Pinnegar and Alvina.
It was a pinched, dreary house. James seemed down for the last time.
But Miss Pinnegar persuaded him to take the shop again on Friday
evening. For the rest, faded and peaked, he hurried shadowily down
to the club.
CHAPTER II
THE RISE OF ALVINA HOUGHTON
The heroine of this story is Alvina Houghton. If we leave her out of
the first chapter of her own story it is because, during the first
twenty-five years of her life, she really was left out of count, or
so overshadowed as to be negligible. She and her mother were the
phantom passengers in the ship of James Houghton's fortunes.
In Manchester House, every voice lowered its tone. And so from the
first Alvina spoke with a quiet, refined, almost convent voice. She
was a thin child with delicate limbs and face, and wide, grey-blue,
ironic eyes. Even as a small girl she had that odd ironic tilt of
the eyelids which gave her a look as if she were hanging back in
mockery. If she were, she was quite unaware of it, for under Miss
Frost's care she received no education in irony or mockery. Miss
Frost was straightforward, good-humoured, and a little earnest.
Consequently Alvina, or Vina as she was called, understood only the
explicit mode of good-humoured straightforwardness.
It was doubtful which shadow was greater over the child: that of
Manchester House, gloomy and a little sinister, or that of Miss
Frost, benevolent and protective. Sufficient that the girl herself
worshipped Miss Frost: or believed she did.
Alvina never went to school. She had her lessons from her beloved
governess, she worked at the piano, she took her walks, and for
social life she went to the Congregational Chapel, and to the
functions connected with the chapel. While she was little, she went
to Sunday School twice and to Chapel once on Sundays. Then
occasionally there was a magic lantern or a penny reading, to which
Miss Frost accompanied her. As she grew older she entered the choir
at chapel, she attended Christian Endeavour and P.S.A., and the
Literary Society on Monday evenings. Chapel provided her with a
whole social activity, in the course of which she met certain groups
of people, made certain friends, found opportunity for strolls into
the country and jaunts to the local entertainments. Over and above
this, every Thursday evening she went to the subscription library to
change the week's supply of books, and there again she met friends
and acquaintances. It is hard to overestimate the value of church or
chapel--but particularly chapel--as a social institution, in places
like Woodhouse. The Congregational Chapel provided Alvina with a
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