Charley, on the other hand, with whom Balfour had once been such a
favorite, felt, though attentive to his needs, by no means cordially
toward him. Gratitude for the fancied service he had done to his late
father compelled him to give Richard his company; but it was not
accorded willingly, as heretofore. He could not but set down to the
account of his companionship the present frigidity of Agnes, and at
first he had even seen him a material obstacle to his hopes. This
audacious man of the world, who had at one time so excited his
admiration, had suddenly become in his eyes an impudent _roue_, who even
on his sick-bed was only too likely to make their past adventures
together the subject of his talk. True, his mother had told him that Mr.
Balfour was now an altered man; but the young gentleman had entertained
some reasonable doubts of this conversion. His manner to the sick man
was so reserved and cool, indeed, that it seemed to all but Richard (who
guessed the cause of it, and yet felt its effect more bitterly than all)
unkind. This behavior on the part of his former ally did not injure
Balfour in the regards of Agnes; she resented Charley's conduct, and did
her best to redress it by manifesting her own good-will; she had herself
had experience of his shifting moods and causeless changes of demeanor,
and perhaps she was willing to show what small importance she attached
to his capricious humors.
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