"My dear Quib," answered Gottlieb soothingly, "don't agitate yourself over so trifling a matter. The only living man who can prove that Hawkins was served is Bunce--and Bunce is a fool. At best it would simply be one swearing against the other. We have a perfect right to believe Hawkins in preference to Bunce if we choose. Anyhow, we're not the judge. All we have to do is to present the evidence at our command--if we can get it. And, by God! we will get it if it costs us ten thousand dollars! Why, Quib, the thing is a windfall. Thirty-five thousand! Why, thirty-five _hundred_ for such a case would be a big fee!" "I don't know!" I answered, for I felt a curious premonition in the matter. "Something tells me that we ought to take no chances." "Come, come!" quoth Gottlieb, with a light show of irritation. "Don't lose your nerve. You've done many a worse thing than this, to my own knowledge!" I do not pretend to any virtue in the matter and yet I must admit to some feelings of compunction about Mrs. Dillingham. Truth to tell, I had taken a strong dislike to her husband, with his sleek confidence and cold-blooded selfishness. In addition, I was quite sure that there was some other fell reason why he wished to divorce her--probably he had another marriage in contemplation, even if he had not admitted it. "I wish we could make the beggar do his own dirty work," I exclaimed. "But what does he pay us for?" inquired Gottlieb innocently. "Quib, just think of the money!" I had, in fact, been thinking of the money, and it looked very good to me. Since my days in Haight & Foster's law office, a great, great change had come in my manner of life; and, though my friends to a great extent remained among the theatrical and sporting class to which I had received my first introduction on coming to New York, I now occupied a large brick house with stone trimmings in Washington Square, where I entertained in truly luxurious fashion. I had a French cook and an English butler, and drove a pair of trotters that were second to none except those of William H. Vanderbilt, with whom I had many a fast brush on the speedways. Though I had never allowed myself to be caught in the net of matrimony, I had many friends among the fair sex, particularly among those who graced the footlights; and some of my evening parties did not break up until dawn was glinting over the roofs of the respectable mansions round about me. It was a gay life, but it cost money--almost more money than I could make; and my share in the thirty-five thousand dollars offered by our friend Dillingham would go a long way to keeping up my establishment for another year. So I allowed my qualms to give me no further uneasiness and told myself that Gottlieb was clever enough to manage the business in such a fashion that there would be no "come-back."