Cheriton hardly knew what put the words into his mouth; but they chimed in Virginia’s heart for many a weary day, lighted up by the bright, brave smile which had accompanied them.
Chapter Twenty Five.
Farewell.
“O near ones, dear ones! you in whose right hands
Our own rests calm, whose faithful hearts all day,
Wide open, wait till back from distant lands
Thought, the tired traveller, wends his homeward way.”
“Of course, since Miss Seyton insists, and you say you wish it, I come home for my marriage in October,” said Alvar.
“You don’t understand,” replied Cheriton vehemently, “and you are unfair to Virginia. She is as kind as she can be. Go and show her that you really care for her as she deserves, and it will all come right. If anything could make matters worse for me, it would be to think I had been the excuse for a break between you!”
Alvar was standing in the library window, leaning back against the shutter. He looked perfectly unmoved and impervious to argument, his mouth shut firm and his eyebrows a little contracted. Cheriton, on the other hand, half lying on the window-seat, was flushed and eager as if he had been pleading for himself, not for another.
“No,” said Alvar obstinately. “Miss Seyton has dismissed me. She tells me that I do not content her. Well, then, I will go.”