It was at Silas Craig's office that Augustus Horton first saw Paul Lisimon.
The two men encountered each other in an office opening out of the private room occupied by the attorney.
Paul was seated at his desk copying a deed; he looked up only for a moment as the planter entered the apartment, and immediately returned to his work. He knew that the visitor was his rival, Augustus Horton, but, secure in the love of Camillia, he was utterly indifferent to his presence. Not so the planter. He looked long and earnestly at the handsome and Spanish face of the young Mexican.
Simply as Paul was dressed, in the loose linen coat and trousers suitable to the climate, with an open shirt collar of the finest cambric, under which was knotted a black silk handkerchief, there was something so distinguished in his appearance that Augustus Horton could not help wondering who this elegant stranger was who had found his way into Silas Craig's office. So great was his curiosity, that when his business with the lawyer was ended he lingered to ask a few questions about the strange clerk.
"In goodness name, Craig," he said, as he lit a cigar from a box of allumerts upon the attorney's desk, "who is that young aristocrat whom you have secured as a pigeon for plucking, under pretense of teaching him the law?"
"A young aristocrat!"
"Yes, a young man I saw in the next office. A Spaniard, I should imagine, from his appearance. Very dark, with black eyes and curling black hair."
Silas Craig laughed aloud.
"An aristocrat!" he exclaimed, "why, surely you must mean Paul Lisimon?"
"Who is Paul Lisimon?"