"Now I want you to tell me what good you expect all this to do? What was the use? What is gained? It's clear to a man without a spy-glass what's _lost_ all around; but it's going to puzzle a prophet to show where the gain comes in, in a case like this. If you'll excuse the remark, sir, it looks like a piece of romantic tom-foolery, to a man up a tree. A kind of tom-foolery, that does harm all around--to black and to white, to bond and to free. Of course if _all_ of 'em were free it would, no doubt, be better. I'm inclined to think that way, myself. But just tell me how many slave-owners--even if they wanted to do it--_could_ do as you have? Simply impossible! Then, besides, where'd they go--the niggers? Pension the whole infernal lot? Gad! but it's the dream of a man who never will wake up to this world, as it is built. And what good _have_ you done? Just stop long enough to tell me that;" he insisted, still holding Griffith's hand. He was smiling down at his client who stood on a lower step. There was in his face a tinge of contempt and of pity for the lack of worldly wisdom. "I'm not pretending to judge for you nor for other men, Mr. Wapley, but for myself it was wrong to own them. That is all. That is simple, is it not?" The lawyer thought it was, indeed, very, very simple; but to a nature like Griffith's it was all the argument needed. His face was clouded, for the lawyer did not seem satisfied. Griffith could not guess why. "My conscience troubled me. I am not advising other men to do as I have done. Sometimes I feel almost inclined to advise them _not_ to follow my example if they can feel satisfied not to--the cost is very great--bitterly heavy has the cost been in a thousand ways that no one can ever know but the man who tries it--and this little woman, here." He took her hand and turned to help her into the carriage. "Ah, Katherine, you have been very brave! The worst has fallen on you, after all--for no sense of imperative duty urged you on. For _my_ sake you have yielded! Her bravery, sir, has been double, and it is almost more than I can bear to ask it--to accept it--of her! For my own sake! It has been selfish, in a sense, selfish in me." Katherine smiled through dim eyes and pressed her lips hard together. She did not trust herself to speak. She bowed to the attorney and turned toward Mammy and the baby as they stood by the carriage door. "I'm a-goin' wid yoh alls to de hotel, ain't I, Mis' Kath'rine? Dar now, honey, des put yoah foot dar an' in yoh goes! Jerry, can't yoh hol' dem hosses still! Whoa, dar! Whoa! Mos' Beverly, he radder set in front wid Jerry, an' I gwine ter set inside wid de baby, an' yo' alls." The old woman bustled about and gave orders until they were, at last, at the door of the Metropolitan, where, until other matters were arranged, the family would remain.