down with a solemnity different from the
aspect of the monarchs of the park, and the nearer we came to our
journey's end the more somber and lowering bent the verdant arch--or so
it seemed.

By that path, patched now with pools of moonlight, Lord Southery had
passed upon his bier, with the sun to light his going; by that path
several generations of Stradwicks had gone to their last resting-place.

To the doors of the vault the moon rays found free access. No branch,
no leaf, intervened. Mr. Henderson's face looked ghastly. The keys
which he carried rattled in his hand.

"Light the lantern," he said unsteadily.

Nayland Smith, who again had been peering suspiciously about into the
shadows, struck a match and lighted the lantern which he carried. He
turned to the solicitor.

"Be calm, Mr. Henderson," he said sternly. "It is your plain duty to
your client."

"God be my witness that I doubt it," replied Henderson, and opened the
door.

We descended the steps. The air beneath was damp and chill. It
touched us as with clammy fingers; and the sensation was not wholly
physical.

Before the narrow mansion which now sufficed Lord Southery, the great
engineer whom kings had honored, Henderson reeled and clutched at me
for support. Smith and I had looked to him for no aid in our uncanny
task, and rightly.

With averted eyes he stood over by the steps of the tomb, whilst my
friend and myself set to work. In the pursuit of my profession I had
undertaken labors as unpleasant, but never amid an environment such as
this. It seemed that generations of Stradwicks listened to each turn
of every screw.

At last it was done, and the pallid face of Lord Southery questioned
the intruding light. Nayland Smith's hand was as steady as a rigid bar
when he raised the lantern. Later, I knew, there would be a sudden
releasing of the tension of will--a reaction physical and mental--but
not until his work was finished.

That my own hand was steady I ascribed to one thing
solely--professional zeal. For, under conditions which, in the event
of failure and exposure, must have led to an unpleasant inquiry by the
British Medical Association, I was about to attempt an experiment never
before essayed by a physician of the white races.

Though I failed, though I succeeded, that it ever came before the
B.M.A., or any other council, was improbable; in the former event, all
but impossible. But the knowledge that I was about to prac