“No,” he said bitterly, pushing the white hand and the white flower away. “Go to your room, and take the flowers with you. I will not have them in any place where I can see them.” Then a negro boy entering, he turned to him, and ordered his breakfast in a tone and manner that admitted of no delay nor dispute. Sapphira had lifted her basket, but as soon as they were alone she asked: “Did you mean those unkind words, father?” “Every one of them.” He shuffled his coffee cup, let the sugar tongs fall, and then rang the bell in a passion. Yet he did not escape the pathetic look of astonished and wounded love in Sapphira’s eyes as she left the room, with the basket of rosebuds clasped to her breast. All day this vision haunted him. He wished to go home long before the usual hour, but that would have been a kind of submission. He said he had a headache, but it was really a heartache that distressed him, and during a large part of the day he was debating within himself how such an unhappy position had managed to subjugate him in so short a period of time. For, if any one a week previously had told him he could be controlled in all his tenderest feelings by a dislike apparently so unreasonable, he would have scoffed the idea away. He said frequently to himself the word “unreasonable,” for that was the troublesome, exasperating sting of the temptation. The young man himself had done nothing that any fair or rational person would consider offensive--quite the contrary; and yet he was conscious of an antagonism that was something more than mere dislike--something, indeed, that might easily become hatred. He had just admitted the word “hatred” to his consciousness as he reached the entrance of the Government House. The day had at last worn itself away, wearily enough, to the dinner hour. He might now go home and face whatever trouble he had evoked. “Good-afternoon, Mr. Justice.” He turned, and the light of a sudden idea flashed into his face, when he saw the man who had accosted him. “Good-afternoon to you, Mr. Attorney Willis. I am just thinking about that case you defended a few days ago--the case of the man Gavazzio. A strange one, rather.” “A very strange case. He stabbed a man for no reason whatever; simply said he hated him, and seemed to think that feeling justification enough.” “See the Italian consul about him. I do not think he had broken any Italian law--that is, there are unwritten laws among these people, of a force quite as strong as the written code. We must take that fact into consideration with the sentence. The stabbed man is recovering, I hear?” “Oh, yes; I will see the consul, as you desire it. Gavazzio most certainly thought we were interfering in his private affairs by arresting him.” “I have no doubt of it. Well, Mr. Attorney, the law is supreme, but we must not forget that the essence of the law is justice. Good-day, sir.”