“I should never let any one interfere with my freedom of action. If a man loves me I expect him to trust me.”
“You don’t trust me.”
“Sometimes you almost hate me. I know that.”
“Sometimes I hate everybody, myself most of all. But I should miss you. You are the only woman in all the world who wants me now.”
Suddenly a thought of his mother intruded into his mind, and he added:
“Wants me as a lover.”
She got up quickly, almost impulsively, and went close to him.
“Yes, I want you, I want you as a lover, and I can’t let you go. That is why I ask you, I beg you, to stay with me while Jimmy’s here.”
She leaned against him, and put her small hands on his shoulders.
“How can a child understand the needs of a woman like me and of a man like you? How can he look into our hearts or read the secrets of our natures—secrets which we can’t help having? You hate what you call deceiving him. But he will never think about it. A boy of Jimmy’s age never thinks about his mother in that way.”