“It is no more than the reaction,” said Northcote, “which attends our highest resolves. Is it not in such moments that a man truly measures himself? It must have been at the fall of the barometer that Samson was shorn of his locks.”
“Is there not always a woman in these cases?” said the lady. “This unfortunate creature whom our advocate is to deliver from the gallows, may she not be a Delilah of some kind?”
XIII
BE BOLD, WARY, FEAR NOT
At these words, lightly spoken, Northcote grew conscious of an indescribable sensation which he had never experienced before.
“If it were one’s custom,” he said, with a laugh as wry as the solicitor’s, “ever to heed the note of prophecy, one might discern it in your words. But I will not do so. Since that dark hour in which I summoned the genie, have I not adopted as my device, ‘Be bold, wary, fear not’?”
“Now you come to mention it,” said the solicitor, “it may be this talk of the genie that has filled me with these forebodings.”
“That is very foolish, Witty,” said the lady. “You have but to look into the eyes of our advocate to know what it is and where it dwells.”
“He is quite entitled to keep one, of course, but it is not usual to take it into society. I sometimes think I may have a bit of a genie myself, but I do what I can to keep it a profound secret from the world.”
“Should a man venture to compliment himself, Witty, upon the score of his reticence?”
“Would you not say,” inquired Northcote, “that all our reticences had their roots in our cowardice?”