prompt:
Chapter: IT was beyond the middle of August--nearly three weeks after the
birthday feast. The reaping of the wheat had begun in our north midland
county of Loamshire, but the harvest was likely still to be retarded
by the heavy rains, which were causing inundations and much damage
throughout the country. From this last trouble the Broxton and Hayslope
farmers, on their pleasant uplands and in their brook-watered
valleys, had not suffered, and as I cannot pretend that they were such
exceptional farmers as to love the general good better than their own,
you will infer that they were not in very low spirits about the rapid
rise in the price of bread, so long as there was hope of gathering in
their own corn undamaged; and occasional days of sunshine and drying
winds flattered this hope.

The eighteenth of August was one of these days when the sunshine looked
brighter in all eyes for the gloom that went before. Grand masses of
cloud were hurried across the blue, and the great round hills behind the
Chase seemed alive with their flying shadows; the sun was hidden for a
moment, and then shone out warm again like a recovered joy; the leaves,
still green, were tossed off the hedgerow trees by the wind; around the
farmhouses there was a sound of clapping doors; the apples fell in the
orchards; and the stray horses on the green sides of the lanes and on
the common had their manes blown about their faces. And yet the wind
seemed only part of the general gladness because the sun was shining. A
merry day for the children, who ran and shouted to see if they could
top the wind with their voices; and the grown-up people too were in
good spirits, inclined to believe in yet finer days, when the wind had
fallen. If only the corn were not ripe enough to be blown out of the
husk and scattered as untimely seed!

And yet a day on which a blighting sorrow may fall upon a man. For if it
be true that Nature at certain moments seems charged with a presentiment
of one individual lot must it not also be true that she seems unmindful
unconscious of another? For there is no hour that has not its births
of gladness and despair, no morning brightness that does not bring new
sickness to desolation as well as new forces to genius and love. There
are so many of us, and our lots are so different, what wonder that
Nature's mood is often in harsh contrast with the great crisis of
our lives? We are children of a large family, and must learn, as such
children do, not to expect that our hurts will be made much of--to be
content with little nurture and caressing, and help each other the more.

It was a busy day with Adam, who of late had done almost double work,
for he was continuing to act as foreman for Jonathan Burge, until some
satisfactory person could be found to supply his place, and Jonathan was
slow to find that person. But he had done the extra work cheerfully, for
his hopes were buoyant again about Hetty. Every time she had seen him
since the birthday, she had seemed to make an effort to behave all the
more kindly to him, that she might make him understand she had forgiven
his silence and coldness during the dance. He had never mentioned the
locket to her again; too happy that she smiled at him--still happier
because he observed in her a more subdued air, something that he
interpreted as the growth of womanly tenderness and seriousness. "Ah!"
he thought, again and again, "she's only seventeen; she'll be thoughtful
enough after a while. And her aunt allays says how clever she is at the
work. She'll make a wife as Mother'll have no occasion to grumble at,
after all." To be sure, he had only seen her at home twice since the
birthday; for one Sunday, when he was intending to go from church to the
Hall Farm, Hetty had joined the party of upper servants from the Chase
and had gone home with them--almost as if she were inclined to encourage
Mr. Craig. "She's takin' too much likin' to them folks i' the house
keeper's room," Mrs. Poyser remarked. "For my part, I was never overfond
o' gentlefolks's servants--they're mostly like the fine ladies' fat
dogs, nayther good for barking nor butcher's meat, but on'y for show."
And another evening she was gone to Treddleston to buy some things;
though, to his great surprise, as he was returning home, he saw her at
a distance getting over a stile quite out of the Treddleston road. But,
when he hastened to her, she was very kind, and asked him to go in again
when he had taken her to the yard gate. She had gone a little farther
into the fields after coming from Treddleston because she didn't want to
go in, she said: it was so nice to be out of doors, and her aunt always
made such a fuss about it if she wanted to go out. "Oh, do come in with
me!" she said, as he was going to shake hands with her at the gate, and
he could not resist that. So he went in, and Mrs. Poyser was contented
with only a slight remark on Hetty's being later than was expected;
while Hetty, who had looked out of spirits when he met her, smiled and
talked and waited on them all with unusual promptitude.

That was the last time he had seen her; but he meant to make leisure for
going to the Farm to-morrow. To-day, he knew, was her day for going to
the Chase to sew with the lady's maid, so he would get as much work done
as possible this evening, that the next might be clear.

One piece of work that Adam was superintending was some slight repairs
at the Chase Farm, which had been hitherto occupied by Satchell, as
bailiff, but which it was now rumoured that the old squire was going to
let to a smart man in top-boots, who had been seen to ride over it
one day. Nothing but the desire to get a tenant could account for the
squire's undertaking repairs, though the Saturday-evening party at Mr.
Casson's agreed over their pipes that no man in his senses would take
the Chase Farm unless there was a bit more ploughland laid to it.
However that might be, the repairs were ordered to be executed with all
dispatch, and Adam, acting for Mr. Burge, was carrying out the order
with his usual energy. But to-day, having been occupied elsewhere,
he had not been able to arrive at the Chase Farm till late in the
afternoon, and he then discovered that some old roofing, which he had
calculated on preserving, had given way. There was clearly no good to
be done with this part of the building without pulling it all down, and
Adam immediately saw in his mind a plan for building it up again, so as
to make the most convenient of cow-sheds and calf-pens, with a hovel for
implements; and all without any great expense for materials. So, when
the workmen were gone, he sat down, took out his pocket-book, and
busied himself with sketching a plan, and making a specification of the
expenses that he might show it to Burge the next morning, and set him
on persuading the squire to consent. To "make a good job" of anything,
however small, was always a pleasure to Adam, and he sat on a block,
with his book resting on a planing-table, whistling low every now and
then and turning his head on one side with a just perceptible smile of
gratification--of pride, too, for if Adam loved a bit of good work, he
loved also to think, "I did it!" And I believe the only people who are
free from that weakness are those who have no work to call their own. It
was nearly seven before he had finished and put on his jacket again; and
on giving a last look round, he observed that Seth, who had been working
here to-day, had left his basket of tools behind him. "Why, th' lad's
forgot his tools," thought Adam, "and he's got to work up at the shop
to-morrow. There never was such a chap for wool-gathering; he'd leave
his head behind him, if it was loose. However, it's lucky I've seen 'em;
I'll carry 'em home."

The buildings of the Chase Farm lay at one extremity of the Chase,
at about ten minutes' walking distance from the Abbey. Adam had come
thither on his pony, intending to ride to the stables and put up his nag
on his way home. At the stables he encountered Mr. Craig, who had come
to look at the captain's new horse, on which he was to ride away the day
after to-morrow; and Mr. Craig detained him to tell how all the servants
were to collect at the gate of the courtyard to wish the young squire
luck as he rode out; so that by the time Adam had got into the Chase,
and was striding along with the basket of tools over his shoulder, the
sun was on the point of setting, and was sending level crimson rays
among the great trunks of the old oaks, and touching every bare patch of
ground with a transient glory that made it look like a jewel dropt upon
the grass. The wind had fallen now, and there was only enough breeze to
stir the delicate-stemmed leaves. Any one who had been sitting in the
house all day would have been glad to walk now; but Adam had been quite
enough in the open air to wish to shorten his way home, and he bethought
himself that he might do so by striking across the Chase and going
through the Grove, where he had never been for years. He hurried on
across the Chase, stalking along the narrow paths between the fern, with
Gyp at his heels, not lingering to watch the magnificent changes of the
light--hardly once thinking of it--yet feeling its presence in a certain
calm happy awe which mingled itself with his busy working-day thoughts.
How could he help feeling it? The very deer felt it, and were more
timid.

Presently Adam's thoughts recurred to what Mr. Craig had said about
Arthur Donnithorne, and pictured his going away, and the changes
that might take place before he came back; then they travelled back
affectionately over the old scenes of boyish companionship, and dwelt
on Arthur's good qualities, which Adam had a pride in, as we all have in
the virtues of the superior who honours us. A nature like Adam's, with
a great need of love and reverence in it, depends for so much of its
happiness on what it can believe and feel about others! And he had no
ideal world of dead heroes; he knew little of the life of men in
the past; he must find the beings to whom he could cling with loving
admiration among those who came within speech of him. These pleasant
thoughts about Arthur brought a milder expression than usual into his
keen rough face: perhaps they were the reason why, when he opened the
old green gate leading into the Grove, he paused to pat Gyp and say a
kind word to him.

After that pause, he strode on again along the broad winding path
through the Grove. What grand beeches! Adam delighted in a fine tree of
all things; as the fisherman's sight is keenest on the sea, so Adam's
perceptions were more at home with trees than with other objects. He
kept them in his memory, as a painter does, with all the flecks and
knots in their bark, all the curves and angles of their boughs, and had
often calculated the height and contents of a trunk to a nicety, as he
stood looking at it. No wonder that, not-withstanding his desire to get
on, he could not help pausing to look at a curious large beech which
he had seen standing before him at a turning in the road, and convince
himself that it was not two trees wedded together, but only one. For the
rest of his life he remembered that moment when he was calmly examining
the beech, as a man remembers his last glimpse of the home where his
youth was passed, before the road turned, and he saw it no more. The
beech stood at the last turning before the Grove ended in an archway of
boughs that let in the eastern light; and as Adam stepped away from the
tree to continue his walk, his eyes fell on two figures about twenty
yards before him.

