“You’ve seen the strain in this house.”
First of all, I would like to make one thing quite clear: I never explain anything.
“But then something happens,” writes girl governess Daphne Harridge in her personal revenge journal, “just like now, and I feel such hate.”
“Who do you hate, Daphne?” the kid asks, clasping his hands and delivering an even stare. “Tell me.”
The kid is clearly used to this kind of scene. He walked into his governess’ room, came up behind her while she was writing in her diary, read what she was writing, and now he wants answers. He doesn’t betray the slightest bit of anxiety or doubt that this is the natural order of things. He is the heir, she is the help, and therefore he can feel free to peruse any of her personal data that he takes an interest in.
“What else did you see?” snaps Daphne, and the kid goes up a level.
“You never answered my question,” he admonishes. “I was taught to answer questions. Weren’t you, ever?”
She shuts up the book in a locked drawer. “A diary is personal, Tad. I write in it things that I wouldn’t tell anyone.”
He looks off into space. “Do you know, that our minister says that to hate is evil?”
She takes the risk, and hates anyway, and so do I. Sometimes you don’t get much of a choice.
