... Well, I suppose you will be hearin' from them pretty soon
about--about that other matter. The plan they told you they had for
you."
He nodded again. "Dear me, yes," he agreed. "I suppose I shall."
"Why do you say 'Dear me'? You want to hear, don't you? It will be a
wonderful thing for you, I should think. It is sure to be somethin' you
will like, because they said so in their letter."
"Yes--ah--yes."
Both were silent for a brief interval, then Martha said:
"I presume likely I shall be sittin' here in this very room this winter,
doin' just the very same thing I'm doin' now, knittin' or sewin',
with everything just as it is, cat and plants and Primmie and all the
everyday things I've been amongst all my life. And you'll be away off,
goodness knows where, among goodness knows what sorts of queer people
and queer places.... Well," she added, with a smile, "you won't have any
one to fret you about whether you put on rubbers or not. That'll be a
comfort for you, at any rate."
He did not seem to find great comfort in the prospect.
"I shall not put them on," he said. "I know I sha'n't. I shall forget
all about them, and forget to eat at regular times, and to--ah--keep
my head covered in the sun. Why, do you know," he added, in a burst of
confidence and quite as if he had not said the same thing before,
"when I am by myself I always forget things like that, things that real
people--ah--normal people, remember.
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