Old People and the Things That Pass

by Louis Couperus

He shook his head.

"Won't you tell me?"

"There's nothing."

"Yes, there's something. Perhaps it's something terrible."

He looked her in the eyes.

"Father, is it a secret?"

"No, dear."

"Yes, it is; it's a secret. It's a secret, a secret that's depressing you ... since I don't know how long."

He turned cold in his limbs and all his soul armed itself, as in a cuirass, and he remained like that, on his guard.

"Child, you're fancying things," he said.