"You are too shrewd a man, Mr. Munn," said he kindly, "to be so
deceived. There have been times when your artlessness made me wonder,
but you have never aroused my wonder quite so much as you have now."
"Why is that?" I asked, puzzled.
"Answer me this, Mr. Munn," he went on. "How did it chance that Mr.
Gilhooly so suddenly recovered his reason?"
"He lost his wits suddenly, and crazed people have been known to regain
their sanity as quickly as they lost it. It must have been so in
Gilhooly's case."
"Indeed!" he said, smiling. "And was it merely a coincidence that you
found your conscience, and Gilhooly his reason, at the same time?"
"Merely a coincidence," I replied.
He laughed, and it was his first happy laugh since King Gaddbai had
announced his coming campaign in the direction of Terra.
"Let us go further," he went on. "What caused Markham, Popham and Meigs
to change their points of view so miraculously? Was it the coal mines,
the lack of food and the need of decent clothing?"
"All that merely paved the way," I averred. "Your arguments did the
rest."
"You are blind, Mr. Munn! It was not the sufferings our friends
endured, nor my arguments."
"Then what was it?" I demanded.
"The Bolla!"