Doctor Porterfield arrived and examined the patient—or rather, glanced at her—with more contempt than concern, chuckled, advised everyone to relax and at the same time to stand ready, and then went downstairs to the dining room, followed by Sarah, who wanted to question him, but who presently found herself ringing the bell for Myrtis and asking her to bring the doctor some coffee and cake. She wondered where Leon was, what kept him in town; but she would not let herself ask the doctor if he knew her husband’s whereabouts. She could guess well enough—with his Uncle Felix and Aunt Nell, in all likelihood. Watching the doctor gobbling up pecan cake, the crumbs of it falling to his chin whiskers and sticking there briefly until they fell to the table and the floor, she asked how long he thought it would be before the child came. He winked at her, chewing his cake, and said to her when his mouth was free enough to deliver speech, “Patience. All we may do is wait until we are needed. In the meantime, don’t worry; try to rest.”

It was twenty-two hours from the time Sarah heard Lauretta’s first cry until she heard the first cry of the child. Lauretta slept briefly, but her body continued to work even while she slept. Sarah lay down toward midnight on a hard sofa that was seldom used even for siting; it was only something to keep the upper hall from looking bare. She wondered before she fell asleep why Leon had not returned and woke to wonder again why he was not there with her.

No one ate a real supper, although the doctor did very well with the cold victuals Myrtis assembled and set out on the dining table. Myrtis also saw to it that coffee was hot and abundant. The kitchen chimneys smoked all night that night. Every now and then those in the house were startled out of their fatigue by the sound of Lauretta’s screams, which had long since ceased to be mere girl-fear and self-dramatizing apprehension. They knew her pain as real when she began to rend the very air with profane curses, some of which they had never heard before in their lives but recognized as if they had always known the words and phrases.

Sarah was herself exhausted, and the doctor was red-faced and droopy-eyed after eating a whole pound of cheese, although not at one time, and having consumed various sweets and cold biscuits and glasses of brandy since early breakfast.