"What _do_ you mean?"

"People talking--my mother's old friends. It was rather serious, as I had
been thinking of their daughters for pupils. I thought I was alone, but
your son--the 'boy' as you call him--was listening. He came and stood
beside me. For a person who does not talk, he can make himself quite well
understood. I tried to go on playing. My blinded eyes, the wrong notes,
told him all. I lay and thought all night, and asked myself, why might I
not be happy and give happiness, like other women of my age. I denied to
my conscience that I was bound to tell him, since I was not, never had
been, what that story in words would report me. Why should I affect a lie
in order literally, vainly to be honest? So a day passed, and another
sleepless night. And now I had his image of me to battle with. Then it
became impossible, and yet more necessary, and each day's silence buried
me deeper beyond the hope of speech. So I gave it up. Why should he have
in his wife less than I would ask for in my husband? I want none of your
experienced men. Such a record as his, such a look in the eyes, the
expression unawares of a life of sustained effort--always in one
direction"--

A white arm in a black sleeve pointed upward in silence.

"And you would rob him of his reward?" said the mother, in a choked voice.

"Mrs. Thorne! Do you not understand me? I am not talking for effect. But
this is what happens if one begins to explain. I did not come here to talk
to you for the rest of my life! It was your sweetness that undid me. I will
never again say what I think of parents in general."