“No, don’t do that. Don’t ask Papa ... to think it over again. It is perhaps too late, after all; and besides ... Papa is right. About you.”
“About me?”
“He could not go six months without you. And I....”
“And you, Mamma....”
“I couldn’t either.”
“Yes, you could.”
“No, I couldn’t either.”
She suddenly passed her hands along his face, along his shoulders, his knees, as though she wished to feel him, to feel the reality ... the reality of her life. He ... he was the real thing, the truth; but all the rest between her husband and her was falsehood, remained falsehood ... because of people. Could they not even for Addie’s sake purge that falsehood into truth? No, no, not even for him. Would falsehood then always cleave to them?...
“We are too small,” she thought and murmured her thought aloud.
“What did you say?”