blistering in the direct rays of the fierce, untempered sun. The tin
sign bearing the dazzling legend, "Starbottle and Bungstarter, Attorneys
and Counselors," glowed with an insufferable light; the two pine-trees
still left in the clearing around the house, ineffective as shade,
seemed only to have absorbed the day-long heat through every scorched
and crisp twig and fibre, to radiate it again with the pungent smell of
a slowly smouldering fire; the air was motionless yet vibrating in the
sunlight; on distant shallows the half-dried river was flashing and
intolerable.

Seated in a wooden armchair before a table covered with books and
papers, yet with that apparently haughty attitude towards it affected
by gentlemen of abdominal fullness, Colonel Starbottle supported himself
with one hand grasping the arm of his chair and the other vigorously
plying a huge palm-leaf fan. He was perspiring freely. He had taken off
his characteristic blue frock-coat, waistcoat, cravat, and collar, and,
stripped only to his ruffled shirt and white drill trousers, presented
the appearance from the opposite side of the table of having hastily
risen to work in his nightgown. A glass with a thin sediment of sugar
and lemon-peel remaining in it stood near his elbow. Suddenly a black
shadow fell on the staring, uncarpeted hall. It was that of a stranger
who had just entered from the noiseless dust of the deserted road. The
Colonel cast a rapid glance at his sword-cane, which lay on the table.

But the stranger, although sallow and morose-looking, was evidently
of pacific intent. He paused on the threshold in a kind of surly
embarrassment.

"I reckon this is Colonel Starbottle," he said at last, glancing
gloomily round him, as if the interview was not entirely of his own