"In short, I see no reason, even from your own view-point, why you should not fight this claim. The orphan you sympathise with is not an active party. You have only a brother opposed to you, who seems to have been willing to barter away a sister's birthright. And, as I said before, your sympathies, however kind and commendable they may be, will be of no avail unless the courts decide against Dr. Devarges. My advice is to fight. If the right does not always succeed, my experience is that the Right, at least, is apt to play its best card, and put forward its best skill. And until it does that, it might as well be the Wrong, you know." "You are wise, Don Arturo. But you lawyers are so often only advocates. Pardon, I mean no wrong. But if it were Grace--the sister, you understand--what would be your advice?" "The same. Fight it out! If I could overthrow your grant, I should do it. The struggle, understand me, is there, and not with this wife and sister. But how does it come that a patent for this has not been applied for before by Gabriel? Did your anonymous correspondent explain that fact? It is a point in our favour." "You forget--_our_ grant was only recently discovered." "True! it is about equal, then, _ab initio_. And the absence of this actual legatee is in our favour." "Why?" "Because there is a certain human sympathy in juries with a pretty orphan--particularly if poor." "How do you know she was pretty?" asked Donna Dolores, quickly. "I presume so. It is the privilege of orphanage," he said, with a bow of cold gallantry. "You are wise, Don Arturo. May you live a thousand years." This time it was impossible but Arthur should notice the irony of Donna Dolores's manner. All his strong combative instincts rose. The mysterious power of her beauty, which he could not help acknowledging, her tone of superiority, whether attributable to a consciousness of this power over him, or some knowledge of his past--all aroused his cold pride. He remembered the reputation that Donna Dolores bore as a religious devotee and rigid moralist. If he had been taxed with his abandonment of Grace, with his half-formed designs upon Mrs. Sepulvida, he would have coldly admitted them without excuse or argument. In doing so, he would have been perfectly conscious that he should lose the esteem of Donna Dolores, of whose value he had become, within the last few moments, equally conscious. But it was a part of this young man's singular nature that he would have experienced a certain self-satisfaction in the act, that would have outweighed all other considerations. In the ethics of his own consciousness he called this "being true to himself." In a certain sense he was right. He rose, and, standing respectfully before his fair client, said-- "Have you decided fully? Do I understand that I am to press this claim with a view of ousting these parties? or will you leave them for the present in undisturbed possession of the land?"