ty."

I don't know how this shabby fellow conceived charity, but I had never
understood that virtue to conflict with the law. "You mean you ferry all
these strays for nothing?"

"My payment is predetermined and exact."

"You are foolish. Anyone using your boat for illegal entry would be glad
to give everything he possessed for the trip."

"There are many penniless ones."

"Need that be your concern--to the extent of risking your life and
devoting all your time?"

"I can speak for no one but myself. It need be my concern."

"One man can't do much. Oh, don't think I don't sympathize with your
attitude. I too pity these poor people deeply; I have given thousands of
pounds to relieve them."

"Their plight touches your heart?"

"Indeed it does. Never in all history have so many been so wretched
through no fault of their own."

"Ah," he agreed thoughtfully. "For you it is something strange and
pathetic."

"Tragic would be a better word."

"But for us it is an old story."

He pushed his boat into the water. "An old story," he repeated.

"Wait, wait--the money!"

He jumped in and began rowing. I waved the banknotes ridiculously in
the air. His body bent backward and forward, urging the boat away from
me with each pull. "Your money!" I yelled.

He moved steadily toward the French shore. I watched him recede into the
Channel mists and thought, another madman. I turned away at last and
began to ascend the path up the cliff.

_91._ When I finally got back to Hampshire, worn out by my ordeal and
feeling as though I'd aged ten years, there was a message from Miss
Francis on my desk. Even her bumptious rudeness could not conceal the
jubilation with which she'd penned it.

"To assuage your natural fear for the continued safety of Albert
Weener's invaluable person, I hasten to inform you that I believe I have
a workable compound. It may be a mere matter of weeks now before we
shall begin to roll back _Cynodon dactylon_."

SIX

_Mr Weener Sees It Through_

_92._ Whether it was from the exposure I endured on that dreadful trip
or from disease germs which must have been plentiful among the
continental savages and the man who rowed me back to England, I don't
know, but that night I was seized with a violent chill, an aching head
and a dry, enervating fever. I sent for the doctor and went to bed and
it was a week before I was myself enough to be cognizant of what was
going on around me.

During my ill