u,
sir; assault or battery, wasn't it?--a fellow broke your window. A tall
fellow--McSomething--case made rather a noise afterwards."

"MacIan is the name, sir," said Turnbull, respectfully; "I have him here
with me."

"Eh!" said Vane very sharply. "Confound him! Has he got anything to do
with this game?"

"Mr. Vane," said Turnbull, pacifically, "I will not pretend that either
he or I acted quite decorously on that occasion. You were very lenient
with us, and did not treat us as criminals when you very well might.
So I am sure you will give us your testimony that, even if we were
criminals, we are not lunatics in any legal or medical sense whatever. I
am sure you will use your influence for us."

"My influence!" repeated the magistrate, with a slight start. "I don't
quite understand you."

"I don't know in what capacity you are here," continued Turnbull,
gravely, "but a legal authority of your distinction must certainly be
here in an important one. Whether you are visiting and inspecting the
place, or attached to it as some kind of permanent legal adviser, your
opinion must still----"

Cumberland Vane exploded with a detonation of oaths; his face was
transfigured with fury and contempt, and yet in some odd way he did not
seem specially angry with Turnbull.

"But Lord bless us and save us!" he gasped, at length; "I'm not here
as an official at all. I'm here as a patient. The cursed pack of
rat-catching chemists all say that I've lost my wits."

"You!" cried Turnbull with terrible emphasis. "You! Lost your wits!"

In the rush of his real astonishment at this towering unreality Turnbull
almost added: "Why, you haven't got any to lose." But he fortunately
remembered the remains of his desperate diplomacy.

"This can't go on," he said, positively. "Men like MacIan and I may
suffer unjustly all our lives, but a man like you must have influence."

"There is only one man who has any influence in England now," said Vane,
and his high voice fell to a sudden and convincing quietude.

"Whom do you mean?" asked Turnbull.

"I mean that cursed fellow with the long split chin," said the other.

"Is it really true," asked Turnbull, "that he has been allowed to buy up
and control such a lot? What put the country into such a state?"

Mr. Cumberland Vane laughed outright. "What put the country into such a
state?" he asked. "Why, you did. When you were fool enough to agree to
fight MacIan, after all, everybody was ready to