He was attended to by our own surgeon, in his comfortable bedroom at the
stables. As the date of his birthday drew near, he was still confined to
his bed.
Physically speaking, he was doing very well. Morally speaking, the surgeon
was not satisfied. Francis Raven was suffering under some mysterious
mental disturbance, which interfered seriously with his rest at night.
Hearing this, I thought it my duty to tell the medical attendant what was
preying on the patient's mind. As a practical man, he shared my opinion
that the hostler was in a state of delusion on the subject of his Wife and
his Dream. "Curable delusion, in my opinion," the surgeon added, "if the
experiment could be fairly tried."
"How can it be tried?" I asked. Instead of replying, the surgeon put a
question to me, on his side.
"Do you happen to know," he said, "that this year is Leap Year?"
"Mrs. Fairbank reminded me of it yesterday," I answered. "Otherwise I
might _not_ have known it."
"Do you think Francis Raven knows that this year is Leap Year?"
(I began to see dimly what my friend was driving at.)
"It depends," I answered, "on whether he has got an English almanac.
Suppose he has _not_ got the almanac--what then?"
"In that case," pursued the surgeon, "Francis Raven is innocent of all
suspicion that there is a twenty-ninth day in February this year.
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