“‘Ha! ha! ha! Now this is really interesting--indeed it is! You don’t know your own name! Can’t remember your pretty wife! Never was here before! Ha! ha! ha! well! well! well! I have often known criminals to try the insane dodge, but I never knew one to deny his own name and repudiate his own wife before. But good-morning, old fellow, I am to blame for letting you talk so much anyway; you just keep very quiet, and drink as much of the beef tea as you can. I will call again in the morning; by that time I guess you will remember your name; and I’ll send a messenger after your wife, as I have been told she has got back home. She has been absent a long time; that is the reason she has not called to see you, I suppose. By-by, Debar.’ “Doctor Lamberton was quite a young man, and from our short acquaintance I had formed rather a favorable opinion of him. He was very kind to me, and I learned that he had been unremitting in his attentions to me during my long and serious illness. Doubtless I would have died but for his kindness. When I was left alone, my thoughts went to work more vigorously than they ever had done before. CHAPTER XXIV. “After Doctor Lamberton departed I closed my eyes and tried to sum up in my mind all that had occurred since I left Memphis, in order to see if I could make anything tangible out of it. The hours dragged slowly along, a faint light struggled through the small aperture misnamed window, a little mouse stole in and began to nibble at the crumbs of bread on the floor, while I watched him intently. It was a relief to me to see any living thing, no matter what it was; it had the effect of keeping my mind from painful subjects. When the little mouse would finish his repast and leave me alone, I would lie on my filthy straw bed and watch his hole for hours at a time, hoping he would come again to keep me company. A large spider had set his net in one corner of the window, in order to capture unsuspecting flies that were constantly coming in and out through the opening. His net was an ingenious piece of workmanship, and it took him several days to finish it; he could throw his fine-spun thread with as much accuracy as a Mexican Greaser could throw his lariat. After he had completed his net, he built a little neat residence for himself near it, so he could sit and look through his window and watch his trap. I noticed that in selecting the location for his residence, he was very particular to place it so that it would not be seen by any insect coming in through the window; he erected his apartments inside, and a little in the rear of the corner of the window-sill, while his net was stretched across it. The web was woven so very fine that it was scarcely visible to the naked eye, and many a bold fly lost his life by being caught in its meshes. Sometimes a vigorous contest would take place, when a fly would make a desperate struggle to free himself; but I noticed that the victim seldom came off victorious.