Page:The Works of H G Wells Volume 11.pdf/58

 "You may die here!"

"Well, I shall die fighting."

"Leaving me here with Mrs. Croome."

His temper broke under her reply. "Leaving you here with Mrs. Croome," he said harshly.

He got up. "I can eat nothing," he repeated, and dropped back sullenly into the horsehair arm-chair.

There was a long silence, and then he heard the little, almost mouselike, movements of his wife as she began her meal. For a while he had forgotten the dull ache within him, but now, glowing and fading and glowing, it made its way back into his consciousness. He was helpless and perplexed; he had not meant to quarrel. He had hurt this poor thing who had been his love and companion; he had bullied her. His clogged brain could think of nothing to set matters right. He stared with dull eyes at a world utterly hateful to him.