“I couldn’t do it, you know.”
“Well—” Lucilla’s tone conceded, apparently, that Val had every right to judge for herself. Further than that, it did not go.
“Lucilla, if you really think like that, about living one’s own life, and I suppose from the aggravating way in which you won’t say anything, that you do—why don’t you do it yourself?”
“But I haven’t any wish to,” said Lucilla, looking surprised.
“Haven’t you ever had any wish to?”
“Oh, yes, once. But not now.”
“Then why didn’t you?” Val pursued desperately. She felt as though she was coming really to know her sister for the first time.
“I suppose because I thought, like you, that it wouldn’t do to leave Father.”
“But you don’t think that any more?”
“No.”