As the stage rattles around dizzy heights, below massy cliffs, swinging under the forest arches, the Missouri champion reasons out that Hardin's hands are tied personally as regards a bloody public quarrel, by the coming senatorial fight. To pluck the honors of the Senate at last from a divided State, is a testimony to the lawyer's great abilities. Joe thinks, with a sigh of regret, that some mere animated money-bag may sit under the white dome, and misrepresent the sovereign State of California. "Well, if Hardin won't bend, he's got to break." The miner puffs his cigar in search of wisdom. Single-minded and unswerving, Woods goes directly to his splendid rooms at the "Golden Eagle," on reaching Sacramento. The capital city of the State is crowded with legislators and attach‚s. The lobby banditti, free lances, and camp followers of the annual raid upon the pockets of the people are on guard. While his meal is being served in his parlor, he indites a note to Hardin's political Mark Antony. It will rest with him to crown a triumph or deliver his unheard oration over the body of a politically dead Caesar. The billet reads: "I want you instantly, on a matter deciding Hardin's election. You can show him this." In half an hour, over burgundy and the ever-flowing champagne, Woods, feeling his visitor in good humor, fires his first gun. He begins with half-shut eyes, in a genial tone: "Harris, I have sent for you to tell you Hardin and me have locked horns over some property. Now I won't vote for him, but I'll hold off my dogs. I won't work against him if he signs a sealed paper I'm goin' to give you. If he don't, I'll open out, and tell an old yarn to our secret nominating caucus. I am solidly responsible for the oration. He will be laid out. It rests only with his friends then, to spread this scandal. He has time to square this. It does not hang on party interests. I am a man of my word, you know. Now, I leave it to you to consider if he has any right to ask his friends to back him in certain defeat. See him quick. If he tells you to hear the story from me, I will tell you all. If he flies the track, I am silent until the caucus. THEN, I will speak, if I'm alive. If I am dead, my pard will speak for me. My death would seal his utter ruin. I can stand the consequences. He has got to come up to the captain's office and settle." The astounded Harris gloomily muses while Woods quietly inscribes a few lines on a sheet of paper. He seals the envelop, and hands it to Senator Harris. "I won't leave this camp, Harris, till I get your answer," calmly remarks Joseph. He refuses to waste more words in explanation. "See Hardin," is his only phrase. "It's open war then between him and me." Harris, with a very grave face, enters the private rooms of Judge Hardin at the Orleans Hotel. Hardin listens, with scowling brow as black as night. He tears open the envelop! His faithful henchman wonders what can bring night's blackness to Judge Hardin's face.