“If you go off again with your figures of speech, Dinah, there is an end of me, for I have one of those unhappy memories that retain the illustration and forget what it typified. Besides this, here is a man who, out of pure good nature and respect for poor George's memory, has been doing us most important services, written letters innumerable, and taken the most active measures for our benefit. What sort of a figure shall I present if I bring him to book about his rental and the state of his bank account?”
“With the exercise of a little tact, Barrington,—a little management—”
“Ask a man with a club-foot to walk gingerly! I have no more notion of getting at anything by address than I have of tying the femoral artery.”
“The more blunt the better, Peter Barrington. You may tumble into the truth, though you'd never pick your way into it. Meanwhile, leave me to deal with Major M'Cor-mick.”
“You'll do it courteously, Dinah; you'll bear in mind that he is a neighbor of some twenty years' standing?” said Barrington, in a voice of anxiety.
“I 'll do it in a manner that shall satisfy my conscience and his presumption.”
She seated herself at the table as she said this, and dashed off a few hasty lines. Indeed, so hurried was the action, that it looked far more like one of those instances of correspondence we see on the stage than an event of real life.
“Will that do?” said she, showing the lines to Withering.
The old lawyer read them over to himself, a faint twitching of the mouth being the only sign his face presented of any emotion. “I should say admirably,—nothing better.”
“May I see it, Dinah?” asked Peter.