She asked him many questions about it -- direct and incisive questions which showed that she had already formed decided opinions and views about it . Yet it was plain to be seen that she did not regard it as anything she might ever share herself . Hers was the dispassionate interest with which she might have listened to a tale of the land of fairy or of some great empire long passed away from earth . Eric discovered that she had read a great deal of poetry and history , and a few books of biography and travel . She did not know what a novel meant and had never heard of one . Curiously enough , she was well informed regarding politics and current events , from the weekly paper for which her uncle subscribed . `` I never read the newspaper while mother was alive , '' she wrote , `` nor any poetry either . She taught me to read and write and I read the Bible all through many times and some of the histories . After mother died Aunt Janet gave me all her books . She had a great many . Most of them had been given to her as prizes when she was a girl at school , and some of them had been given to her by my father . Do you know the story of my father and mother ? '' Eric nodded . `` Yes , Mrs. Williamson told me all about it . She was a friend of your mother . '' `` I am glad you have heard it . It is so sad that I would not like to tell it , but you will understand everything better because you know . I never heard it until just before mother died . Then she told me all . I think she had thought father was to blame for the trouble ; but before she died she told me she believed that she had been unjust to him and that he had not known .
She said XXXXX when people were dying they saw things more clearly and she saw she had made a mistake about father .
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