"You can. Please give me fair warning if you're going to—that's all I ask. I'll try to prepare Mrs. Beckett's mind to bear the shock. She's not very strong, but——"
"If I don't tell, it won't be because of her. It will be for you—always, everything, for you! But I haven't decided yet. I don't know what I shall do yet. I must think. You'll have to make the best of that compromise unless you change your mind."
"I shall not change my mind," I said.
CHAPTER XXIX
Later, Padre, when I'd broken away from Julian, I wondered if he had made up the whole story. The cruel trick would be impishly characteristic! But I went straight to the concierge to ask about Muller. He said that a man of that name had called the night before, inquiring for me, and had talked with "the Monsieur who looked like an Italian." This practically convinced me that Julian hadn't lied.
If only I could get direct advice from you! Do try to send me an inspiration of what to do for the best.
My first impulse was to give Mother Beckett a faint hint of hope. But I dared not run the risk. If Paul Herter proved to be mistaken, it would be for her like losing her son a second time, and the dear one's strength might not be equal to the strain. After thinking and unthinking all night, I decided to keep silent until our two men returned from the British front. Then, perhaps, I might tell Brian of the message from Doctor Paul, and ask his opinion about speaking to Father Beckett. As for myself, I resolved not to make any confession, unless it were certain that Jim lived. And I'm not sure, Padre, whether that decision was based on sheer, selfish cowardice, or whether I founded it partly on the arguments I presented to myself. I said in my mind: "If it's true that everything you did in the beginning was for Brian's good, why undo it all at the most critical hour of his life, when perhaps there may never be any reason to speak?" Also I said: "Why make it impossible for yourself to give Mother Beckett the care she needs, and can hardly do without yet? Every day counts with her now. Why not wait unless you hear again more definitely?"
The annoying part of a specious argument is that there's always some truth in it, and it seems like kind advice from wise friends!
Anyhow, I did wait. Julian made no further appeal to me, and I felt sure that he said nothing to Dierdre. If he had taken her into his confidence, I should have known by her manner; because, from the shut-up, night-flower of a girl that she was, she has rather pathetically opened out for me into a daylight flower. All this since she came of her own free will and told me of the scene in the chill boarding house salon at Soissons. I used to think her as secret as the grave—and deeper. She used to make me "creep" as if a mouse ran over mine, by the way her eyes watched me: still as a cat's looking into the fire. If we had to shake hands, she used to present me with a limp little bunch of cold fingers, which made me long to ask what the deuce she wanted me to do with them? Now, because I'm Brian's sister, and because I'm human enough to love her love of him, the flower-part of her nature sheds perfume and distils honey for me: the cat-part purrs; the girl-part warms. The creature actually deigns to like me! It could not now conceal its anxiety for Brian and Brian's kith and kin, if it knew what Julian knows.