He only paused when he stood on the portico before Fentress’ open door.  He glanced about him at the wide fields, bounded by the distant timber lands that hid gloomy bottoms, at the great log barns in the hollow to his right; at the huddle of whitewashed cabins beyond; then with his big fist he reached in and pounded on the door.  The blows echoed loudly through the silent house, and an instant later Fentress’ tall, spare figure was seen advancing from the far end of the hall.

“Who is it?” he asked.

“Judge Price—­Colonel Fentress’’ said the judge.

“Judge Price,” uncertainly, and still advancing.

“I had flattered myself that you must have heard of me,” said the judge.

“I think I have,” said Fentress, pausing now.

“He thinks he has!” muttered the judge under his breath.

“Will you come in?” it was more a question than an invitation.

“If you are at liberty.”  The colonel bowed.  “Allow me,” the judge continued.  “Colonel Fentress—­Mr. Mahaffy, Mr. Yancy and Mr. Cavendish.”  Again the colonel bowed.

“Will you step into the library?”

“Very good,” and the judge followed the colonel briskly down the hall.

When they entered the library Fentress turned and took stock of his guests.  Mahaffy he had seen before; Yancy and Cavendish were of course strangers to him, but their appearance explained them; last of all his glance shifted to the judge.  He had heard something of those activities by means of which Slocum Price had striven to distinguish himself, and he had a certain curiosity respecting the man.  It was immediately satisfied.  The judge had reached a degree of shabbiness seldom equaled, and but for his mellow, effulgent personality might well have passed for a common vagabond; and if his dress advertised the state of his finances, his face explained his habits.  No misconception was possible about either.

“May I offer you a glass of liquor?” asked Fentress, breaking the silence.  He stepped to the walnut centertable where there was a decanter and glasses.  By a gesture the judge declined the invitation.  Whereat the colonel looked surprised, but not so surprised as Mahaffy.  There was another silence.

“I don’t think we ever met before?” observed Fentress.  There was something in the fixed stare his visitor was bending upon him that he found disquieting, just why, he could not have told.

But that fixed stare of the judge’s continued.  No, the man had not changed—­he had grown older certainly, but age had not come ungracefully; he became the glossy broadcloth and spotless linen he wore.  Here was a man who could command the good things of life, using them with a rational temperance.  The room itself was in harmony with his character; it was plain but rich in its appointments, at once his library and his office, while the well-filled cases ranged about the walls showed his tastes to be in the main scholarly and intellectual.