“You mean you love Arnold; that only duty held you to me?”
“Yes.”
“Well, by God!” Northrup flung his head back and laughed––“and after all I have been fearing, too!”
To her dying day Kathryn never knew what he meant by those words. There was a moment’s silence, then Northrup spoke again:
“I don’t think there is anything more to say. Shall I take the side entrance?”
Outside, the summer night was growing sultry; a sound of thunder broke the heavy quiet of the dark street––it brought back memories that were evil things to remember just then.
“Good God!” Northrup thought, “we’re coming back to all kinds of hells.”
He was bitter and cynical. He hardly took into account, in that hard moment, the feeling of release; all his foregone conclusions, his stern resolves, had been battered down. He had got his discharge with nothing to turn to.
In this mood he reached home. More than anything he wanted to be by himself––but his mother’s bedroom door was open and he saw her sitting by the window, watching the flashes of heat lightning.
He went in and stood near her.