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James, Henry, 1843-1916

"Roderick Hudson"

This morning she has
dried her eyes, but I warrant you it is n't a cheerful house. I long to
be out of it!"
"I 'm extremely sorry," said Rowland, "to have been the prime cause of
so much suffering. I owe your mother some amends; will it be possible
for me to see her?"
"If you 'll see her, it will smooth matters vastly; though to tell the
truth she 'll need all her courage to face you, for she considers you an
agent of the foul fiend. She does n't see why you should have come
here and set me by the ears: you are made to ruin ingenuous youths and
desolate doting mothers. I leave it to you, personally, to answer these
charges. You see, what she can't forgive--what she 'll not really ever
forgive--is your taking me off to Rome. Rome is an evil word, in my
mother's vocabulary, to be said in a whisper, as you 'd say 'damnation.'
Northampton is in the centre of the earth and Rome far away in outlying
dusk, into which it can do no Christian any good to penetrate. And there
was I but yesterday a doomed habitue of that repository of every virtue,
Mr. Striker's office!"
"And does Mr.


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