"If Mr. Barnstable had only mentioned sooner that he wished me to write it," Jack observed graciously, "I'd have been glad to do my best." "Shut up, Jack," commanded Dick once more. "Really, Mr. Barnstable, it does seem a little remarkable that you should go rushing about in this extraordinary way without knowing what you are doing. You'll get into some most unpleasant mess if you keep on." "Or bring up in a lunatic asylum," suggested Jack with the most unblushing candor. Barnstable looked from one to the other with a bewildered expression as if he were just recovering his senses. He walked to the table and took up a glass of water, looked around as if for permission, and swallowed it by uncouth gulps. "Perhaps I'd better go," he said, and turned toward the door. "Oh, by the way, Mr. Barnstable," Jack observed as the visitor laid his hand on the door-knob, "does it seem to you that it would be in good form to apologize before you go? If it doesn't, don't let me detain you." The strange creature turned on the rug by the door, an abject expression of misery from head to feet. "Of course I'd apologize," he said, "if it was any use. When my temper's up I don't seem to have any control of what I do, and what I do is always awful foolish. This thing's got hold of me so I don't sleep, and that's made me worse. Of course you think I'm a lunatic, gentlemen; and I suppose I am; but my wife--" The redness of his face gave signs that he was not far from choking, and out of his fishy eyes there rolled genuine tears. Jack stepped forward swiftly, and took him by the hand. "I beg your pardon, Mr. Barnstable," he said. "Of course I'd no idea what you were driving at. Will you believe me when I tell you something? I had nothing to do with writing 'Love in a Cloud,' but I do know who wrote it. I can give you my word that the author didn't have your story in mind at all." "Are you sure?" stammered Barnstable. "Of course I'm sure." "Then there is nothing I can do," Barnstable said, shaking his head plaintively. "I've just made a fool of myself, and done nothing for her." The door closed behind Barnstable, and the two young men looked at each other a moment. Neither laughed, the foolish tragedy of the visitor's last words not being mirth-provoking. "Well, of all the fools I've seen in my life," Jack commented slowly, "this is the most unique specimen." "I'm afraid I can't blame the divorced Mrs. Barnstable," responded Dick; "but there's something pathetic about the ass." It seemed the fate of Barnstable that day to afford amusement for Jack Neligage. In the latter part of the afternoon Jack sauntered into the Calif Club to see if there were anything in the evening papers or any fresh gossip afloat, and there he encountered the irascible gentleman once more. Scarcely had he nodded to him than Tom Harbinger and Harry Bradish came up to them. "Hallo, Jack," the lawyer said cordially. "Anything new?"