In my struggle to resolve the discord between a nagging conscience, and my adoration for my mother, I seemed to leave childhood behind.
Still, very dimly, if at all, could I have realised there was any connection between her continued shrinking from our fellow-creatures, and that old nameless fear we used to bar the door against. Yet in one guise or another, Fear still was at the gate. Yesterday the menace of Bettina's illness. To-day a hop-picker, bringing a whiff of the sick world's infection through our windows.
CHAPTER VII
A SHOCK
When to-morrow came we knew.
We had been using up our capital.
Another year, at this rate, and it would be gone. What was to become of us?
Should we have to sell Duncombe House? I asked.
Only then we heard that Duncombe belonged to Lord Helmstone.
But the rent was low. My mother said "at the worst," we would go on living at Duncombe. Yes, even if we kept only one servant instead of three.