“You might manage the rest,” said Rand, with good-natured scorn; “but it doesn’t do to be afraid of the dark.”

From the pegs behind the door he took his greatcoat and beaver.  “I am going home now,” he said.  “I have company to supper.”

“Who, then?” asked Mocket.  “Adam Gaudylock?  He’s in town.”

Rand laughed.  “Who, then?’ Tom, Tom, you’ve the manners of the West Indian skippers you consort with!  No, it’s not Adam Gaudylock.  It is—­” He hesitated, then took up a pen and wrote two words.  “That’s his name—­but you are to keep it dark.”

Mocket’s tilted chair came noisily to the floor.  “What!  In Richmond!—­he in Richmond!  When did he come?  Where’s he staying?”

“He came last night, and he’s staying quietly at Bowler’s Tavern.  It isn’t known that he’s here, and he is not anxious that it should be known.  He’s here on business, and he goes to-morrow.  That is all—­and you’re to say no word of what I tell you.”

“All right,” quoth Tom.  “I won’t blab.  But I’d mightily like to see the man who shot Alexander Hamilton.”

“I’ve told you he’s not anxious for company.”

“Oh, I know!” said Tom, not without humility.  “I’m small fry.  Well, there are curious things said about him, and you and he are strange bedfellows!  How did it happen?”

“Tom, Tom,” answered Rand, “you ask too many questions!  It was an accident, or it was predestined and foreordained when I was dust blown about by the wind.  You may take your choice according to your theology!  I’m going now.  Be at the House early to-morrow.”

“Are you going to take that Mathews case?  Young Mathews was here yesterday, swearing that if he couldn’t get you, he would hang himself.”

“I’ve said that I would take it.”

“Ludwell Cary’s for the other side.”

“Yes, I know.  I’ll win.”

“Well, you’re fairly pitted.  Half the town backs one and half the other.  That letter signed ‘Aurelius’ in the Gazette—­did you know ’twas his?”

Rand dropped his hand from the latch.  The colour rushed to his face, then ebbed as quickly.  “No, I did not know,” he said, in a voice that was not quite steady.  “I thought of quite another man.”

“It is Ludwell Cary’s, and every Black Cockade in Richmond, and not a few Republicans, are quoting it.  My certie! it was a commentary in caustic—­and so damned courteous all the time!”

“I don’t care for such courtesy,” answered Rand “Ludwell Cary had best look where he treads.”

“Well, I thought I’d tell you,” said his colleague “I don’t like the Carys, either!—­And so I’m not to go into that land scheme?”

“No.  It’s a small thing, and not honest.  Some day, Tom, I’ll help you to a larger thing than that.”

“And honest?” said Mocket shrewdly.

The other turned upon him with anger, black as it was sudden.  “Honest!  Yes, honest as this storm, honest as any struggle for any piece of earth wider than a coffin space!  Who are you to question me?  I give you warning—­”