AC dBooks

She thinks me a demon. She won't let
her daughters go about with me. I can't imagine how she ever fixed upon
anyone so--"
"So what?" said Mrs. Friend, after a moment, nervously. Lost in the big
white arm-chair, her small hand propping her small face and head, she
looked even frailer than she had looked in the library.
"Well, nobody would ever take you for my jailer, would they?" said
Helena, surveying her.
Mrs. Friend laughed--a ghost of a laugh, which yet seemed to have some
fun in it, far away.
"Does this seem to you like prison?"
"This house? Oh, no. Of course I shall do just as I like in it. I have
only come because--well, my poor Mummy made a great point of it when she
was ill, and I couldn't be a brute to her, so I promised. But I wonder
whether I ought to have promised. It is a great tyranny, you know--the
tyranny of sick people. I wonder whether one ought to give in to her?"
The girl looked up coolly. Mrs. Friend felt as though she had been
struck.
"But your _mother_!" she said involuntarily.
"Oh, I know, that's what most people would say.


Pages:
14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38