Life and Death of Harriett Frean by May Sinclair

Author:May Sinclair [Sinclair, May]
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Tags: Fiction, Unread
Publisher: Project Gutenberg
Published: 2005-10-31T16:00:00+00:00

"I sometimes think, Hatty," said Mrs. Hancock, melancholy and condoling, "that it would have been very different if your poor mother could have had her wish."

"What--what wish?"

"Her wish to live in Sidmouth, near your Aunt Harriett."

And Sarah Barmby, sympathizing heavily, stopping short and brooding, trying to think of something to say: "If the operation had only been done three years ago when they knew it would save her----"

"Three years ago? But we didn't know anything about it then."

"She did.... Don't you remember? It was when I stayed with her.... Oh, Hatty, didn't she tell you?"

"She never said a word."

"Oh, well, she wouldn't hear of it, even then when they didn't give her two years to live."

Three years? She had had it three years ago. She had known about it all that time. Three years ago the operation would have saved her; she would have been here now. Why had she refused it when she knew it would save her?

She had been thinking of the hundred pounds.

To have known about it three years and said nothing--to have gone believing she hadn't two years to live----

That was her secret. That was why she had been so calm when Papa died. She had known she would have him again so soon. Not two years----

"If I'd been them," Lizzie was saying, "I'd have bitten my tongue out before I told you. It's no use worrying, Hatty. You did everything that could be done."

"I know. I know."

She held up her face against them; but to herself she said that everything had not been done. Her mother had never had her wish. And she had died in agony, so that she, Harriett, might keep her hundred pounds.

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