you see she does? What I was thinking of was this. You know she makes a cup of tea for herself every day in the middle of the afternoon while we're out at work. Well, now, if you could make an excuse to slip into the kitchen, and put one of these powders in her teapot—" he tapped the packet in his waistcoat pocket—"she'd never suspect nothing. She'd take it—and be cured."
The boy was silent.
"You don't want to do it, hey?"
"Oh, I don't say that. I was—I was—just wondering."
"Wondering what?"
"Whether it's fair play to anyone to give them medicine when they don't know they're taking it."