He remained as motionless as a statue, and turned almost as pale. The
two figures were standing opposite to each other, with clasped hands
about to part; and while they were bending to kiss, Gyp, who had been
running among the brushwood, came out, caught sight of them, and gave
a sharp bark. They separated with a start--one hurried through the gate
out of the Grove, and the other, turning round, walked slowly, with
a sort of saunter, towards Adam who still stood transfixed and pale,
clutching tighter the stick with which he held the basket of tools over
his shoulder, and looking at the approaching figure with eyes in which
amazement was fast turning to fierceness.

Arthur Donnithorne looked flushed and excited; he had tried to make
unpleasant feelings more bearable by drinking a little more wine than
usual at dinner to-day, and was still enough under its flattering
influence to think more lightly of this unwished-for rencontre with Adam
than he would otherwise have done. After all, Adam was the best person
who could have happened to see him and Hetty together--he was a sensible
fellow, and would not babble about it to other people. Arthur felt
confident that he could laugh the thing off and explain it away. And so
he sauntered forward with elaborate carelessness--his flushed face, his
evening dress of fine cloth and fine linen, his hands half-thrust into
his waistcoat pockets, all shone upon by the strange evening light which
the light clouds had caught up even to the zenith, and were now shedding
down between the topmost branches above him.

Adam was still motionless, looking at him as he came up. He understood
it all now--the locket and everything else that had been doubtful to
him: a terrible scorching light showed him the hidden letters that
changed the meaning of the past. If he had moved a muscle, he must
inevitably have sprung upon Arthur like a tiger; and in the conflicting
emotions that filled those long moments, he had told himself that he
would not give loose to passion, he would only speak the right thing.
He stood as if petrified by an unseen force, but the force was his own
strong will.

"Well, Adam," said Arthur, "you've been looking at the fine old beeches,
eh? They're not to be come near by the hatchet, though; this is a sacred
grove. I overtook pretty little Hetty Sorrel as I was coming to my
den--the Hermitage, there. She ought not to come home this way so late.
So I took care of her to the gate, and asked for a kiss for my pains.
But I must get back now, for this road is confoundedly damp. Good-night,
Adam. I shall see you to-morrow--to say good-bye, you know."

Arthur was too much preoccupied with the part he was playing himself to
be thoroughly aware of the expression in Adam's face. He did not look
directly at Adam, but glanced carelessly round at the trees and then
lifted up one foot to look at the sole of his boot. He cared to say no
more--he had thrown quite dust enough into honest Adam's eyes--and as he
spoke the last words, he walked on.

"Stop a bit, sir," said Adam, in a hard peremptory voice, without
turning round. "I've got a word to say to you."

Arthur paused in surprise. Susceptible persons are more affected by
a change of tone than by unexpected words, and Arthur had the
susceptibility of a nature at once affectionate and vain. He was still
more surprised when he saw that Adam had not moved, but stood with his
back to him, as if summoning him to return. What did he mean? He was
going to make a serious business of this affair. Arthur felt his temper
rising. A patronising disposition always has its meaner side, and in the
confusion of his irritation and alarm there entered the feeling that a
man to whom he had shown so much favour as to Adam was not in a position
to criticize his conduct. And yet he was dominated, as one who feels
himself in the wrong always is, by the man whose good opinion he cares
for. In spite of pride and temper, there was as much deprecation as
anger in his voice when he said, "What do you mean, Adam?"

"I mean, sir"--answered Adam, in the same harsh voice, still without
turning round--"I mean, sir, that you don't deceive me by your light
words. This is not the first time you've met Hetty Sorrel in this grove,
and this is not the first time you've kissed her."

Arthur felt a startled uncertainty how far Adam was speaking from
knowledge, and how far from mere inference. And this uncertainty,
which prevented him from contriving a prudent answer, heightened his
irritation. He said, in a high sharp tone, "Well, sir, what then?"

"Why, then, instead of acting like th' upright, honourable man we've
all believed you to be, you've been acting the part of a selfish
light-minded scoundrel. You know as well as I do what it's to lead to
when a gentleman like you kisses and makes love to a young woman like
Hetty, and gives her presents as she's frightened for other folks
to see. And I say it again, you're acting the part of a selfish
light-minded scoundrel though it cuts me to th' heart to say so, and I'd
rather ha' lost my right hand."

"Let me tell you, Adam," said Arthur, bridling his growing anger and
trying to recur to his careless tone, "you're not only devilishly
impertinent, but you're talking nonsense. Every pretty girl is not such
a fool as you, to suppose that when a gentleman admires her beauty and
pays her a little attention, he must mean something particular. Every
man likes to flirt with a pretty girl, and every pretty girl likes to be
flirted with. The wider the distance between them, the less harm there
is, for then she's not likely to deceive herself."

"I don't know what you mean by flirting," said Adam, "but if you mean
behaving to a woman as if you loved her, and yet not loving her all
the while, I say that's not th' action of an honest man, and what isn't
honest does come t' harm. I'm not a fool, and you're not a fool, and you
know better than what you're saying. You know it couldn't be made
public as you've behaved to Hetty as y' have done without her losing her
character and bringing shame and trouble on her and her relations. What
if you meant nothing by your kissing and your presents? Other folks
won't believe as you've meant nothing; and don't tell me about her not
deceiving herself. I tell you as you've filled her mind so with the
thought of you as it'll mayhap poison her life, and she'll never love
another man as 'ud make her a good husband."

Arthur had felt a sudden relief while Adam was speaking; he perceived
that Adam had no positive knowledge of the past, and that there was no
irrevocable damage done by this evening's unfortunate rencontre. Adam
could still be deceived. The candid Arthur had brought himself into a
position in which successful lying was his only hope. The hope allayed
his anger a little.

"Well, Adam," he said, in a tone of friendly concession, "you're perhaps
right. Perhaps I've gone a little too far in taking notice of the pretty
little thing and stealing a kiss now and then. You're such a grave,
steady fellow, you don't understand the temptation to such trifling.
I'm sure I wouldn't bring any trouble or annoyance on her and the good
Poysers on any account if I could help it. But I think you look a little
too seriously at it. You know I'm going away immediately, so I shan't
make any more mistakes of the kind. But let us say good-night"--Arthur
here turned round to walk on--"and talk no more about the matter. The
whole thing will soon be forgotten."

"No, by God!" Adam burst out with rage that could be controlled no
longer, throwing down the basket of tools and striding forward till he
was right in front of Arthur. All his jealousy and sense of personal
injury, which he had been hitherto trying to keep under, had leaped up
and mastered him. What man of us, in the first moments of a sharp
agony, could ever feel that the fellow-man who has been the medium of
inflicting it did not mean to hurt us? In our instinctive rebellion
against pain, we are children again, and demand an active will to wreak
our vengeance on. Adam at this moment could only feel that he had
been robbed of Hetty--robbed treacherously by the man in whom he had
trusted--and he stood close in front of Arthur, with fierce eyes glaring
at him, with pale lips and clenched hands, the hard tones in which he
had hitherto been constraining himself to express no more than a just
indignation giving way to a deep agitated voice that seemed to shake him
as he spoke.

"No, it'll not be soon forgot, as you've come in between her and me,
when she might ha' loved me--it'll not soon be forgot as you've robbed
me o' my happiness, while I thought you was my best friend, and a
noble-minded man, as I was proud to work for. And you've been kissing
her, and meaning nothing, have you? And I never kissed her i' my
life--but I'd ha' worked hard for years for the right to kiss her. And
you make light of it. You think little o' doing what may damage other
folks, so as you get your bit o' trifling, as means nothing. I throw
back your favours, for you're not the man I took you for. I'll never
count you my friend any more. I'd rather you'd act as my enemy, and
fight me where I stand--it's all th' amends you can make me."

Poor Adam, possessed by rage that could find no other vent, began to
throw off his coat and his cap, too blind with passion to notice the
change that had taken place in Arthur while he was speaking. Arthur's
lips were now as pale as Adam's; his heart was beating violently. The
discovery that Adam loved Hetty was a shock which made him for the
moment see himself in the light of Adam's indignation, and regard Adam's
suffering as not merely a consequence, but an element of his error.
The words of hatred and contempt--the first he had ever heard in his
life--seemed like scorching missiles that were making ineffaceable scars
on him. All screening self-excuse, which rarely falls quite away while
others respect us, forsook him for an instant, and he stood face to face
with the first great irrevocable evil he had ever committed. He was
only twenty-one, and three months ago--nay, much later--he had thought
proudly that no man should ever be able to reproach him justly. His
first impulse, if there had been time for it, would perhaps have been to
utter words of propitiation; but Adam had no sooner thrown off his
coat and cap than he became aware that Arthur was standing pale and
motionless, with his hands still thrust in his waistcoat pockets.

"What!" he said, "won't you fight me like a man? You know I won't strike
you while you stand so."

"Go away, Adam," said Arthur, "I don't want to fight you."

"No," said Adam, bitterly; "you don't want to fight me--you think I'm a
common man, as you can injure without answering for it."

"I never meant to injure you," said Arthur, with returning anger. "I
didn't know you loved her."

"But you've made her love you," said Adam. "You're a double-faced
man--I'll never believe a word you say again."

"Go away, I tell you," said Arthur, angrily, "or we shall both repent."

"No," said Adam, with a convulsed voice, "I swear I won't go away
without fighting you. Do you want provoking any more? I tell you you're
a coward and a scoundrel, and I despise you."

