"
"I shall find out," said Adela. "But what had Mrs. Churchley to do
with it?"
"With MY misery? I told her. I had to tell some one."
"Why didn't you tell me?"
He appeared--though but after an instant--to know exactly why. "Oh
you take things so beastly hard--you make such rows." Adela covered
her face with her hands and he went on: "What I wanted was comfort--
not to be lashed up. I thought I should go mad. I wanted Mrs.
Churchley to break it to father, to intercede for me and help him to
meet it. She was awfully kind to me, she listened and she
understood; she could fancy how it had happened. Without her I
shouldn't have pulled through. She liked me, you know," he further
explained, and as if it were quite worth mentioning--all the more
that it was pleasant to him. "She said she'd do what she could for
me. She was full of sympathy and resource. I really leaned on her.
But when YOU cut in of course it spoiled everything. That's why I
was so furious with you. She couldn't do anything then."
Adela dropped her hands, staring; she felt she had walked in
darkness. "So that he had to meet it alone?"
"Dame!" said Godfrey, who had got up his French tremendously.
Muriel came to the door to say papa wished the two others to join
them, and the next day Godfrey returned to town. His father remained
at Brinton, without an intermission, the rest of the summer and the
whole of the autumn, and Adela had a chance to find out, as she had
said, whether he knew she had interfered.
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