"Let me see," said Wayne, in a friendly but vague manner. "Let me have some sal volatile."
"Eightpence, tenpence, or one and sixpence a bottle?" said the young man, genially.
"One and six—one and six," replied Wayne, with a wild submissiveness. "I come to ask you, Mr. Bowles, a terrible question."
He paused and collected himself.
"It is necessary," he muttered—"it is necessary to be tactful, and to suit the appeal to each profession in turn."
"I come," he resumed aloud, "to ask you a question which goes to the roots of your miraculous toils. Mr. Bowles, shall all this witchery cease?" And he waved his stick around the shop.
Meeting with no answer, he continued with animation—
"In Notting Hill we have felt to its core the elfish mystery of your profession. And now Notting Hill itself is threatened."
"Anything more, sir?" asked the chemist.