He had braced himself as well as he might to endure the shock of public reprehension, surprise, repulsion, reacting on his own nerves, sensitive to every variation of popular opinion, when he should go to his associates, his weapon in his hand, the report of his own foul deed upon his lips. And yet, strong as he was, he faltered, he tottered, he fell almost fainting against the door at which he entered. He had a vague idea of the startled faces turned toward him, the expectant stillness, the sound of his hoarse, disconnected words in an appalled staccato, the sudden rush, the wild clamor. He hardly recognized the two men who disengaged themselves from the turmoil and came to him,—the best friends he had in the world, he might be sure now. He was only aware of what he had said and how well he had said it, when he was supported between them to a carriage, and was driving with them and with the officer who had been summoned at his request, to the magistrate’s house. His friends were talking together in respectful undertones of this “unfortunate affair,” and arranging the details,—a little complicated because of the late hour,—that there might be naught more unseemly than giving speedy bail. Neither intruded on his reserve. The officer was silent, unofficial, respectfully null, effaced. The stars were bright in the dark sky. The horses’ hoofs flashed fire. The magistrate, roused to the fact that justice may not sleep when wrongs are to be righted, made the necessary inquiries in so grave and courteous a tone that it seemed he recognized that the occasional killing of a gentleman may be lamentable to the deceased and inconvenient to the surviving, but was nothing to unduly stretch the limits of his elastic impartiality and abeyance of harsh opinion. He promptly accepted the proffered bail, and Harshaw’s friends left him only at his bedroom door, where they shook hands gravely and kindly with him, and in response to some muttered thanks declared they proposed to see him through. He found beneath the door the cards and notes of other friends who, hearing some wild rumor of the trouble, had called to proffer services. His lips curled triumphantly as he scanned them one by one. They represented the estimation in which he was held. They intimated a reliance on his good faith and motive in any deed. “But I tell you, Mr. Harshaw,” he said ceremoniously to himself, “’twould have been mighty different if ’twasn’t for your own smartness!” For he could hardly thank his craft enough for the timely expedient of slipping the cartridges into Kinsard’s empty pistol.