"That's all true," said Aurora to Anne, nodding toward Judge Henderson. "I've scarce spoken more than twenty words to him in twenty years. I've kept the secret, and carried the blame. Until yesterday Don never knew about himself—about his having no father. He hasn't a guess even now who his father was—or is—at least he'll never make the right guess. No one has, no one ever will. They may wrong another man, but they'll not suspect the right one."
She felt the strong young arm of Anne still about her, and so went on, nodding again toward Judge Henderson—"I asked him to defend his own son—you heard me, then? And he's told me he's hired to hang his son! And I called him 'Judas.' And I pray God to sink him in hell if he does this work. After all, there must be a hell somewhere—I think there must be. This is not right—it's not right! I've stood it all till now, but I can't stand this."
"Wait!" exclaimed Judge Henderson. "Give me time to think, I tell you! My whole life's up on this, as well as yours. You've had twenty years to think about this, and I've not had that many minutes. You and I've not met, I say—our paths have lain totally apart. It was in the past—we'd lived it down."
"We had lived it down!" Aurora Lane's laugh was bitter enough, and she made no other comment.
Still she felt, closer and closer, the warm young body of the girl who stood by her as the two women faced the man in the ancient and undying battle of sex.
"Well, I dropped that case," resumed Judge Henderson, "name or claim the reason as you like. But this case is different——"
"Why?" asked Anne Oglesby. "What's the difference between the two cases? You say you didn't know, then. Now you know."
"But I've my reputation to keep clean, Anne! The higher you climb, the riskier the ladder. I could drop that little case yesterday, but let me drop this case, with all the whole town back of it—and all my whole political party back of it, too—that's another matter!"
"Is it, indeed!"
"Yes!" he rasped. "I put Judge Reeves on the bench here. It's a big case. If I withdrew a second time—if things got stirred up and people began to talk—why, that would be enough to put Old Hod Brooks on the scent. He'd well enough take care of all the rest! It would be the end of my career—in twenty minutes. There'd be nothing left of my chances—there'd be nothing left of my reputation—the work of twenty years would be undone. I'd be ruined!"