C.R. Coleridge (continued 8)

When Cheriton came out of the dining-room, Nettie pursued him into a corner, and began abruptly,—

“Cherry, I want to speak to you. When Jack went to Spain did he tell you anything about me?”

“Nothing that I recollect especially,” said Cherry, surprised.

“Well, I am going to tell you about it. Mind, I think I was perfectly right, and Jack ought to have known I should be.”

“Have you and Jack had a quarrel, then?”

“Yes,” said Nettie, standing straight upright, and making her communication as she looked down on Cherry, as he sat on a low chair. “I taught Dick to pass his examination.”

“You!”

“Yes. You know he wouldn’t work at anything, and I used to make him come and say his lessons to me—the kings of England, you know, and the rivers, and populations, and French verbs. Well, then, if he didn’t know them, I made him learn them till he did. But of course he didn’t wish any one to know, so we had to get up early, and sit in the hay-loft, or down by the bridge. I could not help the boys knowing that Dick and I went out together, and at last Jack found us in Clements’ hay-loft. Dick ran away, but Jack was very angry with me, and insulted me; and Cherry—he went and told papa, and they sent me to London. But I never told the reason, because I had promised Dick. Now, Cherry, wouldn’t it have been very wrong to give up the chance of doing Dick good because Jack chose to be ridiculous? It just made him succeed, and perhaps he will owe it to me that he is a respectable person, and earns his living. You would have helped him, wouldn’t you?”

“Why, yes,” said Cherry; “but that is not quite the same thing.”

“Because I am a girl. Cherry, I think it would be mean to have let that stop me. But now he is through, I shall never do it again, of course; and, Cherry, indeed I meant it just as if he had been a ploughboy.” Here Nettie hung her tall head, and her tone grew less defiant.

“But, after all, Nettie, you should not have done what you knew granny and father would not like,” said Cherry, much puzzled what to say to her.

“It was because papa never knew that I told you,” said Nettie rapidly.

Cheriton asked a few more questions, and elicited that Nettie had, very early in their intimacy, taken upon herself the reform of Dick, and had domineered over him with all the force of a strong will over a weak one. Nettie had acted in perfect good faith, and had defied her brother’s attack on her; but as the lessons went on, her instinct had taught her that Dick found her attractive, and came to learn to please himself, not her. The girl had all the self-confidence of her race, and having set her mind on what she called “doing good” to Dick, she defied her own consciousness of his motives, having begun in kindness dashed with considerable contempt. But lazy Dick had powers of his own, and by the time of her quarrel with Jack, Nettie had felt herself on dangerous ground. “I shan’t marry—no one is like our boys,” she said to herself; but there was just a little traitorous softening and an indefinite sense of wrong-doing which had made her seek absolution from Cheriton, and with the peculiar absence of folly, which was a marked characteristic of the slow-thinking twins, she gave herself the protection of his knowledge.

Cheriton’s impulse was to take up Jack’s line and give her a good scolding, but he was touched by her appeal, and had learned to weigh his words carefully. He said something rather lame and inadequate about being more particular in future, but he gave Nettie’s hand a kind little squeeze, and she felt herself off her own mind. It had been a curious incident, and had done much to make Nettie into a woman—too much of a woman to look on her protégé with favouring eyes. Dick, too, was likely to find other interests, but Nettie had helped to give him a fair start, and her scorn of his old faults could never be quite forgotten.

Chapter Forty.

A New Suggestion.

“Once remember You devoted soul and mind To the welfare of your brethren And the service of your kind, Now what sorrow can you comfort?”

Soon after the scenes recorded in the last chapter, Alvar received a letter from Mrs Lester, in which she thanked him, in a dignified and cordial manner, for his proposal that the home at Oakby should go on as usual, but said she did not consider that her residence there would be for the happiness of any one. During her son’s married life she had lived in a house at Ashrigg, which was part of the Lester property, and was called The Rigg. This was now again vacant, and she proposed to take it, making it a home for Nettie, and for any of her grandsons who chose so to consider it. The great sorrow of her dear son’s death would be more endurable to her, she said, anywhere but at Oakby. The neighbourhood of the Hubbards would provide friends for herself and society for Nettie, who would be very lonely at Oakby in her brothers’ constant absences. Alvar was sincerely sorry. He was accustomed to the idea of a family home being open to all, and did not, in any way, regard himself as trammelled by his grandmother’s presence there, while Cheriton was utterly taken by surprise, and hated the additional change and uprooting. He did not think the step unwise, especially as regarded Nettie, but he marvelled at his grandmother’s energy in devising and resolving on it. He had expected a great outcry from Nettie, but she proved not to be unprepared, and said briefly, “that she liked it better than staying at home now.”

“But you will not desert me?” said Alvar. “Shall I drive you too away from your home?”

“No,” said Cherry. “No, I’ll come home for the holidays, and the boys, too, if you will have them; though I suppose granny will want to see us all sometimes.”

“I wish that I could take you home now,” said Alvar. “I think you are tired with London—you see too many people.”

Cheriton coloured a little at the allusion, but he disclaimed any wish to leave London then, shrinking indeed from breaking through the externals of his profession. It ended by Alvar going down to meet his grandmother at Oakby, and to make arrangements for the change, during which he proved himself so kind, courteous, and helpful to her, that he quite won her heart; and Nettie, on her return, was astonished at hearing Alvar’s judgment deferred to, and “my grandson” quoted as an authority, on several occasions.

Jack, after a few days in London, joined a reading party for the first weeks of the vacation; and Bob, on his return from the gentleman who was combining for him the study of farming and of polite literature, joined Nettie in London, and took her down to Ashrigg; so that the early part of August found only Cheriton and Alvar at Oakby.

Cherry liked this well enough, for though the house could not but seem forlorn and empty to him, daily life was always pleasant with Alvar, and he would have gladly helped him through all the arrears of business that came to hand. These were considerable, for Mr Lester’s subordinates had not been trained to go alone, and none of them had been allowed universal superintendence. Cheriton thought that Alvar required such assistance, and that he ought to have an agent with more authority; but oddly enough he did not take to the proposal, and in the meantime he made mistakes, kept decisions waiting, failed to recognise the relative importance of different matters, and, still worse, of different people.

One afternoon, towards the end of August, Cheriton went over to Elderthwaite. What with business at home, expeditions to Ashrigg, and a great many calls on his attention from more immediate neighbours, he had not seen very much of the parson, and as he neared the rectory he beheld an unwonted sight in the field adjoining, namely, some thirty or forty children drinking tea, under the superintendence of Virginia and one of the Miss Ellesmeres.

“Hallo, Cherry,” said the parson, advancing to meet him; “where have you been? Seems to me we must have a grand—what d’ye call it?—rural collation before we can get a sight of you.”

“As you never invited me to the rural collation, I was not aware of its existence,” said Cherry laughing, as Virginia approached him.

“Oh, Cherry, stay and start some games,” she said. “You know they are so ignorant, they never even saw a school-feast before.”

“Then, Virginia, I wonder at you for spoiling the last traces of such refreshing simplicity. Introducing juvenile dissipation! Well, it doesn’t seem as if the natural child wanted much training to appreciate plum-cake!”

“No; but if you could make the boys run for halfpence—”

“You think they won’t know a halfpenny when they see one.”

“Do have some tea!” said Lucy Ellesmere, running up to him. “Perhaps you are tired, and Virginia has given them beautiful tea, and really they’re very nice children, considering.”

So Cherry stayed, and advanced the education of the Elderthwaite youth by teaching them to bob for cherries, and other arts of polite society, ending by showing them how to give three cheers for the parson, and three times three for Miss Seyton; and while Virginia was dismissing her flock with final hunches of gingerbread, the parson called him into the house.

“Poor lassie!” he said; “she is fond of the children, and thinks a great deal of doing them good; but it’s little good she can do in the face of what’s coming.”

“How do you mean?” said Cheriton. “Is anything specially amiss?”

“Come in and have a pipe. A glass of wine won’t come amiss after so much tea and gingerbread.”

They went into the dining-room, and the parson poked up the fire into a blaze, for even August afternoons were not too warm at Elderthwaite for a fire to be pleasant, and as he subsided into his arm-chair, he said gravely,—

“Eh, Cherry, we Seytons have been a bad lot—a bad lot—and the end of it’ll be we shall be kicked out of the country.”

“Oh, I hope not!” said Cherry, quite sincerely. “What is the matter?”

“Well, look round about you. Is there a wall that’s mended, or a plantation preserved as it ought to be? Look at the timber—what is there left of it? and what’s felled lies rotting on the ground for want of carting. There’s acres of my brother’s hay never was led till the rain came and spoiled it. Look at the cottages. Queenie gets the windows mended, but she can’t make the roofs water-tight. Look at those woods down by the stream, why, there’s not a head of game in them, and once they were the best preserves in the country!”

“Things are bad, certainly,” said Cherry.

“And yet, Cherry, we’ve loved the place, and never have sold an acre of it, spite of mortgages and everything. Well, my brother’s not long for this world. He has been failing and failing before his time, and though he has led a decent life enough, things have gone more to the bad with years of doing nothing, than with all the scandals of my father’s time.”

“Is Mr Seyton ill?” said Cheriton.

