CHAPTER X
In Roseborough, as has been remarked, Judge Giffen was universally listed by the adjective “imposing.” Those spinsters with clinging natures preferred to describe him as “authoritative.” Miss Palametta Watts, who was suspected (to put it mildly) of special leanings—not to say intentions—in his direction, called him “masterful.” Quite recently Miss Palametta had boldly charged him with this trait; and, with the daring of desperate thirty-seven, had asked him if she were not correct in deducing from his stern mien that his wife, when he selected one, would be constrained to obey him; for her own part she knew she would.
“Such is the scriptural injunction,” he pronounced after weighing the matter; but, to her disappointment, pursued the subject no further. To be sure, not having his glasses on at the time, he may not have seen her inviting looks.
Mrs. Witherby’s dicta were taken as final in Roseborough, for it was conceded that she had “a wonderful way of expressing herself,” and Mrs. Witherby had a vast admiration for Judge Giffen and frequently summed him up thus:
“Well, it may be true that the Judge has had more decisions reversed than any other judge in the land, and that but for Hibbert Mearely’s influence he would never have been a judge at all; but what I always say is, ‘Where in all Roseborough (or elsewhere, either, for the matter of that) will you find a man who has such an air about him?’ Judge Giffen is a gentleman who understands his own worth. One can see that at a glance.”
One could see it at a glance this afternoon as he rode forward. It was emphatically a man with a fine understanding of his own worth whom the large, flea-bitten white horse brought to pause at Villa Rose’s gate. Though above medium stature, he was still not so tall as he appeared, from the height of his collar and the lofty manner of carrying his head. It was this last habit in particular, no doubt, which gave him the “air” so much admired.
His hair was graying with an even pepper-and-salt sprinkling. He allowed it to grow long in front, that his small, square forehead might be ornamented with a “statesman’s lock.” His eyes were small and brown and of no marked luminosity or keenness; his pepper-and-salt eyebrows were short and highly peaked at the outer corners—a sign, phrenologists declare, of latent ferocity. Doubtless the eyebrows assisted Miss Palametta Watts to her definition of “masterful.” He wore a short-cropped moustache naturally, and affected an imperial and goatee. His morals, of course, like all Roseborough morals, were above reproach. His hobbies were chess and the Weekly Digest, which gave him the news of the world in twelve pages of small paragraphs with inserts of verse, fiction, humour, publisher’s advertisements, and editorials on all world-wide topics, from single tax to the Oriental problem and back by way of the clam middens of British Columbia to the Greek schism and free verse. By lingering and studious perusal, he managed to make each week’s Digest last until the post brought the next.
For the rest, he dwelt in apartments in the house of a Mrs. Taite, a gentlewoman fallen into adverse circumstances, who was willing to take in and care for a paying guest in order to eke out. He lived in an economical and dignified style, and kept two horses, on the means which could very much better have been applied to the purchase of a neat cottage to shelter a wife. At least such was the opinion of Roseborough’s spinsters.
Perhaps the Judge did not treat the Roseborough spinsters quite fairly. The legal mind, by reason of its professional habits, becomes versed in subtleties, evasions, and the like—“technicalities” as they are called. The judge’s apartments were sincerely and solidly furnished by Mrs. Taite; but they were decorated with technicalities and evasions. In this wise: on the slippery horsehair sofa (supplied by Mrs. Taite) there was a row of cushions contributed by hungry hearts. They were stuffed with rags, excelsior, goose feathers, or ducks’ down, according to the financial rating of Miss Hopeful; and covered with crochet, tatting, crazy-quilt patches, sampler, or crewel work, according to her taste and her proficiency with the embroidery needle, the bobbin, or the small steel hook. One sampler-topped pillow bore the legend, tidily cross-stitched in a circle: “When here you rest your weary head, dream of the Giver.” The Judge had accepted the cushion and highly complimented the workmanship, vaguely maundered on the sweet thoughts that natively abide in woman’s breast, and set the pillow at the foot of the sofa. As his stockinged or slippered pedal extremities were not dreamers, he could use the gift without troubling his weary head about the giver. Thus, it will be seen, that the learned jurist could appropriate the soft advantages of a tentative contract, and escape the expected payment on a technicality, as well as any man he ever solemnly upbraided in court for the same act.
“I know what I should like to do with these rooms,” Miss Hopeful would say, with arch looks.