"And is _he_," she said, "afraid?"
"Not for himself," I said, and she asked me: "For whom, then?" And I
said: "For Lankester." I told her that was what I'd meant when I
said just now that he couldn't do them both. And, as a matter of
fact, he wasn't going to do them both. He had given up one of them.
"Which?" she asked; and I said she might guess which.
But she said nothing. She sat there with her eyes fixed on me and
her lips parted slightly. It struck me that she was waiting for me,
in her dreadful silence, as if her life hung on what I should say.
"He has given up Lankester," I said.
I heard her breath go through her parted lips in a long sigh, and
she looked away from me.
"He cared," she said, "as much as that."
"He cared for _you_ as much," I said. I was a little doubtful as to
what she meant. But I know now.
She asked me if I had come to tell her that.
I said I thought it was as well she should realize it. But I'd come
to ask her--if she cared for him--to let him off. To--to----
She stopped me with it as I fumbled.
"To give Papa up?"