Mrs. Jericho, placing her handkerchief before her face, said, “That is my opinion.”
“Very good,” rejoined Mizzlemist, satisfied that matters were at length shaping themselves into form. “Very good. However, let us proceed with certainty. Let us hear the evidence. For I need not observe, it would be very painful to poor Jericho’s family—very painful to his friends—to sue out a commission of lunacy, and after all not to succeed. Waiving my friendship, failure would hurt my feelings as a professional man.” Saying this, Mizzlemist drew himself up to a table, whereupon were those dangerous implements—paper, pen, and ink. Then with pen in hand, put the opening question—“What was the first wild symptom, my dear madam? Yes; as you conceive, the first indication of Mr. Jericho’s insanity?”
“The first? Oh! It was this,” answered the troubled wife and witness. “This. He said, that as he felt himself a goose in the House of Commons—goose, I remember was the word—he would go to stubble in September, and never return to Parliament again.”
“Humph!” said Mizzlemist; and a little baulked, he rubbed his nose, and looked down upon the virgin sheet. Then, as though taking heart, he said—“But we’ll proceed, if you please. The next?”
“The next symptom? It was when—when—you will recollect, Mr. Candituft, the circumstance—when we spoke of Monica’s dowry, and—and”—
“Perfectly well,” said Candituft, “and in the wildest manner, he refused a single penny.”
“Well?” said Mizzlemist, still twiddling the impending pen. “That doesn’t help us. What next?”
“Why, then,” deposed Mrs. Jericho with amended alacrity, “the poor fellow raved and stormed, and said the house was furnished with money that was his blood.” And still Mizzlemist wrote not a syllable. “His blood,” repeated Mrs. Jericho, with pathetic emphasis.
“Humph!” cried Mizzlemist, “we get no nearer to it. No nearer. But let’s proceed.”
“And then I perfectly recollect”—chimed in Candituft—“that our unfortunate friend, foaming while he said it—foaming, my dear Doctor Mizzlemist—declared that he was being eaten alive by society. That, in other words, people of the best condition who came to his parties, were no better than cannibals.”