“Not ill altogether; but mark my words, he’ll not last long. Well, at last, he was so hard up that he wrote to Roland—and I know, Cheriton, it was the bitterest pill he ever swallowed—and asked his consent to selling Uplands Farm. What does Roland do but write back and say, with all his heart; so soon as it came into his hands he should sell every acre, house and lands, advowson of living and all, and pay his debts. He hated the place, he said, and would never live there. Sell it to the highest bidder. There were plenty of fortunes made in trade, says he, that would give anything for land and position. So there, the old place’ll go into the hands of some purse-proud stranger. But not the church—he shan’t go restoring and improving that with his money. I’m only fifty-nine, and a good life yet, and I’ll stick in the church till I’m put into the churchyard!”

Cherry smiled, it was impossible to help it; but the parson’s story made him very sad. He knew well enough that it was a righteous retribution, that Roland’s ownership would be a miserable thing for every soul in Elderthwaite, and that the most purse-proud of strangers would do something to mend matters; and yet his heart ached at the downfall, and his quick imagination pictured vividly how completely the poor old parson would put himself in the wrong, and what a disastrous state of things would be sure to ensue.

“I’d try and not leave so much ‘restoration’ for any stranger to do,” he said.

“Eh, what’s the good?” said the parson. “She had better let it alone for the ‘new folks.’”

“Nay,” said Cherry, “you cannot tell if the ‘new folks,’ as you call them, will be inclined for anything of the sort, and all these changes may not take place for years. It doesn’t quite pay to do nothing because life is rather more uncertain to oneself than to other people.”

Cheriton spoke half to himself, and the parson went on with his own train of thought.

“Ay, I’ll stick to the old place, though I thought it a heavy clog round my neck once; and if you knew all the ins and outs of that transaction, you’d say, maybe, I ought to be kicked out of it now.”

“No, I should not,” said Cherry, who knew, perhaps, more of the Elderthwaite traditions than the parson imagined. “Things are as they are, and not as they might have been, and perhaps you could do more than any one else to mend matters.”

The parson looked into the fire, with an odd, half humble, half comical expression, and Cherry said abruptly,—

“Do you think Mr Seyton would sell Uplands to me?”

“To you? What the dickens do you want with it?”

“Why—I don’t think it would be a bad speculation, and I should like, I think, to have it.”

“What? Does your brother make Oakby too hot to hold you?”

“No, indeed. He is all that is kind to me,” said Cherry indignantly. “Every one misconstrues him. But I should like to have a bit of land hereabouts, all the same.”

“Well, you had better ask my brother yourself. He may think himself lucky, for I don’t know who would buy a bit of land like that wedged in between the two places. Ah, here’s Queenie to say good-night. Well, my lassie, are you pleased with your sport?”

“Yes, uncle; and the children were very good.”

Cheriton walked a little way with Virginia, beyond the turning where they parted from Lucy Ellesmere. He found that she was unaware of the facts which the parson had told him, and though somewhat uneasy about her father, very much disposed to dwell on the good accounts of Dick and Harry, and on the general awakening in the place that seemed to demand improvements. Oakby offered a ready-made pattern, and other farmers had been roused by Mr Clements to wish for changes, while some, of course, were ready to oppose them.

“They begin to wish Uncle James would have a curate, Cherry,” she said; “but I don’t think he ever will find one that he could get on with. No one who did not know all the ins and outs of the place could get on either with him or with the people.”

“It would be difficult,” said Cheriton thoughtfully; “yet I do believe that a great deal might be done for parson as well as people.”

“Ah, Cherry,” said Virginia, with a smile, “if you hadn’t got another vocation, Uncle James would let you do anything you liked. I wish you were a clergyman, and could come and be curate of Elderthwaite; for you are the only person who could fit into all the corners.”

Virginia spoke in jest, as of an impossible vision, but Cheriton answered her with unexpected seriousness.

“It would be hard on Elderthwaite to put up with a failure, and an offering would not be worth much which one had waited to make till one had nothing left worth giving; I’m afraid, too, my angles are less accommodating than you suppose—ask Alvar.” Cherry finished his sentence thoughtlessly, and was recalled by Virginia’s blush; but she said as they parted, “That is a safe reference for you.”

Cheriton laughed; but as he walked homeward he turned and looked back on the tumble-down, picturesque village at his feet. Loud, rough sounds of a noisy quarrel in the little street came to his ears, and some boys passed him manifestly the worse for drink, though they pulled themselves up and tried to avoid his notice. It was not quite a new idea which Virginia had put into shape; but as the steep hill forced him to slacken his steps, he could not see that the strength which had proved insufficient for a more selfish object was likely to be worth consecrating to the service of his neighbours.

Chapter Forty One.

A New Ambition.

“Like a young courtier of the king’s—like the king’s young courtier.”

In the first week of September Jack came home, and Bob also came over from Ashrigg to assist in demolishing the partridges. The empty, lonely house affected the spirits of the two lads in a way neither of them had foreseen; the unoccupied drawing-room, the absence of Nettie’s rapid footsteps, the freedom from their grandmother’s strictures on dress and deportment—all seemed strange and unnatural; and when they were not absolutely out shooting, they hung about disconsolately, and grumbled to Cheriton over every little alteration. Jack, indeed, recovered himself after a day or two, but he looked solemn, and intensified Cherry’s sense that things were amiss, strongly disapproving of his principle of non-interference. He contrived, too, whether innocently or not, to ask questions that exposed Alvar’s ignorance of the names and qualities of places and people, and betrayed delays in giving orders, misconceptions of requirements, and many a lapse from order and method. Moreover, the way in which some of the excellent old dependents showed their loyalty to the old regime, was by doing nothing without orders. Consequently, a hedge remained unmended till the cows got through into a plantation, and ate the tops off the young trees,—“Mr Lester had given no order on the subject;” and a young horse was thrown down and broke his knees through Mr Lester desiring the wrong person to exercise him. Then, of two candidates for a situation, Alvar often managed to choose the wrong one, and with the sort of irritability that seemed to be growing on him, would not put up with suggestions.

“What?” said Jack; “one of those poaching, thieving Greens taken on as stable-boy! And Jos, too—the worst of the lot! Why, he has been in prison twice. A nice companion for all the other lads about the place! I saw little Sykes after him this morning. I should have thought you would have stopped that, Cherry, at least!”

“I did not know of it, Jack, till too late,” said Cherry quietly.

“Well,” said Jack, driving his hands into his pockets and frowning fiercely, “I don’t think it’s right to let such things pass without a protest. Something will happen that cannot be undone. I don’t approve of systems by which people’s welfare is thrown into the hands of a few; but if they are—if you are those few, it’s—it’s more criminal than many things of which the law takes cognisance, to neglect their interest. It’s destroying the last relics of reality, and bringing the whole social edifice to destruction.”

“What I think,” said Bob, “is that if a man’s a gentleman, and has been accustomed to see things in a proper point of view, he acts accordingly.”

“A gentleman! A man’s only claim to be a gentleman is that he recognises the whole brotherhood of humanity and his duties as a human being.”

“Come, I don’t know,” said Bob, not quite sure where these expressions were leading him.

“His duty to his neighbour,” said Cheriton.

“You worry yourself fifty times too much about it all,” said Jack, with vehement inconsistency.

“Well, perhaps I do,” said Cheriton, glad to turn the conversation. “Come, tell me how you got on in Wales, I have never heard a word of it.”

Jack looked at him for a moment, and with something of an effort began to talk about his reading party; but presently he warmed with the topic, and Cherry brightened into animation at the sound of familiar names and former interests; they began to laugh over old jokes, and quarrel over old subjects of disputation; and they were talking fast and eagerly against each other, with a sort of chorus from Bob, when, looking up, Cherry suddenly saw Alvar standing before them with a letter in his hand.

He was extremely pale, but his eyes blazed with such intensity of wrath, he came up to them with a gesture expressive of such passion, that they all started up; while he burst out,—

“I have to tell you that I am scorned, injured, insulted. My grandfather has died—”

“Your grandfather, Don Guzman? Alvar, I am sorry,” exclaimed Cheriton; but Alvar interrupted him,—

“Sorrow insults me! I learn that he has made his will, that he leaves all to Manoel, that I—I, his grandson—am not fit to be his heir, ‘since I am a foreigner and a heretic, and unfit to be the owner of Spanish property.’”

“That seems very unjust,” said Cheriton, as Alvar paused for a moment.

“Unjust!” cried Alvar. “I am the victim of injustice. Here and there—it is the same thing. I have been silent—yes, yes—but I will not bear it. I will be what I please, myself—there, here, everywhere!”

“Nay, Alvar,” said Cherry gently; “here at least, you have met with no injustice.”

“And why?” cried Alvar, with the sudden abandonment of passion which now and then broke through his composure. “You are doubtless too honourable to plot and scheme; but your thoughts and your wishes, are they not the same—the same as this most false and unnatural traitor, who has stolen from me my inheritance and my grandfather’s love? What do you wish, my brothers—wish in your hearts—would happen to the intruder, the stranger, who takes your lands from you? Would you not see me dead at your feet?”

“We never wished you were dead,” said Bob indignantly, as Alvar walked about the room, threw out his hands with vehement gestures, stamped his foot, and gave way to a violence of expression that would have seemed ludicrous to his brothers but for the fury of passion, which evidently grew with every moment, as if the injury of years was finding vent. All the strong temper of his father seemed roused and expressed with a rush of vindictive passion, his southern blood and training depriving him at once of self-consciousness and self-control.

