he details
of the accusation, and conscious of his own secret, he was debarred
the last resort of demanding a court-martial, which he knew could only
exonerate him by the exposure of the guilt of his wife, whom he still
hoped had safely escaped. His division commander, in active operations
in the field, had no time to help him at Washington. Elbowed aside by
greedy contractors, forestalled by selfish politicians, and disdaining
the ordinary method of influence, he had no friend to turn to. In his
few years of campaigning he had lost his instinct of diplomacy, without
acquiring a soldier's bluntness.

The nearly level rays of the sun forced him at last to turn aside into
one of the openings of a large building--a famous caravansary of that
hotel-haunted capital, and he presently found himself in the
luxurious bar-room, fragrant with mint, and cool with ice-slabs piled
symmetrically on its marble counters. A few groups of men were seeking
coolness at small tables with glasses before them and palm-leaf fans in
their hands, but a larger and noisier assemblage was collected before
the bar, where a man, collarless and in his shirt-sleeves, with his
back to the counter, was pretentiously addressing them. Brant, who had
moodily dropped into a chair in the corner, after ordering a cooling
drink as an excuse for his temporary refuge from the stifling street,
half-regretted his enforced participation in their conviviality. But
a sudden lowering of the speaker's voice into a note of gloomy
significance seemed familiar to him. He glanced at him quickly, from the
shadow of his corner. He was not mistaken--it was Jim Hooker!

For the first time in his life, Brant wished to evade him. In the days
of his own prosperity his heart had always gone out towards this old
companion of his boyhood; in his present humiliation his presence jarred
upon him. He would have slipped away, but to do so he would have had to
pass before the counter again, and Hooker, with the self-consciousness
of a story-teller, had an eye on his audience. Brant, with a palm-leaf
fan before his face, was obliged to listen.

"Yes, gentlemen," said Hooker, examining his glass dramatically, "when
a man's been cooped up in a Rebel prison, with a death line before him
that he's obliged to cross every time he wants a square drink, it seems
sort of like a dream of his boyhood to be standin' here comf'ble before
his liquor, alongside o' white men once more. And when he knows