"And do you think he doesn't know it? Will you just go to him and humble yourself to him. I'll engage he shall meet you half-way." "I'm shot if I do," said Tom stoutly, "he began it and he must end it." "I thought you preached the gospel, Tom." "Aye, aye, that's all very well; but there's nothing in the Bible about eating dirt, or letting a man make a door mat of you for him to wipe his feet on. Besides, there's others to think of, Miss Dorothy. There's Ben, for one, and all those whose money is in the concern. They'd never be willing." "You shan't hide behind Ben, nor yet the others. You know very well they'll say aye to anything you said. I know I should, Tom." Is there ought so subtle in this world as a woman's cozening tongue. "Do promise, Tom," and here Dorothy seemed parlously near letting flow the tears she had threatened a while back; "for Ben's sake, for Lucy's sake." "I cannot, Miss Dorothy, do not ask me. You do not know how hard it is for me to say you nay." "For _my_ sake, Tom; because _I_ ask you. Oh! I am so unhappy amid it all. I know not what I say, nor ask." "For your sake? Miss Dorothy, for your sake!" "For mine, Tom," whispered Dorothy, with down cast eyes and burning cheek. How Tom at that moment constrained himself, and withheld the words that leapt to his lips, he could never tell. "For your sake then, Dorothy," was all he said. She placed her hand within his arm, and in a silence that neither cared to break, they turned by mutual impulse to descend the hill homewards. CHAPTER XIV. Tom Pinder lost no time in waiting upon his solicitor and acquainting him with his desire that the proceedings should be stayed even if to stay them meant an ignominious surrender. Mr. Sykes did not conceal his surprise. "What about the plaintiff's costs?" he asked. Tom said he had reason to hope these would not be insisted on. "It is yours I'm much concerned about." "As to them, make your mind easy. I shall make out an account of my actual disbursements, and you must pay me off by such instalments as you find convenient." "But your labour?" protested Tom, "the days of manna are over long ago, and I suppose that if popular opinion were ought to go by lawyers would be the last body of men in the world for whom a special dispensation from the general rule would be made." "Ah well! popular opinion is sometimes wrong, let us hope, despite the saying, _Vox populi vox Dei_." "I thought you were a Radical, Mr. Sykes." "Yes, yes, but I am not so ardent a lover as to be blind to the faults of my mistress. But about this stay of proceedings. I must sound Wimpenny. I'm afraid he'll be for his pound of flesh and all the other blood he can squeeze out of you. He's very sore about that interim injunction and the judge's remarks at the time would scarcely be as balm of Gilead to him." "I suppose Mr. Wimpenny will take his orders from his client."