But the son of Powhatan was destined to find that circumstances are often stronger than those forces that he defied.

And so his departure from Washington was delayed for weeks by this event.

One morning the Viscount Vincent called as usual, and, after a prolonged private interview with Miss Merlin, he sent a message to Judge Merlin requesting to see him alone for a few minutes.

Ishmael was seated with Judge Merlin in the study at the moment Powers brought this message.

“Ah!  Lord Vincent requests the honor of a private interview with me, does he?  Well, it is what I have been expecting for some days!  Wonder if he doesn’t think he is conferring an honor instead of receiving one?  Ask him to be so good as to walk up, Powers.  Ishmael, my dear boy, excuse me for dismissing you for a few minutes; but pray return to me as soon as this Lord—­’Foppington’—­leaves me.  May Satan fly away with him, for I know he is coming to ask me for my girl!”

It was well that Ishmael happened to be sitting with his back to the window.  It was well also that Judge Merlin did not look up as his young partner passed out, else would the judge have seen the haggard countenance which would have told him more eloquently than words could of the force of the blow that had fallen on Ishmael’s heart.

He went up into his own little room, and sat down at his desk, and leaning his brow upon his hand struggled with the anguish that wrung his heart.

It had fallen, then!  It had fallen—­the crushing blow!  Claudia was betrothed to the viscount.  He might have been, as everyone else was, prepared for this.  But he was not.  For he knew that Claudia was perfectly conscious of his own passionate love for her, and he knew that she loved him with almost equal fervor.  It is true his heart had been often wrung with jealousy when seeing her with Lord Vincent; yet even then he had thought that her vanity only was interested in receiving the attentions of the viscount; and he had trusted in her honor that he believed would never permit her, while loving himself, to marry another, or even give that other serious encouragement.  It is true also that he had never breathed his love to Claudia, for he knew that to do so would be an unpardonable abuse of his position in Judge Merlin’s family, a flagrant breach of confidence, and a fatal piece of presumption that would insure his final banishment from Claudia’s society.  So he had struggled to control his passion, seeing also that Claudia strove to conquer hers.  And though no words passed between them, each knew by secret sympathy the state of the other’s mind.

But lately, since his brilliant success at the bar and the glorious prospect that opened before him, he had begun to hope that Claudia, conscious of their mutual love, would wait for him only a few short years, at the end of which he would be able to offer her a position not unworthy even of Judge Merlin’s daughter.