The colour had all rushed back to Arthur's face; in a moment his right
hand was clenched, and dealt a blow like lightning, which sent Adam
staggering backward. His blood was as thoroughly up as Adam's now, and
the two men, forgetting the emotions that had gone before, fought
with the instinctive fierceness of panthers in the deepening twilight
darkened by the trees. The delicate-handed gentleman was a match for the
workman in everything but strength, and Arthur's skill enabled him to
protract the struggle for some long moments. But between unarmed men the
battle is to the strong, where the strong is no blunderer, and Arthur
must sink under a well-planted blow of Adam's as a steel rod is broken
by an iron bar. The blow soon came, and Arthur fell, his head lying
concealed in a tuft of fern, so that Adam could only discern his darkly
clad body.

He stood still in the dim light waiting for Arthur to rise.

The blow had been given now, towards which he had been straining all the
force of nerve and muscle--and what was the good of it? What had he
done by fighting? Only satisfied his own passion, only wreaked his own
vengeance. He had not rescued Hetty, nor changed the past--there it was,
just as it had been, and he sickened at the vanity of his own rage.

But why did not Arthur rise? He was perfectly motionless, and the time
seemed long to Adam. Good God! had the blow been too much for him? Adam
shuddered at the thought of his own strength, as with the oncoming of
this dread he knelt down by Arthur's side and lifted his head from among
the fern. There was no sign of life: the eyes and teeth were set. The
horror that rushed over Adam completely mastered him, and forced upon
him its own belief. He could feel nothing but that death was in Arthur's
face, and that he was helpless before it. He made not a single movement,
but knelt like an image of despair gazing at an image of death.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: Book Fourth Chapter 27: A Crisis Three weeks after Arthur's party, just before harvest, as the apples are falling in the orchards, the crisis that has been building erupts. Adam's hopes have been buoyed again, and he is working double, for the squire and Jonathan Burge. Hetty seems more serious and mature to Adam these days. She is still getting her sewing lessons, and on the night she is coming home through the wood, Adam is taking a short cut through there after having done repairs on the Chase Farm. He hears that Arthur is leaving in two days to join his regiment. Just as the sun is setting he sees two figures in the wood, and he freezes. They are kissing and saying goodbye. Gyp barks, and the figures break apart. One figure rushes out the gate to the fields, while the other comes towards Adam in the wood. It is Arthur, slightly drunk, swaggering and trying to bluff with Adam about the incident. He thinks Adam is the best person to have caught him and Hetty together, for he can be trusted not to tell anyone. He mentions casually that he just gave Hetty a kiss after walking with her, and he tries to pass by Adam, as if no harm had been done. It was just a bit of flirting, he says. Adam tells him to wait, and accuses him of being two-faced, for Hetty could have loved him if Arthur, whom he thought his friend, hadn't ruined it. Arthur is shocked that Adam loves Hetty, and begins to see the whole affair as much more serious than he imagined. Adam's blood is up, and he taunts Arthur until he fights. The two begin a furious fist fight until Adam knocks Arthur down, and he does not get up. Adam is terrified of his own strength, afraid that he has killed Arthur.


prompt:
Chapter: IT was only a few minutes measured by the clock--though Adam always
thought it had been a long while--before he perceived a gleam of
consciousness in Arthur's face and a slight shiver through his frame.
The intense joy that flooded his soul brought back some of the old
affection with it.

"Do you feel any pain, sir?" he said, tenderly, loosening Arthur's
cravat.

Arthur turned his eyes on Adam with a vague stare which gave way to a
slightly startled motion as if from the shock of returning memory. But
he only shivered again and said nothing.

"Do you feel any hurt, sir?" Adam said again, with a trembling in his
voice.

Arthur put his hand up to his waistcoat buttons, and when Adam had
unbuttoned it, he took a longer breath. "Lay my head down," he said,
faintly, "and get me some water if you can."

Adam laid the head down gently on the fern again, and emptying the tools
out of the flag-basket, hurried through the trees to the edge of the
Grove bordering on the Chase, where a brook ran below the bank.

When he returned with his basket leaking, but still half-full, Arthur
looked at him with a more thoroughly reawakened consciousness.

"Can you drink a drop out o' your hand, sir?" said Adam, kneeling down
again to lift up Arthur's head.

"No," said Arthur, "dip my cravat in and souse it on my head."

The water seemed to do him some good, for he presently raised himself a
little higher, resting on Adam's arm.

"Do you feel any hurt inside sir?" Adam asked again

"No--no hurt," said Arthur, still faintly, "but rather done up."

After a while he said, "I suppose I fainted away when you knocked me
down."

"Yes, sir, thank God," said Adam. "I thought it was worse."

"What! You thought you'd done for me, eh? Come help me on my legs."

"I feel terribly shaky and dizzy," Arthur said, as he stood leaning
on Adam's arm; "that blow of yours must have come against me like a
battering-ram. I don't believe I can walk alone."

"Lean on me, sir; I'll get you along," said Adam. "Or, will you sit down
a bit longer, on my coat here, and I'll prop y' up. You'll perhaps be
better in a minute or two."

"No," said Arthur. "I'll go to the Hermitage--I think I've got some
brandy there. There's a short road to it a little farther on, near the
gate. If you'll just help me on."

They walked slowly, with frequent pauses, but without speaking again.
In both of them, the concentration in the present which had attended
the first moments of Arthur's revival had now given way to a vivid
recollection of the previous scene. It was nearly dark in the narrow
path among the trees, but within the circle of fir-trees round the
Hermitage there was room for the growing moonlight to enter in at the
windows. Their steps were noiseless on the thick carpet of fir-needles,
and the outward stillness seemed to heighten their inward consciousness,
as Arthur took the key out of his pocket and placed it in Adam's hand,
for him to open the door. Adam had not known before that Arthur had
furnished the old Hermitage and made it a retreat for himself, and it
was a surprise to him when he opened the door to see a snug room with
all the signs of frequent habitation.

Arthur loosed Adam's arm and threw himself on the ottoman. "You'll see
my hunting-bottle somewhere," he said. "A leather case with a bottle and
glass in."

Adam was not long in finding the case. "There's very little brandy in
it, sir," he said, turning it downwards over the glass, as he held it
before the window; "hardly this little glassful."

"Well, give me that," said Arthur, with the peevishness of physical
depression. When he had taken some sips, Adam said, "Hadn't I better
run to th' house, sir, and get some more brandy? I can be there and
back pretty soon. It'll be a stiff walk home for you, if you don't have
something to revive you."

"Yes--go. But don't say I'm ill. Ask for my man Pym, and tell him to get
it from Mills, and not to say I'm at the Hermitage. Get some water too."

Adam was relieved to have an active task--both of them were relieved to
be apart from each other for a short time. But Adam's swift pace could
not still the eager pain of thinking--of living again with concentrated
suffering through the last wretched hour, and looking out from it over
all the new sad future.

Arthur lay still for some minutes after Adam was gone, but presently
he rose feebly from the ottoman and peered about slowly in the broken
moonlight, seeking something. It was a short bit of wax candle that
stood amongst a confusion of writing and drawing materials. There was
more searching for the means of lighting the candle, and when that was
done, he went cautiously round the room, as if wishing to assure himself
of the presence or absence of something. At last he had found a slight
thing, which he put first in his pocket, and then, on a second thought,
took out again and thrust deep down into a waste-paper basket. It was a
woman's little, pink, silk neckerchief. He set the candle on the table,
and threw himself down on the ottoman again, exhausted with the effort.

When Adam came back with his supplies, his entrance awoke Arthur from a
doze.

"That's right," Arthur said; "I'm tremendously in want of some
brandy-vigour."

"I'm glad to see you've got a light, sir," said Adam. "I've been
thinking I'd better have asked for a lanthorn."

"No, no; the candle will last long enough--I shall soon be up to walking
home now."

"I can't go before I've seen you safe home, sir," said Adam,
hesitatingly.

"No: it will be better for you to stay--sit down."

Adam sat down, and they remained opposite to each other in uneasy
silence, while Arthur slowly drank brandy-and-water, with visibly
renovating effect. He began to lie in a more voluntary position, and
looked as if he were less overpowered by bodily sensations. Adam was
keenly alive to these indications, and as his anxiety about Arthur's
condition began to be allayed, he felt more of that impatience which
every one knows who has had his just indignation suspended by the
physical state of the culprit. Yet there was one thing on his mind to be
done before he could recur to remonstrance: it was to confess what had
been unjust in his own words. Perhaps he longed all the more to make
this confession, that his indignation might be free again; and as he saw
the signs of returning ease in Arthur, the words again and again came to
his lips and went back, checked by the thought that it would be better
to leave everything till to-morrow. As long as they were silent they did
not look at each other, and a foreboding came across Adam that if they
began to speak as though they remembered the past--if they looked at
each other with full recognition--they must take fire again. So they sat
in silence till the bit of wax candle flickered low in the socket, the
silence all the while becoming more irksome to Adam. Arthur had just
poured out some more brandy-and-water, and he threw one arm behind his
head and drew up one leg in an attitude of recovered ease, which was an
irresistible temptation to Adam to speak what was on his mind.

"You begin to feel more yourself again, sir," he said, as the candle
went out and they were half-hidden from each other in the faint
moonlight.

"Yes: I don't feel good for much--very lazy, and not inclined to move;
but I'll go home when I've taken this dose."

There was a slight pause before Adam said, "My temper got the better of
me, and I said things as wasn't true. I'd no right to speak as if you'd
known you was doing me an injury: you'd no grounds for knowing it; I've
always kept what I felt for her as secret as I could."

He paused again before he went on.

"And perhaps I judged you too harsh--I'm apt to be harsh--and you may
have acted out o' thoughtlessness more than I should ha' believed was
possible for a man with a heart and a conscience. We're not all put
together alike, and we may misjudge one another. God knows, it's all the
joy I could have now, to think the best of you."