“What matter what you wish? Am I not condemned to a life which I abhor, to a place that is hateful to me, despised by one whose feet I would kiss, disliked by you all, insulted by those who should be my slaves? What is this country to me, or I to it? I care not for your laws, your magistrates, your people—who hate me, who would shoot me if they dared. And this—this—has lost me the place where I was as good as others. I lose my home for this—for you who stand together and wonder at me. I curse that villain who has robbed me; I curse the fate that has made me doubly an outlaw; most of all, I curse my father, whose neglect—”

“Silence!” said Cheriton; “you do not speak such words in our presence.”

The flood of Alvar’s words, half Spanish, half English, had fairly silenced the three brothers with amazement. Now he faced round furiously on Cheriton,—

“I will speak—”

“You will not,” said Cheriton, grasping his hand, and looking full in his face. “You forget yourself, Alvar. Don’t say what we could never forget or forgive.”

But Alvar flung him off with a violence and scorn that roused the two lads to fury, and made Cheriton’s own blood tingle as Jack sprang forward,—

“I won’t have that,” he said, in a tone as low as Alvar’s was high, but to the full as threatening.

“I’ll give you a licking if you touch my brother,” shouted Bob, with a rough, schoolboy enforcement of the threat.

“Hush!” said Cheriton; “for God’s sake, stop—all of you! We are not boys now, to threaten each other. Stop, while there is time. Stand back, I say, Jack, and be silent!”

The whole thing had passed in half a minute; Alvar’s own furious gesture had sobered him, and he threw himself into a seat; while Cheriton’s steady voice and look controlled the two lads, and gave Jack time to recollect himself.

There was a moment’s silence. Then Alvar stood up, bowed haughtily, like a duellist after the encounter, and walked out of the room. Jack, after a minute, broke into an odd, harsh laugh, and, pushing open the window, leant out of it.

“One wants air. That was a critical moment,” he said.

“I’ll not stand that sort of thing; I’ll go back to Ashrigg; I’ll not come here again,” said Bob. “What did you stop us for, Cherry, when we were going to show him a piece of our minds?”

“I did not think anybody’s mind was fit to be exhibited,” said Cheriton. “Don’t begin to quarrel with me too, Bob; and do not go away to-day on any account.”

“Well!” said Bob; “if you like such a hollow peace—but I’ll not shoot his partridges, nor ride his horses; I’ll go for a walk, and I shan’t come in to dinner!”

Bob flung out of the room, banging the door behind him.

At first the other two hardly spoke a word to each other. Cherry sat down a little apart, and mechanically took up a newspaper. Jack sat in the window, and as his heat subsided, thought over the scene that had passed. He felt that it was more than a foolish outburst of violent temper; it had been a revelation to themselves and to each other of a state of feeling that it seemed to him impossible any longer to ignore. He knew that Cheriton’s presence of mind had saved them from words and actions that might have parted them for ever; but what was the use of pretending to get on with Alvar after such a deadly breach? Better leave him to do the best he could in his own way, and go theirs. And Jack’s thoughts turned to his own way in the future that he hoped for, success and congenial labour, and sweet love to brighten it. After all, a man’s early home was not everything to him. And then he looked towards Cheriton, who had dropped his newspaper, and sat looking dreamily before him, with a sad look of disappointment on his face.

“What are you going to do, Cherry?” said Jack.

“Do? Nothing. What can I do?” said Cherry. Then he added, “We must not make too much of what passed to-day; let us all try and forget it. Alvar has been ill-treated, and we are none of us so gentle as not to know what a little additional Spanish fire might make of us.”

“To be rough with you!” said Jack.

“Oh, that was accidental. It is the terrible resentment. There, I did not mean to speak of it. Let us get out into the air, and shake it off.”

“It is too wet and cold for you,” said Jack, looking out.

Cheriton flushed at the little check with an impatience that showed how hardly the scene had borne on him.

“Nonsense; don’t be fanciful,” he said. “It won’t hurt me—what if it did?”

Jack followed him in silence, and as they walked Cherry talked resolutely of other matters, though with long pauses of silence between.

In the meantime Alvar endured an agony of self-disgust. He could not forgive himself for his loss of dignity, nor his brothers for having witnessed it. Cheriton had conquered him, and the thought rankled so as to obscure even the love he bore him; while all the bitter and vindictive feelings, never recognised as sinful, took possession of him, and held undisputed sway. He was enough of an Englishman to reject his first impulse of rushing back to Seville and calling out his cousin and fighting him. After all, the bitterness was here; and at dinner-time he appeared silent and sullen in manner. Cheriton looked ill and tired, and could hardly eat; but Alvar offered no remark on it, and the younger boys (for Bob did come back) were shy and embarrassed. Alvar answered when Cheriton addressed him with a sort of stiff politeness, and by the next morning had resumed a more ordinary demeanour; but when Bob again suggested going back to Ashrigg, Cheriton and Jack agreed that he had better do so, only charging him not to let Nettie or their grandmother guess at any quarrel.

“And, Cherry,” Jack said, “suppose we come somewhere together for a little while? A little sea air would do you good—and you could help me with my reading. No one could think it strange, and I am sure you want rest and quiet.”

“No, Jack,” said Cherry. “It is very good of you, my boy, but—I’ll try a little longer. Alvar and I could not come together again if I went away now, and I’ll not give up hoping that after all things may right themselves. Think of all he has been to me. But you must do as you think best yourself.”

“I shall not leave you here without me,” said Jack; “but I don’t see the use of staying.”

“Well—I shall stay,” said Cherry.

Alvar never alluded again to his letter from Spain; and the others were afraid to start the subject. He was very polite to them, and together they formed engagements, went over to Ashrigg, and led their lives in the usual manner; but there was no real approach, and Cheriton missed Alvar’s caressing tenderness, and the tact that had always been exercised on his behalf.

He did not, with all this worry, find as much strength to face the coming winter as he had hoped for, and while he thought that going back to London would put an end to the present discomfort, he believed that he would do no good there; and would not a parting from Alvar now be a real separation?

Alvar, meanwhile, took a fit of attending to business. He spent much time about the place, insisted on being consulted on all subjects, and still more on being instantly obeyed; King Log had vanished, and a very peremptory king Stork appeared in his place. The gentle, courteous, indifferent Alvar seemed possessed with a captious and resentful spirit that brooked no opposition. No one had ever dared to disobey Mr Lester’s orders; but then they had been given with a due regard to possibility, and often after consultation with those by whom they were to be obeyed.

Alvar now proved himself to be equally determined; but he was often ignorant of what was reasonable and of what was not, and though the sturdy north-countrymen had given in against their inclination to their superior, they thought it very hard to be driven against their judgment when they were right and “t’ strange squire” was wrong, or at least innovating. Now Alvar did know something about horses, and his views of stable management differed somewhat from those prevailing at Oakby, and being based on the experience of a different climate and different conditions, were not always applicable there, and could only of course be carried, as it were, at the sword’s point.

Full of this new and intense desire to feel himself master, and to prove himself so, Alvar not unnaturally concentrated his efforts on the one subject where he had something to say. He could not lay down the law about turnips and wheat; but he did think that he knew best how to treat the injuries the young horse had received by his own mistaken order.

Perhaps he did; but so did not think old Bill Fisher, who had been about the stables ever since he was twelve, and who, though past much active work, still considered himself an authority from which there was no appeal.

Alvar visited the horse, and desired a certain remedy to be applied to a sprained shoulder, taking some trouble to explain how it was to be made.

Old Bill listened in an evil silence, and instead of saying that so far as he knew one of the ingredients was unattainable at Oakby, or giving his master an alternative, said nothing at all in reply to Alvar’s imperious—“Remember, this must be done at once;” but happening soon after to encounter Cheriton, requested him to visit the horse, and desired his opinion of the proper treatment.

Cheriton, ignorant of what had passed, naturally quoted the approved remedy at Oakby, adding,—

“Why, Bill, I should have thought you would have known that for yourself.”

“Ay, no one ever heard tell of no other,” muttered the old man, proceeding to apply it with some grumbling about strangers, which Cheriton afterwards bitterly rued having turned a deaf ear to.

The next morning Alvar went to see if his plans had been carried out, and discovering how his orders had been disregarded, turned round, and said sternly,—

“How have you dared to disobey me?”

“Eh, sir,” said Bill, rather appalled at his master’s face, “this stuffs cured our horses these fifty year.”

“You have disobeyed me,” said Alvar, “and I will not suffer it. I dismiss you from my service—you may go. I will not forgive you.”

Old Bill lifted up his bent figure, and stared at his master in utter amaze.

“I served your honour’s grandfather—me and mine,” he said.

“You cannot obey me. What are your wages? I will pay them—you may go.” Neither the old man himself, nor the helpers who had begun to gather round, belonged to a race of violent words, or indeed of violent deeds; but there was more hate in the faces that were turned on Alvar than would have winged many an Irish bullet. All were silent, till a little brother of Cherry’s friends, the Flemings, called out, saucily enough,—“’Twas Mr Cherry’s orders.”

As if stung beyond endurance, Alvar turned, caught the boy by the shoulder, and raising his cane, struck him once, twice, several times, with a violence of which he himself was hardly conscious.

