“Yes, the first days were the worst. I had to cable to you, Eric. If anything had happened... I couldn’t take the risk.”
“But I’m very glad you did.”
“I didn’t want to bring you home.”
Eric found a particle of paper on the carpet. He picked it up and carried it slowly to the fire.
“You knew, then?”
“I guessed, darling.”
“You guessed I never meant to come back.”
“Hush, Eric... I guessed that you probably felt like that. But I hoped that with time—”
“It gets worse every day! I’m waiting, listening for something to go snap in my brain!”
In body or nerves something “went snap,” and he plunged forward, nearly throwing his mother off her balance. She slipped her arm round his waist and walked slowly up and down the room with him. At the door she paused and noiselessly turned the key. He was shaking with dry sobs which seemed to tear him in pieces, and she pulled his head on to her shoulder, running her fingers through his hair and once kissing his neck. Thirty years before she had lifted him out of bed night after night, when he was crying with pain, and walked up and down the nursery with him until he dropped in her arms or fell asleep standing, with his head on her breast.