"I'm all right. I wish you wouldn't constitute yourself my nurse, servant, mentor, guardian, keeper, and personal factotum!" Sudden rage left him inarticulate, and he shot an ugly look at her. "Can't you let me alone?" he snarled.
"You poor boy," she said under her breath.
"Don't talk like that! Damnation! I—I can't stand much more—I can't stand it, I tell you!"
"Yes, you can, and you will. And I don't mind what you say to me."
His malignant expression altered.
"Do you know," he said, in a cool and evil voice, "that I may stop
SAYING things and take to DOING them?"
"Would you hurt me physically? Are you really as sick as that?"
"Not yet…. How do I know?" Suddenly he felt tired and leaned against the doorway, covering his dulling eyes with his right forearm. But his hand was now clenched convulsively.
"Could you lie down? I'll talk to you," she whispered. "I'll see you through."
"I can't—endure—this tension," he muttered. "For God's sake let me go!"
"Where?"