Of course she had
worried--but only at times; wherefore she now suffered more and
more poignant pangs of shame because she had not worried
constantly. Naturally, the figure of Penrod, in her railway
reverie, was that of an invalid.
She recalled all the illnesses of his babyhood and all those of
his boyhood. She reconstructed scene after scene, with the hero
always prostrate and the family physician opening the black case
of phials. She emphatically renewed her recollection of
accidental misfortunes to the body of Penrod Schofield, omitting
neither the considerable nor the inconsiderable, forgetting no
strain, sprain, cut, bruise or dislocation of which she had
knowledge. And running this film in a sequence unrelieved by
brighter interludes, she produced a biographical picture of such
consistent and unremittent gloom that Penrod's past appeared to
justify disturbing thoughts about his present and future.
She became less and less at ease, reproaching herself for having
gone away, wondering how she had brought herself to do such a
crazy thing, for it seemed to her that the members of her family
were almost helpless without her guidance; they were apt to do
anything--anything at all--or to catch anything.
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