traordinary daughter,
whose feelings were so lacerated by the culminating proof of the
fickleness of Brassfield at the Pumphreys' reception that she wondered
how she could ever have thought of keeping him in that perfidious plane
of consciousness in the hope that therein he would cleave to her only.
Better a good friend in Amidon, said she, than a false lover in
Brassfield. Howbeit, she isolated herself and mourned, thinking much
of the wrong her deed of the reception had done to Amidon, and
wondering how it might be remedied.

Nor with Mr. Amidon, who, while ignorant of the full extent of his
misfortune in the eyes of Elizabeth, yet knew that he was deep, deep in
disgrace with her, and found so many plausible reasons for it that the
episode at the reception seemed the least of them. He knew enough of
Brassfield to believe him guilty on any charge which might be brought
against him. The only doubt he allowed himself was as to how far he,
Florian Amidon, was morally responsible for Brassfield's wrong-doings.
He had no doubt that Miss Scarlett had a real grievance against
Brassfield, and, in an extremity of woe, made up his mind that Amidon
must hold himself to the sorry trade of answering a debt he never
contracted. He knew from a brief interview with Alvord that the
political situation was bad, but for this he had scarcely a thought
since the tragic breaking-up of their little Belshazzar's Feast. It
was his relations with Miss Waldron and Miss Scarlett which placed him
beyond the reach of philosophy.

So also is Judge Blodgett, who has been busy since the banquet, some of
the time with a towel about his brow, searching through Edgington's
library, to which his connection with the Bunn's Ferry well case gave
him the _entree_, for the law of breach of promise of marriage as
defined by the Pennsylvania decisions. Edgington himself was
apparently always from his office. Blodgett's call on Fuller and Cox
was most unsatisfactory, Mr. Fuller with some acerbity disclaiming all
knowledge of any such case as Scarlett versus Brassfield, and Mr. Cox
being invisible.

"They act," said he to Florian, "like people who are out for revenge,
or a vindication, or something besides money. I don't consider their
attitude favorable to a compromise."

"Well," said Amidon, "that does not surprise me at all."

"It doesn't, eh?" went on the judge. "Well, I can't say that anything
surprises me; though I was a little taken off my fe