In the darkness she smiled at the thought of an Irish Roman Catholic politician as the protector of this old New England countryside, and aloud she said, “You’re growing to be like all the others. You want to make the world stand still.”
“Yes, I can see that it must seem funny to you.” There was no bitterness in his voice, but only a sort of hurt, which again astonished her, because it was impassible to think of O’Hara as one who could be hurt.
“There will always be the Pentland house, but, of course, all of us will die some day and then what?”
“There will always be our children.”
She was aware slowly of slipping back into that world of cares and troubles behind her from which she had escaped a little while before. She said, “You are looking a long way into the future.”
“Perhaps, but I mean to have children one day. And at Pentlands there is always Sybil, who will fight for it fiercely. She’ll never give it up.”
“But it’s Jack who will own it, and I’m not so sure about him.”
Unconsciously she sighed, knowing now that she was pretending again, being dishonest. She was pretending again that Jack would live to have Pentlands for his own, that he would one day have children who would carry it on. She kept saying to herself, “It is only the truth that can save us all.” And she knew that O’Hara understood her feeble game of pretending. She knew because he stood there silently, as if Jack were already dead, as if he understood the reason for the faint bitter sigh and respected it.
“You see a great deal of Sybil, don’t you?” she asked.
“Yes, she is a good girl. One can depend on her.”