Garnett felt sure she would
never willingly relax her hold on her distinguished friends--was it
possible that it was they who had somewhat violently let go of her?
As Garnett reviewed the situation he began to see that this
possibility had for some time been latent in it. He had felt that
something might happen at any moment--and was not this the something
he had obscurely foreseen? Mrs. Newell really moved too fast: her
position was as perilous as that of an invading army without a base
of supplies. She used up everything too quickly--friends, credit,
influence, forbearance. It was so easy for her to acquire all
these--what a pity she had never learned to keep them! He himself,
for instance--the most insignificant of her acquisitions--was
beginning to feel like a squeezed sponge at the mere thought of her;
and it was this sense of exhaustion, of the inability to provide
more, either materially or morally, which had provoked his
exclamation on opening her note. From the first days of their
acquaintance her prodigality had amazed him, but he had believed it
to be surpassed by the infinity of her resources.
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