Chapter 26 - Page 2

judge and the lawyers, in the corner of the room farthest from the colonel, little was said. A glance about the room showed no one whom the colonel could imagine to be Fetters, and he was about to ask the waiter if that gentleman had yet entered the dining room, when a man came in and sat down on the opposite side of the table. The colonel looked up, and met the cheerful countenance of the liveryman from whom he had hired a horse and buggy some weeks before.

"Howdy do?" said the newcomer amiably. "Hope you've been well."

"Quite well," returned the colonel, "how are you?"

"Oh, just tol'able. Tendin' co't?"

"No, I came down here to see a man that's attending court--your friend Fetters. I suppose he'll be in to dinner."

"Oh, yes, but he ain't come in yet. I reckon you find the ho-tel a little different from the time you were here befo'."

"This is a better dinner than I got," replied the colonel, "and I haven't seen the landlord anywhere, nor his buggy."

"No, he ain't here no more. Sad loss to Carthage! You see Bark Fetters--that's Bill's boy that's come home from the No'th from college--Bark Fetters come down here one day, an' went in the ho-tel, an' when Lee Dickson commenced to put on his big airs, Bark cussed 'im out, and Lee, who didn't know Bark from Adam, cussed 'im back, an' then Bark hauled off an' hit 'im. They had it hot an' heavy for a while. Lee had more strength, but Bark had more science, an' laid Lee out col'. Then Bark went home an' tol' the ole man, who had a mortgage on the ho-tel, an' he sol' Lee up. I hear he's barberin' or somethin' er that sort up to Atlanta, an' the hotel's run by another man. There's Fetters comin' in now."

The colonel glanced in the direction indicated, and was surprised at the appearance of the redoubtable Fetters, who walked over and took his seat at the table with the judge and the lawyers. He had expected to meet a tall, long-haired, red-faced, truculent individual, in a slouch hat and a frock coat, with a loud voice and a dictatorial manner, the typical Southerner of melodrama. He saw a keen-eyed, hard-faced small man, slightly gray, clean-shaven, wearing a well-fitting city-made business suit of light tweed. Except for a few little indications, such as the lack of a crease in his trousers, Fetters looked like any one of a hundred business men whom the colonel might have met on Broadway in any given fifteen minutes during business hours.

The colonel timed his meal so as to leave the dining-room at the same moment with Fetters. He went up to Fetters, who was chewing a toothpick in the office, and made himself known.

"I am Mr. French," he said--he never referred to himself by his military title--"and you, I believe, are Mr. Fetters?"

"Yes, sir, that's my name,"