scious arrangement of his future. Was that, he asked himself, the happiest existence? He shrugged his shoulders. What could it matter? It was his. Nothing could change it.
His father grew softer, more wistful, day by day. He spoke gently to his son, almost meekly. He had acquired a habit of asking unexpected questions: What shall we do with that bush? It's all worm-eaten, or Do you think you would prefer living in a dormitory? or Are you going to take your mandolin with you? There were no more com' mands, no rough words. Haltingly, hesitantly, but persistently, the man was trying to express his real affection, so long submerged, for the strange boy who was his son. To Gareth this metamorphosis seemed ghastly, blasphemously ironic. But he knew what had caused it: the strain resulting from the three living together had been removed. How Gareth detested this simple man! It afforded him a cruel pleasure to realize that he would dupe him, take away from him the one unattainable thing he craved, destroy his last hope.
One day when Gareth was sitting on the porch, Lennie Colman passed the house. He had not seen her since the day she had called just preceding the funeral. As she came towards him up the walk she smiled, a tender, pathetic smile.
I hear that you are going to college, Gareth, she began.
