“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.