In spite of the fact I have noted, that I had lost a certain zest for results, to keep busy seemed to be the only way to relieve my mind of an otherwise intolerable pressure:  and I worked sometimes far into the evening.  In the background of my thoughts lay the necessity of coming to a decision on the question of the senatorship; several times Dickinson and Gorse had spoken of it, and I was beginning to get letters from influential men in other parts of the state.  They seemed to take it for granted that there was no question of my refusing.  The time came when I had grown able to consider the matter with a degree of calmness.  What struck me first, when I began to debate upon it, was that the senatorship offered a new and possibly higher field for my energies, while at the same time the office would be a logical continuation of a signal legal career.  I was now unable to deny that I no longer felt any exhilaration at the prospect of future legal conquests similar to those of the past; but once in the Senate, I might regain something of that intense conviction of fighting for a just and sound cause with which Theodore Wading had once animated me:  fighting there, in the Capitol at Washington, would be different; no stigma of personal gain attached to it; it offered a nearer approach to the ideal I had once more begun to seek, held out hopes of a renewal of my unity of mind.  Mr. Watling had declared that there was something to fight for; I had even glimpsed that something, but I had to confess that for some years I had not been consciously fighting for it.  I needed something to fight for.

There was the necessity, however, of renewing my calculations.  If Hambleton Durrett should recover, even during the ensuing year, and if Nancy relented it would not be possible for us to be divorced and married for some time.  I still clung tenaciously to the belief that there were no relationships wholly unaffected by worldly triumphs, and as Senator I should have strengthened my position.  It did not strike me—­even after all my experience—­that such a course as I now contemplated had a parallel in the one that I had pursued in regard to her when I was young.

It seemed fitting that Theodore Watling should be the first to know of my decision.  I went to Washington to meet him.  It pained me to see him looking more worn, but he was still as cheerful, as mentally vigorous as ever, and I perceived that he did not wish to dwell upon his illness.  I did venture to expostulate with him on the risk he must be running in serving out his term.  We were sitting in the dining room of his house.

“We’ve only one life to live, Hugh,” he answered, smiling at me, “and we might as well get all out of it we can.  A few years more or less doesn’t make much difference—­and I ought to be satisfied.  I’d resign now, to please my wife, to please my friends, but we can’t trust this governor to appoint a safe man.  How little we suspected when we elected him that he’d become infected.  You never can tell, in these days, can you?”