Rickie did not press his triumph, but it was a happy moment, partly because of the triumph, partly because he was sure that his brother must care for him. Stephen was too selfish to give up any pleasure without grave reasons. He was certain that he had been right to disentangle himself from Sawston, and to ignore the threats and tears that still tempted him to return. Here there was real work for him to do. Moreover, though he sought no reward, it had come. His health was better, his brain sound, his life washed clean, not by the waters of sentiment, but by the efforts of a fellow-man. Stephen was man first, brother afterwards. Herein lay his brutality and also his virtue. “Look me in the face. Don’t hang on me clothes that don’t belong—as you did on your wife, giving her saint’s robes, whereas she was simply a woman of her own sort, who needed careful watching. Tear up the photographs. Here am I, and there are you. The rest is cant.” The rest was not cant, and perhaps Stephen would confess as much in time. But Rickie needed a tonic, and a man, not a brother, must hold it to his lips. “I see the old spire,” he called, and then added, “I don’t mind seeing it again.” “No one does, as far as I know. People have come from the other side of the world to see it again.” “Pious people. But I don’t hold with bishops.” He was young enough to be uneasy. The cathedral, a fount of superstition, must find no place in his life. At the age of twenty he had settled things. “I’ve got my own philosophy,” he once told Ansell, “and I don’t care a straw about yours.” Ansell’s mirth had annoyed him not a little. And it was strange that one so settled should feel his heart leap up at the sight of an old spire. “I regard it as a public building,” he told Rickie, who agreed. “It’s useful, too, as a landmark.” His attitude today was defensive. It was part of a subtle change that Rickie had noted in him since his return from Scotland. His face gave hints of a new maturity. “You can see the old spire from the Ridgeway,” he said, suddenly laying a hand on Rickie’s knee, “before rain as clearly as any telegraph post.” “How far is the Ridgeway?” “Seventeen miles.” “Which direction?” “North, naturally. North again from that you see Devizes, the vale of Pewsey, and the other downs. Also towards Bath. It is something of a view. You ought to get on the Ridgeway.” “I shouldn’t have time for that.” “Or Beacon Hill. Or let’s do Stonehenge.” “If it’s fine, I suggest the Rings.” “It will be fine.” Then he murmured the names of villages. “I wish you could live here,” said Rickie kindly. “I believe you love these particular acres more than the whole world.” Stephen replied that this was not the case: he was only used to them. He wished they were driving out, instead of waiting for the Cadchurch train.