the girl. "Any relative wishing, for
reasons of his own, to get you out of the way could bribe two
unscrupulous physicians and deprive you of your liberty!"

"Certainly," rejoined the young man. "There have been many cases of the
sort. The process is very simple. In case the person can be made out as
violently insane so as liable to do injury to some one, two physicians
are called upon to examine the person and to make the necessary
affidavit. Then on the petition of anybody interested in the
person--your uncle, for instance--a Court can at once, on the statement
of the physicians, commit the person to an asylum."

"Horrible!" cried Paula. "And these things can happen in free America?
Surely there is some remedy?"

"Yes," he replied. "Anybody interested in the person, like a father,
brother, next friend, or anybody else, can apply at any time they see
fit, to a Judge of the Supreme Court, on a _habeas corpus_, and have the
question of the sanity of the person tested. This may be done in open
Court by a Judge, or he can send it to a referee, if he sees fit, where
the proceedings are lengthy. This judge decides whether the person is
sane or not. Of course if they had succeeded in putting you in the
asylum Mr. Ricaby would have immediately applied for a _habeas corpus_."

Paula grew silent. How she wished herself back in Paris! It was all on
account of that wretched inheritance! How she regretted having come to
America to claim it! If she was nervous, who could wonder at it? The
manoeuvres of her Uncle James, Mr. Cooley, and Dr. Zacharie were
enough to unnerve any one. If they put her in an asylum, she would go
really mad. She had heard and read so much of the terrors of private
insane asylums. It was nothing but a living death. The horror of it
seized upon her. Shaken by a sudden nervous trembling, she exclaimed
fearfully:

"Don't let them take me, Mr. Chase! Please don't let them take me away!"

Tod put his arm around her sympathetically. He felt sorrier for her than
he dare show. Never so much as now did he realize the place which this
girl had taken in his life. Was it love? He did not know, but he
certainly was more attracted to her than to any girl he had ever known.

"No--no," he said reassuringly. "You're safe from them now. The Court
order which they have secured is only good in New York State. In a few
more minutes we shall be in New Jersey. They can't touch you there."

"But afterward?" she asked. "What