Roddy too. He had always seemed to go his own way without caring, living his secret life, running, jumping, grinning at you. And he, too, was compelled to adore Mark and yet to cling helplessly, hopelessly, to Mamma. When he said things about her he was struggling against her, trying to free himself. He flung himself off and came back, to cling harder. And he was nineteen.
"After all," he said, "why shouldn't I stay? It's not as if I didn't dig in the garden and look after Papa. If I went she'd have to get somebody."
"I thought you wanted to go?" she said.
"So I did. So I do, for some things. But when it comes to the point—"
"When it comes to the point?"
"I funk it."
"Because of Mamma?"
"Because of me. That idiocy. Supposing I had to do something I couldn't do?… That's why I shall have to go away somewhere where it won't matter, where she won't know anything about it."
The frightened look was in his eyes again.
In her heart a choking, breathless voice talked of unhappiness, coming, coming. Unhappiness that no beauty could assuage. Her will hardened to shut it out.