This was the scene that met Cheriton’s startled eyes as he came up to the stable to inquire for the sick horse.

He uttered a loud exclamation of astonishment and dismay, and put his hand on Alvar’s shoulder.

Alvar, with a final blow, threw the lad away from him, and faced round on Cheriton, drew himself up, and folded his arms, as he said, regardless of the spectators,—

“I will not have it that you interfere with me, to alter my orders, or to stop me in what I do. You shall not do it.”

“I have never interfered with you!” cried Cheriton fiercely. “Assuredly I never will. I—I—” He checked himself with a strong effort, and said, very low, “We are forgetting ourselves by disputing here. If you have anything to say to me, it can be said at a better moment.”

Then, without trusting himself with a word or look, he walked slowly away.

Alvar said emphatically,—

“Remember, I have said what I desire,” and turned off in another direction; while those left behind held such an “indignation meeting” as Oakby had never seen.

Chapter Forty Two.

No Use.

“Learn that each duty makes its claim Upon one soul, not each on all; How if God speaks thy brother’s name, Dare thou make answer to the call?”

Cheriton had encountered greater sorrows, he had met with more startling disappointments, but never, perhaps, had he endured such a complication of feeling as when he turned away and left Alvar in the stable yard. Perhaps he had never been so angry, for Alvar’s accusation was peculiarly galling, peculiarly hard to forgive, and impossible to forget. And then there was the bitter sense of utter failure—failure of influence, of tact, of affection, and, in so far as he identified himself with the place and the people, there was yet a deeper sense of injury. Every old prejudice, every old distaste, surged up in his mind, and yet he loved Alvar well enough to sharpen the sting. He walked on faster and faster, till want of breath stopped him, and brought on one of the fits of coughing to which overhaste or agitation always rendered him liable. He just managed to get back to the house and into the library, where Jack started up, as he threw himself into a chair.

“Cherry, what is the matter?”

Cherry could not speak for a moment; and Jack, much frightened, exclaimed,—

“What have you been doing? Let me call Alvar.”

Cheriton caught his arm as he turned away; and, after a few moments, as he began to get his breath,—

“Don’t be frightened. I walked too fast up hill.”

“How could you be so foolish?”

“Jack, I suppose I must tell you; indeed, I want to find out the rights of it; and I can ask no questions,” he added, with a sudden hurry in his accent.

“What do you mean? What has happened?”

The instinct of not irritating Jack enabled Cheriton to control his own indignation, and he said very quietly,—

“When I went up to the stable I found Alvar giving little Chris Fleming a tremendous licking. He was very much vexed with me for—I suppose for trying to interpose; but there were so many people about that we could not discuss it there. I wish you would go and ask old Bill what Chris had been doing, then come and tell me. Don’t say anything to Alvar about it.”

Jack was keen enough to see that this was not quite an adequate account of the matter. He saw that Cheriton was deeply moved in some way; but he was so unfit for discussion just then, that Jack thought the best course was to hurry off on his errand.

He came back in about half-an-hour, looking very serious—too much so to be ready to improve the occasion.

“Alvar has given old Bill warning—do you know that?”

“No. What was that for?” cried Cheriton, starting up.

“He would not speak a word to me, and Chris had gone off to his brother’s; but John Symonds told me what had passed.” Here Jack repeated the story of the ointment, old Bill’s disobedience, and Chris’s declaration that it had been done by Cheriton’s orders.

Cheriton’s face cleared a little.

“Ah, I understand now. No wonder Alvar was vexed! I can explain that easily. But old Bill, it was very unjustifiable; but if Alvar will not overlook it I do believe it will kill him.”

“I don’t see what he would have to live on,” said Jack. “You know that bad son spent his savings. But Alvar will let him off if you ask him, I daresay.”

“I think you had better do so,” said Cheriton quietly.

At this moment Alvar came into the room, and Cheriton addressed him at once.

“Alvar, when old Bill asked me about the ointment, I did not know that you had been giving any orders about it. I am very sorry for the mistake.”

“It is not of consequence,” said Alvar. “Do not trouble yourself about it.”

The words were kind, but the tone was less so; and there was something in Alvar’s manner which made it difficult even for Jack to say,—“I’m afraid old Bill Fisher was provoking. He should have told you that he could not get the stuff; but he is such an old servant, and so faithful. I hope you won’t dismiss him for it. He seems to belong to us altogether.”

“I shall not change,” said Alvar.

“But it’s an extremely harsh measure, and will make every one about the place detest you,” said Jack, still considering himself to be speaking with praiseworthy moderation.

“I will judge myself of the measure.” Then Cherry conquered his pride, and said pleadingly,—

“I wish it very much.”

“I am sorry to grieve you,” said Alvar, more gently; “but I have determined.”

“Well,” said Jack, losing patience, “we spoke as much for your sake as for Bill’s. Every one will consider it harsh dealing and a great shame. You’ll make them hate you.”

“I will make them fear me,” said Alvar.

“Claptrap and nonsense!” said Jack; but Cheriton interposed,—

“Hush, Jack, we have no right to say any more. What must be must.”

To do Alvar justice, he was not aware how deeply he was grieving Cheriton; he felt himself to be asserting his rights, and in the worst corner of his heart knew that any relenting would be ascribed to his brother’s influence.

It was a very miserable day. After some hours of astonished sulking, the poor old groom put his pride in his pocket, and came humbly “to beg t’ squire’s pardon,” and to entreat Cheriton to intercede for him, recapitulating his years of long service, and his recollections of the old squire’s boyhood, till he nearly broke Cherry’s heart; and induced him to promise to make another attempt at interceding—a promise which was not given without quite as severe a rebuke as Alvar had ever inflicted, for disrespect to his master’s orders.

He was closely followed by the eldest of the Fleming brothers, in great indignation.

Nowhere but at Oakby, as the young man took care to observe, would Chris have been allowed to take such a situation, in spite of his love of horses, and troublesomeness at home.

“Chris was impertinent to Mr Lester,” said Cheriton, hardly knowing what line to take.

Young Fleming was very sorry; in that case he was better at home, and he hoped it would not be inconvenient if he took him away at once.

“I suppose it might be best,” said Cheriton, thoroughly sympathising with the grievance, and thankful to Fleming for not obliging him to hear or say much about it.

“Then, sir, maybe you will tell the squire that such is our wish.”

“No; I think you had better write him a note about it.”

The two young men looked at each other, and though Cheriton turned his eyes quickly away, he knew well enough that Fleming understood the whole matter.

“As you please, sir,” he said; “I wouldn’t wish for you to be annoyed, Mr Cherry, and so I’ll keep out of the squire’s way. But Westmoreland men are not black slaves, which no doubt the squire is accustomed to, and accounts for his conduct. It’s plain, sir, to any one that can read the newspapers, that there’s no liberty in foreign parts, where they’re all slaves and papists. Education, sir, teaches us that. And folks do remark that the squire doesn’t keep his church as others do; and I have heard that he means to establish a Popish chapel like the one at Ravenscroft.”

“Then you have heard the greatest piece of nonsense that ever was invented. Education might cure you of such notions,” said Cherry. “You must do as you think best for Chris. I am very sorry.”

The last words were involuntary, and Cherry hurried away before he was betrayed into any further discussion.

Some hours later, as it was growing dusk, he was lying on the window-seat in the library, thinking of how he could plead old Fisher’s cause without giving offence, and coming slowly to the conclusion that his presence there was doing far more harm than good, that he was risking peace with Alvar, and had better give up the straggle, when Alvar himself came into the room, and came up to him.

“Are you not well?” he said, rather constrainedly.

“Only very tired.”

“What have you been doing?” said Alvar, sitting down on the end of the broad-cushioned seat, and looking at him.

The words certainly gave an opening; but Cheriton, famous all his life for the most audacious coaxing, could not summon a smile or a joke.

“I have been tired all day,” he said, to gain time for reflection.

“See,” said Alvar suddenly, “you are unhappy about this old man, whom I have dismissed.”

“Yes. I don’t defend him, far from it; but he is old and crochety, and I think you were harsh with him,” said Cherry resolutely.

“But it is I who should decide what to do with him,” said Alvar.

“Of course. Don’t imagine I dispute it,” said Cheriton, thinking this assertion rather foolish.

“You tell me that I should be master; you have told me so often. Well, then, I can be harsh to my servants if I please.”

“If you please, remembering that you and they serve the same Master above.”

Alvar paused for a moment, then said,—

“I do not please, at present. I have grieved you, as when I hurt Buffer. I will not be ruled by any one, but the old man shall live in his cottage, and have his wages; but he shall not come into the stables nor near my horses. Does that please you, my brother?”

Cherry had his doubts as to how old Bill might regard or fulfil the conditions, and certainly forbidding a servant to do any work was rather an odd way of punishing him; but he answered gratefully,—

“Yes, thank you, you have taken a great weight off my mind.”

“You cough,” said Alvar, after a few moments; “the weather is getting too cold for you.”

“I thought,” said Cherry, forcing himself to take advantage of the excuse, “that I would go to the sea for a little while before the winter.”

“Yes; where shall we go?” said Alvar, in a tone of interest. “Look,” he continued, with wonderful candour; “here we vex each other because we do not think the same. We are angry with each other; but we will come away, and I will take care of you. Then you shall go to London, and I shall come back, and you will see, I will yet be the squire. Where shall we go, mi caro?”

