His fine face was still pale, but there was nothing unusual in its paleness, and it now grew calm and collected under the very intensity of his spirit's stress. For the farthest spiritual extremity lies cold and still beyond all human passion, as the supreme summit of perpetual ice rises cold and still above all human life. There was, therefore, no change in his attitude of mind or body when he suddenly saw the dark, threatening visage and the wild, bloodshot eyes of the Spaniard confronting him through the crowded gloom of the heated court-room. He was accustomed to the sight; it had faced him at every term of his court. There was consequently no disturbance, not the slightest uneasiness in the abrupt turning away of his eyes. His sole feeling was one of unutterable weariness of the struggle of living, of utter sickness of mind and heart and soul. He was so weary that he did not even fear himself, so utterly weary that he was--for the moment--no longer afraid even of the unexpected escape of his own fierce temper, always so hardly held in leash. He no longer dreaded the sudden breaking of the steel bars of his own stern self-control, the greatest danger that he had ever found to fear. When the case against the estate of Major John Bramwell came to trial in its due turn, during the dragging hours of the long, hot afternoon, the judge weighed that also, as he had weighed all which had come before, and as he intended weighing all which were to come after--coolly, calmly, scrupulously--according to the letter of the law. Having so weighed it, and found it wanting, he dismissed the complaint on account of time limitation, and assigned the costs to the plaintiff, as he would have done in any similar case under like circumstances. Then he passed composedly to the deliberate consideration of further business, and the hot, heavy hours droned on. Through it all he had scarcely glanced at Alvarado; in truth he had scarcely thought of him save as a party to one of the many suits before the court. He had had no opportunity to learn that the Spaniard had refused to accept the money, offered early in the day, in payment of the note. He did not observe Alvarado's leaving the court-room after the decision. He did not know that the man was waiting on the steps when he himself hastened out after the adjournment of court.