"I couldn't think anything _you_ did was wrong," she cried passionately. "And, anyway, giving a company legal advice is very far from being in its business. _Every one_ has to have lawyers, of course. They defend even criminals." He smiled quizzically at her argument. "Well," he countered, "I'm respectable in my old age, at any rate." He had pressed a bell as he spoke and to the grizzled negro who now entered he said, "Nelson, has your Marse Chilly come in yet? If he has I'd like to see him." The old man shook his head. "Marse Chilly done tellyfoam he won' be home fo' dinnah, suh." The Judge pulled his chin, palpably annoyed, but quick to his resentful mood, Echo laid her hand caressingly on his arm. "Never mind, dear," she said coaxingly. "Don't fret about Chilly." Mrs. Allen's voice interposed. "Chilly sent me the message an hour ago," she said, with an accent that seemed finally to dismiss the topic. "I think you would better dress now, Echo. Nancy has been in some time, and dinner's at seven-thirty." CHAPTER III THE AWAKENING An automobile speeding through the starry dark! No hesitant progress through congested traffic, no frequent swerving for daylight wayfarers. The city was far behind now--only the clear, well-nigh deserted road, winding like a tremulous magenta ribbon through the swooping gloom that seemed to shrink and cringe from the metal monster hurtling after its golden halo through the eddying dust. A practised hand was on the throttle and the yellow-lined face bent over the wheel was shrewd and keen. There had been no supper for Bob that night and no evening at Black Joe's billiard parlour, but the chauffeur knew his master. "Go like the devil till I tell you to stop," the other had said, and without the word from the moveless figure on the rear seat, he would obey till the engine stopped or his hand went numb on the wheel. Hamlets flashed by--huddles of flaring street-lights--then shadow and blankness again. Now and then a hollow rumbling marked a bridge, or a jovial, beckoning doorway betokened a road-house. Ten, twenty, thirty miles. A turn of the wheel and the car swept into a divergent highway. Another mile and again a turn--Bob was shuttling back and forth now, fearful of an impossible distance from home.