“There's my short clay gone, anyhow,” said Tom, submissively, “and I think I 'll go to bed.” And he yawned drearily as he spoke. “Not till you have done this, if we sit here till breakfast-time,” said she, resolutely. “There's the plate, and there's the reference. Read it till you know it!” “What a slave-driver you 'd make, Polly!” said he, with a half-bitter smile. “What a slave I am!” said she, turning away her head. “That's true,” cried he, in a voice thick with emotion; “and when I 'm thousands of miles away, I 'll be longing to hear the bitterest words you ever said to me, rather than never see you any more.” [Illustration: 202] “My poor brother,” said she, laying her hand softly on his rough head, “I never doubted your heart, and I ought to be better tempered with you, and I will. Come, now, Tom,”--and she seated herself at the table next him,--“see, now, if I cannot make this easy to you.” And then the two heads were bent together over the table, and the soft brown hair of the girl half mingled with the rough wool of the graceless numskull beside her. “I will stand by him, if it were only for her sake,” said Conyers to himself. And he stole slowly away, and gained the inn. So intent upon his purpose was he that he at once set about its fulfilment. He began a long letter to his father, and, touching slightly on the accident by which he made Dr. Dill's acquaintance, professed to be deeply his debtor for kindness and attention. With this prelude he introduced Tom. Hitherto his pen had glided along flippantly enough. In that easy mixture of fact and fancy by which he opened his case, no grave difficulty presented itself; but Tom was now to be presented, and the task was about as puzzling as it would have been to have conducted him bodily into society.