promise she had given to Ezra,
by confiding all money, except what she was immediately in want of, to
Mrs. Meyrick's care, and Lapidoth felt himself under an irritating
completeness of supply in kind as in a lunatic asylum where everything
was made safe against him. To have opened a desk or drawer of Mirah's,
and pocketed any bank-notes found there, would have been to his mind a
sort of domestic appropriation which had no disgrace in it; the degrees
of liberty a man allows himself with other people's property being
often delicately drawn, even beyond the boundary where the law begins
to lay its hold--which is the reason why spoons are a safer investment
than mining shares. Lapidoth really felt himself injuriously treated by
his daughter, and thought that he ought to have had what he wanted of
her other earnings as he had of her apple-tart. But he remained
submissive; indeed, the indiscretion that most tempted him, was not any
insistance with Mirah, but some kind of appeal to Deronda. Clever
persons who have nothing else to sell can often put a good price on
their absence, and Lapidoth's difficult search for devices forced upon
him the idea that his family would find themselves happier without him,
and that Deronda would be willing to advance a considerable sum for the
sake of getting rid of him. But, in spite of well-practiced hardihood,
Lapidoth was still in some awe of Ezra's imposing friend, and deferred
his purpose indefinitely.

On this day, when Deronda had come full of a gladdened consciousness,
which inevitably showed itself in his air and speech, Lapidoth was at a
crisis of discontent and longing that made his mind busy with schemes
of freedom, and Deronda's new amenity encouraged them. This
pre-occupation was at last so strong as to interfere with his usual
show of interest in what went forward, and his persistence in sitting
by even when there was reading which he could not follow. After sitting
a little while, he went out to smoke and walk in the square, and the
two friends were all the easier. Mirah was not at home, but she was
sure to be in again before Deronda left, and his eyes glowed with a
secret anticipation: he thought that when he saw her again he should
see some sweetness of recognition for himself to which his eyes had
been sealed before. There was an additional playful affectionateness in
his manner toward Ezra.

"This little room is too close for you, Ezra," he said, breaking off
his reading.