oppose
us. You are drilling them now that they may murder your own blood when
you think the time is ripe."

The Colonel did not hear Virginia leave the room, so softly had she gone,
He made a grand figure of a man as he stood up, straight and tall, those
gray eyes a-kindle at last. But the fire died as quickly as it had
flared. Pity had come and quenched it,--pity that an unselfish life of
suffering and loneliness should be crowned with these. The Colonel longed
then to clasp his friend in his arms. Quarrels they had had by the
hundred, never yet a misunderstanding. God had given to Silas Whipple a
nature stern and harsh that repelled all save the charitable few whose
gift it was to see below the surface, and Colonel Carvel had been the
chief of them. But now the Judge's vision was clouded.

Steadying himself by his chair, he had risen glaring, the loose skin
twitching on his sallow face. He began firmly but his voice shook ere he
had finished.

"Colonel Carvel," said he, "I expect that the day has come when you go
your way and I go mine. It will be better if--we do not meet again, sir."

And so he turned from the man whose friendship had stayed him for the
score of years he had battled with his enemies, from that house which had
been for so long his only home. For the last time Jackson came forward to
help him with his coat. The Judge did not see him, nor did he see the
tearful face of a young girl leaning over the banisters above. Ice was on
the stones. And Mr. Whipple, blinded by a moisture strange to his eyes,
clung to the iron railing as he felt his way down the steps. Before he
reached the bottom a stronger arm had seize his own, and was helping him.

The Judge brushed his eyes with his sleeve, and turned a defiant face
upon Captain Elijah Brent--then his voice broke. His anger was suddenly
gone, and his thought had flown back to the Colonel's thousand charities.

"Lige," he said, "Lige, it has come."

In answer the Captain pressed the Judge's hand, nodding vigorously to
hide his rising emotion. There was a pause.

"And you, Lige?" said Mr. Whipple, presently.

"My God!" cried the Captain, "I wish I knew."

"Lige," said the Judge, gravely, "you're too good a man to be for
Soothing Syrup."

The Captain choked.

"You're too smart to be fooled, Lige," he said, with a note near to
pleading. "The time has come when you Bell people and the Douglas people
have got to decide. Never in my life did I know it