‘But not his daughter?’ said Clennam.
‘No,’ said Doyce.
There was a pause on both sides. Mr Doyce, still looking at the flame of his candle, slowly resumed:
‘The truth is, he has twice taken his daughter abroad in the hope of separating her from Mr Gowan. He rather thinks she is disposed to like him, and he has painful doubts (I quite agree with him, as I dare say you do) of the hopefulness of such a marriage.’
‘There—’ Clennam choked, and coughed, and stopped.
‘Yes, you have taken cold,’ said Daniel Doyce. But without looking at him.
‘—There is an engagement between them, of course?’ said Clennam airily.
‘No. As I am told, certainly not. It has been solicited on the gentleman’s part, but none has been made. Since their recent return, our friend has yielded to a weekly visit, but that is the utmost. Minnie would not deceive her father and mother. You have travelled with them, and I believe you know what a bond there is among them, extending even beyond this present life. All that there is between Miss Minnie and Mr Gowan, I have no doubt we see.’
‘Ah! We see enough!’ cried Arthur.
Mr Doyce wished him Good Night in the tone of a man who had heard a mournful, not to say despairing, exclamation, and who sought to infuse some encouragement and hope into the mind of the person by whom it had been uttered. Such tone was probably a part of his oddity, as one of a crotchety band; for how could he have heard anything of that kind, without Clennam’s hearing it too?