He listened with a divided mind to the outpouring of the lobbyist, his opaque blue eyes fixed in seeming deliberation upon the chandelier hanging down into the rotunda below, his exceedingly red lips pursed up in a pucker of dubitation. Now and then he patted the toe of one boot on the floor meditatively. Occasionally he looked his interlocutor full in the face, asking a question, presumably a poser; then his triumphant, resonant, burly laugh would vibrate above the dancing of the over-dressed children, and the riotous barking of the dog, and the tinkling waltzes played by a band of musicians ranged about the fountain in the rotunda. His entertainment in his own self-importance and posings was so absorbing that the lobbyists and the advocates of many measures were often at a loss to know how best to reach Mr. Harshaw’s desire to serve his country; for he did not love money, and his integrity, as far as it was concerned, was above suspicion. All at once genuine interest usurped these feignings on his face. His eye fell on Judge Gwinnan walking along the corridor, and leaning upon a stout cane. He looked very thin, very pale, taller than before, and somehow his face was more youthful with the wistfulness of illness upon it, his hair clipped close, and the eyes hollow and luminous. He moved slowly, and with little spirit. Harshaw stepped briskly forward, with a curt “Excuse me” to the lobbyist, taking no reproach for leaving him with his mouth open, for it seemed his normal condition. “Why, judge,” Harshaw exclaimed, with his bluff familiarity, “you look bloomin’!” He was about to stretch out his hand, but desisted, noticing that Gwinnan held his hat in one hand, and leaned upon his stick with the other. He took the judge by the elbow, as he walked a few steps with him. A dim image of the pair paced along in the plate-glass windows, as if their doubles were stalking without in the snow in scenes of which they were unconscious. “I had no idea you were pulling together so fast,” he continued, scanning the face which was almost spectral in its attenuation and pallor, in close contrast to his own fat floridity of countenance, his red lips, his gleaming white teeth, his mane of yellow hair, and his dense yellow beard. His wide, black soft hat stuck on the back of his head accented his high color. “But I declare, it’s worth while for a man to get hit over the head to find out how important he is, and how he is esteemed. I never knew more profound sympathy and indignation than the affair excited. As to myself, I felt it especially, as I had taken so much stock in that rascally client of mine.”