ar to gain, for his own purpose,
more freedom. My fear was of having to deal with the intolerable
question of the grounds of his dismissal from school, for that was
really but the question of the horrors gathered behind. That his uncle
should arrive to treat with me of these things was a solution that,
strictly speaking, I ought now to have desired to bring on; but I
could so little face the ugliness and the pain of it that I simply
procrastinated and lived from hand to mouth. The boy, to my deep
discomposure, was immensely in the right, was in a position to say
to me: "Either you clear up with my guardian the mystery of this
interruption of my studies, or you cease to expect me to lead with you
a life that's so unnatural for a boy." What was so unnatural for the
particular boy I was concerned with was this sudden revelation of a
consciousness and a plan.

That was what really overcame me, what prevented my going in. I walked
round the church, hesitating, hovering; I reflected that I had already,
with him, hurt myself beyond repair. Therefore I could patch up nothing,
and it was too extreme an effort to squeeze beside him into the pew: he
would be so much more sure than ever to pass his arm into mine and make
me sit there for an hour in close, silent contact with his commentary
on our talk. For the first minute since his arrival I wanted to get away
from him. As I paused beneath the high east window and listened to the
sounds of worship, I was taken with an impulse that might master me,
I felt, completely should I give it the least encouragement. I might
easily put an end to my predicament by getting away altogether. Here
was my chance; there was no one to stop me; I could give the whole thing
up--turn my back and retreat. It was only a question of hurrying again,
for a few preparations, to the house which the attendance at church of
so many of the servants would practically have left unoccupied. No one,
in short, could blame me if I should just drive desperately off. What
was it to get away if I got away only till dinner? That would be in
a couple of hours, at the end of which--I had the acute prevision--my
little pupils would play at innocent wonder about my nonappearance in
their train.

"What DID you do, you naughty, bad thing? Why in the world, to worry us
so--and take our thoughts off, too, don't you know?--did you desert us
at the very door?" I couldn't meet such questions nor, as they asked
them, their false l