Page:The Ball and the Cross.djvu/368

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