"Huh?"
He fell into short strides up and down the length of the couch front.
"I--I guess I might have mentioned it before, mother, but--but--oh,
hang!--when a fellow's a senior it--it's all he can do to get home once in
a while and--and--what's the use talking about a thing anyway before
it breaks right, and--well, everybody knows it's up to us college
fellows--college men--to lead the others and show our country what we're
made of now that she needs us--eh, little dressed-up mother?"
She looked up at him with the tremulous smile still trying to break
through.
"My boy can mix with the best of 'em."
"That's not what I mean, mother."
"You got to be twice to me what you been, darling--twice to me. Listen,
darling. I--Oh, my God!"
She was beating softly against his hand held in hers, her voice rising
again, and her tears.
"Listen, darling--"
"Now, mother, don't go into a spell. The war is going to help you out
on these lonesome fits, mother. Like Slawson put it to-day in Integral
Calculus Four, war reduces the personal equation to its lowest terms--it's
a matter of--."
"I need you now, Edwin--O God! how I need you! There never was a minute in
all these months since you've grown to understand how--it is between your
father and me that I needed you so much--"
"Mother, you mustn't make it harder for me to--tell you what I--"
"I think maybe something has happened to me, Edwin.
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