The truth is, Mr.Hampton possessed troubles and scruples of his own in connection with this contemplated call.

He had never met the lady; indeed, he could recall very few of her sex, combining respectability and refinement, whom he had met during the past ten years.

But he retained some memory of the husband as having been associated with a strenuous poker game at Placer, in which he also held a prominent place, and it would seem scarcely possible that the wife did not know whose bullet had turned her for some weeks into a sick-nurse.

For Herndon he had not even a second thought, but the possible ordeal of a woman's tongue was another matter.

A cordial reception could hardly be anticipated, and Hampton mentally braced himself for the worst.
There were some other things, also, but these he brushed aside for the present.