. I can't bear it.

MRS HUSHABYE. Be off, Hector.

HECTOR. I--

MRS HUSHABYE. Quick, quick. Get out.

HECTOR. If you think it better--[he goes out, taking his hat with him
but leaving the stick on the table].

MRS HUSHABYE [laying Ellie down at the end of the sofa]. Now, pettikins,
he is gone. There's nobody but me. You can let yourself go. Don't try to
control yourself. Have a good cry.

ELLIE [raising her head]. Damn!

MRS HUSHABYE. Splendid! Oh, what a relief! I thought you were going to
be broken-hearted. Never mind me. Damn him again.

ELLIE. I am not damning him. I am damning myself for being such a fool.
[Rising]. How could I let myself be taken in so? [She begins prowling to
and fro, her bloom gone, looking curiously older and harder].

MRS HUSHABYE [cheerfully]. Why not, pettikins? Very few young women
can resist Hector. I couldn't when I was your age. He is really rather
splendid, you know.

ELLIE [turning on her]. Splendid! Yes, splendid looking, of course. But
how can you love a liar?

MRS HUSHABYE. I don't know. But you can, fortunately. Otherwise there
wouldn't be much love in the world.

ELLIE. But to lie like that! To be a boaster! a coward!

MRS HUSHABYE [rising in alarm]. Pettikins, none of that, if you please.
If you hint the slightest doubt of Hector's courage, he will go straight
off and do the most horribly dangerous things to convince himself
that he isn't a coward. He has a dreadful trick of getting out of one
third-floor window and coming in at another, just to test his nerve. He
has a whole drawerful of Albert Medals for saving people's lives.

ELLIE. He never told me that.

MRS HUSHABYE. He never boasts of anything he really did: he can't
bear it; and it makes him shy if anyone else does. All his stories are
made-up stories.

ELLIE [coming to her]. Do you mean that he is really brave, and really
has adventures, and yet tells lies about things that he never did and
that never happened?

MRS HUSHABYE. Yes, pettikins, I do. People don't have their virtues and
vices in sets: they have them anyhow: all mixed.

ELLIE [staring at her thoughtfully]. There's something odd about this
house, Hesione, and even about you. I don't know why I'm talking to
you so calmly. I have a horrible fear that my heart is broken, but that
heartbreak is not like what I thought it must be.

MRS HUSHABYE [fondling her]. It's only life educating you, pettikins.
How do you feel about Boss Mangan now?