"To share with him in the secret." "And what I say to it is," cried Dick--"and you can all hear me--that what I invented with my own brains is my own property, and I won't be bullied out of it by all the brothers in Christendom." "Then I shall follow out my own course." "Follow it, then," said Dick scornfully, "and let your boys come after you." Tom turned upon him resentfully, but merely ground his teeth; while Fred winked, and tapped his teeth with his cane. "I have not been idle during my interview with my poor afflicted brother," continued Max; "and I have seen enough from his wild behaviour and language to know that the mental disease that has been threatening for years has now obtained such a hold that he is no longer fit to manage his own affairs." "I say, hold hard there!" cried Dick, looking at him in a puzzled way. "I shall, of course, make due arrangements for the proper carrying out of his business, and for protecting the interests of his wife and child." "Mr Shingle!" cried Tom, stepping forward, "this is atrocious: there are no grounds for what you say." "Silence, sir!" roared Max; while Dick's countenance underwent a complete change. "There!" cried Dick angrily, as he appealed in turn to all present; "what did I always say? Max, you always were, and always will be, a 'umbug!" "What?" cried Max. "A 'umbug, sir. U-m, um--b-u-double-g, bug, 'umbug! That for you!" cried Dick, snapping his fingers in his brother's face. "Ah!" said Max, with a heavy sigh--"all proof of what I say--the violence, the excitement, these strange outbursts. My poor brother!" He took out his handkerchief, and applied it to his eyes. Dick looked at him for a moment, then at his wife and child, and then his face grew longer and his hand played nervously about his face. "But, I say, Max," he cried, "you don't mean this. I'm as right in the upper story as you are." Max shook his head. "My dear Richard," he said, "I'd give my right hand to know you were. This is dreadful." "Dreadful? It's worse than dreadful," cried Mrs Shingle, catching her husband's arm. "Dick, make him leave the house." "My dear Mrs Shingle," said Max deprecatingly, "this is folly. You only excite him terribly." "Excite him?" "Yes, my dear," said Dick, wiping the perspiration from his face, "it do excite me a deal. I don't know that Max ain't right; but he won't be hard on me--Max won't. I have felt a little--little confused and upset, you know, about my business sometimes." "Father, it is not true," cried Jessie, running to his side, "your mind is perfectly clear." "I'm afraid it ain't, my dear," he said. "But your Uncle Max won't be hard on me. No sending to asylums or that sort of thing. Just a friendly visit from a doctor or two, and I should be soon put right." "Whatever the cleverest medical man I could procure--a specialist on your particular ailment--said, I should go by," replied Max sadly.