It was almost a dismissal, and so Cheriton felt it to be; but after all it was his own decision, and the return of Alvar’s old kindness was very comfortable to him.

“I had hardly thought about that,” he said.

“Well,” returned Alvar, “we can talk about it. Now, it is cold here in the window; come nearer to the fire and rest till dinner-time.”

As Cheriton sat up and looked out at the stormy sunset, he saw little Chris Fleming coming up the path that led round to the back door.

“Ah,” said Alvar cheerfully, following his eyes, “I do not wish to punish that boy any more. He has had enough, that little rascal.”

Evidently, Alvar’s conscience was quite at ease, and he did not suppose that he had in any way compromised himself. He began to perceive that Alvar had his own ideas as to what would make him really master of Oakby.

Just after dinner a note was brought to Alvar.

“If you please, sir, this note was found in the passage, just inside the back door.”

Alvar took the letter, lit one of the candles on the chimney-piece, and proceeded to read it.

“Moor End Farm, September 29th. “Honoured Sir,—After the events of this morning, I consider it for the best that my brother Christopher should leave your service at once. I have no objection to forfeit any wages due to him, as I do not feel able to give the usual month’s notice after what has passed. “I remain, honoured sir,— “Your obedient servant,— “Edward Fleming.”

Alvar coloured deeply as he read. “What is this?” he exclaimed. “May I not punish even a little boy, who insults me? Look!” and he threw the letter to his brother.

“It is very awkward,” said Cheriton.

“I think it is insolent,” said Alvar.

“I think there is a great effort to avoid any want of respect in the letter.”

“To take the boy away because he was punished!”

“Well, Alvar, if you or I were in Ned Fleming’s place, we shouldn’t have liked it.”

“Did you know that this letter was coming?”

“Yes, I did.”

“It is perhaps as you have advised Fleming?”

“No. I gave him no advice; but I knew he would not let the boy stay here.”

“Do you then approve?” said Alvar, in a curious sort of voice.

“From their point of view—yes. You are right in saying that you must make yourself felt as the master; but there is no good in enforcing your authority in a way that is not customary, to say the least of it. In England we can’t lay hands on other people; and they might have summoned you for an assault, you know.”

“What! before a judge?”

“Before a magistrate.”

“I?” exclaimed Alvar, in a tone of such amazement that Cheriton nearly laughed. “Who would listen to that little boy against me, who am a gentleman and his master?”

“The little boy is your equal in the eyes of the law, and might meet with more attention just because you are his master. Not that I mean to say it would not be regarded as very annoying to convict you,” said Cheriton, thinking of the feelings of Sir John Hubbard on such an emergency.

“I will myself be a magistrate,” said Alvar.

“That you never will,” said Cherry, losing patience, “while these stories get about, for no one would trust you.”

“Can I not be a magistrate if I choose?”

“Not unless the Lord Lieutenant gives you a commission, of course.”

“I think there is power for every one but me!” said Alvar. “I may not punish that little—what is your word?—vulgar, common boy. I do not like so much law. Gentlemen should do as they wish. You talk so much about my being landlord and squire. What is the use of it if I may not do as I will? Well, I will send away Fleming from his farm—that is mine at least.”

“I am afraid he has a twenty-one years lease in it,” said Cheriton, rather wickedly, and Alvar, fancying himself laughed at, suddenly put the letter in his pocket and turned away, as the gong sounded for dinner. He disappeared afterwards when they went back to the library, and Cheriton had the forbearance to abstain from giving Jack the benefit of Alvar’s peculiar views on the British constitution, though they could not fail to speak of the events of the morning, and Jack said,—

“Well, at least he has heard reason about old Bill, and that was of most consequence; but I should think you would be glad to be back in London, and out of the way of it all.”

“I am not quite sure about London, Jack,” said Cheriton, after a moment.

“What, don’t you feel well enough?”

“I don’t think I shall ever be good for much there; and besides—I think I should like to talk to you a little, Jack, if you’ll listen.”

“Well?”

“You know how I always looked forward to settling in London, and how Uncle Cheriton wished it, and meant to help me on. In fact I never thought of anything else.”

“Yes, I know,” said Jack, briefly.

“There was a time when I desired that sort of success intensely, and when things were very much changed for me, I thought it would still—be satisfactory.”

“Yes?”

“But of course, as you know, I soon perceived that the hard continuous work, necessary for anything like success, was quite out of the question for me—I feel sure that it always will be; and, moreover, I never felt well in London. I was much better here when I first came back.”

Poor Jack looked as if the disappointment were much fresher and harder to him than to the speaker himself.

“You must know,” Cheriton continued, “that a doctor once told me at Oxford that the damp soft air there was very bad for a native of such a place as this, and I see now that the last few months there began the mischief; and London has something the same effect on me. That seems to settle the question.”

“I suppose so,” said Jack, so disconsolately, that Cherry half smiled, as he resumed,—

“Otherwise the pleasant idle life there might have its charms. Though, after all, Jack, I shouldn’t like it as things are now. When I expected to be a London man, I expected, as you know—a good deal else. And afterwards even, while all home ties here were safe and sound, one would not get selfish and aimless. But now I couldn’t be happy, I think, without a home-world that really belonged to me.”

“And so home is being spoilt for you too?” said Jack.

“I see,” returned Cheriton, “that it won’t do. If Alvar is left to himself here, he will fight his way now, I think, to some means of managing proper to himself.”

“Or improper,” said Jack.

“Well, to be honest, I am afraid he will make a great many mistakes, and do a great deal of mischief. But if I were here—I mean if this place were still to be home to me so that I still felt—as I should feel—a personal concern in all the old interests, Alvar would quarrel with me. I might prevent individual evils; but in the long run I should do harm. He thought at first that I should guide him. Perhaps I thought so too; but it is a false and impossible relation, and it must be put a stop to.”

“But, Cherry, I think father looked to you to keep things straight.”

“Yes,” said Cherry, “but not to make them more crooked, by such disputes as we have had lately.”

Cheriton spoke resolutely, though with a quiver of the lip, and Jack could guess well enough at the pain the resolve was costing him. “Alvar is quite changed to you!” he said, savagely.

“Yes, because he himself is changing. He is different in many ways, and conscious of all sorts of difficulties.”

“But what do you mean to do?”

“Oh, nothing desperate, nothing till the winter is over. Probably I shall go to the sea with Alvar, as he suggests. Then if I am pretty well, I shall go and see granny. I have a notion that I should be better here in the cold weather than in London. I want to try.”

“Had you all this in your mind when you settled to buy Uplands?” said Jack suddenly. “Yes—in part I had.”

“But, you are not thinking of living there! What are you driving at, Cherry, I can’t understand you?”

“Well, Jack,” said Cherry, slowly and with rising colour, “I will tell you, but I wanted to show you the process. And you must remember that it is only an idea known to no one, and very probably may prove impossible, perhaps undesirable.”

“Tell me,” said Jack, more gently. Any scheme for the future was a relief from listening to the laying aside of hopes which he knew had been so much a part of Cheriton’s being.

“Well,” said Cherry again, “I’m afraid my motives are rather poor ones. You see, after Oakby there’s no place for me like Elderthwaite. I want the feeling, as I say, of a place and neighbours of my own. I suppose I am used to playing first fiddle, and to looking after other people’s concerns. Granny always said I was a gossip. Then I’m narrow-minded, perhaps I have had too much taken out of me to think of starting fresh. And you know the old parson will always put up with me, and so will Elderthwaite people. And I want an object in life—if you knew how dreary it is to be without one! If they had a strange curate he would set them all by the ears, and the parson would make a fool of himself! So if Mr Ellesmere thinks the bishop would consent, and approves, and if I am fit for anything, I thought that I would try.”

Jack was silent for some moments. He understood Cheriton well enough to “follow the process,” but it affected him strongly, and at last he said, gravely,—

“I am afraid all the vexation here has put this into your head.”

“Partly,” said Cherry, simply, “this actual thing. I can’t say anything of other motives of course, Jack. I know that it looks like, that in fact it is turning to this—which ought to be the offering of all one’s best—when other careers have failed me. And I know that those who sympathise the least will be the most inclined to say so. But it is not quite so. I have always wished to be of use, of service, here especially. I thought I saw how. I have the same wish still, and this seems to offer me a way. It is but a gathering up of the fragments, but I trust He will accept.”

Jack’s view rather was that the plan was not good enough for his brother, than that his brother was not good enough for it.

“You were always good enough for anything, if that is what you mean,” he said. “But I do understand, Cherry, about wanting an object; only—only it’s such an odd one.”

“I tell you,” said Cherry, brightly, for the disclosure was a great relief to him, “that that’s the very point. I don’t think I get on amiss with any one, even with the Sevillanos, but down at the bottom of my heart, Jack, I’m not far removed—we none of us are—from ‘There’s a stranger, ’eave ’alf a brick at him,’ and when I think of any direct dealing with people, anything like clerical work, why, except to my own kith and kin, I should have nothing to say. The self-denial of missionaries seems to me incredible. I could not do as Bob means to do, I think, if health and strength were to be the reward of it. It’s a very unworthy weakness, I know, but I can’t help it.”

“You would get on very well anywhere,” said Jack; “that is all nonsense. I don’t believe Elderthwaite would agree with you, and you could overwork yourself just as well there as anywhere else.”

