I should not mention this to 'ee if he were an ordinary young fellow; but being superior to the rest it behoves you to be careful.' 'Exactly, papa,' said Christine.
But the revived sense that she was deceiving him threw a damp over her spirits.

'But, after all,' she said to herself, 'he is a young man of Elsenford, handsome, able, and the soul of honour; and I am a young woman of the adjoining parish, who have been constantly thrown into communication with him.

Is it not, by nature's rule, the most proper thing in the world that I should marry him, and is it not an absurd conventional regulation which says that such a union would be wrong ?' It may be concluded that the strength of Christine's large-minded argument was rather an evidence of weakness than of strength in the passion it concerned, which had required neither argument nor reasoning of any kind for its maintenance when full and flush in its early days.
When driving home in the dark with her father she sank into pensive silence.

She was thinking of Nicholas having to trudge on foot all those miles back after his exertions on the sward.

Mr.Everard, arousing himself from a nap, said suddenly, 'I have something to mention to 'ee, by George--so I have, Chris! You probably know what it is ?' She expressed ignorance, wondering if her father had discovered anything of her secret.
'Well, according to him you know it.