“I don’t see why you should run away, then.”
“I have a cousin, an unprincipled man, who is anxious to get possession of my property.”
“But how can he do it? The law will protect you in your rights.”
“It ought to, certainly, but my cousin is a cunning schemer. He’s trying to have me adjudged insane, and get an appointment as my guardian. Do you think I look insane?”
“No, sir.”
“I am as sane as my cousin himself, but I am subject to occasional fits, such as the one I had just now. If I were seen in one of these I might be thought to be of unsound mind.”
“Are you often taken that way, Mr. Penrose?”
“Not often, but I have been subject occasionally to fits since I was a boy. My cousin cunningly waited till I was suffering an attack, when he hastily summoned two quacks, and got them to certify that I was insane. I got over the fit before the certificate was made out, but I realized my danger, and I fled from Buffalo, fearing that I might be taken to an asylum during the next seizure.”
“What a scoundrel your cousin must be! He must be worse than Mr. Snowdon.”
“He is a villain of a different type, and certainly quite as bad. In order to enjoy my property, he would coolly doom me to life imprisonment in a madhouse.”