In the hall he found Mrs. Penniman, fluttered and eager; she appeared
to have been hovering there under the irreconcilable promptings of
her curiosity and her dignity.
"That was a precious plan of yours!" said Morris, clapping on his
hat.
"Is she so hard?" asked Mrs. Penniman.
"She doesn't care a button for me--with her confounded little dry
manner."
"Was it very dry?" pursued Mrs. Penniman, with solicitude.
Morris took no notice of her question; he stood musing an instant,
with his hat on. "But why the deuce, then, would she never marry?"
"Yes--why indeed?" sighed Mrs. Penniman. And then, as if from a
sense of the inadequacy of this explanation, "But you will not
despair--you will come back?"
"Come back? Damnation!" And Morris Townsend strode out of the
house, leaving Mrs. Penniman staring.
Catherine, meanwhile, in the parlour, picking up her morsel of fancy
work, had seated herself with it again--for life, as it were.
End of The Project Gutenberg Etext of Washington Square, by Henry James
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