Molly was dejected, she knew not why. Cynthia had drifted a little
apart; that was not it. Her stepmother had whimsical moods; and if
Cynthia displeased her, she would oppress Molly with small kindnesses
and pseudo-affection. Or else everything was wrong, the world was
out of joint, and Molly had failed in her mission to set it right,
and was to be blamed accordingly. But Molly was of too steady a
disposition to be much moved by the changeableness of an unreasonable
person. She might be annoyed, or irritated, but she was not
depressed. That was not it. The real cause was certainly this. As
long as Roger was drawn to Cynthia, and sought her of his own accord,
it had been a sore pain and bewilderment to Molly's heart; but it was
a straightforward attraction, and one which Molly acknowledged, in
her humility and great power of loving, to be the most natural thing
in the world. She would look at Cynthia's beauty and grace, and feel
as if no one could resist it. And when she witnessed all the small
signs of honest devotion which Roger was at no pains to conceal, she
thought, with a sigh, that surely no girl could help relinquishing
her heart to such tender, strong keeping as Roger's character
ensured. She would have been willing to cut off her right hand,
if need were, to forward his attachment to Cynthia; and the
self-sacrifice would have added a strange zest to a happy crisis. She
was indignant at what she considered to be Mrs. Gibson's obtuseness
to so much goodness and worth; and when she called Roger "a country
lout," or any other depreciative epithet, Molly would pinch herself
in order to keep silent. But after all, those were peaceful days
compared to the present, when she, seeing the wrong side of the
tapestry, after the wont of those who dwell in the same house with
a plotter, became aware that Mrs. Gibson had totally changed her
behaviour to Roger, from some cause unknown to Molly.
But he was always exactly the same; "steady as old Time," as Mrs.
Gibson called him, with her usual originality; "a rock of strength,
under whose very shadow there is rest," as Mrs. Hamley had once
spoken of him. So the cause of Mrs. Gibson's altered manner lay not
in him. Yet now he was sure of a welcome, let him come at any hour he
would. He was playfully reproved for having taken Mrs. Gibson's words
too literally, and for never coming before lunch. But he said he
considered her reasons for such words to be valid, and should respect
them. And this was done out of his simplicity, and from no tinge of
malice. Then in their family conversations at home, Mrs. Gibson was
constantly making projects for throwing Roger and Cynthia together,
with so evident a betrayal of her wish to bring about an engagement,
that Molly chafed at the net spread so evidently, and at Roger's
blindness in coming so willingly to be entrapped. She forgot his
previous willingness, his former evidences of manly fondness for the
beautiful Cynthia; she only saw plots of which he was the victim, and
Cynthia the conscious if passive bait. She felt as if she could not
have acted as Cynthia did; no, not even to gain Roger's love. Cynthia
heard and saw as much of the domestic background as she did, and yet
she submitted to the rôle assigned to her! To be sure, this rôle
would have been played by her unconsciously; the things prescribed
were what she would naturally have done; but because they were
prescribed--by implication only, it is true--Molly would have
resisted; have gone out, for instance, when she was expected to stay
at home; or have lingered in the garden when a long country walk was
planned. At last--for she could not help loving Cynthia, come what
would--she determined to believe that Cynthia was entirely unaware of
all; but it was with an effort that she brought herself to believe
it.