Arthur wanted to go home without saying any more--he was too painfully
embarrassed in mind, as well as too weak in body, to wish for any
further explanation to-night. And yet it was a relief to him that Adam
reopened the subject in a way the least difficult for him to answer.
Arthur was in the wretched position of an open, generous man who has
committed an error which makes deception seem a necessity. The native
impulse to give truth in return for truth, to meet trust with frank
confession, must be suppressed, and duty was becoming a question of
tactics. His deed was reacting upon him--was already governing him
tyrannously and forcing him into a course that jarred with his habitual
feelings. The only aim that seemed admissible to him now was to deceive
Adam to the utmost: to make Adam think better of him than he deserved.
And when he heard the words of honest retractation--when he heard the
sad appeal with which Adam ended--he was obliged to rejoice in
the remains of ignorant confidence it implied. He did not answer
immediately, for he had to be judicious and not truthful.

"Say no more about our anger, Adam," he said, at last, very languidly,
for the labour of speech was unwelcome to him; "I forgive your momentary
injustice--it was quite natural, with the exaggerated notions you had in
your mind. We shall be none the worse friends in future, I hope, because
we've fought. You had the best of it, and that was as it should be, for
I believe I've been most in the wrong of the two. Come, let us shake
hands."

Arthur held out his hand, but Adam sat still.

"I don't like to say 'No' to that, sir," he said, "but I can't shake
hands till it's clear what we mean by't. I was wrong when I spoke as
if you'd done me an injury knowingly, but I wasn't wrong in what I said
before, about your behaviour t' Hetty, and I can't shake hands with you
as if I held you my friend the same as ever till you've cleared that up
better."

Arthur swallowed his pride and resentment as he drew back his hand.
He was silent for some moments, and then said, as indifferently as he
could, "I don't know what you mean by clearing up, Adam. I've told you
already that you think too seriously of a little flirtation. But if
you are right in supposing there is any danger in it--I'm going away on
Saturday, and there will be an end of it. As for the pain it has given
you, I'm heartily sorry for it. I can say no more."

Adam said nothing, but rose from his chair and stood with his face
towards one of the windows, as if looking at the blackness of the
moonlit fir-trees; but he was in reality conscious of nothing but the
conflict within him. It was of no use now--his resolution not to speak
till to-morrow. He must speak there and then. But it was several minutes
before he turned round and stepped nearer to Arthur, standing and
looking down on him as he lay.

"It'll be better for me to speak plain," he said, with evident effort,
"though it's hard work. You see, sir, this isn't a trifle to me,
whatever it may be to you. I'm none o' them men as can go making love
first to one woman and then t' another, and don't think it much odds
which of 'em I take. What I feel for Hetty's a different sort o' love,
such as I believe nobody can know much about but them as feel it and God
as has given it to 'em. She's more nor everything else to me, all but
my conscience and my good name. And if it's true what you've been saying
all along--and if it's only been trifling and flirting as you call it,
as 'll be put an end to by your going away--why, then, I'd wait, and
hope her heart 'ud turn to me after all. I'm loath to think you'd speak
false to me, and I'll believe your word, however things may look."

"You would be wronging Hetty more than me not to believe it," said
Arthur, almost violently, starting up from the ottoman and moving away.
But he threw himself into a chair again directly, saying, more feebly,
"You seem to forget that, in suspecting me, you are casting imputations
upon her."

"Nay, sir," Adam said, in a calmer voice, as if he were
half-relieved--for he was too straightforward to make a distinction
between a direct falsehood and an indirect one--"Nay, sir, things don't
lie level between Hetty and you. You're acting with your eyes open,
whatever you may do; but how do you know what's been in her mind? She's
all but a child--as any man with a conscience in him ought to feel bound
to take care on. And whatever you may think, I know you've disturbed
her mind. I know she's been fixing her heart on you, for there's a many
things clear to me now as I didn't understand before. But you seem to
make light o' what she may feel--you don't think o' that."

"Good God, Adam, let me alone!" Arthur burst out impetuously; "I feel it
enough without your worrying me."

He was aware of his indiscretion as soon as the words had escaped him.

"Well, then, if you feel it," Adam rejoined, eagerly; "if you feel as
you may ha' put false notions into her mind, and made her believe as
you loved her, when all the while you meant nothing, I've this demand
to make of you--I'm not speaking for myself, but for her. I ask you t'
undeceive her before you go away. Y'aren't going away for ever, and if
you leave her behind with a notion in her head o' your feeling about her
the same as she feels about you, she'll be hankering after you, and the
mischief may get worse. It may be a smart to her now, but it'll save her
pain i' th' end. I ask you to write a letter--you may trust to my seeing
as she gets it. Tell her the truth, and take blame to yourself for
behaving as you'd no right to do to a young woman as isn't your equal.
I speak plain, sir, but I can't speak any other way. There's nobody can
take care o' Hetty in this thing but me."

"I can do what I think needful in the matter," said Arthur, more and
more irritated by mingled distress and perplexity, "without giving
promises to you. I shall take what measures I think proper."

"No," said Adam, in an abrupt decided tone, "that won't do. I must know
what ground I'm treading on. I must be safe as you've put an end to what
ought never to ha' been begun. I don't forget what's owing to you as a
gentleman, but in this thing we're man and man, and I can't give up."

There was no answer for some moments. Then Arthur said, "I'll see you
to-morrow. I can bear no more now; I'm ill." He rose as he spoke, and
reached his cap, as if intending to go.

"You won't see her again!" Adam exclaimed, with a flash of recurring
anger and suspicion, moving towards the door and placing his back
against it. "Either tell me she can never be my wife--tell me you've
been lying--or else promise me what I've said."

Adam, uttering this alternative, stood like a terrible fate before
Arthur, who had moved forward a step or two, and now stopped, faint,
shaken, sick in mind and body. It seemed long to both of them--that
inward struggle of Arthur's--before he said, feebly, "I promise; let me
go."

Adam moved away from the door and opened it, but when Arthur reached the
step, he stopped again and leaned against the door-post.

"You're not well enough to walk alone, sir," said Adam. "Take my arm
again."

Arthur made no answer, and presently walked on, Adam following. But,
after a few steps, he stood still again, and said, coldly, "I believe I
must trouble you. It's getting late now, and there may be an alarm set
up about me at home."

Adam gave his arm, and they walked on without uttering a word, till they
came where the basket and the tools lay.

"I must pick up the tools, sir," Adam said. "They're my brother's. I
doubt they'll be rusted. If you'll please to wait a minute."

Arthur stood still without speaking, and no other word passed between
them till they were at the side entrance, where he hoped to get in
without being seen by any one. He said then, "Thank you; I needn't
trouble you any further."

"What time will it be conven'ent for me to see you to-morrow, sir?" said
Adam.

"You may send me word that you're here at five o'clock," said Arthur;
"not before."

"Good-night, sir," said Adam. But he heard no reply; Arthur had turned
into the house.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: A Dilemma Arthur regains consciousness and asks for water. Adam is sorry about the fight and tries to help Arthur get home, but he is weak, and asks for Adam's help in walking to the Hermitage, the house in the woods. Adam has never known that this place was furnished; Arthur has been using it for a personal retreat. He asks Adam to go to his servant Pym and get some brandy. While Adam is gone, Arthur removes a woman's handkerchief. Adam returns with the brandy. Arthur is too confused to say anything, but he wishes he could confess and make it all right with Adam. Adam apologizes for hurting him and being hasty. He knows Arthur was ignorant of his love for Hetty, and he says the only joy he can have now is to think the best of Arthur. Arthur tries to make some apology saying he was wrong, and he is going away so there will be no more mistake. Adam insists that Arthur write Hetty a letter admitting he was wrong and that it is over, so that Hetty will not be waiting for him and her life ruined with false hope. Arthur is irritated by Adam telling him what to do, but Adam insists, saying that he has to know where he stands with Hetty, and "in this thing we're man and man, and I can't give up" . Arthur promises to write the letter, and Adam will pick it up and deliver it to Hetty.


prompt:
Chapter: ARTHUR did not pass a sleepless night; he slept long and well. For sleep
comes to the perplexed--if the perplexed are only weary enough. But at
seven he rang his bell and astonished Pym by declaring he was going to
get up, and must have breakfast brought to him at eight.

"And see that my mare is saddled at half-past eight, and tell my
grandfather when he's down that I'm better this morning and am gone for
a ride."

He had been awake an hour, and could rest in bed no longer. In bed our
yesterdays are too oppressive: if a man can only get up, though it
be but to whistle or to smoke, he has a present which offers some
resistance to the past--sensations which assert themselves against
tyrannous memories. And if there were such a thing as taking averages
of feeling, it would certainly be found that in the hunting and shooting
seasons regret, self-reproach, and mortified pride weigh lighter on
country gentlemen than in late spring and summer. Arthur felt that he
should be more of a man on horseback. Even the presence of Pym, waiting
on him with the usual deference, was a reassurance to him after the
scenes of yesterday. For, with Arthur's sensitiveness to opinion,
the loss of Adam's respect was a shock to his self-contentment which
suffused his imagination with the sense that he had sunk in all eyes--as
a sudden shock of fear from some real peril makes a nervous woman afraid
even to step, because all her perceptions are suffused with a sense of
danger.

