A keen intentness suddenly fixed them, and he dropped his head.
"So I think you're wrong, Ricky, in calling this poor Tom a coward because he refuses to try your means of escape," Austin resumed.

"A coward hardly objects to drag in his accomplice.

And, where the person involved belongs to a great family, it seems to me that for a poor plough-lad to volunteer not to do so speaks him anything but a coward." Richard was dumb.

Altogether to surrender his rope and file was a fearful sacrifice, after all the time, trepidation, and study he had spent on those two saving instruments.

If he avowed Tom's manly behaviour, Richard Feverel was in a totally new position.