“You’re asking me. This man has been calling for light—sounds drunk or crazy.”

The man lay on the floor on his stomach, but when Nick turned the kitchen light on, he lifted his head, still not seeing Ellen or Nick, peering at the stove through long, fair hair, as long as a girl’s.

“Christ, where am I?”

“Not in heaven, anyway,” Ellen said.

He twisted around, frowning, a young man in a navy coat and jeans, loafers, but no socks. He took in the two faces looking down at him and gave a bewildered smile as Nick bent over to help him up. Then he staggered to the chair by the table and put his head in his hands, rubbed his eyes with the cuff of his coat, and stared at them silently.

“You were asking for a light out there. What happened?” Ellen asked sharply. “What’s wrong?”

“I don’t know,” he said. “I’m so tired.”

“You didn’t come here on foot,” Ellen prodded.

“Oh,” he groaned. “The car … turned over … awful sharp curve … couldn’t see very well. Oh,” he groaned again, feeling his shoulder as if it hurt.

“Nick, go out with a flashlight and see what’s happened. Too late to call the police. Better wait till morning. I’ll give him some coffee—there’s some on the back of the stove—and he can sleep in the parlor.”

“Sleep …” the boy said. “Sleep …” and laid his head on his arms again.

“If the car did turn over, you’re lucky to be alive. What’s your name?” Ellen asked.

“Joel—Joel Smith,” he said, without lifting his head.

“Where you going? How did you come this way—it’s off the main road.”

“I don’t know … New Jersey … left Hanover sometime … ten maybe.”

“You a student?”

“I was yesterday … not today … today I’m a civilian,” he said, “discharged from that army.”

Ellen did not comment on this.

“Your family expecting you?”

“Christ, no.”

“Here, drink this and leave Christ out of it.”

Ellen was furious with herself for obeying an impulse and getting this problem thrust at her, willy-nilly. He drank the coffee slowly, and when he had set the cup down, he looked a little more normal. His eyes anyway could focus.

“Didn’t know there were rooms like this—warm. Where am I anyway?”

“You’re in Willard.”

“Never heard of it.”

“Not many people have.”

“Geraniums,” he murmured. “Water from a pump.”

“You won’t taste its like in a city. Want a drink?”

She handed him a tin cup full, and he drank it greedily. Ellen observed him closely. If you could forget the girlish hair, he had quite a strong face, blue eyes, long legs in tight jeans.

“Take off your coat,” Ellen said. “You’ll have to stay the night.”