Arthur's, as you know, was a loving nature. Deeds of kindness were as
easy to him as a bad habit: they were the common issue of his weaknesses
and good qualities, of his egoism and his sympathy. He didn't like to
witness pain, and he liked to have grateful eyes beaming on him as the
giver of pleasure. When he was a lad of seven, he one day kicked down an
old gardener's pitcher of broth, from no motive but a kicking impulse,
not reflecting that it was the old man's dinner; but on learning that
sad fact, he took his favourite pencil-case and a silver-hafted knife
out of his pocket and offered them as compensation. He had been the same
Arthur ever since, trying to make all offences forgotten in benefits.
If there were any bitterness in his nature, it could only show itself
against the man who refused to be conciliated by him. And perhaps the
time was come for some of that bitterness to rise. At the first moment,
Arthur had felt pure distress and self-reproach at discovering that
Adam's happiness was involved in his relation to Hetty. If there had
been a possibility of making Adam tenfold amends--if deeds of gift, or
any other deeds, could have restored Adam's contentment and regard for
him as a benefactor, Arthur would not only have executed them without
hesitation, but would have felt bound all the more closely to Adam,
and would never have been weary of making retribution. But Adam could
receive no amends; his suffering could not be cancelled; his respect and
affection could not be recovered by any prompt deeds of atonement. He
stood like an immovable obstacle against which no pressure could
avail; an embodiment of what Arthur most shrank from believing in--the
irrevocableness of his own wrongdoing. The words of scorn, the refusal
to shake hands, the mastery asserted over him in their last conversation
in the Hermitage--above all, the sense of having been knocked down, to
which a man does not very well reconcile himself, even under the most
heroic circumstances--pressed on him with a galling pain which was
stronger than compunction. Arthur would so gladly have persuaded himself
that he had done no harm! And if no one had told him the contrary, he
could have persuaded himself so much better. Nemesis can seldom forge a
sword for herself out of our consciences--out of the suffering we feel
in the suffering we may have caused: there is rarely metal enough there
to make an effective weapon. Our moral sense learns the manners of good
society and smiles when others smile, but when some rude person gives
rough names to our actions, she is apt to take part against us. And
so it was with Arthur: Adam's judgment of him, Adam's grating words,
disturbed his self-soothing arguments.

Not that Arthur had been at ease before Adam's discovery. Struggles and
resolves had transformed themselves into compunction and anxiety. He was
distressed for Hetty's sake, and distressed for his own, that he
must leave her behind. He had always, both in making and breaking
resolutions, looked beyond his passion and seen that it must speedily
end in separation; but his nature was too ardent and tender for him not
to suffer at this parting; and on Hetty's account he was filled with
uneasiness. He had found out the dream in which she was living--that she
was to be a lady in silks and satins--and when he had first talked to
her about his going away, she had asked him tremblingly to let her go
with him and be married. It was his painful knowledge of this which had
given the most exasperating sting to Adam's reproaches. He had said no
word with the purpose of deceiving her--her vision was all spun by her
own childish fancy--but he was obliged to confess to himself that it was
spun half out of his own actions. And to increase the mischief, on this
last evening he had not dared to hint the truth to Hetty; he had been
obliged to soothe her with tender, hopeful words, lest he should throw
her into violent distress. He felt the situation acutely, felt the
sorrow of the dear thing in the present, and thought with a darker
anxiety of the tenacity which her feelings might have in the future.
That was the one sharp point which pressed against him; every other he
could evade by hopeful self-persuasion. The whole thing had been secret;
the Poysers had not the shadow of a suspicion. No one, except Adam, knew
anything of what had passed--no one else was likely to know; for Arthur
had impressed on Hetty that it would be fatal to betray, by word or
look, that there had been the least intimacy between them; and Adam, who
knew half their secret, would rather help them to keep it than betray
it. It was an unfortunate business altogether, but there was no use in
making it worse than it was by imaginary exaggerations and forebodings
of evil that might never come. The temporary sadness for Hetty was
the worst consequence; he resolutely turned away his eyes from any bad
consequence that was not demonstrably inevitable. But--but Hetty might
have had the trouble in some other way if not in this. And perhaps
hereafter he might be able to do a great deal for her and make up to her
for all the tears she would shed about him. She would owe the advantage
of his care for her in future years to the sorrow she had incurred now.
So good comes out of evil. Such is the beautiful arrangement of things!

Are you inclined to ask whether this can be the same Arthur who, two
months ago, had that freshness of feeling, that delicate honour which
shrinks from wounding even a sentiment, and does not contemplate any
more positive offence as possible for it?--who thought that his own
self-respect was a higher tribunal than any external opinion? The same,
I assure you, only under different conditions. Our deeds determine us,
as much as we determine our deeds, and until we know what has been or
will be the peculiar combination of outward with inward facts, which
constitutes a man's critical actions, it will be better not to think
ourselves wise about his character. There is a terrible coercion in
our deeds, which may first turn the honest man into a deceiver and then
reconcile him to the change, for this reason--that the second wrong
presents itself to him in the guise of the only practicable right. The
action which before commission has been seen with that blended common
sense and fresh untarnished feeling which is the healthy eye of the
soul, is looked at afterwards with the lens of apologetic ingenuity,
through which all things that men call beautiful and ugly are seen to
be made up of textures very much alike. Europe adjusts itself to a
_fait accompli_, and so does an individual character--until the placid
adjustment is disturbed by a convulsive retribution.

No man can escape this vitiating effect of an offence against his own
sentiment of right, and the effect was the stronger in Arthur because of
that very need of self-respect which, while his conscience was still at
ease, was one of his best safeguards. Self-accusation was too painful to
him--he could not face it. He must persuade himself that he had not been
very much to blame; he began even to pity himself for the necessity he
was under of deceiving Adam--it was a course so opposed to the honesty
of his own nature. But then, it was the only right thing to do.

Well, whatever had been amiss in him, he was miserable enough in
consequence: miserable about Hetty; miserable about this letter that
he had promised to write, and that seemed at one moment to be a gross
barbarity, at another perhaps the greatest kindness he could do to her.
And across all this reflection would dart every now and then a sudden
impulse of passionate defiance towards all consequences. He would carry
Hetty away, and all other considerations might go to....

In this state of mind the four walls of his room made an intolerable
prison to him; they seemed to hem in and press down upon him all the
crowd of contradictory thoughts and conflicting feelings, some of which
would fly away in the open air. He had only an hour or two to make up
his mind in, and he must get clear and calm. Once on Meg's back, in
the fresh air of that fine morning, he should be more master of the
situation.

The pretty creature arched her bay neck in the sunshine, and pawed the
gravel, and trembled with pleasure when her master stroked her nose, and
patted her, and talked to her even in a more caressing tone than usual.
He loved her the better because she knew nothing of his secrets. But
Meg was quite as well acquainted with her master's mental state as many
others of her sex with the mental condition of the nice young gentlemen
towards whom their hearts are in a state of fluttering expectation.

Arthur cantered for five miles beyond the Chase, till he was at the foot
of a hill where there were no hedges or trees to hem in the road. Then
he threw the bridle on Meg's neck and prepared to make up his mind.

Hetty knew that their meeting yesterday must be the last before Arthur
went away--there was no possibility of their contriving another without
exciting suspicion--and she was like a frightened child, unable to think
of anything, only able to cry at the mention of parting, and then put
her face up to have the tears kissed away. He could do nothing but
comfort her, and lull her into dreaming on. A letter would be a
dreadfully abrupt way of awakening her! Yet there was truth in what Adam
said--that it would save her from a lengthened delusion, which might be
worse than a sharp immediate pain. And it was the only way of satisfying
Adam, who must be satisfied, for more reasons than one. If he could have
seen her again! But that was impossible; there was such a thorny hedge
of hindrances between them, and an imprudence would be fatal. And yet,
if he COULD see her again, what good would it do? Only cause him to
suffer more from the sight of her distress and the remembrance of it.
Away from him she was surrounded by all the motives to self-control.

A sudden dread here fell like a shadow across his imagination--the dread
lest she should do something violent in her grief; and close upon that
dread came another, which deepened the shadow. But he shook them off
with the force of youth and hope. What was the ground for painting the
future in that dark way? It was just as likely to be the reverse. Arthur
told himself he did not deserve that things should turn out badly. He
had never meant beforehand to do anything his conscience disapproved;
he had been led on by circumstances. There was a sort of implicit
confidence in him that he was really such a good fellow at bottom,
Providence would not treat him harshly.

At all events, he couldn't help what would come now: all he could do
was to take what seemed the best course at the present moment. And he
persuaded himself that that course was to make the way open between
Adam and Hetty. Her heart might really turn to Adam, as he said, after a
while; and in that case there would have been no great harm done, since
it was still Adam's ardent wish to make her his wife. To be sure, Adam
was deceived--deceived in a way that Arthur would have resented as a
deep wrong if it had been practised on himself. That was a reflection
that marred the consoling prospect. Arthur's cheeks even burned in
mingled shame and irritation at the thought. But what could a man do in
such a dilemma? He was bound in honour to say no word that could injure
Hetty: his first duty was to guard her. He would never have told or
acted a lie on his own account. Good God! What a miserable fool he was
to have brought himself into such a dilemma; and yet, if ever a man had
excuses, he had. (Pity that consequences are determined not by excuses
but by actions!)

Well, the letter must be written; it was the only means that promised
a solution of the difficulty. The tears came into Arthur's eyes as he
thought of Hetty reading it; but it would be almost as hard for him
to write it; he was not doing anything easy to himself; and this
last thought helped him to arrive at a conclusion. He could never
deliberately have taken a step which inflicted pain on another and left
himself at ease. Even a movement of jealousy at the thought of giving up
Hetty to Adam went to convince him that he was making a sacrifice.

