n horseback should, like the beggar of the adage, ride to the
devil."

"Your business now is the 'Lemorne?'"

"You know it is."

"I did not know but that you had found something besides to litigate."

"It must have been Edward Uxbridge that you saw. He is the brain of the
firm."

"You expect Mr. Van Horn?"

"Oh, he must come; I can not be writing letters."

We had been in Newport two weeks when Mr. Van Horn, Aunt Eliza's lawyer,
came. He said that he would see Mr. Edward Uxbridge. Between them they
might delay a term, which he thought would be best. "Would Miss Huell
ever be ready for a compromise?" he jestingly asked.

"Are you suspicious?" she inquired.

"No; but the Uxbridge chaps are clever."

He dined with us; and at four o'clock Aunt Eliza graciously asked him
to take a seat in the carriage with me, making some excuse for not going
herself.

"Hullo!" said Mr. Van Horn when we had reached the country road;
"there's Uxbridge now." And he waved his hand to him.

It was indeed the black horse and the same rider that I had met. He
reined up beside us, and shook hands with Mr. Van Horn.

"We are required to answer this new complaint?" said Mr. Van Horn.

Mr. Uxbridge nodded.

"And after that the judgment?"

Mr. Uxbridge laughed.

"I wish that certain gore of land had been sunk instead of being mapped
in 1835."

"The surveyor did his business well enough, I am sure."

They talked together in a low voice for a few minutes, and then Mr. Van
Horn leaned back in his seat again. "Allow me," he said, "to introduce
you, Uxbridge, to Miss Margaret Huell, Miss Huell's niece. Huell _vs._
Brown, you know," he added, in an explanatory tone; for I was Huell
_vs._ Brown's daughter. "Oh!" said Mr. Uxbridge bowing, and looking at
me gravely. I looked at him also; he was a pale, stern-looking man, and
forty years old certainly. I derived the impression at once that he had
a domineering disposition, perhaps from the way in which he controlled
his horse.

"Nice beast that," said Mr. Van Horn.

"Yes," he answered, laying his hand on its mane, so that the action
brought immediately to my mind the recollection that I had done so too.
I would not meet his eye again, however.

"How long shall you remain, Uxbridge?"

"I don't know. You are not interested in the lawsuit, Miss Huell?" he
said, putting on his hat.

"Not in the least; nothing of mine is involved."

"We'll gain it for your portion yet, Miss Margare