arrival. Endearments had been rarer, more formal;
living bodily untroubled and unashamed, and, as she phrased it, having no one to
care for her, she turned insensibly in the direction where she was due; she
slightly imitated Miss Dale's colloquial responsiveness. To tell truth, she felt
vivacious in a moderate way with Willoughby after seeing him with Miss Dale.
Liberty wore the aspect of a towering prison-wall; the desperate undertaking of
climbing one side and dropping to the other was more than she, unaided, could
resolve on; consequently, as no one cared for her, a worthless creature might as
well cease dreaming and stipulating for the fulfilment of her dreams; she might
as well yield to her fate: nay, make the best of it.
    Sir Willoughby was flattered and satisfied. Clara's adopted vivacity proved
his thorough knowledge of feminine nature; nor did her feebleness in sustaining
it displease him. A steady look of hers had of late perplexed the man, and he
was comforted by signs of her inefficiency where he excelled. The effort and the
failure were both of good omen.
    But she could not continue the effort. He had over-weighted her too much for
the mimicry of a sentiment to harden and have an apparently natural place among
her impulses; and now an idea came to her that he might, it might be hoped,
possibly see in Miss Dale, by present contrast, the mate he sought; by contrast
with an unanswering creature like herself, he might perhaps realize in Miss
Dale's greater accomplishments and her devotion to him the merit of suitability;
he might be induced to do her justice. Dim as the loophole was, Clara fixed her
mind on it till it gathered light. And as a prelude to action, she plunged
herself into a state of such profound humility, that to accuse it of being
simulated would be venturesome, though it was not positive. The tempers of the
young are liquid fires in isles of quicksand; the precious metals not yet cooled
in a solid earth. Her compassion for Lætitia was less forced; but really she was
almost as earnest in her self-abasement, for she had not latterly been
brilliant, not even adequate to the ordinary requirements of conversation. She
had no courage, no wit, no diligence, nothing that she could distinguish save
discontentment like a corroding acid, and she went so far in sincerity as with a
curious shift of feeling to pity the man plighted to her. If it suited her
purpose to pity Sir Willoughby, she was not moved by policy, be assured; her