By the next morning Cheriton’s thoughts had cleared themselves, and matters began to take some shape; he could make up his mind to a certain line of conduct, or at least could place a distinct aim before him. He had often before been forced to acknowledge that Alvar’s character, as well as his position, had its own rights; they must take him as they found him; neither his faults nor his excellencies were theirs—and how much Cherry owed to those very points in Alvar which had come on them like a surprise! Was it not the height both of ingratitude and of conceit to think of him as of one to be altered and influenced before he could be fit for his new station? Why would not Alvar’s gentleness, honour, and courtesy, his undoubted power of setting himself aside, make him as valuable a member of society as industry, integrity, and regard for those about him had made of his father? It was his misfortune, not his fault, that he was a square man in a round hole; and what could Cherry do but try to round off a few angles or poke a few corners for them to stick into? Was it prejudice and unworthy jealousy that made him unable to accept this view, or was there something in Nettie’s vehement disapproval, however unkindly and arrogantly it was expressed? If Alvar chose he could make a very good Squire Lester. Yes, if—There was the question. The English Lesters sometimes did right, and sometimes—some of them very often—did wrong; but they one and all recognised that doing right was the business of their lives, and that if they did wrong they must repent and suffer. They certainly believed that “conduct is nine-tenths of life,” in other words, that they must “do their duty in that state of life to which they were called.”
But in Alvar this motive seemed almost non-existent. He did not care about his own duty or other people’s. Only such a sense, or the strong influence of the religion from which in the main it sprang, or a sort of enthusiasm equally foreign to him, could have roused an indolent nature to the supreme effort of altering his whole way of living, of caring for subjects hitherto indifferent to him—in short, of changing his entire self. No doubt Alvar would think something due to his position, and something more to please Cheriton, but he would not regard shortcomings as of any consequence; in short, it was not that Alvar’s principles were different from theirs, but that as motives of action he had not got any; not that he had Spanish instead of English notions of property, politics, or religion, but that he did not care to entertain any notions at all.
Cheriton understood enough now of the shifting scenes of Spanish life to understand that this might be their effect on an outsider who saw many different schemes of life all produce an equally bad effect on society; but it was none the less peculiarly ill-adapted to an owner of English property; and he took leave to think that if Spanish gentlemen in past generations had administered justice in their own neighbourhoods, mended their own roads, and seen to the instruction of their own tenants, a happier state of things might have prevailed at the present time in the peninsula. Anyhow, to him, as to his father, the welfare of Oakby was very dear—dearer now than ever, for his father’s sake. One thought had troubled Mr Lester’s last hours, that by his own conduct he had allowed Alvar to become unfit to succeed him: all, therefore, that Cheriton could do to remove that unfitness was so much work done for his father’s sake; all, too, that made Alvar happy, was an undoing of the wrong that he had suffered. There was no real discord between what was right by Alvar and by Oakby and by his own sense of right. To make the best of Alvar, to allow for all his difficulties, to help him in every possible way, was not only due to that loving brother, but was the right way to be loyal to his father’s higher self, and to clear his memory from those weaknesses and errors which cling to every one in this mortal life—was, too, the only way to see his work carried on.
This “high endeavour” came to Cheriton, indeed, as “an inward light” to brighten the perplexed path before him. Sorrow, he had already learnt, could be borne, difficulties might be overcome, now that his inmost feelings were at peace.
Certainly he had enough on his hands. Much of the correspondence with old friends fell naturally to his share. English “business” was unintelligible to Alvar without his explanations, and though the new Squire showed himself perfectly willing to receive from Mr Malcolm an account of the various sources of his income, and submitted to go through his father’s accounts, and to hear reports from farmers and bailiffs, he always insisted on Cheriton’s presence at these interviews; and though he was too easily satisfied with the fact that “my brother understands,” no one could have expected him to find it all quite easy to understand himself.
Cherry apologised for putting his finger in every pie.
“Oh,” said Alvar cheerfully; “I could not make the pie if I put in both my hands.”
But Cheriton knew perfectly well that the parish and the estate believed themselves to be entering on the reign of King Log. Any breakers, however, in this direction were still far ahead; but within doors difficulties and incongruities came sooner to a point, and Alvar was by no means always to blame for them.
On the day after the funeral, Mrs Lester resumed her place in the family; but her son’s death had aged her much, and to see Alvar in his place was gall and wormwood to her. She accepted his offer of a home, and thanked him for it with dignity and propriety; but she did not attempt to conceal from the young ones that she grudged him the power to make it.
The household arrangements went on as usual, and Alvar’s behaviour to her was irreproachable in its courtesy and consideration, nor did she ever clash with him, but reserved her fears and her disapprobations for Cherry’s benefit.