Little Dorrit - Page 274/462

Daniel Doyce, still wiping his forehead, ploddingly repeated. 'Yes. He

was there, he was there. Oh yes, he was there. And his dog. He was there

too.' 'Miss Meagles is quite attached to--the--dog,' observed Clennam.

'Quite so,' assented his partner. 'More attached to the dog than I am to

the man.' 'You mean Mr--?' 'I mean Mr Gowan, most decidedly,' said Daniel Doyce.

There was a gap in the conversation, which Clennam devoted to winding up

his watch. 'Perhaps you are a little hasty in your judgment,' he said. 'Our

judgments--I am supposing a general case--' 'Of course,' said Doyce.

'Are so liable to be influenced by many considerations, which, almost

without our knowing it, are unfair, that it is necessary to keep a guard

upon them. For instance, Mr--'

'Gowan,' quietly said Doyce, upon whom the utterance of the name almost

always devolved. 'Is young and handsome, easy and quick, has talent, and has seen a

good deal of various kinds of life. It might be difficult to give an

unselfish reason for being prepossessed against him.'

'Not difficult for me, I think, Clennam,' returned his partner. 'I see

him bringing present anxiety, and, I fear, future sorrow, into my old

friend's house. I see him wearing deeper lines into my old friend's

face, the nearer he draws to, and the oftener he looks at, the face

of his daughter. In short, I see him with a net about the pretty and

affectionate creature whom he will never make happy.' 'We don't know,'

said Clennam, almost in the tone of a man in pain, 'that he will not

make her happy.' 'We don't know,' returned his partner, 'that the earth will last another

hundred years, but we think it highly probable.'

'Well, well!' said Clennam, 'we must be hopeful, and we must at least

try to be, if not generous (which, in this case, we have no opportunity

of being), just. We will not disparage this gentleman, because he is

successful in his addresses to the beautiful object of his ambition; and

we will not question her natural right to bestow her love on one whom

she finds worthy of it.' 'Maybe, my friend,' said Doyce. 'Maybe also, that she is too young and

petted, too confiding and inexperienced, to discriminate well.'

'That,' said Clennam, 'would be far beyond our power of correction.' Daniel Doyce shook his head gravely, and rejoined, 'I fear so.'

'Therefore, in a word,' said Clennam, 'we should make up our minds that

it is not worthy of us to say any ill of Mr Gowan. It would be a poor

thing to gratify a prejudice against him. And I resolve, for my part,

not to depreciate him.'