Mr. Grey saw in the further room the back of a thin figure in a white jacket seated at a desk. The man thus occupied on hearing his entrance said, without looking back, "Sit down, and in a moment I'll attend to you."
Grey replied, "In a moment you won't see me;" and, his voice rising, "I am accustomed to be treated with civility."
Swallow rose at once, and seeing a well-dressed stranger said, "Excuse me, I was drawing a mortgage for a farmer I expected. Take a seat. I am at your service."
Somewhat mollified, Grey sat down. As he took his seat he was not at all sure of what he was really willing to say or do. He was not an indecisive person at home, but here in a Northern State, on what might be hostile ground, he was in doubt concerning that which he felt he honourably owed as a duty to his neighbour. The word had for him limiting definitions, as indeed it has for most of us. Resolving to be cautious, he said with deliberate emphasis, "I should like what I have to say to be considered, sir, as George Washington used to remark, as 'under the rose'--a strictly professional confidence."
"My name is George Grey. I am at Grey Pine on a visit to my cousin, Mrs. Penhallow."
"A most admirable lady," said the lawyer; "absent just now, I hear." He too determined on caution.
"I have been wandering about your quiet little town this morning and made some odd acquaintances. One Billy, he called himself, most amusing--most amusing. It seems that my cousin gave him money to pay his poll-tax. The poor simple fellow bought a fishing-pole and line. He was, I fancy, to vote for Buchanan. My cousin, I infer, must be like all our people a sound Democrat."
"I have heard as much," returned Swallow. "I am doing what I can for the party, but the people here are sadly misled and our own party is slowly losing ground."
"Indeed! I talked a little with a poor fellow named Lamb, out-of-work and sick. He assured me that the town was solid for Buchanan, and also the county."
Swallow laughed heartily. "What! Peter Lamb. He is our prize drunkard, sir, and would have been in jail long ago but for Penhallow. They are foster-brothers."
"Indeed!" Mr. Grey felt that his knowledge of character had been sadly at fault and that he had been wise in not having said more to the man out-of-work.