Page:Later Life (1919).djvu/325

Rh But he gave just a smile of melancholy resignation; and his look told that that was not all. She understood. She understood that they had spoken of Marianne.

"So Papa . . ." she repeated.

"Would rather stay with us, Mamma."

"With us," she repeated. "We three together?"

"Yes."

"It means going on living . . . a lie," she said, in a blank voice.

"Then I will speak to Papa again."

"No, Addie."

"Why not? . . ."

"No, don't do that. Don't ask Papa . . . to think it over again. It is perhaps too late, after all; and besides . . . Papa is right. About you."

"About me?"

"He could not go six months without you. And I . . ."

"And you, Mamma . . ."

"I couldn't either."

"Yes, you could."

"No, I couldn't either."

She suddenly passed her hands along his face, along his shoulders, his knees, as though she wished to feel him, to feel the reality. . . the reality of her life. He. . . he was the real thing, the truth; but all the rest between her husband and her was