“It is the only objection you have put forward.”
“I did wrong,” said Ethel. “It is not the real one. It is earnest goodness that one honours in Richard. Where do we find it in this man, who has never done anything but yawn over his self indulgence?”
“Now, Ethel, you are working yourself up into a state of foolish prejudice. You and papa have taken a dislike to him; and you are overlooking a great deal of good safe sense and right thinking. I know his opinions are sound, and his motives right. He has been undereducated, we all see, and is not very brilliant or talkative; but I respect Flora for perceiving his solid qualities.”
“Very solid and weighty, indeed!” said Ethel ironically. “I wonder if she would have seen them in a poor curate.”
“Ethel, you are allowing yourself to be carried, by prejudice, a great deal too far. Are such imputations to be made, wherever there is inequality of means? It is very wrong! very unjust!”
“So papa said,” replied Ethel, as she looked sorrowfully down. “He was very angry with me for saying so. I wish I could help feeling as if that were the temptation.”
“You ought,” said Norman. “You will be sorry, if you set yourself, and him, against it.”
“I only wish you to know what I feel; and, I think, Margaret and papa do,” said Ethel humbly; “and then you will not think us more unjust than we are. We cannot see anything so agreeable or suitable in this man as to account for Flora’s liking, and we do not feel convinced of his being good for much. That makes papa greatly averse to it, though he does not know any positive reason for refusing; and we cannot feel certain that she is doing quite right, or for her own happiness.”
“You will be convinced,” said Norman cheerfully. “You will find out the good that is under the surface when you have seen more of him. I have had a good deal of talk with him.”
A good deal of talk to him would have been more correct, if Norman had but been aware of it. He had been at the chief expense of the conversation with George Rivers, and had taken the sounds of assent, which he obtained, as evidences of his appreciation of all his views. Norman had been struggling so long against his old habit of looking down on Richard, and exalting intellect; and had seen, in his Oxford life, so many ill-effects of the knowledge that puffeth up, that he had come to have a certain respect for dullness, per se, of which George Rivers easily reaped the benefit, when surrounded by the halo, which everything at Abbotstoke Grange bore in the eyes of Norman.