's money what's done it.
She was always so fond of me, was Pattie, and I thought she loved me
with all her heart, as I did her. But one of her young ladies has got
engaged to a gentleman as is pretty well off, and I s'pose--in fact,
Pattie allowed it was so--they got talking, as girls will, and it's
turned Pattie's head. 'She don't want to marry poor'--them's just her
words--and so she's----"

"Chucked you," said Jim grimly.

Tom sighed deeply. "I told her as my wage, though not big, was
reg'lar, winter and summer, and that was better than a big wage in
the summer and being out of work in the winter; and I don't drink--nor
smoke--and them two things makes a hole in any fellow's wages; but
there--talking ain't no good--argufying don't bring love. I suppose
she don't care for me and that's all about it." He reached out his cup
for more tea and gulped it down; it seemed to help him to gulp down
his feelings.

"I feel a bit done," he said after a minute's silence. "I'll be better
to-morrow. I never thought as how my love-making would end like this."

Jim got up and gave him a hearty thump on his back.

"Don't you be downhearted," he said, "you keep on steady and wait a
bit. You'll be seeing her looking downhearted soon, you mark my word,
and then you can step up and say, 'Is't me you want, my girl?' You're
a right down good fellow, Tom, and she don't know yet what she's
giving up."

Tom looked a little more cheerful. "You can tell Jane," he said,
rising to go.

"That's her on the stairs," answered Jim. "I'm going off to bed, so
you can stay and tell her yourself. She's out of sorts with me."

So Jane, with her jug of supper beer, found only her brother waiting
for her.

She greeted him effusively, and insisted on spreading the table afresh
with meat and bread and cheese, talking incessantly and laughing loud
and long as she did so, and Tom, knowing what it meant, wished he had
gone before her return.

But being there and having come on purpose, in a moment's lull in her
stream of talk, he told her about Pattie.

Her anger against Pattie was unbounded. She hugged Tom and called him
"poor dear," till he pushed her away, and then she said she would pay
the girl out. She would make her repent having used an honest fellow
like that! She was going into Old Keston on Monday for a day's
charring, and she knew well enough where Pattie lived. The garden of
the house where she worked ran down to Pattie's garden, and she