“Be hanged to your easier mind!” spluttered Baldwin. “Is he going to let us have t’ brass, or isn’t he?—that’s t’ question I want answering. Are we to be shamed wi’ wer creditors, or aren’t we? I’ve no time to stand here while you’re raking your mind ower to find fine words.” Inman looked at him steadily but gave no other sign of impatience. “I think he’ll let you have the money,” he said calmly. “He’ll do his level best, anyway, and he’s promised not to pay Drakes or anyone till you’ve had what you want.” “That’s what I’m waiting to get at,” growled Baldwin; “only I don’t like that word ‘think.’ If I’d ha’ gone I’d ha’ known; I wouldn’t ha’ thought; and John ’ud ha’ heard a piece o’ my mind into t’ bargain.” “I was man, not master,” Inman explained, “that was why I should have liked it better if you’d gone yourself. I said all I dare say, seeing that I wasn’t boss; and I’d all my work cut out, I can tell you, to get him to promise.” “It was a try-on, that’s what it was!” Angry as Baldwin showed himself there was a note of relief in his voice, and Inman knew that his master’s greatest care now was to conceal his satisfaction. “He can’t bear to part. T’ more he has and t’ more he wants,—the selfish devil. That’s one good thing you’ve worked anyway. I’ll bet he won’t try t’ same game on wi’ me again for a long time. There’s naught like letting ’em see ’at you can put your foot down.” Inman made no comment, but looked steadily at his boots. He was skilled in all the cunning of face language; and though Baldwin had little of that lore he would have been a fool if he had not realised that his ambassador was holding something back. “You look glum enough for a burying, spite o’ all your cleverness wi’ John,” he sneered. “What ails you?” Inman appeared to rouse himself; but he spoke with unusual hesitation. “Nay, it’s naught but an uneasy feeling.... It isn’t that there’s exactly aught to go by; but....” “But what? Get it out, man, can’t you? The devil take you and your uneasy feelings! John Clegg’s safe as t’ Bank of England, I tell you. If he doesn’t die worth his hundred-thousand I’m no prophet; and he’ll ha’ scraped it up wi’ a bit o’ interest here and a bit there, where mugs have been silly enough to let him, to say naught of his money-lending, and he won’t ha’ worked _that_ at a loss, no fear.” Inman allowed a look of relief to creep into his expression, and a more hopeful tone sounded in his voice as he said: “Well, certainly he ought to have made money and I always reckoned him to be very well off—not a hundred-thousand man, maybe; I wouldn’t have gone so far; but comfortable. It was just that I didn’t altogether like the look of things; and if he isn’t badly worried he’s a good play-actor. But you’re likely to know better’n me; and as I’ve naught fairly to go by, no more’n what I’ve told you, we can leave it at that.”