Are you flattered, Mr.Plank ?" He said he was, very pleasantly, perfectly undeceived, and convinced of her purpose--a purpose never even tacitly admitted between them; and the old loneliness came over him again--not resentment, for he was willing that she should use him.

Why not?
Others used him; everybody used him; and if they found no use for him they let him alone.

Mortimer, Fleetwood, Belwether--all, all had something to exact from him.

It was for that he was tolerated--he knew it; he had slowly and unwillingly learned it.

His intrusion among these people, of whom he was not one, would be endured only while he might be turned to some account.