administration and of which he could render not the least
account.  The obligation thus attributed to her adversary was no
small balm to Ida's resentment; it drew a part of the sting from
her defeat and compelled Mr.  Farange perceptibly to lower his
crest.  He was unable to produce the money or to raise it in any
way; so that after a squabble scarcely less public and scarcely
more decent than the original shock of battle his only issue from
his predicament was a compromise proposed by his legal advisers
and finally accepted by hers. 

His debt was by this arrangement remitted to him and the little
girl disposed of in a manner worthy of the judgement-seat of
Solomon.  She was divided in two and the portions tossed
impartially to the disputants.  They would take her, in rotation,
for six months at a time; she would spend half the year with
each.  This was odd justice in the eyes of those who still blinked
in the fierce light projected from the tribunal--a light in which
neither parent figured in the least as a happy example to youth
and innocence.  What was to have been expected on the evidence was
the nomination, in loco parentis, of some proper third person,