BOOK THE THIRD - GARNERING
7. Chapter Vii - Whelp-hunting (continued)
But, in the morning he appeared at breakfast at the usual hour, and
took his usual place at the table. Aged and bent he looked, and
quite bowed down; and yet he looked a wiser man, and a better man,
than in the days when in this life he wanted nothing - but Facts.
Before he left the room, he appointed a time for them to come to
him; and so, with his gray head drooping, went away.
'Dear father,' said Louisa, when they kept their appointment, 'you
have three young children left. They will be different, I will be
different yet, with Heaven's help.'
She gave her hand to Sissy, as if she meant with her help too.
'Your wretched brother,' said Mr. Gradgrind. 'Do you think he had
planned this robbery, when he went with you to the lodging?'
'I fear so, father. I know he had wanted money very much, and had
spent a great deal.'
'The poor man being about to leave the town, it came into his evil
brain to cast suspicion on him?'
'I think it must have flashed upon him while he sat there, father.
For I asked him to go there with me. The visit did not originate
with him.'
'He had some conversation with the poor man. Did he take him
aside?'
'He took him out of the room. I asked him afterwards, why he had
done so, and he made a plausible excuse; but since last night,
father, and when I remember the circumstances by its light, I am
afraid I can imagine too truly what passed between them.'
'Let me know,' said her father, 'if your thoughts present your
guilty brother in the same dark view as mine.'
'I fear, father,' hesitated Louisa, 'that he must have made some
representation to Stephen Blackpool - perhaps in my name, perhaps
in his own - which induced him to do in good faith and honesty,
what he had never done before, and to wait about the Bank those two
or three nights before he left the town.'
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