“They’re in the right, sir, indeed they are. You can’t get down to see the place, and White doesn’t choose to tell you what the people say, but it’s a shame that any one should have to live in such holes.”
“You’ll live in them yourself one of these days, if you go on in this confounded fashion of yours.”
“Then I hope you’ll have them set in order at once, sir,” said Anthony, with a promptitude over which old Tregennas chuckled.
In about a fortnight he let them go. Anthony was so conscious of the sacrifice he had made upon the altar of friendship, that he was the more irritated at the change which had become perceptible in Marmaduke. It seemed at times as if he scarcely cared to conceal his repulsion, and at other moments as though he were studiously forcing himself to wear the old dress of pleasant companionship. Anthony’s nature was one which very quickly took the tone which others exhibited towards him; he was apt to fall aloof at the first symptom of drawing back, and to feel more anger than sorrow at the loss of good-will. In this case, however, the thought of Marion prevented the alteration in their relations to one another becoming so marked as it might otherwise have been, and, indeed, Marmaduke was kept closely at his distasteful duties during the following autumn and winter months.
Anthony himself was not uninterruptedly at the Vicarage. He had a feeling as if this choice of a profession which lay before him were a crisis in his life; perhaps a little pleasant sense of self-importance gave it even undue gravity in his eyes. It was possible to debate upon it without that goad of necessity behind him by which men are often driven into the decisions of life, and his mind travelled after many projects in the paths which stretched to this and that summit in the horizon of the future. At one time he would be a barrister,—until he went to London and was talked out of it by one of the profession; at another he would travel with a pupil, an idea unconsciously crushed by Sir James Milman’s energy in offering him the charge of a shock-headed lad whose irreproachable heaviness would have driven Anthony out of his senses by the end of a week; finally, his longest and favourite dream was that of literature, the gates of which were to fly open as all gates are to open before these young knights. Meanwhile his life was much what it had been in the summer, energetic in everything, whether shooting or flirting or dancing or writing, splendidly young, as Mr Robert once said. As to his relations with Winifred Chester, the barrier between them, doubtless, still existed, and caused a fret on either side, he telling himself that Winifred was changeable and unsympathetic, and she accusing him of giving up old friendships for new, yet neither the one nor the other so entirely believing in their own reproaches as to have lost the idea that some day things would go back to what once had been. Meanwhile, if the old familiar life did not flow on with the pleasant smoothness of former days,—and, indeed, the Squire’s manner with Anthony must be allowed in some measure to have prevented this,—Winifred was less tired in the winter than in the gay brightness of the summer days, and it was less sharp to dream of his sitting by Miss Milman’s side than to be actually there to feel herself neglected. Moreover, she was struggling with all her might to prove herself—even to herself—indifferent. It was balm to her sore heart, ashamed of its own weakness and attempting to ignore it, to keep away from the Vicarage when Anthony was there, to avoid the roads in which she was likely to meet him, to turn the conversation when it drew near the subject which was dearest, to remain in her own room when he came to Hardlands. Every such act was a triumph, but what a triumph! For Anthony was not likely to bear his treatment with good-humoured indifference. It galled him. He was inclined to retaliate, and he laid all the blame of their altered relations at Winifred’s door. Now and then there came a faint return of what once had been, but there was no doubt that the last few months had developed a certain easiness to take offence, which had never before seemed to belong to the girl’s nature, so that often even after a momentary relaxation she pulled herself up with a sharp and uncomfortable check. It is indeed a little difficult for a woman in her position to strike the just balance between self-respect and pride.
If she could not altogether deceive herself, she unconsciously contrived to mystify others: the men said she had refused young Miles, the women that she had tried in vain to marry him, even shrewd Mr Robert was puzzled. There was no one so loving, so tender, so observant, that they weighed the trifles which might have betrayed her, no swiftness of motherhood to read what was passing. So far as human sympathy was concerned, she bore her burden, without a finger being stretched to help her; but there is a Hand from whose loving touch the sorest heart never shrinks, and from out of the very depths it draws us gently.
Her self-containing puzzled even herself. There comes a time in most strong lives when the mysterious power of repression becomes an experience to them and grows into a wonder. It fills the world with a keener interest than when all things seemed open in the page of the great book. Face, heart, nature,—what is hidden beyond our sight?—what does the mask cover?—of what tremendous powers are we unconscious that lie beside us and round our very hearth? Now and then the crust heaves, and we see a flash, but the very working of our own hearts is often hidden from us, and it is only by slow degrees that we learn those forces in ourselves which teach us to reverence our brother’s soul.