"Cherry, you shouldn't worry yourself with Bob. It's too much for you."
"Not generally," said Cheriton. "I'm tired to-day."
"What's the matter with you, Cherry?" said Jack, coming nearer.
"The matter?" said Cherry, sitting up, and laughing more in his usual
way. "What should be the matter? Are you taking a leaf out of Alvar's
book? Of course, one isn't very strong after such an illness, and I
don't sleep always. I shall go away, I think, soon, and then I shall be
right enough."
"Where will you go to? Let me go with you. Or must it be Alvar?"
"Oh, I shall be best alone. Don't worry, Jack. I'm no worse, really."
Poor Cheriton! His efforts at concealment, made half in pride, and half
in consideration, were not very successful.
As he lay awake through the long nights, Ruth's woeful look and
appealing eyes haunted him, and as he remembered their parting, his own
bitter scorn came back on him with a pang, partly, no doubt, because she
was still irresistible to him, but partly, also, because he knew that
_he_ had felt the temptation under which _she_ had fallen. She had
treated him shamefully; and she declared that her excuse was, if excuse
it could be called, that she had been driven so frantic by her
misjudgment of Rupert, that anything seemed legitimate that would give
him pain. She had transgressed every code of womanly honour, and had
cost Cheriton pain beyond expression by obeying a sudden impulse of
mortified passion. Any sort of revenge on her by Cheriton was at least
as incompatible with any standard of social obligation, no extra high
principle was needed to condemn it; to take such a blow and be silent
over it seemed a mere matter of course. Cheriton was very
high-principled, he had conquered in his time strong temptations;
moreover, he was more than commonly loving and tender, and yet he felt
that there had been more than one moment when he might have committed
this utter baseness. He forgot for a moment that he _had_ conquered,
that strength, however unconscious, had come to him from his former
struggles, and had held him back; he felt that if this were possible to
him, he was safe from nothing. He shuddered as he thought of his
interview with Rupert, and his first prayer since the blow turned into a
thanksgiving.
But any thought of his own conduct was soon swept away by the rush of
regret and pain. She _had_ failed him, however unworthy he might be to
judge her; and as he remembered the many sweet and enchanting moments
that had led up to his final disappointment, he could not but feel that
she had deliberately deceived him. And yet--and yet--as he recalled her
face at the dinner-table, he knew that he would have come back to her at
a word; he felt as if life was worth nothing without her, as if father
and brothers, home, interests, and ambitions had all lost their charm.
Cheriton retained enough command over himself to resolve to make head
against this state of mingled regret and bitterness; he could not yet
bring himself to accept it with any sort of submission; his feelings of
gratitude and joy at his returning strength seemed almost as if they had
been sent in mockery to make disappointment more cruel. But this
thought brought its own remedy. His life had been given back to him,
not surely only that he might endure this fierce trial--something would
come out of the furnace. And when he remembered what his well-being was
to his father, the resolution of self-conquest was made in something
else than pride. "God help me. I'll learn my lesson!" he thought; and
he dimly felt that that lesson meant more than putting a bold face on
things, or even than a surface recovery of spirits, of the probability
of which last he was of course then no judge. It meant whether this
bitter trial was to leave him more or less of a man than it found him--
more of a Christian if he would not be less of a man.
It must not be supposed that Cheriton at this time attained with any
permanence to such convictions--he worked his way to them at intervals;
but, after all, most of his sleepless hours were spent in a hopeless
involuntary recall of his past happiness. Ruth haunted him as if she
had been a spirit, and of course the over-fatigue produced by the effort
to force his mind into its usual channels affected his health, and made
him still less able to fight against his troubles.
He was very reluctant to confess himself beaten, and began to talk to
Jack with would-be eagerness about going to London and beginning his
reading for the bar. His name had been entered at the Temple, most of
his "dinners" were eaten, and he had never intended his time of waiting
for a brief to be an idle one. Presently his father called him, and he
started up and went downstairs, while Jack went back to his writing with
divided attention, and dim suspicions of the truth gaining ground.
Meanwhile Cheriton found himself called to a conference in the study.
All the arrangements for Alvar's marriage had been deferred through
Cheriton's illness, and Mr Lester felt it somewhat strange that he
should be the first person who saw the need of recommencing them. He
told Alvar that he wished to speak to him, and made a sort of apology to
him for Cheriton's presence by saying that he wished him to hear the
money arrangements which he thought fit to make.
"I am sure, Alvar," said Mr Lester, formally, "you have shown great
unselfishness in putting your own affairs so completely on one side
during your brother's illness; but now there is no longer any reason for
deferring the consideration of your marriage, and I should be glad to
know what plans you may have formed for the future."
"It is your wish, sir, that I should be married--soon?" said Alvar,
coolly and deferentially.
"Why--October was mentioned from the first, wasn't it?" said Mr Lester,
with a sort of taken-aback manner that made Cheriton smile.
"Yes," said Alvar. "If that is your desire, and Mr Seyton approves, I
should wish it."
"Why--why--haven't you settled it all with Virginia?"
"I did not think one should trouble a lady with those matters, nor did I
wish to marry while my brother might need me."
"That was very good of you; but I hope by that time to be in London,"
said Cherry, decidedly, and with a look, conveying caution.
Alvar was silent for a moment, and then said, with what Cheriton called
his princely air,--
"I shall then marry in October, and I will take my wife to visit my
friends and my--other country."
"Why, yes; that would be very proper, no doubt; and I think you once
told me that you wished to take a house in London."
"That would be good luck for me," said Cherry, by way of encouragement.
"Yes," said Alvar, "I wish it to be so."
Mr Lester then entered into an explanation of the means which he was
prepared to place at Alvar's disposal, talked of house rent and of
Virginia's fortune, and said a few words on the amount of his own means,
and what he meant to do for the younger ones. Nettie was provided for
by her mother's fortune, a smaller proportion of which would be
inherited by the sons also at their father's death. "But," as Mr
Lester concluded, "of course they all know that in the main they must
look to their own exertions."
"Of course," said Cheriton.
Alvar looked very much surprised.
"The boys," he said, "yes; but I thought, my father, you would wish that
Cheriton should be rich."
"Alvar," said Mr Lester, rising and speaking with real dignity, "you
misunderstand me. In such matters I can make no distinctions between my
sons. Cheriton and his brothers stand exactly on the same footing. As
for you, you will have to represent the old name, and keep the old place
on its proper level. I shall not stint you of the means of doing so
with ease and dignity."
Alvar cast down his eyes, and a curious look as of a sort of oppression
passed over his face.
"That will be an obligation to me," he said, gravely. "You are most--
honourable to me, my father."
"Not at all," said Mr Lester. "I should not think of acting otherwise.
Well--now you had better be off to Elderthwaite and settle all your
affairs."