He was big boned and tall when he stood up.

“Pendleton,” he said, “I would have come to you, but for my guest.”

And he indicated the elegant young man at the table.

“But I did not send you word to ride a dozen miles through the hills on any trivial business, or out of courtesy to me.  It is a matter of some import, so I will pay ten eagles.”

My father looked steadily at the man.

“I am not for hire,” he said.

My father was a justice of the peace in Virginia, under the English system, by the theory of which the most substantial men in a county undertook to keep the peace for the welfare of the State.  Like Washington in the service of the Colonial army, he took no pay.

The big man laughed.

“We are most of us for purchase, and all of us for hire,” he said.  “I will make it twenty!”

The young man at the table now interrupted.  He was elegant in the costume of the time, in imported linen and cloth from an English loom.  His hair was thick and black; his eyebrows straight, his body and his face rich in the blood and the vitalities of youth.  But sensuality was on him like a shadow.  The man was given over to a life of pleasure.

“Mr. Pendleton,” he said, with a patronizing pedantic air, “the commonwealth is interested to see that litigation does not arise; and to that end, I hope you will not refuse us the benefit of your experience.  We are about to draw up a deed of sale running into a considerable sum, and we would have it court proof.”

He made a graceful gesture with his jeweled hand.

“I would be secure in my purchase, and Zindorf in his eagles, and you, Sir, in the knowledge that the State will not be vexed by any suit between us.  Every contract, I believe, upon some theory of the law, is a triangular affair with the State a party.  Let us say then, that you represent Virginia!”

“In the service of the commonwealth,” replied my father coldly, “I am always to be commanded.”

The man flicked a bit of dust from his immaculate coat sleeve.

“It will be a conference of high powers.  I shall represent Eros; Mr. Pendleton, Virginia; and Zindorf” and he laughed — “his Imperial Master!”

And to the eye the three men fitted to their legend.  The Hellenic God of pleasure in his sacred groves might have chosen for his disciple one from Athens with a face and figure like this youth.  My father bore the severities of the law upon him.  And I have written how strange a creature the third party to this conference was.

He now answered with an oath.

“You have a very pretty wit, Mr. Lucian Morrow,” he said.  “I add to my price a dozen eagles for it.”

The young man shrugged his shoulders in his English coat.

“Smart money, eh, Zindorf . . .  Well, it does not make me smart.  It only makes me remember that Count Augsburg educated you in Bavaria for the Church and you fled away from it to be a slave trader in Virginia.”