“Well, as to the place agreeing with me, that remains to be proved. It’s a very small church, and a small place; and I hope I might be able to do the little they are fit for—at present. But I know it may prove to be out of the question.”

Jack was silent. He could not bear to vex Cherry by opposing a scheme which seemed to offer him some pleasure in the midst of his annoyances, and if his brother had proposed to take orders with more ordinary expectations, it would have been quite in accordance with the Oakby code of what was fitting. But there was something in the consecration of what Cheriton evidently viewed as a probably short life and failing powers to an object so unselfish, and yet, as it seemed to Jack, so commonplace, it was so like Cherry, and yet showed such a conquest of himself—there was such humility in the acknowledgment that he was only just fit for the sort of imperfect work that offered itself, and yet such a complete sense that no one else could manage that particular bit of work so well—it was, as Jack said, “so odd,” that it thrilled him through and through, and he was glad that Alvar’s entrance saved him from a reply.

Chapter Forty Three.

Revenge.

”‘Now, look you,’ said my brother, ‘you may talk, Till, weary with the talk, I answer nay.’”

Alvar, having avoided his brothers after dinner, came back into the hall, and, sitting down by the fire, lighted a cigarette. As he sat there in the great chair by himself, the flames flickering on the oak panels, and the subdued light of the lamp failing to penetrate the dark corners of the old hall, his face took an expression of melancholy, and there was an air of loneliness about his solitary figure—a loneliness which was not merely external. He was perplexed and unhappy, and the fact that his unhappiness had roused in his breast pride and jealousy and anger, did not make it less real. He had not come to the point of owning himself in the wrong, and yet he felt puzzled. He could not see how he had offended. It was a critical moment. Gentle and affectionate as Cheriton was, and happy as the relations had hitherto been between them, Alvar felt himself judged and condemned by his brother’s higher standard, now that he had at last become aware of its existence. He had never been distressed by Virginia’s way of looking at things, she was a woman, and her view’s could not affect his; and for a long time, as has been said, he had regarded Cheriton’s ideas of duty as as much an idiosyncrasy as his fair complexion, or his affection for Rolla and Buffer. Now he perceived that Cheriton himself did not so regard them, but with whatever excuses and limitations, expected them to be binding on Alvar himself; and Alvar’s whole nature kicked against the criticism. Cheriton had been clear-sighted enough to perceive this, and so judged it better to draw back; but Alvar, through clouds and darkness, had seen a glimpse of the light. He knew that Cheriton was right, and the knowledge irritated him. In a fitful, dark sort of way he tried to assert his independence and yet justify himself to Cheriton. It was doubtful whether he would gradually follow the light thus held out to him, or decidedly turn away from it, and just now his wounded pride prompted him to the latter course. He would go his own way; and when he had settled his affairs to his mind, his brothers should own that he was right. And yet—did he not owe a debt, never to be forgotten, to the kind hand that had welcomed him, the bright face that had smiled on him, long ago, on that dreary Christmas Eve? Alvar did not say to himself, as he perhaps might have done with truth, that he had repaid Cheriton’s early kindness to him tenfold; but he thought of the joyous, active youth, whose animal spirits, constant activity, and frequent laughter had been such a new experience to him.

As Alvar thought how great the change had been, his softer feelings revived, and with them the instinct of caving for his brother’s comfort in a thousand trifling ways. He remembered that Cheriton had hardly eaten any dinner, and rose, intending to go to him and persuade him to have some of the chocolate for which he had never lost the liking gained in Spain. As he moved towards the library the butler came into the hall, and, with some excitement, told him that Fletcher, his farm bailiff, wanted to speak to him.

“But it is too late,” said Alvar. “He may come to-morrow.”

“Indeed, sir, I think it is of consequence. Some ill-disposed persons, sir, have set one of your ricks on fire, as I understand,” said the butler, with the air of elevation with which the news of any misdemeanour is usually communicated.

“Tell him, then, to come in,” said Alvar, coolly; and Fletcher appearing, deposed that a certain valuable hayrick, in a field about a mile from the house, on a small farm called Holywell, which had always been managed, together with the home farm, by Mr Lester himself, had been discovered by one of the men going home from work to be on fire. In spite of all their efforts, a great part had been burnt, and the rest much injured by the water used to put out the fire.

“And how did the hay catch fire?” asked Alvar, with composure.

“Well, sir, that young lad Fleming was found hanging about behind a hedge, as soon as we had eyes for anything but the flames; and after this morning’s work, and words that many have heard him drop, the constable thought it his duty to take him up on suspicion, and he is in the lock-up at Hazelby.”

Fletcher eyed his master as he spoke, to see how the intelligence would be received.

“Ah, then,” said Alvar, “he will be sent to prison.”

“The magistrates meet on Thursday, sir—day after to-morrow; but arson being a criminal offence, he’ll be committed for trial at quarter-sessions,” said Fletcher, in an instructive manner. “Wilfully setting fire to property we name arson, sir; the sentence is transportation for a term of years, sir.”

“It is the passion of revenge,” said Alvar, calmly. “It does not surprise me.”

Fletcher looked as if the squire surprised him greatly; but Alvar wished him good-night, and dismissed him.

“Why—the old squire would have been up at Holywell and counted the very sticks of hay that was left!” he thought to himself as he withdrew; while Alvar went and communicated the intelligence to his brothers.

Cheriton listened, dismayed, while Jack exclaimed,—

“I don’t believe it! No Fleming ever was such a fool.”

“But he was angry with me,” said Alvar. “He might have stabbed me out of revenge.”

“Nonsense! we don’t live in Ireland, nor in Spain either! They’ll never forgive you, of course, to their dying day, but they won’t put you in the right by breaking the law—we’re too far north for that.”

“Fletcher doesn’t belong to these parts, you know,” said Cherry; “He might take up an idea. I do think it most unlikely that a boy brought up like Chris would commit such an act. Besides, we saw him down here. When was the fire seen?”

“I do not know,” said Alvar; “but Fletcher said that he was there.”

“It can’t be,” said Cheriton; “I cannot believe it. But they’ll never get over the boy being taken up at all. Why on earth did they never let us know what was going on! I wish I had been there.”

“Yes; a fire, and for us never to know of it!” said Jack, regretfully.

“I think that Chris is a bad boy, and that he has done it,” said Alvar. “But I do not care about the hay. What does that matter?”

“Why, the rick was worth forty pounds,” said Cherry.

“I do not care for forty pounds. I care that I shall be obeyed,” said Alvar.

A great deal more discussion followed, chiefly between Alvar and Jack; the latter at last relieving his mind of much of the good advice which he had long been burning to bestow. He showed Alvar his errors at length, and in the clearest language. Alvar took it very coolly, and without much more interest than if it had been an essay. He was not, as they would have expected, enraged at the burnt rick; indeed Cheriton could not help fancying that he regarded it as a justification of his violence towards Chris. As usual, it was the sense of Cheriton’s opposing view rather than the thing itself that annoyed him.

“Don’t worry yourself, Cherry,” said Jack, as he wished him good-night. “I’ll go the first thing in the morning and find out the rights of it.”

Accordingly, before either of his brothers appeared, Jack started off through wind and rain, and investigated the story of the burnt rick.

He returned in high feather, and found them still at breakfast; for Alvar by no means held his father’s opinion as to the merits of early rising.

“Well,” said Jack, “it’s clear that Chris had nothing to do with it. He left home at half-past four, went straight to old Bill’s cottage, where Alice Fisher gave him some tea, and where no doubt they indulged in a good crack, left them at half-past five, and came straight up here with the note for Alvar, when you saw him.”

“Yes,” said Cherry, “I looked at the clock when I came over to the fire.”

“Well, then, John Kitson saw the rick on fire exactly at half-past five, he heard the church clock strike; so if you and Alvar go over to Hazelby to-morrow, and prove that Chris came here on his way from old Bill’s at that time, you can set it all to rights in a moment. And if that idiot Fletcher had sent for you—for Alvar—last night, poor Chris would never have been suspected.”

“Well, Jack, you have done a good morning’s work,” said Cherry, much relieved.

“Yes. Give me some coffee, I had hardly any breakfast,” said Jack, cutting himself some cold beef. “It is such a cold morning, too.”

“And who did set the rick on fire, then?” said Cherry.

“Ah, that’s not so clear. Fletcher and Jos Green had a shindy a day or two ago, and that lad is capable of anything; but, after all, it may have been an accident.”

Alvar all this time had eaten his breakfast in silence. He did not disbelieve Jack’s evidence, but perhaps he hardly felt its force, and the sense of having been nearly concerned in committing an injustice, did not strike him as forcibly as it did the others. He felt, perhaps not unnaturally, a sense of intense irritation against the whole Fleming family, and a wish never to hear their names again. Besides, Jack was openly triumphant, and he could not doubt that Cherry was secretly so.

The conversation dropped therefore, and Alvar, as the weather brightened, ordered his horse and went out. Jack retreated to his books; and presently came the vicar, to hear the rights of the story about Chris Fleming.

Cheriton said as little as he could, declaring that the arrest had been an entire mistake, which they much regretted, and that Alvar would take care that it was set right to-morrow.

“Have you heard of the outbreak of reforming zeal at Elderthwaite?” asked Mr Ellesmere.

