He smiled again, and said, more gently,-- "And how is Mrs.Hooker ?" Mr.Hooker fixed his eyes on the ceiling, rose, and pretended to look out of the window; then, taking his seat again by the table, as if fronting an imaginary audience, and pulling slowly at his gauntlets after the usual theatrical indication of perfect sangfroid, said,-- "There ain't any!" "Good heavens!" said Brant, with genuine emotion.

"I beg your pardon.
Really, I"-- "Mrs.Hooker and me are divorced," continued Hooker, slightly changing his attitude, and leaning heavily on his sabre, with his eyes still on his fanciful audience.

"There was, you understand"-- lightly tossing his gauntlet aside--"incompatibility of temper--and--we--parted! Ha!" He uttered a low, bitter, scornful laugh, which, however, produced the distinct impression in Brant's mind that up to that moment he had never had the slightest feeling in the matter whatever.
"You seemed to be on such good terms with each other!" murmured Brant vaguely.
"Seemed!" said Hooker bitterly, glancing sardonically at an ideal second row in the pit before him, "yes--seemed! There were other differences, social and political.

You understand that; you have suffered, too." He reached out his hand and pressed Brant's, in heavy effusiveness.

"But," he continued haughtily, lightly tossing his glove again, "we are also men of the world; we let that pass." And it was possible that he found the strain of his present attitude too great, for he changed to an easier position.
"But," said Brant curiously, "I always thought that Mrs.Hooker was intensely Union and Northern ?" "Put on!" said Hooker, in his natural voice.
"But you remember the incident of the flag ?" persisted Brant.
"Mrs.Hooker was always an actress," said Hooker significantly.
"But," he added cheerfully, "Mrs.Hooker is now the wife of Senator Boompointer, one of the wealthiest and most powerful Republicans in Washington--carries the patronage of the whole West in his vest pocket." "Yet, if she is not a Republican, why did she"-- began Brant.
"For a purpose," replied Hooker darkly.