“She is ill you know.”
“There’s some imagines theirselves ill. If she was anything like as ill as I am she might have something to complain about.”
“I think she’s rather plucky. She doesn’t want to give in. It’s a kind of illness that doesn’t show much. I know her doctor. He’s a Harley Street man. He says that her kind of disorder makes it absolutely impossible for the patient to tell the truth. I don’t believe that. It’s just one of those doctory things they all repeat.” … What is truth said jesting Pilate and did not wait for an answer. Their idea of truth—
“Well if she is ill why doesn’t she act according?”
“Look after herself a bit. Yes. That’s what she wants to do. But not give in.”
“Quite so. That’s a thing a person can understand. But that doesn’t make it right to come to private people and behave in the way she has done. Strangers. I never met such conduct, nor heard of it.”
“No.”
“She’s got relatives I suppose; or friends.”
“Well, that’s just it. I don’t think she has. I suppose the truth is all her friends are tired of helping her.”
“Well, I’m not judging her there. There’s none can be so cruel as relatives, as I know, my word.”
“Yes.”
“They’ll turn from you when you’re struggling to the utmost to help yourself, going on ill, left with four young children, your husband cut off and not a penny .”