She carried it across the room to the fire. She didn't want even
now--even now. You saw again the old way of it, her little obstinate,
triumphant smile, the look that paid you out, that said, "See how I've
sold you."
The violet ashen sheet clung to the furred soot of the chimney: you could
still see the blenched letters.
She couldn't really have thought it would make you conceited. That was
only what she wanted to think she had thought.
"It wasn't easy to make you pleased with me all the time.... Still, I
can't think why on earth you weren't pleased."
She knelt before the fire, watching the violet ashen bit of burnt-out
paper, the cause, the stupid cause of it all.
Her mother had settled again, placidly, in her chair.
"Even if I _was_ a bit conceited.... I don't think I was, really. I only
wanted to know whether I could do things. I wanted people to tell me just
because I didn't know. But even if I was, what did it matter? You must
have known I loved you--desperately--all the time."
"I didn't know it, Mary."
"Then you were stup--"
"Oh, say I was stupid. It's what you think. It's what you always have
thought."
"You were--you were, if you didn't see it."
"See what?"
"How I cared--I can remember--when I was a kid--the awful feeling. It
used to make me ill."
"I didn't know that. If you did care you'd a queer way of showing it."
"That was because I thought you didn't."
"Who told you I didn't care for you?"
"I didn't need to be told. I could see the difference."
Her mother sat fixed in a curious stillness. She held her elbows pressed
tight against her sides. Her face was hard and still. Her eyes looked
away across the room.
"You were different," she said. "You weren't like any of the others. I
was afraid of you. You used to look at me with your little bright eyes. I
felt as if you knew everything I was thinking. I never knew what you'd
say or do next."
No. Her face wasn't hard. There was something else. Something clear.
Clear and beautiful.
"I suppose I--I didn't like your being clever. It was the boys I wanted
to do things. Not you."
"Don't--Mamma darling--_don't_."
The stiff, tight body let go its hold of itself. The eyes turned to her
again.
"I was jealous of you, Mary. And I was afraid for my life you'd find it
out."