human
Very lonely, sir, Ware is. You've come to stay for a little time perhaps.
gpt
Oh! no. Oh, dear no. My view upon that subject is very decided indeed, as you know. I ask myself this question,--What good can I possibly do, about it, by residing for any time at Ware, until my income shall have been secured, and my proper position ascertained and recognised? I find myself, by the anomalous absurdity of our existing law, placed in a position, about it, of so much difficulty and hardship, that although the people must feel it very much, and the county regret it, I feel it only due to myself, to wash my hands about it, of the entire thing for the present, and to accept the position of a mere private person, which the existing law, in its wisdom, imposes upon me--don't you see?
human
It certainly is, acquiesced Cleve,
gpt
Absurdity! my dear sir, I don't call it _absurdity_ at all, I call it rank injustice, and a positive _cruelty_, said the feeble voice of this old gentleman with an eager quaver in it, while, as always occurred when he was suddenly called on for what he called his
human
upon this intolerable topic, a pink flush suffused his thin temples and narrow forehead.
gpt
Here I am, about it, invested by opinion, don't you see, and a moral constraint, with the liabilities of a certain position, and yet excluded from its privileges and opportunities. And what, I ask myself, can come of such a thing, except the sort of thing, about it, which we see going on? Don't you see?
human
Any news of any kind from the East, sir?
gpt
Well, now, wait--a--a--I'll come to it--I'm coming to that. I wrote to you to say that you were to meet me in town, d'ye see, on the fifteenth, and I mean to have a Mr. Larkin, an attorney, a very proper person in his rank of life--a very proper person--about it, to meet us and produce his papers, and make his statement again. And I may tell you that he's of opinion, and under the impression, that poor Arthur is _dead_, about it; and now you'll read this letter--very good, and now this--very good, and now this.