In March when the mist hung over puddles in the street, Gilbert Finch got sick and took to his bed. There was a bad influenza going around — with some fatalities among the poor — but according to Dickie Wiggin that wasn’t what was wrong with Gilbert Finch. Dickie explained deliberately one day at tea, straightening his pants’ crease, peaking his handkerchief, that Gilbert Finch, though athletic, had always been prone to illness. Why, he’d missed a whole winter at St. Mark’s, and had to make it up at summer school to graduate. Emmett Smith, taking up his tea saucer, began telling stories about Paris where he’d just come back from, but Lilian only half-listened to the chatter which once had made her mouth water. She did not care a bit. She was far more interested with what went on at 242 Marlborough Street where a certain someone resided.

She would have liked to go visit him but didn’t know him well enough and was sure he would think it odd. Marian and Dickie did go, and said that Gilbert Finch had asked them to say hello to their friend Lilian Eliot, which she thought was friendly of him, more friendly really than he ever was to her face.

The next time Lilian saw him was at Dickie Wiggin’s birthday party a few weeks later. A strange feeling gathered in her as she dressed in a new pink blouse, knowing that Gilbert Finch would be there, and by the time she walked up the steps to the Wiggins’ house the feeling had grown into a disturbance. She wondered, as she walked in the door, if it showed.

She glimpsed him across the room — he looked thinner and younger — and went straight for the bootleg, though she hardly liked to drink, and had one. She thought, I’m quite used to boys, what is it about this Gilbert Finch of all people?

Finally she went up to say hello, her face smooth and friendly, betraying nothing of her disturbance. I’m glad to see you’re better, she said.

He checked over her shoulder, as if to see whom she was with. Lilian found herself flattered.

The curling team must have missed you, she said.

You’re not a follower of curling, he said.

No, but I read about it. You’re quite famous, aren’t you?

He was wearing a brown wool jacket with a rumpled lapel. He looked at her curiously. Been buying any ribbon lately? he said.

No. She smiled and felt herself flush. I’ve been making do with what I have.

I’m sure you have no trouble with that, he said.

Oh, he was better than she’d thought.

If you’re ever buying ribbon again —

Yes?

Well, sometime you might —