Keeping open house, and hospitable to the point of vulgarity, they were, it was evident, pinchfists when it came to parting with their money.

Still, in the case of a little woman who had served them so faithfully! In thought he set a thick black mark against their name, for their cavalier treatment of his Polly.

And extended it to John Turnham as well.

John had made no move to put hand to pocket; and Polly's niceness of feeling had stood in the way of her applying to him for aid.

It made Mahony yearn to snatch the girl to him, then and there; to set her free of all contact with such coarse-grained, miserly brutes.
Old Ocock negotiated the hire of a neat spring cart for him, and a stout little cob; and at last the day had actually come, when he could set out to bring Polly home.