from his hands with a handkerchief. He had set fire to the
building in accordance with the strict principles of the social
contract.

But MacIan had taken a stride forward and stood there shaken and
terrible. "Now," he cried, panting, "now is the judgement of the
world. The doctors will leave this place; the keepers will leave
this place. They will leave us in charge of the machinery and the
machine-guns at the windows. But we, the lunatics, will wait to
be burned alive if only we may see them go."

"How do you know we shall go?" asked Hutton, fiercely.

"You believe nothing," said MacIan, simply, "and you are
insupportably afraid of death."

"So this is suicide," sneered the doctor; "a somewhat doubtful
sign of sanity."

"Not at all--this is vengeance," answered Turnbull, quite calmly;
"a thing which is completely healthy."

"You think the doctors will go," said Hutton, savagely.

"The keepers have gone already," said Turnbull.

Even as they spoke the main doors were burst open in mere brutal
panic, and all the officers and subordinates of the asylum rushed
away across the garden pursued by the smoke. But among the
ticketed maniacs not a man or woman moved.