“We shall see, sir,” said Hotchkiss, grasping the handle of the door and backing into the passage.  “There are other lawyers who”—­

“Permit me to see you out,” interrupted the Colonel, rising politely.

—­“will be ready to resist the attacks of blackmail,” continued Hotchkiss, retreating along the passage.

“And then you will be able to repeat your remarks to me in the street,” continued the Colonel, bowing, as he persisted in following his visitor to the door.

But here Mr. Hotchkiss quickly slammed it behind him, and hurried away.  The Colonel returned to his office, and sitting down, took a sheet of letter-paper bearing the inscription “Starbottle and Stryker, Attorneys and Counselors,” and wrote the following lines:—­

Hooker versus Hotchkiss.

Dear madam,—­Having had a visit from the defendant in above, we should be pleased to have an interview with you at two P. M. to-morrow.

Your obedient servants,

Starbottle and Stryker.

This he sealed and dispatched by his trusted servant Jim, and then devoted a few moments to reflection.  It was the custom of the Colonel to act first, and justify the action by reason afterwards.

He knew that Hotchkiss would at once lay the matter before rival counsel.  He knew that they would advise him that Miss Hooker had “no case”—­that she would be nonsuited on her own evidence, and he ought not to compromise, but be ready to stand trial.  He believed, however, that Hotchkiss feared such exposure, and although his own instincts had been at first against this remedy, he was now instinctively in favor of it.  He remembered his own power with a jury; his vanity and his chivalry alike approved of this heroic method; he was bound by no prosaic facts—­he had his own theory of the case, which no mere evidence could gainsay.  In fact, Mrs. Hooker’s admission that he was to “tell the story in his own way” actually appeared to him an inspiration and a prophecy.

Perhaps there was something else, due possibly to the lady’s wonderful eyes, of which he had thought much.  Yet it was not her simplicity that affected him solely; on the contrary, it was her apparent intelligent reading of the character of her recreant lover—­and of his own!  Of all the Colonel’s previous “light” or “serious” loves, none had ever before flattered him in that way.  And it was this, combined with the respect which he had held for their professional relations, that precluded his having a more familiar knowledge of his client, through serious questioning or playful gallantry.  I am not sure it was not part of the charm to have a rustic femme incomprise as a client.