They had been talking about him--those two grown-up people.
He knew the kind of things they had said: "It's very tiresome of him to be
out so late, Mrs. Withers," and, "Boys is worritting, outrageous critters,
M'am," and the cruel impossibility of reaching their far-off impervious
understanding lamed him before the door had opened.
Mrs. Withers' lumpy figure loomed up grotesquely against the yellow murk.
"Is that you, Master Robert? You'd better run up quick. Your aunt is
going to give you a jacketing, I can tell you."
"Aunt" was the term with which Mrs. Withers covered up what she considered
privately to be an ambiguous relationship.
Robert slunk past her. He crawled upstairs with an aggressive
deliberation. He would show how much he cared. He was not afraid of
Christine. He had seen her unhappy too often. In a way he knew that he
was stronger than she was. For she was old and had no one to love but
himself.
All the same he was afraid. With every step he took he seemed to climb
farther and farther into the midst of fear. It was all around him--in the
close, airless dark and in the deathly quiet light that came from the open
doorway overhead. What was waiting for him there? His father, risen
unimaginably loathsome from the grave? For he could never be in the dark
without thinking of his father. Or something else? At least he knew that
the never-really-believed-in time of peace was over and that the monster
which had lain hidden and quiescent so long was crouched somewhere close
to him, ready to leap out.
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