she knew enough to unlock the action and load the
chamber." He turned and faced the others.

Doctor Vehrner was sitting on the floor, with his back to the chair
Colonel Hampton had occupied, his injured leg stretched out in front of
him. Albert was hovering over him with mother-hen solicitude. T.
Barnwell Powell was finishing his whiskey and recovering a fraction of
his normal poise.

"Well, I suppose you gentlemen see, now, who was really crazy around
here?" Colonel Hampton addressed them bitingly. "That woman has been
dangerously close to the borderline of sanity for as long as she's been
here. I think my precious nephew trumped up this ridiculous insanity
complaint against me as much to discredit any testimony I might ever
give about his wife's mental condition as because he wanted to get
control of my estate. I also suppose that the tension she was under
here, this afternoon, was too much for her, and the scheme boomeranged
on its originators. Curious case of poetic justice, but I'm sorry you
had to be included in it, Doctor."

"Attaboy, Popsy!" Dearest enthused. "Now you have them on the run; don't
give them a chance to re-form. You know what Patton always said--Grab
'em by the nose and kick 'em in the pants."

Colonel Hampton re-lighted his cigar. "Patton only said 'pants' when he
was talking for publication," he told her, _sotto voce_. Then he noticed
the unsigned commitment paper lying on the desk. He picked it up,
crumpled it, and threw it into the fire.

"I don't think you'll be needing that," he said. "You know, this isn't
the first time my loving nephew has expressed doubts as to my sanity."
He sat down in the chair at the desk, motioning to his servant to bring
him a drink. "And see to the other gentlemen's glasses, Sergeant," he
directed. "Back in 1929, Stephen thought I was crazy as a bedbug to sell
all my securities and take a paper loss, around the first of September.
After October 24th, I bought them back at about twenty per cent of what
I'd sold them for, after he'd lost his shirt." That, he knew, would have
an effect on T. Barnwell Powell. "And in December, 1944, I was just
plain nuts, selling all my munition shares and investing in a company
that manufactured baby-food. Stephen thought that Rundstedt's Ardennes
counter-offensive would put off the end of the war for another year and
a half!"

"Baby-food, eh?" Doctor Vehrner chuckled.

Colonel Hampton sipped his whiskey slowly, then puffed on