“Yes,” said Cheriton, colouring. “Miss Seyton told me about it, and besides, Clements was full of it when I saw him last. You see some new blood has come into the place, and there is a violent reaction, of course only among the few.”

“Yes. Clements came to consult me about writing to the bishop. They want to have a curate; but I am afraid the old parson has set all his strength against it, and there are plenty to back him up. Besides, I don’t see how the payment could be managed, as, of course, Miss Seyton will not act against her uncle. I told Clements to have patience; but a good deal of ill-feeling is cropping up. I wish you would go over and see if you can smooth things down a little.”

“Do you think I could?”

“Why, yes; you always take Elderthwaite abuses under your protection. You would be the only curate to please the parson and his parishioners, too!”

Mr Ellesmere spoke entirely in jest, and was exceedingly surprised when Cheriton answered seriously,—

“Indeed, I have thought so;” and then proceeded, at greater length than he had done with Jack, to unfold his project. He did not try to prepossess the vicar in its favour, nor touch on his home difficulties, save by saying that an idle life at Oakby would not suit him. He said plainly that he felt that only the peculiar circumstances of Elderthwaite, and his own independent means, could justify such a step in one who believed himself likely to have but little time and less strength before him. Would Mr Ellesmere explain the whole state of the case to the bishop, and ask—other matters being satisfactory—would he ordain him if the next spring he found himself capable of doing anything.

“And would this really content you, Cherry?” said Mr Ellesmere. “It would be clerical work in its most unattractive form, among, I should say, very unattractive people?”

“Not to me,” said Cheriton. “It would not be a distasteful life to me.”

“And then the climate here—”

“That the doctors shall decide next spring,” said Cherry, smiling.

“I don’t see my way to it, my boy,” said Mr Ellesmere, struck by his fragile look. “You must not run risks, and you would take responsibilities upon you which would make each particular risk seem unavoidable.” Cheriton evidently did not see his way to a reply. His face fell. The vivid, vigorous nature, checked at every turn, was ever striving after a fresh outlet. The instinct to be up and doing, to put his hand to everything that came to it, could not be stifled by loss and disappointment, or even by want of physical health and strength. After a pause he said, in an altered voice,—

“There are things that make it seem as if that did not much matter. I mean it is my own concern now. A short life and a busy one is better than a few more months, or years even, like mine.”

“I do not think your life has ever been useless yet, Cherry, even under the limitations that have been laid on it,” said Mr Ellesmere, quietly.

Cheriton sat looking into the fire in silence, then he turned round and smiled with much of his old playful defiance, though there was a deeper undercurrent.

“You can keep a look-out on me all the winter, and tell the Elderthwaite reformers that they don’t know what may happen, if they will only have patience. Then next spring I’ll come and ask your advice again, and if you make out a very good case against me, why, I’ll give in.”

He uttered the last words slowly, and Mr Ellesmere fully understood all that they implied. He feared that the question might be answered for him before next spring.

Cherry himself felt that he had not taken a very favourable moment for putting forward his designs, for he was neither looking nor feeling well; and could hardly point to himself as a proof of the suitability of his native climate. Still the communication had given a certain point to look forward to, and was an individual interest apart from the confusing worry of affairs at Oakby. If, after the present crisis had subsided, Alvar still held to his intention of going to the sea with him, their old friendliness would soon supersede the present irritation. Then, afterwards, he would go to London, break up his arrangements there, and see the Stanforths, and would then spend Christmas with his grandmother. In the meantime he would be exceedingly prudent; and having regard both to the bad weather and to the charge of interference, would leave Alvar to go by himself to Hazelby to-morrow.

Alvar’s ride had been interrupted by an encounter with Edward Fleming, full of resentment, by no means unnatural, though it was by this time somewhat unreasonable, for he could hardly help believing that the accusation against Chris had been intentional. A very sturdy and recalcitrant north-countryman he showed himself, respectful indeed in word to the squire, but intensely conscious of his injuries, and giving the squire very plainly to understand that a full explanation before all the magistrates at Hazelby, not to say a full apology, was no more than his duty, and fully to be expected of him. It was an unfortunate meeting. An appeal to Alvar’s generosity and protection would have been instantly responded to; but the one form of pride roused the other, and stirred up the fear of dictation in his mind. He looked down at the sullen, resolute face of the young farmer with an expression of intense haughtiness, a look which, on the dark foreign face, seemed utterly hateful to Fleming, and said, as he made his horse move on,—

“That is as I shall please.”

“If you let my brother be wronged, sir,” said Fleming, “mark me, you’ll repent it. ’Tis not the way your father would treat an old tenant, nor your brother either. A dog had his rights at their hands.”

And in a rage, intensified by his consciousness of Alvar’s scorn, he flung off with a sense of injury which would have led an Irishman to fire a shot, but which, in the English farmer, meant opposing the squire in Church and State, disobliging him on every private and parochial question, taking on every occasion the other side, and carrying on this line of conduct till his dying day.

He was young, too, and, as he had remarked to Cheriton, had education, and he might confide his grievance to the county paper. But he was both too proud and too generous to appeal again to Cheriton; and, besides, he never supposed for a moment that the squire would withhold his evidence.

But Alvar’s wrath was hot within him. As master against servant, as head of the family against his juniors, above all, as gentleman against peasant, he felt bound to assert himself and his authority. No one should threaten him into begging off the boy who had insulted him, and whose family had so defied him. He would not yield to any one’s view of his duty. Let the insolent boy have a few weeks more of suspense; what did it matter? When the real trial came he would condescend to give evidence in his favour (subpoenas did not at that moment occur to his mind), and would explain to the judge why he had chosen to delay his evidence. Then every one would see with what vigour he could administer his estate; and perhaps he would, to please Cheriton, then of his own free will confer some benefit on the Flemings which would make everything smooth.

Of course Alvar was not so foolish as his intentions, but all his past negligence had resulted in an amount of present ignorance of his surroundings which made such a scheme appear possible to him. It did strike him that Cheriton might take the matter into his own hands, and go to Hazelby himself; but so great a point had been made of his own going that he hardly knew how far this would supersede the need for it, and he did not mean to provoke a discussion.

Circumstances favoured him; Jack was going to dine and sleep at Ashrigg, he himself had another dinner engagement, and on the next day he had really promised to go early and shoot with Lord Milford. Cheriton had forgotten all about this, and, anxious not to irritate Alvar, said nothing about the magistrates’ meeting during the short time they were together.

Chapter Forty Four.

A New Life.

“His peaceful being slowly passes by To some more perfect peace.”

The next morning Cheriton slept late, and awoke to the consciousness that he had caught a slight cold, “which,” as he said to himself, “might happen to any one.”

“Will you ask Mr Lester to come to me before he goes to Hazelby?” he said, not feeling quite able to satisfy himself that Alvar had all the needful evidence clear in his head.

“Mr Lester is not going to Hazelby, sir,” said the man; “he went to Lord Milford’s early this morning in the dog-cart. He left word that he would not disturb you, sir.”

The engagement at Milford flashed across Cheriton’s mind, and with dismay and indignation he perceived that Alvar had not thought it worth while to break it on Chris Fleming’s account. In a moment he recognised the utter ruin that would fall on all chance of Alvar’s success with his tenants, still more the disgrace that he would bring on himself in the eyes of the whole bench of magistrates, by the neglect of such an obvious duty, while on his own part he felt that it was such an unkindness as he hardly knew how to forgive. His first impulse was to let the matter alone, and to leave Alvar to bear the brunt of his own misdoings. But then the thought came of the distress to the Flemings, of the fatal injury to the boy from the weeks of undeserved detention, and, after all, the discredit would fall on them all alike. He forgot all his intention of nursing his cold, forgot its very existence, as he perceived, on looking at his watch, that he had barely time to reach Hazelby for the meeting.

“It is all the same,” he said, “my going to Hazelby will answer every purpose. Tell them to bring Molly round at once. As Mr Lester has the dog-cart, I will ride.”

“There is a very cold wind, and it looks like rain, sir.”

“That can’t be helped,” said Cheriton, “there is no time to lose.”

He tried to make his expedition seem a matter of course; but every one in the house believed that he went because the squire had gone off on his own pleasure, or out of what the old cook did not hesitate to call “nasty spite,” had refused to justify little Fleming. Indeed, as Cheriton rode hurriedly away, he could hardly divest himself of the same opinion.

In the meanwhile, Alvar no sooner found himself well on the way to Milford than he began to feel pangs of compunction. The cold wind and drizzling rain beat in his face, as the conviction was borne in upon him, that Cheriton would certainly go to Hazelby in his place. He had not been at Milford since the day of the great rejoicing, when Cheriton, with all his fresh honours, had met them there, had wooed, and, as he thought, won Ruth Seyton; when he himself was Virginia’s acknowledged lover. He called her to mind, as she had walked by his side in smiling content, as she played with the children—felt now, as he never had then, the wistfulness of her eyes when they met his, and almost for the first time he recognised that the want of devotion had been on his side. He had not loved her enough. A sense of discouragement and despondence seized on him, a deep melancholy softened the resentment which he had been cherishing. As he looked back on the years of his father’s neglect, on Virginia’s dismissal, on his brother’s views of what his position required, for once the sense of his shortcomings overpowered his sense of the many excuses for them. His indifference to the chance of Cheriton’s running a great risk touched him with a self-reproach for which his theories of life offered no palliative. He could not rest, and with a suddenness and vehemence of action most unusual with him, he turned to Lord Milford as they prepared to start on their day’s sport, declared that he had suddenly recollected an important engagement, and must beg them to excuse him at once; overruled all objections on the score of his horse wanting rest by declaring that he would only drive to the station, and go by train to Hazelby.

