"
"Indeed?" said Fritzing, bland because ignorant.
Mrs. Pearce fidgeted a little, wrestling perhaps with her conscience,
before she added defiantly, "It wouldn't."
"Indeed?" said Fritzing once more; and he looked at the junket through
his spectacles with that air of extreme and intelligent interest with
which persons who wish to please look at other people's babies.
He was desirous of being on good terms with Symford, and had been very
pleasant all the morning to Mrs. Pearce. That mood in which, shaken
himself to his foundations by anxiety, he had shaken his fist to
Annalise, was gone as completely as yesterday's wet mist. The golden
sunshine of October lay beautifully among the gentle hills and seemed
to lie as well in Fritzing's heart. He had gone through so much for so
many weeks that merely to be free from worries for the moment filled
him with thankfulness. So may he feel who has lived through days of
bodily torture in that first hour when his pain has gone: beaten,
crushed, and cowed by suffering, he melts with gratitude because he is
being left alone, he gasps with a relief so utter that it is almost
abject praise of the Cruelty that has for a little loosened its hold.
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