Perhaps Alice felt something of this; on entering the library she
shivered a little, and went to warm her hands at the fire.
'Sit in this deep chair,' said her brother. 'I'll have a cigarette.
How's mother?'
'Well, she hasn't been quite herself,' Alice replied, gazing into
the fire. 'She can't get to feel at home, that's the truth of it.
She goes. very often to the old house.'
'Goes very often to the old house, does she?'
He repeated the words mechanically, watching smoke that issued from
his lips. 'Suppose she'll get all right in time.'
When the coffee arrived a decanter of cognac accompanied it. Richard
had got into the habit of using the latter rather freely of late. He
needed a stimulant in view of the conversation that was before him.
The conversation was difficult to begin. For a quarter of an hour he
strayed over subjects, each of which, he thought, might bring him to
the point. A question from Alice eventually gave him the requisite
impulse.
'What's the bad news you've got to tell me, Dick?' she asked shyly.
'Bad news? Why, yes, I suppose it is bad, and it's no use pretending
anything else. I've brought you down here just to tell it you.
Somebody must know first, and it had better be somebody who'll
listen patiently, and perhaps help me to get over it.
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