"Go back, Mother!" he said. "You'll only make things worse. This isn't a
woman's business. Let father do what he likes; I can hold on!"
Mrs. Pendyce did not answer, and he was obliged to look round. She was
sitting perfectly still with her hands in her lap, and his man's hatred
of anything conspicuous happening to a woman, to his own mother of all
people, took fiercer fire.
"Go back!" he repeated, "before there's any fuss! What good can you
possibly do? You can't leave father; that's absurd! You must go!"
Mrs. Pendyce answered:
"I can't do that, dear."
George made an angry sound, but she was so motionless and pale that he
dimly perceived how she was suffering, and how little he knew of her who
had borne him.
Mrs. Pendyce broke the silence:
"But you, George dear? What is going to happen? How are you going to
manage?" And suddenly clasping her hands: "Oh! what is coming?"
Those words, embodying all that had been in his heart so long, were too
much for George. He went abruptly to the door.
"I can't stop now," he said; "I'll come again this evening."
Mrs. Pendyce looked up.
"Oh, George"
But as she had the habit of subordinating her feelings to the feelings
of others, she said no more, but tried to smile.
That smile smote George to the heart.
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