confident of
doing everything agreeable which Casaubon, poor fellow, was too much
absorbed to think of, had arranged to bring Ladislaw to Lowick several
times (not neglecting meanwhile to introduce him elsewhere on every
opportunity as "a young relative of Casaubon's"). And though Will had
not seen Dorothea alone, their interviews had been enough to restore
her former sense of young companionship with one who was cleverer than
herself, yet seemed ready to be swayed by her. Poor Dorothea before
her marriage had never found much room in other minds for what she
cared most to say; and she had not, as we know, enjoyed her husband's
superior instruction so much as she had expected. If she spoke with
any keenness of interest to Mr. Casaubon, he heard her with an air of
patience as if she had given a quotation from the Delectus familiar to
him from his tender years, and sometimes mentioned curtly what ancient
sects or personages had held similar ideas, as if there were too much
of that sort in stock already; at other times he would inform her that
she was mistaken, and reassert what her remark had questioned.

But Will Ladislaw always seemed to see more in what she said than she
herself saw. Dorothea had little vanity, but she had the ardent
woman's need to rule beneficently by making the joy of another soul.
Hence the mere chance of seeing Will occasionally was like a lunette
opened in the wall of her prison, giving her a glimpse of the sunny
air; and this pleasure began to nullify her original alarm at what her
husband might think about the introduction of Will as her uncle's
guest. On this subject Mr. Casaubon had remained dumb.

But Will wanted to talk with Dorothea alone, and was impatient of slow
circumstance. However slight the terrestrial intercourse between Dante
and Beatrice or Petrarch and Laura, time changes the proportion of
things, and in later days it is preferable to have fewer sonnets and
more conversation. Necessity excused stratagem, but stratagem was
limited by the dread of offending Dorothea. He found out at last that
he wanted to take a particular sketch at Lowick; and one morning when
Mr. Brooke had to drive along the Lowick road on his way to the county
town, Will asked to be set down with his sketch-book and camp-stool at
Lowick, and without announcing himself at the Manor settled himself to
sketch in a position where he must see Dorothea if she came out to
walk--and he knew that she usually wa