Again there came upon me the involuntary laughter of heart-agony at its tensest. I cried aloud: 'Faith and Love! Faith and Love! That farce of the Raxton crypt with the great-grandmother's fool on his knees shall be repeated for the delight of Nin-ki-gal and the Danish skeletons and the ancestral ghosts from Hugh the Crusader down to the hero of the knee-caps and mittens; and there shall be a dance of death and a song, and the burden shall be-- As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods: They kill us for their sport.' Misery had made me a maniac at last; my brain swam, and the head of the woman seemed to be growing before me--seemed once more to be transfigured before me into a monstrous mountainous representation of an awful mockery-goddess and columbine-queen, down whose merry wrinkles were flowing tears that were at once tears of Olympian laughter and tears of the oceanic misery of Man. 'Well, you _are_ a rum un, and no mistake,' said the woman. 'But who the dickens _are_ you? _That's_ what licks me. Who the dickens _are_ you? Howsomever, if you'll fork out another quid, the Queen of the Jokes'll tell you some'ink to your awantage, an' if you won't fork out the Queen o' the Jokes is mum.' I stood and looked at her--looked till the street seemed to heave under my feet and the houses to rock. After this I seem to have wandered back to Wilderspin's studio, and there to have sunk down unconscious. XII THE REVOLVING CAGE OF CIRCUMSTANCE I I will not trouble the reader with details of the illness that came upon me as the result of my mental agony and physical exhaustion. At intervals I was aware of what was going on around me, but for the most part I was in a semi-comatose state. I realised at intervals that a medical man was sitting by my side, as I lay in bed. Then I had a sense of being moved from place to place; and then of being rocked by the waves. Slowly the periods of consciousness became more frequent and also more prolonged. My first exclamation was--'Dead! Have I been ill?' and I tried to raise myself in vain. 'Yes, very ill,' said a voice, my mother's. 'Dangerously?' 'For several days you were in danger. Your recovery now entirely depends upon your keeping yourself calm.' 'I am out at sea?' 'Yes,' said my mother; 'in Lord Sleaford's yacht.' 'How did I come here?'