Mr. Harthouse, as a thoroughly well-bred man, accustomed to the best society, was not to be surprised⁠—he could as soon have been affected⁠—but he raised his eyelids a little more, as if they were lifted by a feeble touch of wonder. Albeit it was as much against the precepts of his school to wonder, as it was against the doctrines of the Gradgrind College.

“What is the present need, Tom? Three figures? Out with them. Say what they are.”

“ Mr. Harthouse,” returned Tom, now actually crying; and his tears were better than his injuries, however pitiful a figure he made: “it’s too late; the money is of no use to me at present. I should have had it before to be of use to me. But I am very much obliged to you; you’re a true friend.”

A true friend! “Whelp, whelp!” thought Mr. Harthouse, lazily; “what an ass you are!”