“My dear Harriet,” said Mr Morfin, after a silence, “I was not prepared for this. Do I understand you that you wish to make your own part in the inheritance available for your good purpose, as well as John’s?”
“Oh, yes,” she returned “When we have shared everything together for so long a time, and have had no care, hope, or purpose apart, could I bear to be excluded from my share in this? May I not urge a claim to be my brother’s partner and companion to the last?”
“Heaven forbid that I should dispute it!” he replied.
“We may rely on your friendly help?” she said. “I knew we might!”
“I should be a worse man than,—than I hope I am, or would willingly believe myself, if I could not give you that assurance from my heart and soul. You may, implicitly. Upon my honour, I will keep your secret. And if it should be found that Mr Dombey is so reduced as I fear he will be, acting on a determination that there seem to be no means of influencing, I will assist you to accomplish the design, on which you and John are jointly resolved.”
She gave him her hand, and thanked him with a cordial, happy face.
“Harriet,” he said, detaining it in his. “To speak to you of the worth of any sacrifice that you can make now—above all, of any sacrifice of mere money—would be idle and presumptuous. To put before you any appeal to reconsider your purpose or to set narrow limits to it, would be, I feel, not less so. I have no right to mar the great end of a great history, by any obtrusion of my own weak self. I have every right to bend my head before what you confide to me, satisfied that it comes from a higher and better source of inspiration than my poor worldly knowledge. I will say only this: I am your faithful steward; and I would rather be so, and your chosen friend, than I would be anybody in the world, except yourself.”
She thanked him again, cordially, and wished him good-night.
“Are you going home?” he said. “Let me go with you.”
“Not tonight. I am not going home now; I have a visit to make alone. Will you come to-morrow?”