Indubitably it was. Her caprice, characterised as preposterous by males, had been justified. Thus chance often justifies women, setting at naught the high priests of reason.
Three.
Looking at the unconscious and yet tormented child, Edwin was aware of a melting protective pity for him, of an immense desire to watch over his rearing with all insight, sympathy, and help, so that in George’s case none of the mistakes and cruelties and misapprehensions should occur which had occurred in his own. This feeling was intense to the point of being painful.
“I don’t know whether you know or not,” he said, “but we’re great pals, the infant and I.”
Hilda smiled, and in the very instant of seeing the smile its effect upon him was such that he humiliated himself before her in secret for ever having wildly suspected that she was jealous of the attachment. “Do you think I don’t know all about that?” she murmured. “He wouldn’t be here now if it hadn’t been for that.” After a silence she added: “You’re the only person that he ever has really cared for, and I can tell you he likes you better than he likes me.”
“How do you know that?”
“I know by the way he talks and looks.”
“If he takes after his mother, that’s no sign,” Edwin retorted, without considering what he said.
“What do you mean—‘if he takes after his mother’?” She seemed puzzled.