"Not very clearly, perhaps; but I shall wait a little further explanation. What is it that the respectable public imputes to us?"
"That you are a very dangerous companion for a young lady in a country walk."
"But am I? Don't you think you are in a position to refute such a calumny?"
"Very amusing at some moments; very absent at others; very desirous to be thought lenient and charitable in your judgments of people, while evidently thinking the worst of every one; and with a rare frankness about yourself that, to any one not very much interested to learn the truth, was really as valuable as the true article."
"But you never charged me with any ungenerous use of my advantage; to make professions, for instance, because I found you alone."
"A little--a very little of that--there was; just as children stamp on thin ice and run away when they hear it crack beneath them."
"Yes; and Sally says, if she was in my place, she 'd send papa to you this morning."
"And I should be charmed to see him. There are no people whom I prefer to naval men. They have the fresh, vigorous, healthy tone of their own sea life in all they say."
"Yes; you'd have found him vigorous enough, I promise you."
"And why did you consult your sister at all?"
"I did not consult her; she got all out of me by cross-questioning. She began by saying, 'That man is a mystery to me; he has not come down here to look after the widow nor Isabella; he's not thinking of politics nor the borough; there 's no one here that he wants or cares for. What can he be at?'"
"Could n't you have told her that he was one of those men who have lived so much in the world it is a luxury to them to live a little out of it? Just as it is a relief to sit in a darkened room after your eyes have been dazzled with too strong light. Could n't you have said, He delights to talk and walk with me, because he sees that he may expand freely, and say what comes uppermost, without any fear of an unfair inference? That, for the same reason,--the pleasure of an unrestricted intercourse,--he wishes to know old Mrs. Butler, and talk with her,--over anything, in short? Just to keep mind and faculties moving,--as a light breeze stirs a lake and prevents stagnation?"