You're right: he's rich, handsome, successful and admired. He could afford to be magnanimous to the faded, depressed spinster whose family is so hard up they have to rent out their ancestral home to make ends meet. Objectively, the balance of power is all on his side. So why does he act so coldly? Some here interpret his behavior as evidence of real character flaws -- pettiness, unkindness, etc. What I see, though, is someone for whom, psychologically, the balance of power is quite different. Just seeing her again has ripped the scab off that old wound and plunged him right back into those feelings of hurt, rejection and self-questioning ("Could she be right that I'm never going to be successful enough to support her?") He's repressed all this in his feverish career-building, and now it's all coming out of the deep freeze. She's not the only one for whom eight years seems like nothing.