A step sounded in the narrow hall.  An instant later the door was pushed open, and grateful for any interruption that would serve to take Mr. Saul’s attention from himself, the judge abruptly turned his back on the clerk and began to examine the record before him.  Engrossed in this, he was at first scarcely aware of the conversation that was being carried on within a few feet of him.  Insensibly, however, the cold, level tones of the voice that was addressing itself to Mr. Saul quickened the beat of his pulse, the throb of his heart, and struck back through the years to a day from which he reckoned time.  The heavy, calf-bound volume in his hand shook like a leaf in a gale.  He turned slowly, as if in dread of what he might see.

What he saw was a man verging on sixty, lean and dark, with thin, shaven cheeks of a bluish cast above the jaw, and a strongly aquiline profile.  Long, black locks swept the collar of his coat, while his tall, spare figure was habited in sleek broadcloth and spotless linen.  For a moment the judge seemed to struggle with doubt and uncertainty, then his face went a ghastly white and the book slipped from his nerveless fingers to the window ledge.

The stranger, his business concluded, swung about on his heel and quitted the office.  The judge, his eyes starting from their sockets, stared after him; the very breath died on his lips; speechless and motionless, he was still seeing that tall, spare figure as it had passed before him, but his memories stripped a weight of thirty years from those thin shoulders.  At last, heavy-eyed and somber, he glanced about him.  Mr. Saul, bending above his desk, was making an entry in one of his ledgers.  The judge shuffled to his side.

“Who was that man?” he asked thickly, resting a shaking hand on the clerk’s arm.

“That?—­Oh, that was Colonel Fentress I was just telling you about.”  He looked up from his writing.  “Hello!  You look like you’d seen a ghost!”

“It’s the heat in here—­I reckon—­” said the judge, and began to mop his face.

“Ever seen the colonel before?” asked Mr. Saul curiously.

“Who is he?”

“Well, sir, he’s one of our leading planters, and a mighty fine lawyer.”

“Has he always lived here?”

“No, he came into the county about ten years ago, and bought a place called The Oaks, over toward the river.”

“Has he—­has he a family?” The judge appeared to be having difficulty with his speech.

“Not that anybody knows of.  Some say he’s a widower, others again say he’s an old bachelor; but he don’t say nothing, for the colonel is as close as wax about his own affairs.  So it’s pure conjecture, sir.”  There was a brief silence.  “The county has its conundrums, and the colonel’s one of them,” resumed Mr. Saul.

“Yes?” said the judge.

“The colonel’s got his friends, to be sure, but he don’t mix much with the real quality.”