For four more days, Richard Yorke continued at the Gethin Castle—­to outward appearance, in the same relation with the landlord and his family as before, but in reality on a totally different footing.  Trevethick had not found it practicable to exclude his late guest from the bar parlor; he could not do so without entering into an explanation with its other tenants, which he was not prepared for, or without devising some excuse far beyond his powers.  Notwithstanding his bluff ways, he could tell a lie without moving a muscle; but he was incapable of any such ambitious flight of deceit as the present state of affairs demanded.  He had, indeed, no aptitude for social diplomacy of any kind, and suffered his change of feeling toward the young landscape-painter to appear so plainly that even the phlegmatic Solomon observed it.  He was rather pleased than otherwise to do so.  He had acquiesced in the hospitality with which Richard had been treated, but without the slightest sympathy with it; and, in fact, he had no sympathies save those which were connected with his personal interests.  It was evident enough that his father-in-law elect had had some reasons of his own—­probably in relation to the property he held under Carew—­for conciliating this young gentleman; and “Sol” had taken it for granted they were good, that is, substantial, ones.  If these reasons no longer existed, the sooner this young gentleman was got rid of the better.  It was true he had behaved himself very civilly; but his presence among them had been, on the whole, oppressive.  “Sol” rather chafed at Richard’s social superiority, though it was certainly never intruded, and, at all events, he preferred the society of his own class, among whom he felt himself qualified to take the lead.  But the idea of jealousy had never entered into his mind.  In his eyes Richard was a mere boy, whose years, as well as his position in life, precluded him from any serious intentions with respect to Harry, whom, moreover, Solomon regarded as his betrothed.  If he had been married to her, he would certainly have forbidden her “gadding about” so much with this young fellow; but at present she was under her father’s rule, and the old man knew very well what he was about.  He was glad that there now seemed a prospect, to judge from the latter’s manner, that the lad’s intimacy with Harry, and the family generally, was about to end; but it might have lasted six months longer without “Sol’s” opening his mouth about it, so prudently had Richard played his cards—­so irreproachably behaved “before folk.”

Solomon went, as usual, daily to look after affairs at Dunloppel, but Trevethick remained within doors, under pretense that the influx of guests, which was in fact considerable, demanded his presence.  He took care that Richard and Harry should have no opportunity of meeting alone throughout the day; while in the evening he sat in almost total silence, sucking his pipe, and frowning gloomily—­a wet blanket upon the little company, and the source of well-grounded terror to his daughter Harry.