"Well, Aurora," said he after a time, "you have broken in here, anyway—just as I broke down your gate last night in my own clumsiness. Suppose we call it quits. Let's not figure too close on the moving consideration. There's nothing you can give Horace Brooks, attorney at law, in the way of pay. And you need Horace Brooks—only as attorney at law. What can I do for you?'
"I don't know, but all that can be done now for him you can do. I've nowhere else to go. It wasn't easy for me to come here, but I'd make any sacrifice for my boy."
"Sacrifices are at a discount in a lawyer's office. I don't ask you to reconsider your decision, as to me—as to me as your husband. But speaking of sacrifices, I only point out to you that so far as I'm concerned as a lawyer in this town, I might as well be your husband or your lover as your lawyer of record in this case! Since the trial yesterday, and my walk home with you last night, there'll be plenty who'll think so anyway. I may be held as a man worse than I ever was—and neither of us gain by that."
"That may be so," said she, bending her face forward in her hands. "God! What a trial, what a risk, what a peril I am to myself and everyone I meet! I've brought loss, suspicion, wrong on you—you who're noble! And after twenty years——"
"Yes, Aurora. Twenty years outlaws a claim in the law—for men—but not for women. Now, I take on those twenty years of yours when I take on this case. I'm clear about that. I can see this thing straight enough. This town will go into two camps. Ours is the hopeless one, as things stand now. We are the under dog. If I took this case—maybe even if I won it—I'd be hated by the men and snubbed by the women of this town. Now, I see all that clearly. And speaking of pay——"
"Oh, if you would," she exclaimed, leaning toward him, her hands extended, "I'd do anything you asked me. Do you understand that—anything!"
She paused. In the silence the little clock on the mantel ticked so loud it seemed almost to burst the walls. He sat for a long time motionless, and she went on, leaning yet more toward him.
"I've thought it all over again," she said desperately. "I'd—I'd begin it again—I'd do anything—I'd do anything you asked me——Why, I've nothing—nothing—oh, so little to give! But—as to what you said last night—I've thought of that. I'm ready—what is it that you wish?"
He looked at her dumbly for a long time, and she thought it was in condemnation. For almost the first time she voiced in her life—continually on the defensive.
"I don't understand it all," said she. "I've tried very hard since then. I was so young. I didn't know much at first—I didn't feel that it was all so wrong—I didn't know much of anything at all, don't you see?"