"Suppose we did find a man who said it
probably wasn't so serious as that, and that she could probably live
all right here? We shouldn't know that he was right--wouldn't dare trust
to that. Besides, if I drag mother around to any more of them, she'll
know."
Rose looked up sharply. "Doesn't she know?"
"No," said Portia in that hard even voice of hers. "I lied to her of
course. I told her the doctor said her condition was very serious, and
that the only way to keep from being a hopeless invalid would be to do
what he said--go out to California--take an absolute rest for two or
three years--no lectures, no writing, no going about.
"You know mother well enough to know what she'd do if she knew the truth
about it. She'd say, 'If I can never be well, what's the use of
prolonging my life a year, or two, or five; not really living, just
crawling around half alive and soaking up somebody else's life at the
same time?' She'd say she didn't believe it was so bad as that anyway,
but that whether it was or not, she'd go straight along and live as
she's always done, and when she died, she'd be dead.
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