Clara was expected to reply, and she said: "Probably because you are
fond of acting. It would require capacity on both sides."

"Miss Middleton, I would undertake to breathe the enthusiasm for the
stage and the adventure."

"You are recommending it generally."

"Let my gentleman only have a fund of enthusiasm. The lady will kindle.
She always does at a spark."

"If he has not any?"

"Then I'm afraid they must be mortally dull."

She allowed her silence to speak; she knew that it did so too
eloquently, and could not control the personal adumbration she gave to
the one point of light revealed in, "if he has not any". Her figure
seemed immediately to wear a cap and cloak of dulness.

She was full of revolt and anger, she was burning with her situation;
if sensible of shame now at anything that she did, it turned to wrath
and threw the burden on the author of her desperate distress. The hour
for blaming herself had gone by, to be renewed ultimately perhaps in a
season of freedom. She was bereft of her insight within at present, so
blind to herself that, while conscious of an accurate reading of
Willoughby's friend, she thanked him in her heart for seeking simply to
amuse her and slightly succeeding. The afternoon's ride with him and
Crossjay was an agreeable beguilement to her in prospect.