Vietnam or Thailand ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
Updated: May 15, 2025
"It's a pity if it's good-bye," said Alice. Her voice might have been the voice of a young woman who is sanely and innocently gay, but to Rowcliffe's ear there was a sound of exaltation in it. He could see her now clearly in the light of the open door. The Vicar had not lied. Alice had all the appearances of health. Something had almost cured her. But not quite.
There were all sorts of interesting things to be done in Leeds by a man of Rowcliffe's keenness and energy. "Do you know, Steven, you're getting quite stout?" "I do know," he said almost with bitterness. "I don't mean horridly stout, dear, just nicely and comfortably stout." "I'm too comfortable," he said. "I don't do enough work to keep me fit." "Is that what's bothering you?" He frowned.
She had only to close her eyes and shut out these objects and she saw the room as it used to be. She closed them now and instantly she opened them again, for the vision hurt her. She went restlessly about the room, picking up things and looking at them without seeing them. In the room upstairs she heard the cries of Rowcliffe's children, bumping and the scampering of feet.
Mary had made it snug and gay with cushions and shining, florid chintzes. There were a great many things in rosewood and brass; a piano took the place of Rowcliffe's writing table; a bureau and a cabinet stood against the wall where his bookcases had been; and a tall palm-tree in a pot filled the little window that looked on to the orchard.
They went together to the night nursery where the three children lay in their cots, the little red-haired girls awake and restless, and the dark-haired baby in his first sleep. They bent over them together. Mary's lips touched the red hair and the dark where Steven's lips had been. They spent the evening sitting by the fire in Rowcliffe's study. The doctor dozed.
She stood still then and clenched her hands. The pain at her heart was like no other pain. It was as if she hated Rowcliffe's children. Presently she would have to go up and see them. She waited. Mary was taking her own time. Upstairs the doors opened and shut on the sharp grief of little children carried unwillingly to bed. Gwenda's heart melted and grew tender at the sound.
"Shall I ask her to call again, sir?" "No. I'll see her. Where is she?" "In the dining-room, sir." "Show her into the study." Nothing could have been more distant and reserved than Rowcliffe's dining-room. But, to a young woman who had made up her mind that she didn't want to know anything about him, Rowcliffe's study said too much.
Rowcliffe's smile that had been reminiscent was now vague and obscurely speculative. "I ought to have let you go when you wanted to," she said. Rowcliffe looked down at the table. She sat leaning sideways against it; one thin arm was stretched out on it. The hand gripped the paper weight that he had pushed away. It was this hand, so tense and yet so helpless, that he was looking at.
"No, sir, that was the lady you've seen. I think this'll be her sister." Rowcliffe was still frowning as he dried his hands with fastidious care. "She's different, sir. Taller like." "Taller?" "Yes, sir." Rowcliffe turned to the table and picked up a probe and a lancet and dropped them into a sterilising solution. The maid waited. Rowcliffe's absorption was complete.
She walked the four miles, going across the moor under Karva and loitering by the way, and it was past six before she reached Morfe. She was shown into the room that was once Rowcliffe's study. It had been Mary's drawing-room ever since last year when the second child was born and they turned the big room over the dining-room into a day nursery.
Word Of The Day
Others Looking