Lee would sit smiling a little, and his quick fragile hands flew about their work as though they had independent lives. Abra wasn’t aware that she spoke exclusively of herself. And sometimes while she talked Lee’s mind wandered out and came back and went out again like a ranging dog, and Lee would nod at intervals and make a quiet humming sound.

He liked Abra and he felt strength and goodness in her, and warmth too. Her features had the bold muscular strength which could result finally either in ugliness or in great beauty. Lee, musing through her talk, thought of the round smooth faces of the Cantonese, his own breed. Even thin they were moon-faced. Lee should have liked that kind best since beauty must be somewhat like ourselves, but he didn’t. When he thought of Chinese beauty the iron predatory faces of the Manchus came to his mind, arrogant and unyielding faces of a people who had authority by unquestioned inheritance.

She said, “Maybe it was there all along. I don’t know. He never talked much about his father. It was after Mr. Trask had the—you know—the lettuce. Aron was angry then.”

“Why?” Lee asked.

“People were laughing at him.”

Lee’s whole mind popped back. “Laughing at Aron? Why at him? He didn’t have anything to do with it.”

“Well, that’s the way he felt. Do you want to know what I think?”

“Of course,” said Lee.

“I figured this out and I’m not quite finished figuring. I thought he always felt—well, kind of crippled—maybe unfinished, because he didn’t have a mother.”

Lee’s eyes opened wide and then drooped again. He nodded. “I see. Do you figure Cal is that way too?”

“No.”

“Then why Aron?”

“Well, I haven’t got that yet. Maybe some people need things more than others, or hate things more. My father hates turnips. He always did. Never came from anything. Turnips make him mad, real mad. Well, one time my mother was—well, huffy, and she made a casserole of mashed turnips with lots of pepper and cheese on top and got it all brown on top. My father ate half a dish of it before he asked what it was. My mother said turnips, and he threw the dish on the floor and got up and went out. I don’t think he ever forgave her.”

Lee chuckled. “He can forgive her because she said turnips. But, Abra, suppose he’d asked and she had said something else and he liked it and had another dish. And then afterward he found out. Why, he might have murdered her.”

“I guess so. Well, anyway, I figure Aron needed a mother more than Cal did. And I think he always blamed his father.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know. That’s what I think.”

“You do get around, don’t you?”

“Shouldn’t I?”

“Of course you should.”

“Shall I make some fudge?”

“Not today. We still have some.”

“What can I do?”

“You can pound flour into the top round. Will you eat with us?”