“I am humiliated by my want of courtesy to your lordship, but it is necessary that I should go,” he said; but what with the delay of starting, and the absence of a train at the last moment, the magistrates’ meeting was over long before he reached Hazelby, every one had dispersed, and the court-house was shut.

He could not bring himself to ask any questions; but ordered a conveyance and started on his way back to Oakby, hardly knowing whether to reveal his change of purpose or not. On the road he passed the three Fleming brothers, trudging home through the mud. They looked away, and omitted to touch their hats to him. Alvar said to himself that he did not care; but the sense of unpopularity can never be other than bitter. He thought to himself that after all English gentlemen did not always live on their estates. There were hundreds of his father’s rank who did not hold his father’s view of their duties. He could shut Oakby up, let it, go where he would never see it again. But where? Never as the disinherited heir would he set foot in Seville, and he had no craving to hunt tigers in India, or buffaloes on the prairies. He did not wish to go yachting; did not care to travel; he hated the fogs and the colourlessness of London. He was as little ready to cut himself loose from all his moorings as Cheriton himself. Suddenly, as he drove on, he saw one of the Oakby grooms riding fast towards him. The man pulled up as he passed.

“Mr Cheriton is ill, sir; Mrs Lester is there, and she sent me for the doctor.”

Alvar felt as if he had been shot.

“Ride on,” he said, breathlessly; then seized the driver of the trap by the shoulder—“Drive fast; I will give you five pounds if you will drive fast. My brother is ill; he will want me.”

“Ay, sir—all right, sir,” said the lad, lashing up his horse.

Alvar felt as if a telegraph would have been slow; but he folded his arms, and sat like a statue till they reached the door, when he sprang out, and at the foot of the stairs saw Jack.

“Alvar! you here!” he exclaimed.

“What is it?—where is he?—what has happened?—tell me!” cried Alvar.

“Cherry went to Hazelby, of course, to clear Chris, as you were out of the way. He was so done up when he came back, and seems so evidently in for just such a bad attack as he had before, that granny, who came back here with me, sent for Mr Adamson. Yes, he is in bed; he was wet through.”

Jack’s face was like thunder; but Alvar dashed past him upstairs, and opened the door of his brother’s room.

Cheriton was sitting up in bed. He had recovered a little from the exhaustion of his hasty ride, and though suffering much pain and oppression, was spending some of the little breath he had left, in trying to explain matters to his grandmother.

“You always were a perverse lad, or you would not be using your voice now, Cherry,” she said. “When your brother comes back, I shall give him a piece of my mind.”

“There he is,” cried Cherry. There was a look in his eyes for a moment as if he hardly knew how they were to meet; but as Alvar advanced into the room, all his vehemence subsided. He came up to the bed, and laid his hand on Cheriton’s with the old tender touch.

“You are ill, mi caro. I think you must not talk so much just now.”

Cheriton looked up in his face, and read in it, steady as was the voice, an altogether new terror and trouble.

“This is my own fault,” he said. “I was in such a hurry—that—I would not wait for the carriage. After all, there would have been time.”

“Oh, my brother—my brother!” cried Alvar, losing his self-control, “your fault! Grandmother, it is I who have let him kill himself.”

“You are just crazy,” said Mrs Lester, agitated and angry, as Alvar rushed up to her, and threw himself on his knees beside her chair, clasping her hands in his. “I don’t care whose fault it is. No doubt you are one as bad as the other. For the last half hour I have been trying to make Cherry hold his tongue, and now you make a worse turmoil than ever. Since my poor son went there is no one to look to.”

Mrs Lester was shaken and terrified by the shock of sudden alarm, and agitated by Alvar’s extraordinary behaviour, and thus her still fresh grief came back on her, and she burst into tears.

“Oh, granny, don’t—don’t!” cried Cherry, and the distress of his tone recalled Alvar to his senses.

“Oh, I am a fool!” he said, and getting up, he applied himself to soothe his grandmother with all the tact of which he was master, and was so successful, that in a few minutes she went away in search of some remedy for Cheriton, who, as he was left alone with his brother, felt, spite of his increasing suffering, the old sense of repose in Alvar’s care creep over him.

“As violent an attack as the last, and much less strength to meet it,” was the doctor’s verdict, and the great common terror hushed for the time all disputes and differences.

Mrs Lester remained at Oakby, Nettie had returned to London a few days previously, and both she and Bob held themselves ready for a sudden summons.

Mrs Lester questioned Alvar on that first evening about all that had passed, in a dry, caustic fashion, while he answered, meekly enough. “Why, ye’ll have made yourself a laughing-stock to the whole place,” was her only comment on the story of the horsewhipping.

Alvar coloured to his temples, but said nothing; the reproach of Jack’s silent misery was much harder to bear. He who knew how all the last weeks had been troubled by Alvar’s fault, could not forgive, and felt that if Cheriton died, he could never bear the sight of Alvar again.

Alvar himself was shaken and disturbed as he had never been before. He had lost all the calm hopefulness and power of living in the present, that had made him such a support in Cheriton’s previous illness; and though he was still a devoted and efficient nurse to him, there were times when he was quite unable to control his distress. He was frightened, and expected the worst; and poor Jack had to try to encourage him, a process that much softened his indignation.

All this was fully apparent to Cheriton. There was no longer the daze and confusion of that first attack of illness, the boyish astonishment at the fact of being ill at all, the novelty of all the surroundings, now, alas! so familiar; no longer, too, the sense that the exceeding sweetness of life made death incredible; no longer the same instinctive dependence on those around. Since then Cheriton had travelled a long way on the road of life, had looked across the dark river, and grown familiar with the thought of its other shore; he was no longer frightened at his own suffering, or at its probable result, and, as his senses were generally clear, except sometimes at night, or when under the influence of the remedies, he was able to think for others—a habit in which he had gained considerable skill.

He made Alvar write to Mr Stanforth, and beg that Gipsy might write to Jack, knowing that the surprise and joy of such a letter, and the relief of pouring out his heart in the answer, must lighten the heavy weight of the poor boy’s anxiety; and so, in truth, it did, though Jack could never trust himself to thank Cherry for his kind thought. He also made the vicar go to Edward Fleming, and tell him that Alvar had only been a few minutes too late in coming to give evidence, and to entreat him to lay aside any ill-feeling for the misunderstanding “which,” he said, “was partly caused by my bad management.” He thought much about the state of affairs at Elderthwaite, or rather, perhaps, recalled at intervals much previous thinking. He was not equal to anything like a connected conversation, and he knew that no one would let the poor vehement old parson come near him; but he greatly astonished his grandmother by telling her that he had an especial desire to see Virginia Seyton.

“I cannot talk enough to tell you why,” he said; “but, granny, do get her to come.”

Mrs Lester promised; for how could she refuse him? He gave a good many directions to Mr Ellesmere, and in especial desired that a certain cup, won many years ago at some county athletic sports in a contest with his cousin Rupert, should be given to him as a remembrance.

From only one thing Cheriton’s whole heart shrank, and that was from forcing Jack to listen to parting words. He had several things to say to him, but he put them off; he could not bear the sight of Jack’s grief, and in this case could not trust his own self-command. It was the one parting that he could not yet face.

With Alvar it was different. In one way, he had with him much less sense of self-restraint, and in another, things lay between them that must be cleared away.

This state of things lasted for several days, and all the while the hard struggle between the remedies and the disease went on, a hand-to-hand fight indeed, and Cheriton’s strength ebbed away, till he knew that he dared wait no longer for what he wanted to say.

It had been raining, but the yellow, level light of an October evening was shining through the thinly-clothed boughs of the great elms, and lighting up the russet and amber of the woodlands; while the purple hills beyond were still heavy with clouds—clouds receding more and more as the clear blue spread over the sky.

As Cheriton listened to the noise of the rooks, and looked out at the sunset, he recalled the awe and strange curiosity, the clinging to the dear home, to the dearer love which had made life so dear; the attempted submission, the dim trust that death, if it came, must be well for him, with which he had first said to himself that he must die; remembered, too, other hours, when, in weakness of body and anguish of soul, he had found it still harder to believe that it must be well for him that he should live. The passionate joy, the passionate sorrow, had passed away, or rather, had been offered at last as a willing sacrifice, and the loving kindly spirit had found sweetness in life without the first, while much anxiety, much trying disappointment, had succeeded to the second. Now there came over him a wonderful peace, as he summoned his strength for what he had in his mind to say.

With a look and sign he called Alvar over to him; and Jack, who was sitting apart in the window, watched and listened.

“Alvar,” he said, taking hold of his hand, “I see it clearly.” And the intent, wide-open eyes, seemed to Jack as if they could indeed look beyond the mists of life. “We were wrong to wish you like ourselves. Forgive me. You—yourself—can be as good for Oakby as—I—yes—as my father. But there is only one way for us both—to love God with all our hearts, and our neighbour as ourself. To take pains about it for His sake. That is the truth, Alvar—the truth as I know it!”