Eagerly he spread a fresh napkin and picked up the bowl of broth and spoon. It would have been easier for her to feed herself, but she saw how much he wanted to do it, and so she allowed herself to be fed. But when they had got through the broth, dripping as much as was safely conveyed from bowl to lips, she declared that she felt stronger and would sit up for the ham and bread. She did so, and he packed extra pillows behind her and set the plates about her on the bed so that she might reach them easily.

She found that she was hungry. Between bites she thought, and now and then exclaimed a fragment of what went through her mind. “Poor Aunt Pea… Uncle Felix will miss Bonard, they were almost like father and son… Is Lauretta merely vain and reckless, or downright wicked? Romantics always feel romantic about themselves, never about other people. That’s the point about romantics… Poor Bonard!… And dear old Edna, how she must feel!… Has anyone told Selma? I don’t suppose it will matter to her, will it?… Oh, I’d all but forgot! It had gone right out of my head. Floyd!… Lovey, Ezra, they have a real grief!…”

She finished the last piece of ham and ate the last bit of bread and butter. Leon gathered the dishes and put them back on the tray.

“If I go down for coffee, will you drink some with me?”

“You haven’t had your dinner,” she said.

He smiled and went out the door. Soon he returned with coffee and cups and saucers and served them. He found her out of bed, having opened the curtains and put on a robe over her bed dress.

They sat down with their coffee by the window. When they had drunk the first cup in silence and Leon had poured fresh, she observed, “I’ve felt sorrow and rage, I’ve pitied everyone except you. Yet you have lost two friends. You’ll miss them both, Leon.”

His face went very still, almost stiff, as if she had trespassed on an area that was not hers to make a concern. He finished his coffee and was patient without seeming to be, as she finished hers more slowly. Then he stood and said, “I think I must go downstairs. They will begin to wonder about us.”

“Tell them I shall be down in a little while, and not to come up for me.”

He nodded. There was a pause during which either might have reached kindly toward the other, but neither did, and the moment was lost. Leon went out and left Sarah alone again without anything’s having been really changed between them.

24