Page:Gissing - The Nether World, vol. II, 1889.djvu/294

 “All sorts of things. I’ve meant to have a long talk with you; but then I don’t quite know how to begin. Well, see, it’s chiefly about Jane.”

Sidney neither moved nor spoke.

“After all, Sidney,” resumed the other, softening his voice, “I am her father, you see. A precious bad one I’ve been, that there’s no denying, and dash it if I don’t sometimes feel ashamed of myself. I do when she speaks to me in that pleasant way she has,—you know what I mean. For all that, I am her father, and I think it’s only right I should do my best to make her happy. You agree with that, I know.”

“Certainly I do.”

“You won’t take it ill if I ask whether—in fact, whether you’ve ever asked her—you know what I mean.”

“I have not,” Sidney replied, in a clear, unmoved tone, changing his position at the same time so as to look his interlocutor in the face.

Joseph seemed relieved.