"So you think of going into the show business?" said the State Treasurer, resting his head on the back of his chair and looking up at the ceiling. "Well, not actively," the Senator replied. "That is, I'm not to be active in the work." "Oh, I suppose it's all right," admitted Estell; "but it's a new line and new lines are dangerous." "But if dangerous, not without interest," the Senator was quick to retort. "It's settled, at any rate. I'm going to try it." Mrs. Estell had not accompanied us. I heard her talking to a dog in the hall, and I listened with pleasure, for her voice was strong, deep and singularly musical. "The next session of the Legislature will be a very busy one, I am inclined to think," Estell remarked. "Always is," the Senator replied, laughing. "The better part of a new session is generally taken up with the work of repealing the laws passed by an older Assembly." I was wondering whether Estell would ever become deeply enough interested in my existence to warrant a straight look from his pale and abstracted eye, when he withdrew his gaze from the ceiling, directed it at me and said that he was glad to see me so far advanced toward recovery. It was a mere commonplace which may not have arisen from a real interest, and which politeness could no longer defer, but it gave me a better opinion of him. "I suppose," said I, not knowing what else to say, "that you find your occupation one of almost painful exactness." I think that he gave me a look of contempt. I am quite sure that, if he did not, his eye failed him of his intention. "I wouldn't stay there ten minutes if it meant play," he replied, and turning to the Senator he said: "Saw old Dan Hilliard the other day." "No!" the Senator exclaimed. "You don't mean _old_ Dan Hilliard?" "Yes, I do--old Dan Hilliard." "Hanged if I didn't think he was dead. Well, I'll swear! Old Dan Hilliard! Humph! Why, I met his wife one day about three years ago and she told me that Dan was dying, that he couldn't live till night. Now what do you suppose he wanted to get well for?" "To distress his friends, I reckon. Wanted to get five dollars from me, and said if I'd give him the money you would pay him back." My eyes with wandering about the room alighted on two foils, crossed above a bookcase. I was right. The young woman had taken fencing lessons. And just at that moment she entered the room, a great dog following her. At the door she turned about to drive him back. He tried to spring by her; she caught him, lifted him from the floor and with a swing she tumbled him out into the hall. "What _are_ you doing?" the Treasurer cried, with a nervous jump; and the Senator, who sat facing the door, fell back with a laugh so full of contagion that I caught it before I had time to strengthen my gravity with the reflection that I might give Estell a cause to think that I was intruding myself into a family affair. "I am teaching old Tiger to behave himself," she replied, with a smile.