It gratified him intensely to hear such words, yet he could not hear them without the suspicions of a vulgar nature brought in contact with nobleness.
'Well, yes,' he replied, 'I think you were a bit too hasty: you're not practical, you see.

It wants a practical man to manage those kind of things.' The reply was not such as completes the blessedness of pure submission.
Adela averted her eyes.

Another woman would perchance have sought to assure herself that she was right in crediting him with private benevolence to the family he was compelled to visit so severely.

Such a question Adela could not ask.

It would have been to betray doubt; she imagined a replying glance which would shame her.