She stood looking down at her mother with a curious expression on her face.

Mrs.Lessing could make nothing of it; she merely thought Hilda "queer"; she had travelled farther than she knew from youth.
"Shall I, mother ?" said Hilda.

"Yes, I expect I shall.

I have been carefully brought up, as you say, so carefully that even now I can only just see what a fool might do, and I know quite well that I can't do it.
After a while I shall no more see it than you do.

I shall even probably forget that I ever did.