ave ended in tears.

Called up for interrogation in the afternoon of the same day, he did
nothing but go into convulsions of laughter at every question put to
him; and when the Governor, worried out of all patience, lost his temper
and began to swear, he only laughed more immoderately than ever.
The unlucky Governor fumed and stormed and threatened his refractory
prisoner with impossible punishments; but finally came, as James Burton
had come long ago, to the conclusion that it was mere waste of breath
and temper to argue with a person in so unreasonable a state of mind.

The Gadfly was once more taken back to his cell; and there lay down upon
the pallet, in the mood of black and hopeless depression which always
succeeded to his boisterous fits. He lay till evening without moving,
without even thinking; he had passed, after the vehement emotion of the
morning, into a strange, half-apathetic state, in which his own misery
was hardly more to him than a dull and mechanical weight, pressing on
some wooden thing that had forgotten to be a soul. In truth, it was of
little consequence how all ended; the one thing that mattered to any
sentient being was to be spared unbearable pain, and whether the relief
came from altered conditions or from the deadening of the power to
feel, was a question of no moment. Perhaps he would succeed in escaping;
perhaps they would kill him; in any case he should never see the Padre
again, and it was all vanity and vexation of spirit.

One of the warders brought in supper, and the Gadfly looked up with
heavy-eyed indifference.

"What time is it?"

"Six o'clock. Your supper, sir."

He looked with disgust at the stale, foul-smelling, half-cold mess, and
turned his head away. He was feeling bodily ill as well as depressed;
and the sight of the food sickened him.

"You will be ill if you don't eat," said the soldier hurriedly. "Take a
bit of bread, anyway; it'll do you good."

The man spoke with a curious earnestness of tone, lifting a piece
of sodden bread from the plate and putting it down again. All the
conspirator awoke in the Gadfly; he had guessed at once that there was
something hidden in the bread.

"You can leave it; I'll eat a bit by and by," he said carelessly. The
door was open, and he knew that the sergeant on the stairs could hear
every word spoken between them.

When the door was locked on him again, and he had satisfied himself that
no one was watching at the spy-hole, he to