"Well, go ahead with your story," said the Judge.
"Oh, it’s no story. I was simply telling you when I met old Bill the last time."
"All! Isn’t it enough? I didn’t start to tell a story and you know it well enough. Look here, Howard," he added, turning upon the young lawyer, "are you fixing to jump on me, too?"
"Oh, Uncle Billy, is it? Then I know you’ve got it in for me. Mr. Bradley, I studied for the ministry—not very hard, I admit—but I studied, and I am sorry sometimes that I didn’t go so far as to put on the cloth. It would have at least protected me from ridicule."
Bradley smiled upon him in a lonesome sort of way, with his ear turned toward the front door, listening for the coming of Agnes. The family joke, so eternally green for the Judge, was but dry grass to him. His soul was panting for the sweet waters of love, the babbling brook of a girl’s delightful mischief. But the mind can talk shop while the soul is panting. "You no doubt would have added strength to our profession," he said. "I call it profession in want at the present moment of a better term. Why did you give up your intention? Not want of faith, I hope."
Mrs. Elbridge shook her head as if to imply that there could be no want of faith in one connected with her family. "Well, I don’t know," said William. "But the scheme, if I may so express it, struck me as being not exactly useless, but, let us say, hopeless."
"Yes. The warfare has been going on nearly two thousand years, and the victory is not yet in sight."
"At what date did it begin?" the Judge asked.
William began to puff up. "Now, look here, John, this is a serious discussion. Is it possible that there is nothing serious except in the law, in the names of your old clients? Do you keep everything serious shut up in your safe?"
The Judge’s countenance changed, like the sudden turning down of a light, and he made a distressful gesture. "Don’t, William; don’t say that."
The Judge got up and slowly walked back into his office. William looked at Mrs. Elbridge. "Rachel, did I say anything?"
"He isn’t well, William, and we never know what is going to displease him. But he means nothing by it, Mr. Bradley," she added. "Sometimes he begins to joke in its old way, but it has been long since we heard his laugh in its old heartiness. I wish you would talk to him, Mr. Bradley. I know he is not well, but he won’t permit a doctor to come near him."