Bodney got up and went to the door, but turned and looked at the old man, bowed over with his fingers pressed to his eyes. The coming of the sun had driven the game further off into the night, and now the wretch’s heart smote him hard. He could lift that gray head; into those dull eyes he could throw the light of astonishment, but they would shoot anger at him and drive him out of the house. If he could only win enough to replace the money taken from the safe, to give himself the standing of true repentance, he would confess his crime. Win enough! He could not conceive of getting it in any other way; all idea of business had been driven from his mind. He had no mind, no reason; what had been his mind was now a disease on fire, half in smoke and half in flame, but he felt that if he could get even, the fire would go out and the smoke clear away. The old fellow who turned moralist could have told him that he had for more than half a life-time struggled to get even, that the poker fool is never even but twice, once before he plays and once after he is dead. And the scholar who had forgotten his grammar in the constant strain of the present tense would have assured him that the hope to get even was a trap set by the devil to catch the imaginative mind. The Judge groaned, and Bodney took a step toward him, with his hands stretched forth as if he would grasp him and shake him into a consciousness of the truth, but the old man looked up and the young man faltered. "I thought you were going to bed, George." "I am, sir." "Then, why do you stand there looking at me?" "I—I don’t know," he stammered, in his embarrassment. "Yes, you do know," said the Judge, giving him a straight and steady look. "You know that you are hanging about to plead the cause of your—your friend; but it is of no use. Friend! I would to God he had been my friend. Confess, now; isn’t that the reason you are standing there?" "You read my mind, Judge," said the wretch. "Do I? Then read mine and go to bed." As Bodney turned toward the door, he met William coming in. The old fellow carried his coat thrown across one arm and was trying to button his shirt collar. It was his custom to begin dressing at his bedside, grabbing up the first garment within reach, and to complete his work in the office, the basement, or even the back yard. "Hold on a minute," he said to Bodney. "Button this infernal collar for me." Bodney halted to obey. "Can’t you take hold of it? Is it as slick as all that? Do you think I wear an eel around my neck? Confound it, don’t choke the life out of me. Get away. I can do it better myself. Didn’t I tell you to quit? Are you a bull-dog, that you have to hang on that way?" Bodney trod heavily to his room. The old fellow threw his coat on the table and began to walk about, tugging at his collar.