"You've been a very good friend to me and made my mind bigger," declared Lawrence. "A man that can preach patience from your bed of pain, like you do, did ought to be heard. It ain't easy I should reckon." They talked of Enoch's books and his master, who had lately been to see him. "There's one who fears not to look the truth in the face," said the huntsman. "He told me things that only I say to myself, because the rest are too tender to say them. Doctor looks them, but even he won't say them out. But master could tell me I'd soon be gone. He believes in the next world, and don't see no reason in the nature of things why there shouldn't be fox-hunting there." Another visitor dropped in upon Mr. Withycombe. It was Arthur Chaffe in his Sunday black. "If one's enough at a time, I'll be off," he said, "and fetch up again next Sunday." But Enoch welcomed him. "I'm in good fettle, Arthur, and be very willing to make hay while the sun shines." Arthur, however, doubted. "You'm looking so grim as a ghost, my old dear," he answered, "and so white as a dog's tooth." Mr. Withycombe laughed. "You be a cheerful one for a death-bed, sure enough," he answered. "There's no death, Enoch, and you know it so well as what I do." "And you an undertaker! Mind you deal fair and square with me, Chaffe; for death, or no death, 'tis as certain as life that I shall want some of your best seasoned elm afore very long." But Mr. Chaffe steadied the conversation. "You be quiet, Enoch," he said. "This is the Lord's Day and us didn't ought to be joking, like as if 'twas Monday." The hunter took up the challenge and they went at it again, in the best of humour, till Melinda returned and gave the three men tea. They spoke of Dinah and gave examples of her quality and difference from other young women. Mrs. Honeysett tended rather to disparage her of late, having been influenced thereto in certain quarters; but Arthur Chaffe supported Dinah, and Lawrence listened. He presently, however, quoted. "Long ago, before she had to break with poor Bamsey, I remember a word she said to me," he remarked. "It showed she knew a bit about human nature and was finding out that everybody couldn't be relied upon. She asked me if I was faithful. It seemed a curious question at the time." "And you said you was, no doubt?" asked Melinda. "We must all be faithful," declared Arthur Chaffe. "Where there's no faith, there's no progress, and the order of things would run down like a clock." "The world goes round on trust," admitted Mr. Withycombe, "and the more man can trust man, the easier we advance and the quicker. 'Faithful' be the word used between us in business and it wasn't the one we fixed upon for nothing. 'Yours faithfully' we say."