him to a parlor scarcely less dirty and disgusting that the
saloon itself, at the opposite end of which, wreathed in a cloud of
tobacco smoke, he beheld the object of his search.

"Well, I see you are here," he said, drawing a chair to the table.

"And waiting," a deep and rich but melancholy voice replied.

"Can't we have a couple of candles? These shadows seem to crawl up my
legs and take me by the throat. I feel as if some one were blindfolding
and gagging me," said David, looking uneasily about.

The judge ordered the candles, and while they were waiting observed:
"You had better accustom yourself to shadows, young man, for you will
find plenty of them on the road you are traveling. They deepen with the
passing years, along every pathway; but the one on which you are about
to set your feet leads into the hopeless dark."

These unexpected words agitated the soul of the young plotter, but while
he was still shuddering the barkeeper entered with the candles and set
them down on the table between the two men, who found themselves
vis-a-vis in the flickering gleams.

They leaned on their elbows and looked into each other's faces. The
contrast was remarkable. The countenance of the judge had unquestionably
once been noble, and perhaps also beautiful; but the massive features
were now coarsened by dissipation. A permanent curl of scorn had
wreathed itself around the mouth. A look of ennui brooded over his
features. One would as soon expect to see a flower in the crater of a
volcano as a smile on the lips of this extinct man.

David's face was young and beautiful. The features were still those of a
saint, even if the aureole had for a time been eclipsed by a cloud.
These two human beings gazed incredulously at each other for a moment.

"I was once like this youth," the judge was saying to himself with a
sigh.

"I shall never be like this beast," thought David with a shudder of
repulsion and disgust.

The "Justice" (grotesque parody) broke the silence.

"Did you succeed?" he asked.

"No," said David, sullenly.

"She would not yield, then?"

"No more than adamant or steel."

"You should have pressed her harder."

"I used my utmost skill."

"You are a novitiate, perhaps. An adept would have succeeded."

"Not with her."

"Ah! who ever caught a trout at the first cast? What you need is
experience."

"What I want is help."

"And so you have appealed to me? You wish me to go to this woman and
tell her t