When he came in, I fixed ham and cheese sandwiches for both of us. Surprisingly I was hungry. Duff had a good appetite too.

“I’ve never really thought of that place out there as a ceme­tery,” I said, “but now with Dad there it makes it different, doesn’t it?”

“I guess so.”

“Do you think that means we have an obligation to stay here?”

“What do you think, Mom?”

“Well, let’s not worry about it for a while. We can’t leave anyway until Franny is better.”

He was silent for a while and then he said, “Mom, do you think you might ever get married again?”

“Come on, Duff.”

“Why not? You’re attractive and young looking.”

“Thank you. Would you like me to get married again?”

“No, I guess not.”

“Well, then, I won’t.” Then I said, “It was nice of Mrs. Reddy and Mrs. Weber to come today, wasn’t it?”

“I didn’t see them,” he said.

I was sure he was lying, but I didn’t pursue it. He helped me with the dishes and then we drove to Ashland to see Franny. She was as unresponsive as ever, so after a while we drew our chairs away from her bed and conversed in low tones about a lot of unrelated things—vacations, holidays, funny experiences we had had. I said “low tones,” but after a while we were giggling so much a nurse came and looked in at us.

Then we said good-­bye to Franny and went to a supermarket where we bought enough food for a dozen people, enough to last us a month or more. In fact, much of what we bought that day is still in the refrigerator or on the kitchen shelves. I also bought a box of cake mix and managed to hide it from Duff. His birthday was coming up very shortly.

Nothing out of the ordinary happened that night. After a good dinner we went to bed early and I had a wonderful ten hours sleep with no dreams I could remember. Father Jackson called twice before we went upstairs, wondering if he ought to drive out to see us. I told him positively not and the third time the phone rang I refused to answer it.

On Monday Duff went back to school. I let him take the car and he brought it back on time without incident. The General was evidently leaving him alone, as Margaret Dorn seemed to be leaving me alone. Duff brought several textbooks with him and spent a couple of hours that night at the dining room table doing his homework.

I had spent that day writing neglected letters, including one to our lawyer in Scarsdale. Although there was quite a lot of money coming from Jack’s insurance, I said I wanted to sell the Scarsdale house as soon as possible, since Franny’s care would be a continuing expense.