'I think he got frightened, mamma, and had not nerve to go through with it.'
Mrs. Woodward looked vexed; but she made no immediate reply, and for some time the mother and daughter went on working without further conversation. At last Gertrude said:—
'I think every man is bound to do the best he can for himself—that is, honestly; there is something spoony in one man allowing another to get before him, as long as he can manage to be first himself.'
Mrs. Woodward did not like the tone in which her daughter spoke. She felt that it boded ill for Harry's welfare; and she tried, but tried in vain, to elicit from her daughter the expression of a kinder feeling.
'Well, my dear, I must say I think you are hard on him. But, probably, just at present you have the spirit of contradiction in you. If I were to begin to abuse him, perhaps I should get you to praise him.'
'Oh, mamma, I did not abuse him.'
'Something like it, my dear, when you said he was spoony.'
'Oh, mamma, I would not abuse him for worlds—I know how good he is, I know how you love him, but, but—-' and Gertrude, though very little given to sobbing moods, burst into tears.
'Come here, Gertrude; come here, my child,' said Mrs. Woodward, now moved more for her daughter than for her favourite; 'what is it? what makes you cry? I did not really mean that you abused poor Harry.'
Gertrude got up from her chair, knelt at her mother's feet, and hid her face in her mother's lap. 'Oh, mamma,' she said, with a half-smothered voice, 'I know what you mean; I know what you wish; but—but—but, oh, mamma, you must not—must not, must not think of it any more.'