It was possible that he still might be something to her, that he, his presence, might penetrate.
"But you are not resting, mother," he said.

"Why are you sitting up?
I came to talk to you, as I said I would, while you rested." Suddenly into those blank, irresponsive eyes there leaped recognition.
He saw the pupils contract as they focused themselves on him, and hand in hand with recognition there leaped into them hate.

Instantly that was veiled again.

But it had been there, and now it was not banished; it lurked behind in the shadows, crouching and waiting.
She answered him at once, but in a voice that was quite toneless.

It seemed like that of a child repeating a lesson which it had learned by heart, and could be pronounced while it was thinking of something quite different.
"I was waiting till you came, my dear," she said.