“Well,” answered Moon, “that Beacon House is a certain rather singular sort of house⁠—a house with the tiles loose, shall we say? Innocent Smith is only the doctor that visits us; hadn’t you come when he called before? As most of our maladies are melancholic, of course he has to be extra cheery. Sanity, of course, seems a very bumptious eccentric thing to us. Jumping over a wall, climbing a tree⁠—that’s his bedside manner.”

“You daren’t say such a thing!” cried Rosamund in a rage. “You daren’t suggest that I⁠—”

“Not more than I am,” said Michael soothingly; “not more than the rest of us. Haven’t you ever noticed that Miss Duke never sits still⁠—a notorious sign? Haven’t you ever observed that Inglewood is always washing his hands⁠—a known mark of mental disease? I, of course, am a dipsomaniac.”

“I don’t believe you,” broke out his companion, not without agitation. “I’ve heard you had some bad habits⁠—”