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Burnett, Frances Hodgson, 1849-1924

"The Head of the House of Coombe"

"
"My lord!" Andrews gasped. "You wouldn't overlook a woman and take
her living from her and send her to starvation!"
"I would take her living from her and send her to starvation
without a shadow of compunction," was the reply made in the fine
gentleman's cultivated voice, "--if she were capable of what you
were capable of tonight. You are, I judge, about forty, and, though
you are lean, you are a powerful woman; the child is, I believe,
barely six." And then, looking down at her through his glass, he
added--to her quite shuddering astonishment--in a tone whose very
softness made it really awful to her, "Damn you! Damn you!"
"I'll--I swear I'll never let myself go again, my lord!" the woman
broke out devoutly.
"I don't think you will. It would cost you too much," he said.
Then he went down the steep, crooked little staircase quite
soundlessly and Andrews, rather white and breathless, went and
packed her trunk. Robin--tired baby as she was--slept warm and
deeply.



CHAPTER XIII


It was no custom of his to outstay other people; in fact, he
usually went away comparatively early. Feather could not imagine
what his reason could be, but she was sure there was a reason.
She was often disturbed by his reasons, and found it difficult to
adjust herself to them. How--even if one had a logically brilliant
mind--could one calculate on a male being, who seemed not exactly
to belong to the race of men.


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