She lent him sealing-wax.
"But how am I to post it?" said he.
"Easily: there is a box in the house; I will show you."
She took him and showed him the box: he put his letters into it, and in
the ardour of his gratitude kissed her hand. She winced a little and
said, "Mind, this is not by my advice; I would never tell my friends I
had been in a madhouse; oh, never. I would be calm, make friends with the
servants-- they are the real masters--and never let a creature know where
I had been."
"Oh, you don't know my Julia," said Alfred; "she will never desert me,
never think the worse of me because I have been entrapped illegally into
a madhouse."
"Illegally, Mr. Hardie! you deceive yourself; Mr. Baker told me the order
was signed by a relation, and the certificates by first-rate lunacy
doctors."
"What on earth has that to do with it, madam, when I am as sane as you
are?"
"It has everything to do with it. Mr. Baker could be punished for
confining a madman in this house without an order and two certificates;
but he couldn't for confining a sane person under an order and two
certificates.
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