"Killing is a game that two can play at."
"Ah! but 't is an ugly game; and I'll have no hand in it. And—don't you be angry with me, Tom—I've known him longest, and—I love him best."
By pertinacity and vanity in lying, she hit the mark at last. Tom swallowed this figment whole.
"That is but reason," said he. "I take my answer, and I wish ye both many happy days together, and well spent." With this he retired, and blubbered a good hour in an outhouse.
Tom avoided the castle, and fell into low spirits. He told his mother all, and she advised him to change the air. "You have been too long in one place," said she; "I hate being too long in one place myself."
This fired Tom's gypsy blood, and he said he would travel to-morrow, if he could but scrape together money enough to fill a pedler's pack.
He applied for a loan in several quarters, but was denied in all.
At last the poor fellow summoned courage to lay his case before Mrs. Gaunt.
Ryder's influence procured him an interview. She took him into the drawing-room, and bade him wait there. By and by a pale lady, all in black, glided into the room.
He pulled his front hair, and began to stammer something or other.