Sir Willoughby drew near her solicitously.
Dr Middleton's mane of silvery hair was in a state bearing witness to the vehemence of the sermon, and Willoughby said: "I hope, sir, you have not made too much of a trifle."
"I believe, sir, that I have produced an effect, and that was the point in contemplation."
"Clara! my dear Clara!" Willoughby touched her.
"She sincerely repents her conduct, I may inform you," said Dr.
Middleton.
"My love!" Willoughby whispered. "We have had a misunderstanding. I am at a loss to discover where I have been guilty, but I take the blame, all the blame. I implore you not to weep. Do me the favour to look at me. I would not have had you subjected to any interrogation whatever."
"You are not to blame," Clara said on a sob.
"Undoubtedly Willoughby is not to blame. It was not he who was bound on a runaway errand in flagrant breach of duty and decorum, nor he who inflicted a catarrh on a brother of my craft and cloth," said her father.
"The clerk, sir, has pronounced Amen," observed Willoughby.
"And no man is happier to hear an ejaculation that he has laboured for with so much sweat of his brow than the parson, I can assure you," Dr. Middleton mildly groaned. "I have notions of the trouble of Abraham. A sermon of that description is an immolation of the parent, however it may go with the child."