In the train he tried to tell himself that he was taking back the brightness of his love to Thrigsby, but as he came nearer, more and more powerfully did it seem to reach out to crush his love. By the time he was out in the Albert Station, he had reached a depression not to be broken even by the excitement of seeing again the familiar sights, the trams, the black river, the Collegiate Church, the dark warehouses, the school where he had spent so many dazed, busy, monotonous years, the statue of the Prince Consort, the yellow timber-yards by the canal, the brilliant greengrocer's shop at the corner of Kite Street, the council school where he had begun his education, the dirty brick streets among which his whole youth had been spent. Only some horrid disaster could have relieved him. Even up to the moment when the door opened he hoped almost desperately to find some difference in his home. The erratic servant came to the door. She had a black smudge across her cheek, and her hair was tousled. She gave him no greeting. "Oh, it's you," she said, and as she turned he saw that one of her shoes was split down the heel and had frayed her stocking into what was known in the family as a "potato." He heaved his bag into the lobby and passed along to the dining-room, where he found his mother. She was, as he knew she would be, doing crochet-work. He kissed her. "How brown you are!" she said. "It's been wonderful weather. Aunt Janet sent you some shortbread and some knitted things." "I wish she wouldn't. She can't knit, and she's forgotten how old you are, and makes things as if you were still children. But she's very good to us. I don't know what I should have done without her." "She said she admired you more than she can say." "I've done my best for you." "She said you married a bad Fourmy." "I wish she hadn't said that." René responded to his mother's embarrassment, but he could not spare her. "Is that true. Was my father a bad man?" "He was a gentleman. The Fourmys are proud, clever people. They think they are always right, and they want everything their own way. That is all very well if you have money. But, without it-- But why talk of it? It's all done." "Did you love my father?" Mrs. Fourmy brought her hands down into her lap and stopped plying her needle. "What's come to you, René?" He longed to tell his mother that he too loved, and could therefore understand, but his question had so disarmed her, her eyes looked so frightened, so expectant of hurt, that he could not continue. "Oh," he said, "it's just queer, coming back. One can feel all sorts of things in the house, and----" "You are like your father in many ways." And she resumed her crochet. That alarmed him. Like his father? He felt indignant and uncomfortably self-conscious. He contrasted his hitherto exemplary and successful career with those mean memories--lying abed, whisky and cigarettes. He began to protest: "But he----"