III
ome weeks after these occurrences I was on my way South, and again found myself within reach of the sleepy old park and the gruesome court-room.
I was the only passenger in the Pullman. I had traveled all night in this royal fashion—a whole car to myself—with the porter, a quiet, attentive young colored man of perhaps thirty years of age, duly installed as First Gentleman of the Bedchamber, and I had settled myself for a morning of seclusion when my privacy was broken in upon at a way station by the entrance of a young man in a shooting jacket and cap, and high boots splashed with mud.
He carried a folding gun in a leather case, an overcoat, and a game-bag, and was followed by two dogs. The porter relieved him of his belongings, stowed his gun in the rack, hung his overcoat on the hook, and distributed the rest of his equipment within reach of his hand. Then he led the dogs back to the baggage car.
The next moment the young sportsman glanced over the car, rose from his seat, and held out his hand.
"Haven't forgotten me, have you? Met you at the luncheon, you know—time the Judge was late waiting for the jury to come in."
To my delight and astonishment it was the young man in the Prince Albert coat.
He proved, as the morning wore on, to be a most entertaining young fellow, telling me of his sport and the birds he had shot, and of how good one dog was and how stupid the other, and how next week he was going after ducks down the river, and he described a small club-house which a dozen of his friends had built, and where, with true Southern hospitality, he insisted I should join him.
And then we fell to talking about the luncheon, and what a charming morning we had spent, and of the pretty girls and the dear grandmother; and we laughed again over the Judge's stories, and he told me another, the Judge's last, which he had heard his Honor tell at another luncheon; and then the porter put up a table, and spread a cloth, and began opening things with a corkscrew, and filling empty glasses with crushed ice and other things, and altogether we had a most comfortable and fraternal and much-to-be-desired half hour.