She had the key to Edward’s apartment in her pocket. Professor Fosca had given it to her and suggested that she might like to go there, perhaps to take back with her some small object. The settling of the estate would no doubt involve the sale of his belongings, but meanwhile there was no reason why as a member of the family she should not take what she wanted. Actually, last night, she had thought with pleasure of finding something to give to each of the friends she had met; she had looked forward to this one small positive gesture she might make while she was here. Now, although she hailed a taxi and gave the address on Mt. Vernon Street quite casually, she wished she could avoid this confrontation of things, this voluntary immersion into Edward’s atmosphere. She wanted above all to get away, to flee before some final defense she held hard against her like a shield, was battered down. And, as the taxi turned up Park Street and she found herself among grass and trees with the fine brick façade of the State House and its golden dome before her, she felt quite definitely that she was moving out of one world and into another. In the world of office buildings, she had been in some way, protected—or thought she was. She had not been prepared for the violence of emotion which gathered quite irrationally in her around Edward’s money, but still this was a matter of resenting the sordid quarrel ahead, a business matter. Business might be sordid, but it could be dealt with rationally. It was, in essence, impersonal. And as far as the will went, the responsibility, thank goodness would be with the law. It did not lie inside her own consciousness. If there was guilt, it was Edward’s for allowing his conscientious scruples to affect in such a disturbing way the matter-of-fact business of a will.

Now the taxi took her like fate into a world of private houses. She could not but feel their privacy, their distinction, the ineffable reserved air of them, brass knockers brightly polished, white doors gleaming to set off the warm, old, delightfully various red of the brick. Why had Edward chosen to live here rather than in Cambridge? Was it a deliberate gesture of setting himself apart from the academic world? Was this apartment, where in a moment she would be, the habitation of some part of him held in reserve, not shared with students and faculty—in fact, his private life?