Job shook his head.
“You’ll not stand it,” said he briefly. “We don’t say anything, but we know right enough you’re a come down. You didn’t start in the same mould as the rest of us.”
“Rubbish,” retorted Antony on a note of half-anger and wholly aghast at the other’s perspicacity. “I’m the same clay as yourself.”
“A duke’s that,” declared Job, “but the mould’s different.”
“Saints alive!” cried Antony, “it’s no matter what the mould may be. Sure, it’s just a question of what it’s been used for at all. My mould has been used for labour since I was little more than a boy, and stiffer labour than this little smiling village has dreamt of, that’s sure. Besides, think of your wife and child, man.”
Job hesitated, debated within his soul. “It’s them I am thinking of,” he said; “I could fend for myself well enough, and snap my fingers at Curtis and his like.”
“Then, ’tis settled,” said Antony with amazing cheerfulness.
There was a silence.
“Well,” said Job at last, “if you’re in the same mind a week hence, but don’t you go for doing things in a hurry-like, that you’ll repent later.”
“’Tis settled now,” said Antony. “Tell your wife, and snap your fingers at that old curmudgeon.”