Eglah noticed that while he held and pressed her fingers cordially, he merely bowed, and seemed not to see Judge Kent's proffered hand. After the interview she understood, when Eliza told her that during the period _habeas corpus_ was suspended by Federal authority the husband of Mr. Whitfield's only sister had been imprisoned for "treasonable language" by the desire and co-operation of Judge Kent, and that distress of mind and anxiety on her husband's account had precipitated the death of the wife before his release from jail. Thin, wiry, grizzled, keenly alert, the lawyer's light-blue eyes dwelt chiefly on the girl's face, save when her father asked a question or a fuller explanation of some statement. Now and then Judge Kent, watchful but studiedly debonair and suave, glanced over a paper, and once he challenged the accuracy of a computation of interest, which on revision proved correct. They were grouped around an oval table in the library, an open tin box in the centre, flanked by two ledgers and piles of papers, and Eglah sat close to Mr. Whitfield's right, while her father took his place immediately opposite her. She leaned a little forward, her arms crossed on the mahogany, and looked up steadily at the lawyer, but when he offered a paper for examination she smiled and shook her head. "You must perceive the farcical futility of talking business to such an inexperienced girl," said Judge Kent, stretching out his hand to take a bundle of stock certificates his daughter had motioned away. "Really you surprise me, because, from all we have heard of her college training, I was prepared to find Marcia's child an expert." "Father knows I can calculate interest, and that I understand bookkeeping, but he would be ashamed of me if I suspected or hunted for errors in the accounts of a friend who for so many years has kindly guarded my financial interests." The lawyer patted her hand and smiled.