"I have a suspicion that Gideon knows human nature about as thoroughly as our General here knows the battles of the Confederacy." "I confess the man rather gripped me," rejoined Stephen.

"There's something about him, personality or mere play-acting, that catches one in spite of oneself." The Judge appeared to acquiesce.

"I am inclined to think," he observed presently, "that the quality you feel in Vetch is simply a violent candour.

Most people give you truth in small quantities; but Vetch pours it out in a torrent.

He offers it to you as Powhatan used to take his Bourbon in the good old days before the Eighteenth Amendment--straight and strong.