Page:The Novels and Tales of Henry James, Volume 1 (New York, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1907).djvu/462

 "Thrown it away. It was no such great amount. I 've done nothing this winter."

"You 've done nothing?"

"I 've done no manner of work! Why in the world did n't you guess it and spare me all this? Could n't you see I was empty, distracted, debauched?"

"Debauched, my dear son?" Mrs. Hudson repeated.

"That 's over for the present! But could n't you see—could n't Mary see—that I was in a damnably bad way?"

"I 've no doubt Miss Garland saw," Rowland said.

"But Mary has said nothing whatever!" Mrs. Hudson protested.

"Oh, she 's too wonderful," Rowland permitted himself to observe.

"Have you done anything that will hurt poor Mary?" Mrs. Hudson gasped.

"I 've only been thinking night and day of another woman."

She dropped helplessly into her seat again. "Oh dear, dear, had n't we better go home?"

"Not to get out of her way!" Roderick said. "She has started on a career of her own, and she does n't care a rap for me. My head was filled with her; I could think of nothing else; I would have sacrificed everything to her—you, Mary, Mallet, my work, my fortune, my future, my honour. I was in a lovely state, eh? I don't pretend to be giving you good news; but I 'm telling the simple, literal truth, so that you may know why I 've gone to the dogs. She pretended to care greatly for all this, and to be willing to make any 428