When once he had come to this conclusion, he turned Meg round and set
off home again in a canter. The letter should be written the first
thing, and the rest of the day would be filled up with other business:
he should have no time to look behind him. Happily, Irwine and Gawaine
were coming to dinner, and by twelve o'clock the next day he should
have left the Chase miles behind him. There was some security in this
constant occupation against an uncontrollable impulse seizing him to
rush to Hetty and thrust into her hand some mad proposition that would
undo everything. Faster and faster went the sensitive Meg, at every
slight sign from her rider, till the canter had passed into a swift
gallop.

"I thought they said th' young mester war took ill last night," said
sour old John, the groom, at dinner-time in the servants' hall. "He's
been ridin' fit to split the mare i' two this forenoon."

"That's happen one o' the symptims, John," said the facetious coachman.

"Then I wish he war let blood for 't, that's all," said John, grimly.

Adam had been early at the Chase to know how Arthur was, and had been
relieved from all anxiety about the effects of his blow by learning
that he was gone out for a ride. At five o'clock he was punctually there
again, and sent up word of his arrival. In a few minutes Pym came down
with a letter in his hand and gave it to Adam, saying that the captain
was too busy to see him, and had written everything he had to say.
The letter was directed to Adam, but he went out of doors again before
opening it. It contained a sealed enclosure directed to Hetty. On the
inside of the cover Adam read:

"In the enclosed letter I have written everything you wish. I leave it
to you to decide whether you will be doing best to deliver it to Hetty
or to return it to me. Ask yourself once more whether you are not taking
a measure which may pain her more than mere silence.

"There is no need for our seeing each other again now. We shall meet
with better feelings some months hence.

"A.D."

"Perhaps he's i' th' right on 't not to see me," thought Adam. "It's
no use meeting to say more hard words, and it's no use meeting to shake
hands and say we're friends again. We're not friends, an' it's better
not to pretend it. I know forgiveness is a man's duty, but, to my
thinking, that can only mean as you're to give up all thoughts o' taking
revenge: it can never mean as you're t' have your old feelings back
again, for that's not possible. He's not the same man to me, and I can't
feel the same towards him. God help me! I don't know whether I feel the
same towards anybody: I seem as if I'd been measuring my work from a
false line, and had got it all to measure over again."

But the question about delivering the letter to Hetty soon absorbed
Adam's thoughts. Arthur had procured some relief to himself by throwing
the decision on Adam with a warning; and Adam, who was not given to
hesitation, hesitated here. He determined to feel his way--to ascertain
as well as he could what was Hetty's state of mind before he decided on
delivering the letter.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: The Next Morning This chapter centers on the thoughts of Arthur on his last day before leaving. He gets up early and goes for a ride on his horse. He is upset about the loss of Adam's good opinion. He thinks that if he had done any other injury, he would have made it up to Adam with some gift, for he has a kind heart and likes to make people happy. His realization that he cannot make this up to Adam is the first understanding of "the irrevocableness of his own wrong-doing" . He remembers that he did not tell Hetty on their last meeting that it was over between them. Adam had been right about Hetty's delusions, for she asked Arthur to take her with him and marry her. He had been too cowardly to tell her the truth. The narrator notes that Arthur has slowly changed over the last few months from a fresh and honest person to a deceiver. But because he needs his own self-respect, he cannot admit his wrong. He believes the letter is the only answer, for it will satisfy Adam and cure Hetty of her dreams. For one moment, Arthur thinks about the other terrible possible outcomes of his deeds, but he puts them out of his mind. He writes the letter and leaves it with his man Pym, saying he is too busy to see Adam. Adam takes the letter and thinks it better they don't see each other, for they are no longer friends.


prompt:
Chapter: THE next Sunday Adam joined the Poysers on their way out of church,
hoping for an invitation to go home with them. He had the letter in
his pocket, and was anxious to have an opportunity of talking to Hetty
alone. He could not see her face at church, for she had changed her
seat, and when he came up to her to shake hands, her manner was doubtful
and constrained. He expected this, for it was the first time she had
met him since she had been aware that he had seen her with Arthur in the
Grove.

"Come, you'll go on with us, Adam," Mr. Poyser said when they reached
the turning; and as soon as they were in the fields Adam ventured to
offer his arm to Hetty. The children soon gave them an opportunity of
lingering behind a little, and then Adam said:

"Will you contrive for me to walk out in the garden a bit with you this
evening, if it keeps fine, Hetty? I've something partic'lar to talk to
you about."

Hetty said, "Very well." She was really as anxious as Adam was that she
should have some private talk with him. She wondered what he thought of
her and Arthur. He must have seen them kissing, she knew, but she had
no conception of the scene that had taken place between Arthur and Adam.
Her first feeling had been that Adam would be very angry with her, and
perhaps would tell her aunt and uncle, but it never entered her mind
that he would dare to say anything to Captain Donnithorne. It was a
relief to her that he behaved so kindly to her to-day, and wanted to
speak to her alone, for she had trembled when she found he was going
home with them lest he should mean "to tell." But, now he wanted to talk
to her by herself, she should learn what he thought and what he meant to
do. She felt a certain confidence that she could persuade him not to
do anything she did not want him to do; she could perhaps even make him
believe that she didn't care for Arthur; and as long as Adam thought
there was any hope of her having him, he would do just what she liked,
she knew. Besides, she MUST go on seeming to encourage Adam, lest her
uncle and aunt should be angry and suspect her of having some secret
lover.

Hetty's little brain was busy with this combination as she hung on
Adam's arm and said "yes" or "no" to some slight observations of his
about the many hawthorn-berries there would be for the birds this
next winter, and the low-hanging clouds that would hardly hold up till
morning. And when they rejoined her aunt and uncle, she could pursue her
thoughts without interruption, for Mr. Poyser held that though a young
man might like to have the woman he was courting on his arm, he would
nevertheless be glad of a little reasonable talk about business the
while; and, for his own part, he was curious to hear the most recent
news about the Chase Farm. So, through the rest of the walk, he claimed
Adam's conversation for himself, and Hetty laid her small plots and
imagined her little scenes of cunning blandishment, as she walked along
by the hedgerows on honest Adam's arm, quite as well as if she had been
an elegantly clad coquette alone in her boudoir. For if a country beauty
in clumsy shoes be only shallow-hearted enough, it is astonishing how
closely her mental processes may resemble those of a lady in society
and crinoline, who applies her refined intellect to the problem of
committing indiscretions without compromising herself. Perhaps the
resemblance was not much the less because Hetty felt very unhappy all
the while. The parting with Arthur was a double pain to her--mingling
with the tumult of passion and vanity there was a dim undefined fear
that the future might shape itself in some way quite unlike her dream.
She clung to the comforting hopeful words Arthur had uttered in their
last meeting--"I shall come again at Christmas, and then we will see
what can be done." She clung to the belief that he was so fond of
her, he would never be happy without her; and she still hugged her
secret--that a great gentleman loved her--with gratified pride, as a
superiority over all the girls she knew. But the uncertainty of the
future, the possibilities to which she could give no shape, began to
press upon her like the invisible weight of air; she was alone on her
little island of dreams, and all around her was the dark unknown water
where Arthur was gone. She could gather no elation of spirits now by
looking forward, but only by looking backward to build confidence on
past words and caresses. But occasionally, since Thursday evening, her
dim anxieties had been almost lost behind the more definite fear that
Adam might betray what he knew to her uncle and aunt, and his sudden
proposition to talk with her alone had set her thoughts to work in a
new way. She was eager not to lose this evening's opportunity; and after
tea, when the boys were going into the garden and Totty begged to go
with them, Hetty said, with an alacrity that surprised Mrs. Poyser,
"I'll go with her, Aunt."

It did not seem at all surprising that Adam said he would go too,
and soon he and Hetty were left alone together on the walk by the
filbert-trees, while the boys were busy elsewhere gathering the large
unripe nuts to play at "cob-nut" with, and Totty was watching them with
a puppylike air of contemplation. It was but a short time--hardly two
months--since Adam had had his mind filled with delicious hopes as he
stood by Hetty's side in this garden. The remembrance of that scene had
often been with him since Thursday evening: the sunlight through
the apple-tree boughs, the red bunches, Hetty's sweet blush. It came
importunately now, on this sad evening, with the low-hanging clouds, but
he tried to suppress it, lest some emotion should impel him to say more
than was needful for Hetty's sake.

"After what I saw on Thursday night, Hetty," he began, "you won't think
me making too free in what I'm going to say. If you was being courted by
any man as 'ud make you his wife, and I'd known you was fond of him and
meant to have him, I should have no right to speak a word to you about
it; but when I see you're being made love to by a gentleman as can never
marry you, and doesna think o' marrying you, I feel bound t' interfere
for you. I can't speak about it to them as are i' the place o' your
parents, for that might bring worse trouble than's needful."

Adam's words relieved one of Hetty's fears, but they also carried a
meaning which sickened her with a strengthened foreboding. She was pale
and trembling, and yet she would have angrily contradicted Adam, if she
had dared to betray her feelings. But she was silent.

"You're so young, you know, Hetty," he went on, almost tenderly, "and y'
haven't seen much o' what goes on in the world. It's right for me to
do what I can to save you from getting into trouble for want o' your
knowing where you're being led to. If anybody besides me knew what I
know about your meeting a gentleman and having fine presents from him,
they'd speak light on you, and you'd lose your character. And besides
that, you'll have to suffer in your feelings, wi' giving your love to
a man as can never marry you, so as he might take care of you all your
life."

