The opinion current in old-port-drinking circles was that Gervase Brandon was as charming a fellow as you would meet in a day’s march, but that he was overeducated--he had been a don at Oxford before he came into the property--and that he had more money to spend than was good for him. For some years he had been “queering the pitch” for less happily placed neighbors and contemporaries, and these found it hard to forgive him. They had prophesied that the day would come when his vagaries would cause trouble, and at the moment the famous Brandon coat of arms of the lion and the dove, and its motto: “Let the weak help the strong, let the strong help the weak,” came within the vicar’s purview, he felt that the prophecy had been most oddly, not to say dramatically, fulfilled. If blame there was for the appearance of a Mad Mullah in the parish, without a doubt it must be laid to the door of Gervase Brandon. In the most absurd way he had long encouraged one whom the vicar could only regard as a wastrel. He had allowed this incorrigible fellow the run of the Hart’s Ghyll library, and the vicar recalled meeting John Smith in the village street with a priceless Elzevir copy of Plato’s Theætetus under his arm, the Brandon crest stamped on the leather, the Brandon bookplate inside. The vicar understood that the man had been a frequent visitor at the house, that money had been given him from time to time, and that the mother had been allowed to occupy the cottage on the common rent free. Was it to be wondered at that a weak, half-developed brain had been thrown off its balance? In these circumstances it was right that Gervase Brandon should be made to understand the mischief he had wrought; it was right that he should be called upon to take a hand in the adjustment of the coil. But as Mr. Perry-Hennington passed through the gate of Hart’s Ghyll and walked slowly up the avenue toward the house there was still a reservation in his mind. As matters were with Brandon now he might not be able to grapple with a problem of a nature to make heavy demands upon the mental and moral faculties. The vicar had scarcely entered upon this aspect of the case, when the sight of a spinal carriage in the care of two nurses forbade any more speculation upon the subject. He was suddenly brought face to face with reality in a grimly practical shape. “How are you this morning, Gervase?” said the vicar, stopping the little procession with a hearty voice. The question was addressed to a gaunt, hollow-eyed man in a green dressing gown, who was propped up on pillows. “I’ve nothing to complain of,” said Gervase Brandon. He spoke in a calm, gentle way. “Another capital night.” “Do you still have pain?” “None for a week, I’m thankful to say. But I touch wood!”