ship so long subsisting between the
Hewetts and himself, but from the day of Clara's engagement with Mrs.
Tubbs John Hewett began to alter in his treatment of him. At first
there was nothing more than found its natural explanation in regret of
what had happened, a tendency to muteness, to troubled brooding; but
before long John made it unmistakable that the young man's presence was
irksome to him. If, on coming home, he found Sidney with Mrs. Hewett
and the children, a cold nod was the only greeting he offered; then
followed signs of ill-humour, such as Sidney could not in the end fail
to interpret as unfavourable to himself. He never heard Clara's name on
her father's lips, and himself never uttered it when John was in
hearing.

'She told him what passed between us that night,' Sidney argued
inwardly. But it was not so. Hewett had merely abandoned himself to an
unreasonable resentment. Notwithstanding his concessions, he blamed
Sidney for the girl's leaving home, and, as his mood grew more
irritable, the more hopeless it seemed that Clara would return, he
nursed the suspicion of treacherous behaviour on Sidney's part. He
would not take into account any such thing as pride which could forbid
the young man to urge a rejected suit. Sidney had grown tired of Clara,
that was the truth, and gladly caught at any means of excusing himself.
He had made new friends. Mrs. Peckover reported that he was a constant
visitor at the old man Snowdon's lodgings; she expressed her belief
that Snowdon had come back from Australia with a little store of money,
and if Kirkwood had knowledge of that, would it not explain his
interest in Jane Snowdon?

'For shame to listen to such things!' cried Mrs. Hewett angrily, when
her husband once repeated the landlady's words, 'I'd be ashamed of
myself, John! If you don't know him no better than that, you ought to
by this time.'

And John did, in fact, take to himself no little shame, but his
unsatisfied affection turned all the old feelings to bitterness. In
spite of himself, he blundered along the path of perversity. Sidney,
too, had his promptings of obstinate humour. When he distinctly
recognised Hewett's feeling it galled him; he was being treated with
gross injustice, and temper suggested reprisals which could answer no
purpose but to torment him with self-condemnation. However, he must
needs consult his own dignity; he could not keep defending himself
against ignoble charges. For the present