She looked as if she were only sister
to Dinah. Adam was silent with surprise and conjecture for some moments,
and then he said, "I hope I've not hurt or displeased you by what I've
said, Dinah. Perhaps I was making too free. I've no wish different from
what you see to be best, and I'm satisfied for you to live thirty mile
off, if you think it right. I shall think of you just as much as I do
now, for you're bound up with what I can no more help remembering than I
can help my heart beating."
Poor Adam! Thus do men blunder. Dinah made no answer, but she presently
said, "Have you heard any news from that poor young man, since we last
spoke of him?"
Dinah always called Arthur so; she had never lost the image of him as
she had seen him in the prison.
"Yes," said Adam. "Mr. Irwine read me part of a letter from him
yesterday. It's pretty certain, they say, that there'll be a peace soon,
though nobody believes it'll last long; but he says he doesn't mean to
come home. He's no heart for it yet, and it's better for others that he
should keep away. Mr. Irwine thinks he's in the right not to come. It's
a sorrowful letter. He asks about you and the Poysers, as he always
does. There's one thing in the letter cut me a good deal: 'You can't
think what an old fellow I feel,' he says; 'I make no schemes now.
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