"What possible motive!"--he said. "For it is evident that the shot was fired of intent, and evident that you yourself think so. It is unheard-of!" "Were you bred to the bar, that you sum up evidence before it is given?" said Mr. Linden, with a good-humoured raising of his brows at the doctor. "But the man ran!" "So did I--he could hardly think I was much hurt." "I don't want to have such a fellow abroad in Pattaquasset," said the doctor. "But suppose we go back to the pleasant things. You must start the subject, Linden. Rousseau says a man can best describe the sweets of liberty from the inside of a prison--so, I suppose, you being shot at and laid on your back, can have no lack of theme." Mr. Linden smiled--the smile of a most unfettered spirit. "Liberty!" he said. "Yes, I have realized since I have lain here, that-- 'My soul is free, as ambient air,'-- My sense of liberty comes from the possession--not the want." "Prospective possession,"--said the doctor. "Unless indeed," he went on with a humorous play of the lips--"you mean that my orders to you to lie still, merely gave zest to your triumphant knowledge that you could get up if you had a mind. A riotous degree of self-will that I believe I do not possess. Was that what good Mrs. Derrick meant when she said she wondered how I had hindered you?" "No," said Mr. Linden smiling--"she meant that she did not think you had." "She didn't mean a thing of the kind! She spoke in pure wonder, and made me begin to wonder in my turn." Which wonder Mr. Linden did not inquire into. "I am very sorry I wasn't a boy this morning!" said Dr. Harrison, after standing and looking down at him a little. "Can't you sit down and say why?" "I should have heard so much!--which now I am not to hear. For if I had been a boy, I should certainly not have been missing at your levee." "O you deceive yourself,--if you were a boy nothing short of my authority would bring you, in the first place." "I have not the slightest doubt the power would have been found equal to the resistance," said the doctor bowing. "Neither have I." "Well!--" said the doctor laughing a little peculiarly,--"in that case I should have been here. Now I have a fancy to know what you call pleasant things, Linden. You speak with a mouth full--as if there were plenty of them." "Yes, there are plenty," Mr. Linden said, moving a little and resting his face on his hand as if he felt tired; "but we were talking of only two this morning,--heaven, and the way thither." Dr. Harrison looked at him steadily.