“But in what way?” Kitty pursued with the same smile. “Don’t you too work for others? What about your cooperative settlement, and your work on the estate, and your book?⁠ ⁠…”

“Oh, but I feel, and particularly just now⁠—it’s your fault,” he said, pressing her hand⁠—“that all that doesn’t count. I do it in a way halfheartedly. If I could care for all that as I care for you!⁠ ⁠… Instead of that, I do it in these days like a task that is set me.”

“Well, what would you say about papa?” asked Kitty. “Is he a poor creature then, as he does nothing for the public good?”

“He?⁠—no! But then one must have the simplicity, the straightforwardness, the goodness of your father: and I haven’t got that. I do nothing, and I fret about it. It’s all your doing. Before there was you⁠—and this too,” he added with a glance towards her waist that she understood⁠—“I put all my energies into work; now I can’t, and I’m ashamed; I do it just as though it were a task set me, I’m pretending.⁠ ⁠…”