His only memories of his mother, who
had died so young, were of an angelic being in a long white gown, who
stood in the twilit doorway of his bedroom. . .then entered softly,
and kissed and petted him good-night. And without realizing it, he
longed with all his soul for that gentle, reassuring touch, so
suddenly and irrevocably lost.
He remembered more distinctly his first governess, the widow MacCain,
whose patient affection he had begun to return when his father, for
reasons he would never make clear, had sent her away in disgrace. In
later life he had solved the bitter puzzle for himself, after his own
fashion and understanding, and hated them both for it.
Back to the present, he set to his breakfast with a will. He ate not
because he was hungry---genuine, limb-weakening hunger was something
he had never known---but because he had a long ride ahead of him, and
wished to retain a good measure of strength at the end of it, when he
saw, and would meet.....
Her.
He abruptly pushed away his plate. And for perhaps the second time in
his adult life (the first being the morning of the Battle, in which he
had served as an adjutant) he felt a kind of fear and nervous awe of
what lay ahead.
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