possible lover, that he would himself have wished to avoid an outward show of displeasure which would have recognized the disagreeable possibility. If anyone had asked him why he shrank in that way, I am not sure that he would at first have said anything fuller or more precise than “ That Ladislaw!”—though on reflection he might have urged that Mr. Casaubon’s codicil, barring Dorothea’s marriage with Will, except under a penalty, was enough to cast unfitness over any relation at all between them. His aversion was all the stronger because he felt himself unable to interfere.
But Sir James was a power in a way unguessed by himself. Entering at that moment, he was an incorporation of the strongest reasons through which Will’s pride became a repellent force, keeping him asunder from Dorothea.