They clawed his heart. He called
to Christine before he saw her, and the answering silence made him sick
with panic. It was reasonless panic, for Christine often fell asleep at
dusk. She was difficult to wake and when she woke it was strangely, with
a look of bewilderment, like a traveller who has come home after a long
absence. Once she had spoken his father's name with a ringing joy, and
he had answered roughly and had seen her shrink back into herself. Her
little hands trembled, fumbling apologetically with the shabby bag she
always carried. She was like a girl who, in one withering tragic moment,
had become old. But his aching love found no outlet, no word of regret
or tenderness. It recoiled back on himself in a dead weight of pain.
He began to watch himself like a sick man. There were hours when he knew
his brain to be losing edge--black periods of hideous impotency which,
when they passed, left him shaken and wet with terror. Supposing, at the
end of everything, be failed? He didn't care so much. His very power of
caring had been dissipated. His single purpose lost itself amidst
incompatible dreams. He was being torn asunder--and there was a limit to
endurance.
Cosgrave had failed. He couldn't concentrate. He was always looking for
happiness. He had fallen in love and wasted himself and made a mess of
his life.
It was mad to fall in love.
And yet the worst dread of all was the dread of losing Francey.
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