“Hallo, Alvar, have you come to look for me? I have been to see Parson Seyton. You have no idea what grand doings there are now in Elderthwaite.”
“I did not come to look for you,” said Alvar, with some emphasis.
“Well, I was coming home.”
Then Alvar turned, and with a sort of haughty politeness hoped that Mr and Miss Seyton were well; and Virginia, in the sweet tones unheard for so many months, replied to him, and after shaking hands with Cheriton, walked away down the sunny lane, from which she could not turn aside, and which afforded no shelter from any eyes that might choose to follow her.
Alvar, however, turned away, and Cherry following, said,—
“I think a little light will dawn on Elderthwaite one day, thanks to Virginia.”
Alvar did not make any answer, and Cheriton was not at all sorry to see how much the meeting had disturbed him.
He never alluded to it again, but whether from any feelings connected with it or from the worries of his new position, he was less even-tempered than usual.
There was much to try him. So many matters pressed on him, and he was so very much at fault as to the way of dealing with them. Mr Lester had kept a considerable portion of his property in his own hands; he had also been a most active magistrate, sat upon innumerable county committees, and had united in his own person the chief lay offices of the parish. In all these capacities he had done a considerable amount of useful work, and though no one expected Alvar to take up the whole of it, he ought to have endeavoured to make himself master of the more necessary parts.
But the real defect of Alvar’s nature—the intense pride, that made the sense of being at a disadvantage hateful to him—worked at first in a wrong direction. The great effort of bending himself to learn to do badly what those around him could do well, was beyond one who had never felt the need of repentance, never acknowledged an error in himself; nor did the sense of duty to his neighbour, that counteracted this tendency in others of his name, appeal to the conscience of one who inherited the selfish instincts of the Spanish grandee. After the very first he grew impatient of the tasks that were so new to him, and yet resentful of any comment on his behaviour. He resented the standard to which he would not conform, all the more because an unspeakable soreness connected it with Virginia’s rejection of him.