"Do we not love you at Hurst Staple?"
"I do not know. But I know this, that you ought to be ashamed of me. I think Adela Gauntlet is my friend; that is, if in our pig-headed country a modest girl may love a man who is neither her brother nor her lover."
"I am sure she is," said Arthur; and then there was another pause. "Do you know," he continued, "I once thought—"
"Thought what?"
"That you were fond of Adela."
"So I am, heartily fond of her."
"But I mean more than that."
"You once thought that I would have married her if I could. That is what you mean."
"Yes," said Wilkinson, blushing to his eyes. But it did not matter; for no one could see him.
"Well, I will make a clean breast of it, Arthur. Men can talk here, sitting in the desert, who would be as mute as death at home in England. Yes; there was once a moment, once one moment, in which I would have married her—a moment in which I flattered myself that I could forget Caroline Waddington. Ah! if I could tell you how Adela behaved!"