"That's all very fine," grumbled Tinker, gloomily. "We may have found _their_ weak spot; but it seems to me they've found one or two of ours--and one sore one, too, judging by the way you squirmed when my Lord rubbed it into you." "Oh! That's nothing," laughed Wimpenny. "I took his salt _cum grano_, and I don't doubt you'll attach the same importance to this little _contretemps_. The trial's the thing.'' "You must win this case, Wimpenny, if money can win it.'' "Money can do anything in this world," said Wimpenny, "at least that's my professional experience." Mr. Tinker left the lawyer's office in anything but a tranquil frame of mind. He felt like a conspirator in a sordid crime. The very paltriness of the issues and the insignificance of his opponent galled and fretted him. But how retreat now that all the world was saying that Tom Pinder was more than a match for Jabez Tinker? CHAPTER XIII. FROM this time onward for some months there is little to record. The parties to the great law suit awaited with what patience they might the final trial of the all-important issue. The failure of the attempt to stay the work at Co-op Mill pending the final decision secured for Tom Pinder and his colleagues a welcome breathing space. If it were possible all hands bent themselves to their respective tasks with increased energy. The check to the plaintiff gave them heart for the present and hope for the future. Every precaution was taken to guard against any fouling or minishing of the stream. The people of the Holme Valley are even to this day a litigious, disputatious race. They are law-loving in an inverted sense. An average native does not feel that he has lived his life unless he has at least once been prosecutor or plaintiff in a "law do." With the poet he may be supposed to sing-- "'Tis better to have sued and lost Than never sued at all."