Mr. Waddington of Wyck Part 53

"If I'd loved him?"

"Yes. If you'd gone away with him and made him happy. If you hadn't laughed at him, Barbara."

"I know. It was awful of me. But what could I do?"

"What could you do? We all do it. I do it. Mrs. Levitt did it."

"I didn't do it like Mrs. Levitt."

"No. But you were just one more. Think of it. All his life to be laughed at. And when he was making love, too; the most serious thing, Barbara, that anybody can do. I tell you I can't bear it. I'd have given him to you ten times first."

"Then," said Barbara, "you _have_ got to forgive me."

"If I don't, it's because it's my own sin and I can't forgive myself....

"... Besides, I let it happen. Because I thought it would cure him."

"Of falling in love?"

"Of trying to be young when he didn't feel it. I thought he'd see how impossible it was. But that's the sad part of it. He _would_ have felt young, Barbara, if you'd loved him. If I'd loved him I could have kept him young. I told you," she said, "it was all my fault."

"You told me Ralph and I would never be old. Is that what you meant?"

"Yes."

They sat silent a moment, looking down through Ralph's window into the Market Square.

And presently they saw Mr. Waddington pa.s.s the corner of the Town Hall and cross the wide, open s.p.a.ce to the Dower House.

"You must come back with me, Barbara. If you don't everybody'll know what's happened."

"I can't, f.a.n.n.y."

"He won't be there. You won't see him till your wedding day. He's going to stay with Granny. He says she isn't very well."

"I'm sorry she isn't well."

"She's perfectly well. That isn't what he's going for."

Across the Square they could see the door of the Dower House open and receive him. f.a.n.n.y smiled.

"He's going back to his mother to be made young again," she said.