“That wasn’t what I came about, but it’s what I knew you’d suggest,” she said, smiling at him. “I want to mortgage my house.’
“Why? Mortgage? You’ll do nothing of the sort”
“Well, I could sell it, but I’d like to live there during the winter, you see. Then I could sell it later. I thought of a mortgage in bed last night. I don’t quite know how to do it, but I’m sure that would be a way out. You’ll help me, won’t you?”
The old man got up and walked about the office angrily.
“You’re making me very angry, Cecily. Very angry.”
“I don’t mean to. I don’t want to. But I’ve got to do this the fair way. I can’t take money under these circumstances.”
“You’re obsessed,” said Mr. Warner. “Now, look here, Cecily, I’m your father, you know.”
“I know you are—and you’re more than most fathers ever could be, and so you must see that——”
“I’ve a right to support my own grandchildren.”
“If they were in need,” said Cecily, slowly, “it would be different. But they aren’t. They could live on my money easily if we had a flat or a little house. I’d sooner have a little house than a flat. But to keep that big house running on your money—I can’t do it. Don’t you see that the children are my job—all I have left! I want them to be mine, and I can’t feel that they are unless I do it.”