“We must; but it passes me to know how to set about it.”
Chapter Eighteen.
Sunday at Home.
On the next Sunday morning the bells of Ashcroft Church were ringing for an early celebration of the Holy Communion. Many eyes were turned on Alwyn Cunningham as he walked down the village in the fresh sweetness of the summer morning. Such early church-going was not according to Mr Cunningham’s habits, and probably Alwyn was the last person that any one expected to see practise it, for the formal confirmation of a careless public schoolboy had never been followed up, and in old days he had never been a communicant. The change from former habits was so marked that the conservative villagers of Ashcroft looked at him very distrustfully, as if they wondered why he came.
Perhaps Alwyn had forgotten what it was to be the observed of all observers; perhaps he had learnt that only thus would he obtain the help he needed in a most painful position. His father had accepted his statements as to Lennox’s confession, and had allowed such a search for the jewels as could be made without publicity to be commenced at once. He also acknowledged in a more indirect way that his son had become a respectable member of society, fit to visit at his house; but he did not open his heart to him, nor forgive him, except in a formal manner. Alwyn felt that his father did not trust him, he knew that his engagement to an American lady would not tell in his favour, and he guessed that the marked and complete change of attitude as to religious matters, the account of which, indeed, had been intended for Edgar only, would be viewed with suspicion. Mr Cunningham, after reading the letter, had touched on no point but the lost jewels, and Alwyn had accepted his silence and the situation, and talked diligently when they met, and at meal times, of general topics.
But when old Mr Murray saw him this morning he wondered if the inaccessible Cunninghams, who had always been so polite, and on such stiff term with him since his coming to Ashcroft, would approached by the unlikely channel of the returned exile.
Certainty anything less like the irreverent, light-minded youth whom he had heard described than Alwyn’s serious face could hardly be imagined, and Bessie Warren could not help wondering what he was thinking of, as she saw him look round before he turned away, as if noting the once familiar scene.
Edgar had been so weak and so much shaken by all that had passed that he had been content to take his brother’s presence for granted, and when Alwyn realised how very solitary such hours of languor and suffering must usually have been, he cared little what his presence there cost himself, if the sight of him made Edgar’s eye brighten and gave him any pleasure, however small.