"Aye, with that fool. He's been at me from the start. Naught would do him but he must have his try at it. Let him. He shall play second fiddle, by the Lord Harry!"
He began plucking at some torn scraps of paper, and did not let them rest while he spoke.
"I've been over th' place from top to bottom," he said. "I held out until to-night. To-night I give in, and as soon as I left 'em I came here. Ten minutes after it was done I'd have undone it if I could—I'd have undone it. But it's done, and there's an end on it."
He threw the scraps of paper aside and clenched his hand, speaking through his teeth.
"She's never given me a word to hang on," he said, "and I've done it for her. I've give up what I worked for and boasted on, just to be brought nigher to her. She knows I've done it,—she knows it, though she's never owned it by a look,—and I'll make that enough."
"If you make your way with her," said Murdoch, "you have earned all you won."
"Aye," was the grim answer. "I've earned it."
And soon after the light in the window went out, and they parted outside and went their separate ways in the dark.