CHAPTER XXXVIII
PATCHWORK QUILTS
And now that the first ten minutes had passed he felt anew the futility
of his errand. His first look into her face made him certain he might
better have remained in Chicago. The thing which cut off all approach was
that she too had done some work on the surface.
It seemed to him as he sat there in utter silence that he had been
brutal, not alone to her heart, but to his own, that he asked too much,
not only of her command, but of his. He had come to talk of Ernestine and
the future; the things about him drew him overmasteringly to Karl and the
past.
She had taken him to her little sitting room up stairs, forced to do so
because the fire down stairs had gone out. He understood now why it was
she had faltered so in asking him to come up here. Here was Karl's big
chair--many things from their library at home. It was where she lived
with her past. She wanted no one here.
She would make no attempt at helping him. She sat there in silence, her
face white, almost stern.
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