sinner down in that
hole, and he confessed honestly that he did not like the job. Still, it
must be done, so with our leave he would go apart and seek inspiration,
which at present seemed to be quite lacking.

Thus declaimed Bastin and departed.

"Don't you tell your opinion about the Deluge or he may cause another
just to show that you are wrong," called Bickley after him.

"I can't help that," answered Bastin. "Certainly I shall not hide the
truth to save Oro's feelings, if he has got any. If he revenges himself
upon us in any way, we must just put up with it like other martyrs."

"I haven't the slightest ambition to be a martyr," said Bickley.

"No," shouted Bastin from a little distance, "I am quite aware of that,
as you have often said so before. Therefore, if you become one, I am
sorry to say that I do not see how you can expect any benefit. You
would only be like a man who puts a sovereign into the offertory bag in
mistake for a shilling. The extra nineteen shillings will do him no good
at all, since in his heart he regrets the error and wishes that he could
have them back."

Then he departed, leaving me laughing. But Bickley did not laugh.

"Arbuthnot," he said, "I have come to the conclusion that I have gone
quite mad. I beg you if I should show signs of homicidal mania, which
I feel developing in me where Bastin is concerned, or of other abnormal
violence, that you will take whatever steps you consider necessary, even
to putting me out of the way if that is imperative."

"What do you mean?" I asked. "You seem sane enough."

"Sane, when I believe that I have seen and experienced a great number of
things which I know it to be quite impossible that I should have seen
or experienced. The only explanation is that I am suffering from
delusions."

"Then is Bastin suffering from delusions, too?"

"Certainly, but that is nothing new in his case."

"I don't agree with you, Bickley--about Bastin, I mean. I am by no means
certain that he is not the wisest of the three of us. He has a faith and
he sticks to it, as millions have done before him, and that is better
than making spiritual experiments, as I am sorry to say I do, or
rejecting things because one cannot understand them, as you do, which is
only a form of intellectual vanity."

"I won't argue the matter, Arbuthnot; it is of no use. I repeat that I
am mad, and Bastin is mad."

"How about me? I also saw and experienced these things. Am I mad, too?"