“I’m not really hard to please, and even if you make mistakes now and then, good intentions count for a good deal. But you are dreadfully solemn, and there’s so much that is pleasant to talk about.”
They walked on briskly, for it had been possible to stand still only in the shelter of the bluff with bright sunshine streaming down on them; the cold they had forgotten now made itself felt.
“I can’t understand Jernyngham,” Prescott said after a while. “One can’t blame him for persecuting me, but there’s something in his conduct that makes one think him off his balance.”
Muriel’s eyes sparkled with indignation.
“I suppose he ought to be pitied, but I can’t forgive him, and I’ll tell you what I think. He has led a well-regulated life, but his virtues are narrow and petty. Indeed, I think they’re partly habits. He is not a clever or a really strong man; but because of his money and position, which he never ventured out of, he found people to obey him and grew into a domineering autocrat. I believe he was fond of Cyril and felt what he thought of as his loss; but that was not all. The shock brought him a kind of horrified anger that anything of a startling nature should happen to him—he felt it wasn’t what he deserved. Then his desire for justice degenerated into cruelty and when he came out here, where nobody gave way to him, he somehow went to pieces. His nature wasn’t big enough to stand the strain.”
It was a harsh analysis, but Muriel was not inclined to be charitable. Jernyngham had made things very hard for her lover.
“I dare say you’re right,” responded Prescott. “But the morning after he reached my place in the blizzard I had a talk with him and found him reasonable. I think he half believed in my innocence, but soon afterward he was more savage than before.”
“Isn’t it possible that you took too much for granted? He couldn’t be rude to you when you had saved him from freezing.”
“I don’t think I did. He was pretty candid at first and I wasn’t cordial, but he listened to me, and I feel convinced that before he left he was beginning to see that he might have been mistaken. What I don’t understand is why he changed again, when nothing fresh turned up to account for it.”
A light dawned on Muriel. She saw Gertrude’s work in this and her face flushed with anger, but it was not a subject she meant to discuss with the man she loved.