"Aye, ma!"
"The woman's a fool," said Mrs. MacDermott. "You're well rid of her!..."
He saw now that there would be no further objection made by his mother against his going from home. As clearly as if she had said so, he understood that she now regarded his departure from home as a pilgrimage from which in due time he would return, purged of his grief. And she was content.
"A woman that would marry a peeler when she might marry a MacDermott, is not fit to marry a MacDermott," she said, almost to herself.
IX
And so, when three months later, he decided to go to London, she did not try to hold him back. He had worked hard on a bitter novel that would, he imagined, fill men with amazement and women with shame, and when he had completed it, he bound the long, loose sheets of foolscap together and announced that he was now ready to go to London. Mr. Cairnduff told him of lodgings in Brixton, where an old friend of his, an Ulsterman and a journalist, was living, and Mr. McCaughan gave him a very vivid account of the perils of London life. "Bad women!" he said, ominously, "are a terrible temptation to a young fellow all by himself in a big town!" and then, brightening a little, he remarked that he need not tell so sensible a lad as John how to take care of himself. John had only to remember that he was a MacDermott!...
But Mrs. MacDermott did not offer any advice to him. She packed his trunk and his bag on the day he was to leave Ballyards, taking care to put a Bible at the bottom of the trunk, and told him that they were ready for him. He was to travel by the night boat from Belfast to Liverpool, and it was not necessary for him to leave Ballyards until the evening, nor did he wish to spend more time in Belfast than was absolutely necessary. His Uncle and his mother were to accompany him to the boat: Mr. McCaughan and Mr. Cairnduff would say good-bye to him at Ballyards station. Willie Logan, now safely married to his Jennie and a little dashed in consequence of the limitations imposed upon him by marriage, had volunteered to come to the station "and see the last of" him. There was to be a gathering of friends on the platform ... but he wished in his heart they would allow him to go away in peace and quietness.
It was strange, he thought, that his mother did not talk to him about his journey to London. He had imagined that she would have a great deal to say about it, but it was not until the day of his departure that she spoke of it to him.
She came to him, after she had packed his trunk and bag, and said, "Come into the return room a wee minute!" and, obediently, he followed her.
"I want to show you something," she said in explanation. "Shut the door behind you!"