Page 88 - sons-and-lovers

his going away than glad of his success. Indeed, as the days
drew near for his departure, her heart began to close and
grow dreary with despair. She loved him so much! More
than that, she hoped in him so much. Almost she lived by
him. She liked to do things for him: she liked to put a cup
for his tea and to iron his collars, of which he was so proud.
It was a joy to her to have him proud of his collars. There
was no laundry. So she used to rub away at them with her
little convex iron, to polish them, till they shone from the
sheer pressure of her arm. Now she would not do it for him.
Now he was going away. She felt almost as if he were going
as well out of her heart. He did not seem to leave her inhab-
ited with himself. That was the grief and the pain to her. He
took nearly all himself away.
A few days before his departure—he was just twenty—he
burned his love-letters. They had hung on a file at the top of
the kitchen cupboard. From some of them he had read ex-
tracts to his mother. Some of them she had taken the trouble
to read herself. But most were too trivial.
Now, on the Saturday morning he said:
‘Come on, Postle, let’s go through my letters, and you
can have the birds and flowers.’
Mrs. Morel had done her Saturday’s work on the Friday,
because he was having a last day’s holiday. She was making
him a rice cake, which he loved, to take with him. He was
scarcely conscious that she was so miserable.
He took the first letter off the file. It was mauve-tint-
ed, and had purple and green thistles. William sniffed the
page.