"Yes," she said, faintly, and with much reluctance, "I did."
"Why, if you wanted me?"
"I can't tell you that. But I did. He refused to have anything to do with the defense for my boy."
"Very naturally—very naturally. Didn't you know he would before you went to ask him? Couldn't you guess that?—couldn't you have figured out that much for your own self? Didn't you know that man? He's not with the under dog."
"It seems not," said Aurora Lane, wearily. "So I came to you."
"Even after last night?"
"Yes, after last night. At first it was hard to think of it."
"Aurora," said he, "I reckon I'm not a very practical sort of man. If I were—if I were a man like Judge Henderson, say, I'd clamp on the screws right now. I'd try to get you to alter what you said to me last night."
"It wouldn't be like you. You've never yet—in all our lives—done anything like that."
"No? I'm second choice—that's my fate, is it—that's as high as I get? Yes, I reckon that's about a fair estimate of me—I'm a typical second choice man. I suppose I'll have to accept that fact." And now he laughed uproariously, though none too happily.