‘I have been trying to show mother that I cannot do as she wishes. It is very kind of her, but, unless you think it would be better for me to stay, I shall of course accompany you.’
‘You can stay if you like.’
Adela understood too well what that permission concealed.
‘I have no wish to stay.’
Mutimer turned his look on Mrs. Waltham, without saying anything.
‘Then I can say no more,’ Mrs. Waltham replied. ‘But you must understand that I take leave of my daughter with the deepest concern. I hope you will remember that her health for a long time has been anything but good, and that she was never accustomed to do hard and coarse work.’
‘We won’t talk any more of this, mother,’ Adela interposed firmly. ‘I am sure you need have no fear that I shall be tried beyond my strength. You must remember that I go with my husband.’
The high-hearted one! She would have died rather than let her mother perceive that her marriage was less than happy. To the end she would speak that word ‘my husband,’ when it was necessary to speak it at all, with the confidence of a woman who knows no other safeguard against the ills of life. To the end she would shield the man with her own dignity, and protect him as far as possible even against himself.
Mutimer smiled again, this time with satisfaction.
‘I certainly think we can take care of ourselves,’ he remarked briefly.