There were so many possible answers to this question, and all of them so very unpleasant, that Mr. Thorpe couldn’t, he found, sit quiet in his chair. Three o’clock. Fourteen hours now since last she was seen....
He got up and walked about. In the next room he could hear Jocelyn doing the same thing. No—dash it all, thought Mr. Thorpe after listening for some time to the ceaseless voice, he couldn’t be allowed to go on at his mother like that. He’d had close on a couple of hours of it. All very well being heartbroken, all very well being out of one’s senses, but he couldn’t be allowed——
Mr. Thorpe opened the door and went in. There was Jocelyn, striding about the room, up and down, round and round, enough to make one giddy just to see him, his words pouring out, his face convulsed, and there sitting looking at him, not saying a word, with tears rolling down her face, was his mother.
No—damn it all—there were limits——
‘Better shut up now, eh?’ said Mr. Thorpe firmly to the demented young man. ‘Said all there’s to say long ago, I bet. Won’t help, you know—this sort of thing.’
‘I’m telling my mother—I’m making it clear to her once and for all,’ raved Jocelyn, who indeed no longer had the least control of himself, ‘that if I ever find Sally never again as long as I live shall she come between us, never shall she set foot——’
‘Oh, shut up. We know all that, don’t we, Margery. Who’s going to come between you, you silly young ass? Look here—no good crying, you know,’ said Mr. Thorpe, going to Mrs. Luke and putting his arm round her. It seemed natural. For two pins he would have kissed her. Habit. Can’t get away from habits.
But Mrs. Luke didn’t appear to know he was there. Her eyes, from which the tears dropped slowly and unnoticed, were fixed only on Jocelyn.
‘He’s so tired—so tired,’ she kept on whispering to herself. ‘Oh, my darling—you’re so tired.’