"How?"
"Pray for his aid; it will surely be given. You trust me, you say; well, I promise you of a certainty that he stands ready to receive you. Will you begin to-day, Pliny?"
"You will despise me if I tell you why I can not," Pliny said, hesitatingly, after a long, and, on Theodore's part, an anxious silence.
"No, I shall not;" he answered, quickly.
"Tell me."
"Well then, it is because, whatever else I may have been, I have never played the hypocrite, and I have sense enough left to know that the effort which you desire me to make, will not accord with an engagement which I have this very evening."
"What is it?"
"To accompany Ben Phillips to the dance at the hotel on the turnpike, nine miles from here. I'm as sure that I will drink wine and brandy to-night, as I am that I lie here, in spite of all the helps in creation, or out of it. So what's the use?"
"Will you give me one great proof of your friendship, Pliny?" was Theodore's eager question.
"I'll give you 'most anything quicker than I would any other mortal," answered Pliny, wearily.