 night, my friend and partner!« He shook his hand in saying this,
as if there had been something serious at the bottom of their conversation; and
they separated.
    By this time, they had visited the family on several occasions, and had
always observed that even a passing allusion to Mr. Henry Gowan when he was not
among them, brought back the cloud which had obscured Mr. Meagles's sunshine on
the morning of the chance encounter at the Ferry. If Clennam had ever admitted
the forbidden passion into his breast, this period might have been a period of
real trial; under the actual circumstances, doubtless it was nothing - nothing.
    Equally, if his heart had given entertainment to that prohibited guest, his
silent fighting of his way through the mental condition of this period might
have been a little meritorious. In the constant effort not to be betrayed into a
new phase of the besetting sin of his experience, the pursuit of selfish objects
by low and small means, and to hold instead to some high principle of honour and
generosity, there might have been a little merit. In the resolution not even to
avoid Mr. Meagles's house, lest, in the selfish sparing of himself, he should
bring any slight distress upon the daughter through making her the cause of an
estrangement which he believed the father would regret, there might have been a
little merit. In the modest truthfulness of always keeping in view the greater
equality of Mr. Gowan's years, and the greater attractions of his person and
manner, there might have been a little merit. In doing all this and much more,
in a perfectly unaffected way and with a manful and composed constancy, while
the pain within him (peculiar as his life and history) was very sharp, there
might have been some quiet strength of character. But, after the resolution he
had made, of course he could have no such merits as these; and such a state of
mind was nobody's - nobody's.
    Mr. Gowan made it no concern of his whether it was nobody's or somebody's.
He preserved his perfect serenity of manner on all occasions, as if the
possibility of Clennam's presuming to have debated the great question were too
distant and ridiculous to be imagined. He had always an affability to bestow on
Clennam and an ease to treat him with, which might of itself (in the
supposititious case of his not having taken that sagacious course) have been a
very uncomfortable element in his state of mind.
    »I quite regret you were not with us
