"I never saw the--the lady in my life," was the reply; "so how can I be--can I be--engaged to her?" "In te Amidon blane of gonsciousness," said the professor, "you are stranchers. In te Brassfield pairsonality, you are:--_Gott im Himmel_, you are stuck on her, stuck on her--not, Clara? Vas he not gracey? Only Clara cut it short in te temonstration; but as a luffer, in te Brassfield blane, you are vot you call hot stuff." "You had better read the gentlemen your notes," said Madame le Claire coldly. "And please excuse me. I hope to see you both again." And with a sinuous bow, she swept from the room. Blodgett, keenly analytical, lost no word of the professor's notes. Florian sat with the letter from Miss Waldron in his hand, lost in thought. Sometimes his face burned with blushes, sometimes it paled with anxiety. His eyes ran over the letter full of sweet ardors; and when he thought of replying to them--or leaving them unanswered--his brow went moist and his heart sick. What should he do? What could he do? When they returned to the hotel, the judge was in a fever of excitement. "I tell you, Florian," said he, "I believe the professor is right about this. It seems that there are precedents, you know--cases on all-fours with yours. When I went to the telephone, up there, I called up Stacy and Stacy's and asked 'em to get me Dun's and Bradstreet's report on your Bellevale business. It ought to be up here pretty soon. There may be something down there worth looking after, and needing attention." "Perhaps," groaned Amidon. "Do you know that I'm engaged----" "One of the things I referred to," said the judge. "--to a lady, down there, whom I shouldn't know if I were to meet her out in the hall? If I go back to Hazelhurst, she is put under a cloud as a deserted woman--to say nothing of her feelings. And if I go back to Bellevale--my God, Judge, how can I go back, and take my place in a society where every one knows me, and I know nobody; and be a lover to a girl who may be--anything, you know; but who has the highest sort of claims on me, and a nature, I'm sure, capable of the keenest suffering or pleasure--how can I?" "Message, sir, from Stacy and Stacy," said a messenger boy at the door. Judge Blodgett tore open the envelope, and read the telegraphic reports. "M--m--m----Y--e--es," said he. "It'll take diplomacy, Florian, diplomacy. But, if these reports are to be trusted, and I guess they are, you've got about ten times as much at Bellevale as you have at Hazelhurst. And, as you say, the lady has claims. As an honorable man--an engaged man, who has received the plighted troth of a pure young heart--and a good financier, this Bellevale life demands resumption at your hands. Prepare, fellow citizen, to meet the difficulties of the situation." VIII POISING FOR THE PLUNGE