And she said that that would have been the last straw to break her heart.
But she declared that she was sure now that she need not worry.

Such a thing would never be.
I guess I gasped a little at this.

Anyhow, I know I tried to break in and tell her that we _were_ going to separate, and that that was exactly what I had come into the room in the first place to say.
But again she kept right on talking, and I was silenced before I had even begun.
She said how she knew it could never be--on account of Eunice.

That I would never subject my little girl to the sort of wretchedly divided life that I had had to live when I was a child.
(As she spoke I was suddenly back in the cobwebby attic with little Mary Marie's diary, and I thought--what if it _were_ Eunice--writing that!) She said I was the most devoted mother she had ever known; that I was _too_ devoted, she feared sometimes, for I made Eunice _all_ my world, to the exclusion of Jerry and everything and everybody else.

But that she was very sure, because I _was_ so devoted, and loved Eunice so dearly, that I would never deprive her of a father's love and care.
I shivered a little, and looked quickly into Mother's face.