but looked at her, and listened with attention.

'Yes, Susan,' she said, when that young lady had concluded. 'He is in
Papa's confidence, and is his friend, I am sure.'

Florence's mind ran high on this theme, and had done for some days. Mr
Carker, in the two visits with which he had followed up his first one,
had assumed a confidence between himself and her--a right on his part
to be mysterious and stealthy, in telling her that the ship was still
unheard of--a kind of mildly restrained power and authority over
her--that made her wonder, and caused her great uneasiness. She had
no means of repelling it, or of freeing herself from the web he was
gradually winding about her; for that would have required some art and
knowledge of the world, opposed to such address as his; and Florence had
none. True, he had said no more to her than that there was no news of
the ship, and that he feared the worst; but how he came to know that
she was interested in the ship, and why he had the right to signify
his knowledge to her, so insidiously and darkly, troubled Florence very
much.

This conduct on the part of Mr Carker, and her habit of often
considering it with wonder and uneasiness, began to invest him with
an uncomfortable fascination in Florence's thoughts. A more distinct
remembrance of his features, voice, and manner: which she sometimes
courted, as a means of reducing him to the level of a real personage,
capable of exerting no greater charm over her than another: did not
remove the vague impression. And yet he never frowned, or looked upon
her with an air of dislike or animosity, but was always smiling and
serene.

Again, Florence, in pursuit of her strong purpose with reference to
her father, and her steady resolution to believe that she was herself
unwittingly to blame for their so cold and distant relations, would
recall to mind that this gentleman was his confidential friend, and
would think, with an anxious heart, could her struggling tendency to
dislike and fear him be a part of that misfortune in her, which had
turned her father's love adrift, and left her so alone? She dreaded that
it might be; sometimes believed it was: then she resolved that she
would try to conquer this wrong feeling; persuaded herself that she was
honoured and encouraged by the notice of her father's friend; and hoped
that patient observation of him and trust in him would lead her bleeding
feet along that stony road which ended in her father's