The moment the doctor re-entered the ward, as he had to do to return to the office, I disappeared through my door—­into the dining room.  I then walked the length of that room and picked up one of the heavy wooden chairs, selected for my purpose while the doctor and his tame charges were at church.  Using the chair as a battering-ram, without malice—­joy being in my heart—­I deliberately thrust two of its legs through an upper and a lower pane of a four-paned plate glass window.  The only miscalculation I made was in failing to place myself directly in front of that window, and at a proper distance, so that I might have broken every one of the four panes.  This was a source of regret to me, for I was always loath to leave a well-thought-out piece of work unfinished.

The crash of shattered and falling glass startled every one but me.  Especially did it frighten one patient who happened to be in the dining room at the time.  He fled.  The doctor and the attendant who were in the adjoining room could not see me, or know what the trouble was; but they lost no time in finding out.  Like the proverbial cold-blooded murderer who stands over his victim, weapon in hand, calmly awaiting arrest, I stood my ground, and, with a fair degree of composure, awaited the onrush of doctor and attendant.  They soon had me in hand.  Each taking an arm, they marched me to my room.  This took not more than half a minute, but the time was not so short as to prevent my delivering myself of one more thumb-nail characterization of the doctor.  My inability to recall that delineation, verbatim, entails no loss on literature.  But one remark made as the doctor seized hold of me was apt, though not impromptu.  “Well, doctor,” I said, “knowing you to be a truthful man, I just took you at your word.”

Senseless as this act appears it was the result of logical thinking.  The steward had entire charge of the building and ordered all necessary repairs.  It was he whom I desired above all others to see, and I reasoned that the breaking of several dollars’ worth of plate glass (for which later, to my surprise, I had to pay) would compel his attention on grounds of economy, if not those of the friendly interest which I now believed he had abandoned.  Early the next morning, as I had hoped, the steward appeared.  He approached me in a friendly way (as had been his wont) and I met him in a like manner.  “I wish you would leave a little bit of the building,” he said good-naturedly.

“I will leave it all, and gladly, if you will pay some attention to my messages,” was my rejoinder.

“Had I not been out of town,” he replied, “I would have come to see you sooner.”  And this honest explanation I accepted.

I made known to the steward the assistant physician’s behavior in balking my desire to telephone my conservator.  He agreed to place the matter before the superintendent, who had that morning returned.  As proof of gratitude, I promised to suspend hostilities until I had had a talk with the superintendent.  I made it quite plain, however, that should he fail to keep his word, I would further facilitate the ventilation of the violent ward.  My faith in mankind was not yet wholly restored.