"I agree with you," responded Haldane gravely, "she certainly did come
down the street like the devil."

The doctor was a little shocked at this putting of his thoughts into
plain English, for it sounded somewhat profanely. But he was in no mood
to find fault with his companion, and they got on very well together to
the end of their brief journey. The young scapegrace was glad, indeed,
that it was brief, for his self-control was fast leaving him, and having
bowed a rather abrupt farewell to the doctor, he was not long in
reaching one of his haunts, from which during the evening, and quite
late into the night, came repeated peals of laughter, that grew more
boisterous and discordant as that synonyme of mental and moral anarchy,
the "spirit of wine," gained the mastery.

The tidings of her son's exploit in rescuing the doctor were not long in
reaching Mrs. Haldane, and she felt that the good seed sown that day had
borne immediate fruit. She longed to fold him in her arms and commend
his courage, while she poured out thanksgiving that he himself had
escaped uninjured, which immunity, she believed, must have resulted from
the goodness and piety of the deed. But when he at last appeared with
step so unsteady and utterance so thick that even she could not mistake
the cause, she was bewildered and bitterly disappointed by the apparent
contradictoriness of his action; and when he, too far gone for
dissimulation, described and acted out in pantomime the doctor's plight
and appearance, she became half hysterical from her desire to laugh, to
cry, and to give vent to her kindling indignation.

This anger was raised almost to the point of white heat on the morrow.
The cause of the old mare's behavior, and the interview which had led to