Theron spent half an hour in aimless strolling about the streets.From earliest boyhood his mind had always worked most clearly when he walked alone.Every mental process which had left a mark upon his memory and his career--the daydreams of future academic greatness and fame which had fashioned themselves in his brain as a farm lad;the meditations, raptures, and high resolves of his student period at the seminary; the more notable sermons and powerful discourse by which he had revealed the genius that was in him to astonished and delighted assemblages--all were associated in his retrospective thoughts with solitary rambles.
He had a very direct and vivid consciousness now that it was good to be on his legs, and alone.He had never in his life been more sensible of the charm of his own companionship.
The encounter with Gorringe seemed to have cleared all the clouds out of his brain, and restored lightness to his heart.After such an object lesson, the impossibility of his continuing to sacrifice himself to a notion of duty to these low-minded and coarse-natured villagers was beyond all argument.There could no longer be any doubt about his moral right to turn his back upon them, to wash his hands of the miserable combination of hypocrisy and hysterics which they called their spiritual life.
And the question of Gorringe and Alice, that too stood precisely where he wanted it.Even in his own thoughts, he preferred to pursue it no further.
Between them somewhere an offence of concealment, it might be of conspiracy, had been committed against him.
It was no business of his to say more, or to think more.
He rested his case simply on the fact, which could not be denied, and which he was not in the least interested to have explained, one way or the other.The recollection of Gorringe's obvious disturbance of mind was especially pleasant to him.He himself had been magnanimous almost to the point of weakness.He had gone out of his way to call the man "brother," and to give him an opportunity of behaving like a gentleman; but his kindly forbearance had been wasted.Gorringe was not the man to understand generous feelings, much less rise to their level.