“Howard handed me the surprise of my life,” Hugh continued in a tone of self-pity. “When I explained to him that this mess he had gotten himself into would cost me a fortune, but that I was willing to spend it if he would remain with me, why, he turned on me like a maniac and denounced me shamefully! Acted like the hero in a dime novel—played heroics to a fare-thee-well—ending up by telling me plainly just what he thought of me and my money!” Hammond’s eyes shone bright as he urged: “Yes! Yes! Go on—I’m greatly interested.” “He had tried my patience a bit too far, so I ordered him to go and see just where he would find himself without my money. Then Mrs. Benton made her entrance dramatically, as I daresay she believed. She declared she would accept my offer of the early evening, and grant me my freedom providing I gave her the money I had promised her.” “It is like her, to do a thing like that,” Hammond murmured, almost inaudibly, “and you consented—I suppose?” He turned inquiringly to Benton. “Certainly—I wanted my freedom, and if Fate chose to bring——” “Ah!” the lawyer interrupted him. “There you are! Now you believe in Fate! This is evidently one of the instances when you choose to believe in it.” In a twinkling the lawyer’s attitude changed. All semblance of friendship dropped from him like a cloak. He turned on the financier with accusingly uplifted hand while the voice that so often had brought terror to the heart of a culprit, had swayed juries and filled courtrooms, thundered. “You’re a coward, Hugh Benton! You want to leave this woman, who has been your wife for twenty-two years, and the mother of your children, for another woman and you’re afraid to acknowledge that you yourself are to blame and——” “But I’m _not_ to blame,” Hugh insisted. “I told you that we have been uncongenial for years——” “You managed to stand the uncongeniality in your home for twenty-two years, and you would have stood it to the very end—if some other woman hadn’t aroused your passion.” “See here, Hammond,” Hugh turned white. Hammond was going too far entirely. “I don’t like your tone. You’re my attorney, and you said you were my friend. That is why I am telling you all this. I didn’t ask you for your opinion of me, and it’s immaterial whether my conduct meets with your approval or not! If you don’t wish to handle my affairs, say so—I shall be able to find another attorney in the city.” “Precisely!” Hammond roared. “You haven’t an inducement you could offer with which to retain my services! I’ve curbed my impatience with difficulty in order to let you reach the end of your narrative. Now I want to tell you that after twenty-five years of practice, I find myself unable to read a man’s character correctly. I was never so deceived in all my life as I have been in you, Hugh Benton, and I blush to think I called you—friend!” CHAPTER XVII