r determined on anything in my life as I determined on finding out
how he had got his information, and who he really was. It was quite
plain to me that I had roused some hidden feeling in him by my question
about Armadale, which was as strong in its way as his feeling for _me_.
What had become of my influence over him?

"I couldn't imagine what had become of it; but I could and did set to
work to make him feel it again.

"'Don't treat me cruelly,' I said; 'I didn't treat _you_ cruelly just
now. Oh, Mr. Midwinter, it's so lonely, it's so dark--don't frighten
me!'

"'Frighten you!' He was close to me again in a moment. 'Frighten you!'
He repeated the word with as much astonishment as if I had woke him from
a dream, and charged him with something that he had said in his sleep.

"It was on the tip of my tongue, finding how I had surprised him, to
take him while he was off his guard, and to ask why my question about
Armadale had produced such a change in his behavior to me. But after
what had happened already, I was afraid to risk returning to the
subject too soon. Something or other--what they call an instinct, I dare
say--warned me to let Armadale alone for the present, and to talk to
him first about himself. As I told you in one of my early letters, I had
noticed signs and tokens in his manner and appearance which convinced
me, young as he was, that he had done something or suffered something
out of the common in his past life. I had asked myself more and more
suspiciously every time I saw him whether he was what he appeared to be;
and first and foremost among my other doubts was a doubt whether he was
passing among us by his real name. Having secrets to keep about my own
past life, and having gone myself in other days by more than one assumed
name, I suppose I am all the readier to suspect other people when I find
something mysterious about them. Any way, having the suspicion in
my mind, I determined to startle him, as he had startled me, by an
unexpected question on my side--a question about his name.

"While I was thinking, he was thinking; and, as it soon appeared, of
what I had just said to him. 'I am so grieved to have frightened you,'
he whispered, with that gentleness and humility which we all so heartily
despise in a man when he speaks to other women, and which we all so
dearly like when he speaks to ourselves. 'I hardly know what I have been
saying,' he went on; 'my mind is miserably disturbed. Pray forgive