"I found it out accidentally," Mrs. Mynors was saying, "when she first came to town. She was in a terrible state of distress about Pansy, and would not go away from the nursing home when night came. They were very kind, and let her lie on a sofa in a sitting-room, and I was in an arm-chair. She dropped off to sleep a dozen times, I should think, and each time woke in a kind of nightmare, crying out to him that he might torture her as he liked, but she was going to Pansy; he might cut her to pieces when she got back."
"Good God!" said Gerald.
"It was dreadful to listen," sighed the mother. "First, she was repeating: 'I am not afraid—I am not afraid of you any more!' Then she was begging him not to make her try to walk, because she could not stand. I can't think what he can have been doing to her, but I have made up my mind that, by hook or by crook, she must not go back to him. The thing is: How to prevent it?"
The drops were standing upon the young man's forehead. He had had hints before, but this was the first time he had succeeded in being alone with Mrs. Mynors long enough to hear all.
"How could you—how could you have permitted it?" he broke out violently. "Such an inhuman sacrifice!"
"My dear Gerald, does the modern mother control her children? Oh, don't think I am saying a word to disparage my darling. I know she is a martyr; I know she sacrificed herself for us. But I implored her not to do so. If only——" She broke off. He waited, feverishly eager, and as she did not continue, broke out:
"Well, if only what?"
"If only she had never gone to London," murmured the mother in a low voice. "Then he would never have seen her, and she would never have seen—you!"
"Never have seen me?"
"Oh, I know it was not the first time you had met. But it was the fatal time. Poor innocent child! she gave you her heart, and you handed it back with a polite thank you. Did you not, dear boy?"