Maybe Asia’s been persuaded. Rosalie has not. But why shouldn’t Edwin fall in love? Rosalie only wants to see him happy, a condition he rarely achieves as he has no gift for it. And, after all, hasn’t Asia done the same? She’s certainly been performing the part—rushing for the post, sighing over songs of lovers parted.

The kitchen smells of chicken and ham. Since Father’s death, meat has become commonplace at dinnertime and Mrs. Murphy likes to put ham in everything, pile one meat on top of another, frying them together. Rosalie has had more trouble getting used to meat than the others. She looks down at the drumstick on her plate and thinks how very much like someone’s leg it still looks. She takes a sip of tea, which she has secretly sparked up with a bit of gin. Mrs. Murphy is the Booths’ third cook, the last one having been dismissed for drinking on the job.

Edwin changes the subject. “So, Joe, what are your plans now that school is done?”

“I don’t know,” Joe says. His knife clicks against his plate as he saws off a great hunk of meat. He lifts it to his mouth, but before it goes in, he says, “I haven’t thought.”

Joe’s less handsome than his brothers, still growing into his nose and ears, his cheeks still plump and cherubic. He’s a dreamy, indolent boy of whom a friend will later say that he was either stupid or else had a wonderful knack for counterfeiting stupidity. He’s currently working as a ticket taker at the Holliday Street Theatre.

He and Rosalie remain close. She remembers how he used to climb into her lap, the weight and warmth of him on her legs. She remembers the dusty smell of his hair when he was a little boy, how his grubby little hands would snake around her neck. What Rosalie and Joe share is a sort of outsider view of their own family—Rosalie the oldest, since June is never around, and Joe the youngest. What they share is that neither of them is Edwin or Asia or John.

Since Joe appears to have nothing more to say concerning his future, Edwin changes the subject again. Like many melancholics, he can tell a funny story. He describes a recent performance of The Merchant of Venice. He was playing in some backwater—a place so small that Edwin can’t even remember the town’s name, just that the theater held perhaps forty people, so even though every seat was taken, few people were in attendance.

Edwin was Antonio and they were nearing the end, halfway through the trial scene, when they heard the steamboat whistle. If they missed the boat, they’d miss their next engagement. Edwin saw Uncle Ben in the wings, gesturing wildly for Antonio and Shylock to wrap things up, quick as they could.