Adam paused and looked at Hetty, who was plucking the leaves from the
filbert-trees and tearing them up in her hand. Her little plans and
preconcerted speeches had all forsaken her, like an ill-learnt lesson,
under the terrible agitation produced by Adam's words. There was a cruel
force in their calm certainty which threatened to grapple and crush her
flimsy hopes and fancies. She wanted to resist them--she wanted to throw
them off with angry contradiction--but the determination to conceal what
she felt still governed her. It was nothing more than a blind prompting
now, for she was unable to calculate the effect of her words.

"You've no right to say as I love him," she said, faintly, but
impetuously, plucking another rough leaf and tearing it up. She was very
beautiful in her paleness and agitation, with her dark childish eyes
dilated and her breath shorter than usual. Adam's heart yearned over her
as he looked at her. Ah, if he could but comfort her, and soothe her,
and save her from this pain; if he had but some sort of strength that
would enable him to rescue her poor troubled mind, as he would have
rescued her body in the face of all danger!

"I doubt it must be so, Hetty," he said, tenderly; "for I canna believe
you'd let any man kiss you by yourselves, and give you a gold box with
his hair, and go a-walking i' the Grove to meet him, if you didna love
him. I'm not blaming you, for I know it 'ud begin by little and little,
till at last you'd not be able to throw it off. It's him I blame for
stealing your love i' that way, when he knew he could never make you
the right amends. He's been trifling with you, and making a plaything of
you, and caring nothing about you as a man ought to care."

"Yes, he does care for me; I know better nor you," Hetty burst out.
Everything was forgotten but the pain and anger she felt at Adam's
words.

"Nay, Hetty," said Adam, "if he'd cared for you rightly, he'd never
ha' behaved so. He told me himself he meant nothing by his kissing and
presents, and he wanted to make me believe as you thought light of 'em
too. But I know better nor that. I can't help thinking as you've been
trusting to his loving you well enough to marry you, for all he's a
gentleman. And that's why I must speak to you about it, Hetty, for
fear you should be deceiving yourself. It's never entered his head the
thought o' marrying you."

"How do you know? How durst you say so?" said Hetty, pausing in her walk
and trembling. The terrible decision of Adam's tone shook her with fear.
She had no presence of mind left for the reflection that Arthur would
have his reasons for not telling the truth to Adam. Her words and look
were enough to determine Adam: he must give her the letter.

"Perhaps you can't believe me, Hetty, because you think too well of
him--because you think he loves you better than he does. But I've got
a letter i' my pocket, as he wrote himself for me to give you. I've not
read the letter, but he says he's told you the truth in it. But before
I give you the letter, consider, Hetty, and don't let it take too much
hold on you. It wouldna ha' been good for you if he'd wanted to do such
a mad thing as marry you: it 'ud ha' led to no happiness i' th' end."

Hetty said nothing; she felt a revival of hope at the mention of a
letter which Adam had not read. There would be something quite different
in it from what he thought.

Adam took out the letter, but he held it in his hand still, while he
said, in a tone of tender entreaty, "Don't you bear me ill will, Hetty,
because I'm the means o' bringing you this pain. God knows I'd ha' borne
a good deal worse for the sake o' sparing it you. And think--there's
nobody but me knows about this, and I'll take care of you as if I was
your brother. You're the same as ever to me, for I don't believe you've
done any wrong knowingly."

Hetty had laid her hand on the letter, but Adam did not loose it till
he had done speaking. She took no notice of what he said--she had not
listened; but when he loosed the letter, she put it into her pocket,
without opening it, and then began to walk more quickly, as if she
wanted to go in.

"You're in the right not to read it just yet," said Adam. "Read it when
you're by yourself. But stay out a little bit longer, and let us call
the children: you look so white and ill, your aunt may take notice of
it."

Hetty heard the warning. It recalled to her the necessity of rallying
her native powers of concealment, which had half given way under the
shock of Adam's words. And she had the letter in her pocket: she was
sure there was comfort in that letter in spite of Adam. She ran to find
Totty, and soon reappeared with recovered colour, leading Totty, who was
making a sour face because she had been obliged to throw away an unripe
apple that she had set her small teeth in.

"Hegh, Totty," said Adam, "come and ride on my shoulder--ever so
high--you'll touch the tops o' the trees."

What little child ever refused to be comforted by that glorious sense of
being seized strongly and swung upward? I don't believe Ganymede cried
when the eagle carried him away, and perhaps deposited him on Jove's
shoulder at the end. Totty smiled down complacently from her secure
height, and pleasant was the sight to the mother's eyes, as she stood at
the house door and saw Adam coming with his small burden.

"Bless your sweet face, my pet," she said, the mother's strong love
filling her keen eyes with mildness, as Totty leaned forward and put
out her arms. She had no eyes for Hetty at that moment, and only said,
without looking at her, "You go and draw some ale, Hetty; the gells are
both at the cheese."

After the ale had been drawn and her uncle's pipe lighted, there was
Totty to be taken to bed, and brought down again in her night-gown
because she would cry instead of going to sleep. Then there was supper
to be got ready, and Hetty must be continually in the way to give help.
Adam stayed till he knew Mrs. Poyser expected him to go, engaging her
and her husband in talk as constantly as he could, for the sake of
leaving Hetty more at ease. He lingered, because he wanted to see her
safely through that evening, and he was delighted to find how much
self-command she showed. He knew she had not had time to read the
letter, but he did not know she was buoyed up by a secret hope that the
letter would contradict everything he had said. It was hard work for him
to leave her--hard to think that he should not know for days how she was
bearing her trouble. But he must go at last, and all he could do was
to press her hand gently as he said "Good-bye," and hope she would take
that as a sign that if his love could ever be a refuge for her, it was
there the same as ever. How busy his thoughts were, as he walked home,
in devising pitying excuses for her folly, in referring all her weakness
to the sweet lovingness of her nature, in blaming Arthur, with less and
less inclination to admit that his conduct might be extenuated too! His
exasperation at Hetty's suffering--and also at the sense that she was
possibly thrust for ever out of his own reach--deafened him to any
plea for the miscalled friend who had wrought this misery. Adam was a
clear-sighted, fair-minded man--a fine fellow, indeed, morally as well
as physically. But if Aristides the Just was ever in love and jealous,
he was at that moment not perfectly magnanimous. And I cannot pretend
that Adam, in these painful days, felt nothing but righteous indignation
and loving pity. He was bitterly jealous, and in proportion as his love
made him indulgent in his judgment of Hetty, the bitterness found a vent
in his feeling towards Arthur.

"Her head was allays likely to be turned," he thought, "when a
gentleman, with his fine manners, and fine clothes, and his white hands,
and that way o' talking gentlefolks have, came about her, making up to
her in a bold way, as a man couldn't do that was only her equal; and
it's much if she'll ever like a common man now." He could not help
drawing his own hands out of his pocket and looking at them--at the hard
palms and the broken finger-nails. "I'm a roughish fellow, altogether; I
don't know, now I come to think on't, what there is much for a woman to
like about me; and yet I might ha' got another wife easy enough, if
I hadn't set my heart on her. But it's little matter what other women
think about me, if she can't love me. She might ha' loved me, perhaps,
as likely as any other man--there's nobody hereabouts as I'm afraid of,
if he hadn't come between us; but now I shall belike be hateful to her
because I'm so different to him. And yet there's no telling--she may
turn round the other way, when she finds he's made light of her all the
while. She may come to feel the vally of a man as 'ud be thankful to be
bound to her all his life. But I must put up with it whichever way it
is--I've only to be thankful it's been no worse. I am not th' only man
that's got to do without much happiness i' this life. There's many a
good bit o' work done with a bad heart. It's God's will, and that's
enough for us: we shouldn't know better how things ought to be than He
does, I reckon, if we was to spend our lives i' puzzling. But it 'ud ha'
gone near to spoil my work for me, if I'd seen her brought to sorrow and
shame, and through the man as I've always been proud to think on. Since
I've been spared that, I've no right to grumble. When a man's got his
limbs whole, he can bear a smart cut or two."

As Adam was getting over a stile at this point in his reflections, he
perceived a man walking along the field before him. He knew it was Seth,
returning from an evening preaching, and made haste to overtake him.

"I thought thee'dst be at home before me," he said, as Seth turned round
to wait for him, "for I'm later than usual to-night."

"Well, I'm later too, for I got into talk, after meeting, with John
Barnes, who has lately professed himself in a state of perfection,
and I'd a question to ask him about his experience. It's one o' them
subjects that lead you further than y' expect--they don't lie along the
straight road."

They walked along together in silence two or three minutes. Adam was not
inclined to enter into the subtleties of religious experience, but he
was inclined to interchange a word or two of brotherly affection and
confidence with Seth. That was a rare impulse in him, much as the
brothers loved each other. They hardly ever spoke of personal matters,
or uttered more than an allusion to their family troubles. Adam was
by nature reserved in all matters of feeling, and Seth felt a certain
timidity towards his more practical brother.

"Seth, lad," Adam said, putting his arm on his brother's shoulder, "hast
heard anything from Dinah Morris since she went away?"

"Yes," said Seth. "She told me I might write her word after a while, how
we went on, and how mother bore up under her trouble. So I wrote to her
a fortnight ago, and told her about thee having a new employment, and
how Mother was more contented; and last Wednesday, when I called at the
post at Treddles'on, I found a letter from her. I think thee'dst perhaps
like to read it, but I didna say anything about it because thee'st
seemed so full of other things. It's quite easy t' read--she writes
wonderful for a woman."

Seth had drawn the letter from his pocket and held it out to Adam, who
said, as he took it, "Aye, lad, I've got a tough load to carry just
now--thee mustna take it ill if I'm a bit silenter and crustier nor
usual. Trouble doesna make me care the less for thee. I know we shall
stick together to the last."

