But his car was beside the house. The kitchen was mobbed with flowers as though a garden had magically been planted there since I had been gone. Branches of lilac drooped over the sides of the blue sink; the table was piled with jonquils and iris; on the chairs, wrapped in wet newspapers, were sprays of syringa, forsythia, and Japanese quince. Old marmalade jars and jelly glasses were filled with lilies-of-the-valley whose little ivory bells trailed down or nestled close to their broad caressing leaves. I stood on the threshold, breathing in the sweet air. A breeze blew through the kitchen window and carried to me the whole essence of the lilac with which it had been charged as it traversed the sink. For a moment, overjoyed with his bountiful gift, I was remorseful that I had been suspicious of the doctor. His flowers showed that our pleasure was his purpose.

From the bedroom, as usual, came the voices. They were laughing tonight over some private joke and I gathered that it had to do with the cabin in the Adirondacks, for I heard the isolated words “lake” and “firewood” and “chipmunks.” Evidently they had not heard me for they continued to talk as I walked about the kitchen from one group of flowers to another. Shortly the door opened and the doctor came out.

“Good evening,” I said. “How lovely your flowers are!”

The doctor grinned obscenely at me and leaned against the table for support. One foot, handsomely shod in a half-boot, moved in an uncertain circle on the linoleum. The bright bronze hands tossed fretfully from their limp junctures as he said thickly and in a masterful imitation of my mother’s accent, “I am so glad you like them, dear. They are all from my garden and they are all for you.” His sweet breath came to me in gusts, mingling with the flowers’ fragrance. Abruptly, his hands and feet were stilled and he rose to his full height, rocking slightly but apparently in command of himself again. “It’s close in the bedroom,” he said, still thickly but now without the accent. “I felt a little giddy for a moment. I was just about to examine your mother. It wouldn’t do to fold up in the midst of that, would it? Give a patient a bad idea, make her say, ‘Physician, heal thyself.’ ” Suspecting that he had a mission of delicacy in coming away from my mother, I asked him if he would like to wash his hands before he made his examination, and although the door to our “bathroom” was open and revealed only the toilet, its sole article of furniture besides the shower, he thanked me, said that was what he had come out for, and went in.