'Not from them. Jane has often spoken of her.'
Sidney again hesitated, then, from a fragmentary beginning, passed
into a detailed account of his relations with Clara. The girl
herself, had she overheard him, could not have found fault with the
way in which the story was narrated. lie represented his love as
from the first without response which could give him serious hope;
her faults he dealt with not as characteristics to be condemned, but
as evidences of suffering, the outcome of cruel conditions. Her
engagement at the luncheon-bar he spoke of as a detestable slavery,
which had wasted her health and driven her in the end to an act of
desperation. What now could be done to aid her? John Hewett was
still in ignorance of the step she had taken, and Sidney described
himself as distracted by conflict between what he felt to be his
duty, and fear of what might happen if he invoked Hewett's
authority. At intervals through the day he had been going backwards
and forwards in the street where Clara had her lodging. He did not
think she would seek to escape from her friends altogether, but her
character and circumstances made it perilous for her to live thus
alone.
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