Page:Sorrell and Son - Deeping - 1926.djvu/240

 "He's poisoned you against me. It wasn't my fault that I couldn't love him"

Kit had stood like a prisoner lashed to a tree, rigid, making no response, while she had hung about him, and wept and raged. It had been his first experience of woman as an emotional creature, and he was never to forget it, and doubtless it coloured his experiences with other women. He remained shy of the woman who showed signs of trying to submerge him in an emotional storm.

He had ended it by breaking away and locking himself in his bedroom, and he had got out of the house at six o'clock next morning, and carried his suit-case to Paddington Station.

At Winstonbury he strolled casually into his father's room, and stood by the window, looking out into the June garden. He was glad to be back in this male room, more glad than Sorrell knew.

"Enjoyed yourself, old chap?"

"Not much."

Sorrell asked him no bothering questions, for which wise restraint Christopher was supremely grateful.

"I think I'll go out for a good grind, pater."

"All right," said his father.

Later in the day, when Sorrell was lighting his after-tea pipe, he had the wise man's reward.

"I'm not going up there again, pater."

"Just as you like," said Sorrell, drawing a breath of silent and profound relief.