"I take nought ill o' thee, Adam. I know well enough what it means if
thee't a bit short wi' me now and then."

"There's Mother opening the door to look out for us," said Adam, as they
mounted the slope. "She's been sitting i' the dark as usual. Well, Gyp,
well, art glad to see me?"

Lisbeth went in again quickly and lighted a candle, for she had heard
the welcome rustling of footsteps on the grass, before Gyp's joyful
bark.

"Eh, my lads! Th' hours war ne'er so long sin' I war born as they'n been
this blessed Sunday night. What can ye both ha' been doin' till this
time?"

"Thee shouldstna sit i' the dark, Mother," said Adam; "that makes the
time seem longer."

"Eh, what am I to do wi' burnin' candle of a Sunday, when there's on'y
me an' it's sin to do a bit o' knittin'? The daylight's long enough
for me to stare i' the booke as I canna read. It 'ud be a fine way o'
shortenin' the time, to make it waste the good candle. But which on
you's for ha'in' supper? Ye mun ayther be clemmed or full, I should
think, seein' what time o' night it is."

"I'm hungry, Mother," said Seth, seating himself at the little table,
which had been spread ever since it was light.

"I've had my supper," said Adam. "Here, Gyp," he added, taking some cold
potato from the table and rubbing the rough grey head that looked up
towards him.

"Thee needstna be gi'in' th' dog," said Lisbeth; "I'n fed him well
a'ready. I'm not like to forget him, I reckon, when he's all o' thee I
can get sight on."

"Come, then, Gyp," said Adam, "we'll go to bed. Good-night, Mother; I'm
very tired."

"What ails him, dost know?" Lisbeth said to Seth, when Adam was gone
upstairs. "He's like as if he was struck for death this day or two--he's
so cast down. I found him i' the shop this forenoon, arter thee wast
gone, a-sittin' an' doin' nothin'--not so much as a booke afore him."

"He's a deal o' work upon him just now, Mother," said Seth, "and I think
he's a bit troubled in his mind. Don't you take notice of it, because it
hurts him when you do. Be as kind to him as you can, Mother, and don't
say anything to vex him."

"Eh, what dost talk o' my vexin' him? An' what am I like to be but kind?
I'll ma' him a kettle-cake for breakfast i' the mornin'."

Adam, meanwhile, was reading Dinah's letter by the light of his dip
candle.

DEAR BROTHER SETH--Your letter lay three days beyond my knowing of it
at the post, for I had not money enough by me to pay the carriage, this
being a time of great need and sickness here, with the rains that have
fallen, as if the windows of heaven were opened again; and to lay
by money, from day to day, in such a time, when there are so many in
present need of all things, would be a want of trust like the laying
up of the manna. I speak of this, because I would not have you think me
slow to answer, or that I had small joy in your rejoicing at the worldly
good that has befallen your brother Adam. The honour and love you bear
him is nothing but meet, for God has given him great gifts, and he uses
them as the patriarch Joseph did, who, when he was exalted to a place of
power and trust, yet yearned with tenderness towards his parent and his
younger brother.

"My heart is knit to your aged mother since it was granted me to be near
her in the day of trouble. Speak to her of me, and tell her I often bear
her in my thoughts at evening time, when I am sitting in the dim light
as I did with her, and we held one another's hands, and I spoke the
words of comfort that were given to me. Ah, that is a blessed time,
isn't it, Seth, when the outward light is fading, and the body is a
little wearied with its work and its labour. Then the inward light
shines the brighter, and we have a deeper sense of resting on the Divine
strength. I sit on my chair in the dark room and close my eyes, and it
is as if I was out of the body and could feel no want for evermore. For
then, the very hardship, and the sorrow, and the blindness, and the sin
I have beheld and been ready to weep over--yea, all the anguish of the
children of men, which sometimes wraps me round like sudden darkness--I
can bear with a willing pain, as if I was sharing the Redeemer's cross.
For I feel it, I feel it--infinite love is suffering too--yea, in the
fulness of knowledge it suffers, it yearns, it mourns; and that is a
blind self-seeking which wants to be freed from the sorrow wherewith
the whole creation groaneth and travaileth. Surely it is not true
blessedness to be free from sorrow, while there is sorrow and sin in the
world: sorrow is then a part of love, and love does not seek to throw it
off. It is not the spirit only that tells me this--I see it in the whole
work and word of the Gospel. Is there not pleading in heaven? Is not the
Man of Sorrows there in that crucified body wherewith he ascended? And
is He not one with the Infinite Love itself--as our love is one with our
sorrow?

"These thoughts have been much borne in on me of late, and I have seen
with new clearness the meaning of those words, 'If any man love me, let
him take up my cross.' I have heard this enlarged on as if it meant the
troubles and persecutions we bring on ourselves by confessing Jesus. But
surely that is a narrow thought. The true cross of the Redeemer was the
sin and sorrow of this world--that was what lay heavy on his heart--and
that is the cross we shall share with him, that is the cup we must drink
of with him, if we would have any part in that Divine Love which is one
with his sorrow.

"In my outward lot, which you ask about, I have all things and abound. I
have had constant work in the mill, though some of the other hands have
been turned off for a time, and my body is greatly strengthened, so that
I feel little weariness after long walking and speaking. What you say
about staying in your own country with your mother and brother shows me
that you have a true guidance; your lot is appointed there by a clear
showing, and to seek a greater blessing elsewhere would be like laying a
false offering on the altar and expecting the fire from heaven to kindle
it. My work and my joy are here among the hills, and I sometimes think
I cling too much to my life among the people here, and should be
rebellious if I was called away.

"I was thankful for your tidings about the dear friends at the Hall
Farm, for though I sent them a letter, by my aunt's desire, after I came
back from my sojourn among them, I have had no word from them. My
aunt has not the pen of a ready writer, and the work of the house is
sufficient for the day, for she is weak in body. My heart cleaves to her
and her children as the nearest of all to me in the flesh--yea, and to
all in that house. I am carried away to them continually in my sleep,
and often in the midst of work, and even of speech, the thought of them
is borne in on me as if they were in need and trouble, which yet is dark
to me. There may be some leading here; but I wait to be taught. You say
they are all well.

"We shall see each other again in the body, I trust, though, it may be,
not for a long while; for the brethren and sisters at Leeds are desirous
to have me for a short space among them, when I have a door opened me
again to leave Snowfield.

"Farewell, dear brother--and yet not farewell. For those children of
God whom it has been granted to see each other face to face, and to
hold communion together, and to feel the same spirit working in both can
never more be sundered though the hills may lie between. For their souls
are enlarged for evermore by that union, and they bear one another about
in their thoughts continually as it were a new strength.--Your faithful
Sister and fellow-worker in Christ,

"DINAH MORRIS."

"I have not skill to write the words so small as you do and my pen moves
slow. And so I am straitened, and say but little of what is in my mind.
Greet your mother for me with a kiss. She asked me to kiss her twice
when we parted."

Adam had refolded the letter, and was sitting meditatively with his head
resting on his arm at the head of the bed, when Seth came upstairs.

"Hast read the letter?" said Seth.

"Yes," said Adam. "I don't know what I should ha' thought of her and her
letter if I'd never seen her: I daresay I should ha' thought a preaching
woman hateful. But she's one as makes everything seem right she says
and does, and I seemed to see her and hear her speaking when I read the
letter. It's wonderful how I remember her looks and her voice. She'd
make thee rare and happy, Seth; she's just the woman for thee."

"It's no use thinking o' that," said Seth, despondingly. "She spoke so
firm, and she's not the woman to say one thing and mean another."

"Nay, but her feelings may grow different. A woman may get to love by
degrees--the best fire dosna flare up the soonest. I'd have thee go and
see her by and by: I'd make it convenient for thee to be away three
or four days, and it 'ud be no walk for thee--only between twenty and
thirty mile."

"I should like to see her again, whether or no, if she wouldna be
displeased with me for going," said Seth.

"She'll be none displeased," said Adam emphatically, getting up and
throwing off his coat. "It might be a great happiness to us all if she'd
have thee, for mother took to her so wonderful and seemed so contented
to be with her."

"Aye," said Seth, rather timidly, "and Dinah's fond o' Hetty too; she
thinks a deal about her."

Adam made no reply to that, and no other word but "good-night" passed
between them.

Q: Can you write an appropriate summary of the above paragraphs?
A:

completion: The Delivery of the Letter Adam joins the Poysers on their walk home after church because he wants to talk to Hetty. She is afraid he means to tell on her, but Hetty is confident she can manipulate Adam to her own purposes. Hetty believes that Arthur will miss her and will come home at Christmas, as he said he might do. Adam is direct and says that he is trying to help Hetty because she does not know the ways of the world. Arthur does not love her and will not marry her. Hetty is shocked and does not believe Adam. She knows more than Adam does about how serious their relationship is. She realizes Adam does not know the worst. He keeps repeating that Arthur does not mean to marry her, and finally he produces the letter. He says that he will be like a brother to her in this crisis, and tries to get her to see how dangerous the situation is for her. Hetty believes the letter will be a love letter and puts it in her pocket. They spend the evening with her aunt and uncle and Adam is very kind, trying to cover for her and be entertaining, so her pale look will not be noticed. Adam's tenderness is aroused, and at home, he is kind to Seth, asking him about Dinah. Seth says there is no hope she will change her mind, but gives him a letter from Dinah to read that has consolation and wisdom in it for Adam's situation. Dinah speaks of sorrow being a part of love and that love bears it and does not throw it off. Adam thinks Dinah has the power to make everything seem right. He tells Seth a woman sometimes takes time to love by degrees, hoping this is true of Hetty.