54-40 or Fight

There is scarcely a single cause in which a woman is not engaged in some way fomenting the suit.--Juvenal.
"Then you offer me no hope, Doctor?" The gray mane of Doctor Samuel Ward waved like a fighting crest as he made answer:
"Not the sort of hope you ask." A moment later he added: "John, I am ashamed of you."
The cynical smile of the man I called my chief still remained upon his lips, the same drawn look of suffering still remained upon his gaunt features; but in his blue eye I saw a glint which proved that the answer of his old friend had struck out some unused spark of vitality from the deep, cold flint of his heart.