You haven't the same interest
in the work. I hoped once you would have had.'
Adela remembered what her brother had said, but she could not allude
to it. To question was useless. She thought of a previous occasion
on which he had justified himself when accused.
He still held her hand.
'Which would do the most good with this money, he or I?'
'We cannot ask that question.'
'Yes, we can. We ought to. At all events, _I_ ought to. Think what
it means. In my hands the money is used for the good of a suffering
class, for the good of the whole country in the end. He would just
spend it on himself, like other rich men. It isn't every day that a
man of my principles gets the means of putting them into practice.
Eldon is well enough off; long ago he's made up his mind to the loss
of Wanley. It's like robbing poor people just to give money where it
isn't wanted.'
She withdrew her hand, saying coldly:
'I can understand your looking at it in this way. But we can't help
it.'
'Why can't we?' His voice grew disagreeable in its effort to be
insinuating. 'It seems to me that we can and ought to help it. It
would be. quite different if you and I had just been enjoying
ourselves and thinking of no one else.' He thought it a skilful
stroke to unite their names thus. 'We haven't done anything of the
kind; we've denied ourselves all sorts of things just to be able to
spend more on New Wanley.
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