“No, you don’t,” he said impatiently. “You’d much rather hear about Roland and all the things he does at Fernhurst.”
There was a moment of difficult silence, then April said quite quietly:
“You are quite right, Ralph; as a matter of fact I should”; and she turned towards Roland, but before she could say anything, Mrs. Curtis once more assumed her monopoly of the conversation.
“Yes, Roland, you’ve told us nothing about that, and how you got your firsts. We were so proud of you, too. And you never wrote to tell us. If it hadn’t been for your father we should never have known.” And for the next half hour her voice flowed on placidly, while Ralph sat in a frenzy of self-pity and self-contempt, and Roland longed for an opportunity to kick him, and April looked out between the half-drawn curtains towards the narrow line of sky that lay darkly over the long stretch of roofs and chimney-pots, happy that Roland’s holidays had begun, regretting wistfully that childhood was finished for them, that they could no longer play their own games in the nursery, that they had become part of the ambitions of their parents.
When at last they rose to go, Ralph lingered for a moment in the doorway; he could not go home till April had forgiven him.
She stood on the top of the step, looking down the street to Roland, her heart still beating a little quickly, still disturbed by that pressure of the hand and that sudden uncomfortable meeting of the eyes when he had said “Good-by.” She did not notice Ralph till he began to speak to her.
“I am awfully sorry I was so rude to you, April. I’m rather tired. I didn’t mean to offend you. I wouldn’t have done it for worlds.”
She turned to him with a quiet smile.
“Oh, don’t worry about that,” she said, “that’s nothing.”
And he could see that to her it was indeed nothing, that she had not thought twice about it, that nothing he said or did was of the least concern to her. He would much rather that she had been angry.