She was part of his life, and she would always be so.

Why, now, when he thought of it, he could do nothing without his mother; every day he must tell her what he had done and what he was going to do, must show her what he had acquired and must explain to her what he had lost, must go to her when he was hurt and when he was frightened and when he was glad...

And of all these things he had never even thought until now.
As he sat there the house seemed to grow ever quieter and quieter about him.

He felt as though he would have liked to have gone to the schoolroom door and listened.

It was terrible imagining the house behind the door--quite silent--so that the clocks had stopped, and no one walked upon the stairs and no one laughed down in the pantry.