Until that moment of revelation he had liked Stephen; but he liked him no longer.

He felt that Stephen had stolen the privilege he should have asked for, and he deeply resented the position the young man had taken.

On the contrary, Stephen had been guilty of no intentional wrong.

He had simply grown into an affection too sweet to be spoken of, too uncertain and immature to be subjected to the prudential rules of daily life; yet, had the question been plainly put to him, he would have gone at once to the squire, and said, "I love Charlotte, and I ask for your sanction to my love." He would have felt such an acknowledgment to be the father's most sacred and evident right, and he was thinking of making it at the very hour in which Sandal was feeling bitterly toward him for its omission.
And thus the old, old tragedy of mutual misunderstanding works to sorrowful ends.
The night of the sheep-shearing the squire could not sleep.

To lay awake and peer into the future through the dark hours was a new experience, and it made him full of restless anxieties.