“That is not true,” said Simple. “I got mad. Joyce made me so mad I walked out of the house at one A.M. without my coat and the wind was frantic that night. Zero! But being drunk had nothing to do with it. A woman aggravates a man, drunk or sober. But Joyce is sorry now that she ever mentioned Zarita. She come here yesterday and told me so. She is sorry she done caused me to get pneumonia. She knows Zarita ain’t nothing to me even if she did accidentally see me talking to her through the vestibule. But I do not want to discuss how come I am in this hospital. I am here. I am sick. And I cannot get out of this bed. Why do you reckon they make these hospital beds so high?”

“To keep people from getting out easily,” I said.

“Well, they are so high that if a man ever fell out, he would break his neck. I am even afraid to turn over in this bed. I naturally sleeps restless, but this bed is so high I am scared to sleep restless, so I lay here stiff as a board and don’t close my eyes. I mean I am really stiff when morning comes! This would be a right nice bed if it was not so narrow and so hard and so high.”

“Everything must be wrong with that bed,” I said, “to hear you tell it.”

“I don’t see why they don’t make hospital beds more comfortable. In a place where people have to stay in bed, they ought to have a feather mattress like Aunt Lucy used to have.”

“If hospital beds were that comfortable,” I said, “folks might never want to go home.”

“I would, because I don’t like even a pretty nurse to be washing my ears. That is one reason I was glad when I growed up, so I could wash my own ears, and comb my own head.”

“Has any nurse here tried to comb your hair?” I inquired.

“These nurses are not crazy,” said Simple. “My head is tender! Man, nobody here better not try to pull a comb through my hair but me. If they do, I will get up out of this bed—no matter how high it is—and carry my bohunkus on home.”

“Calm down,” I said. “You’ll run your temperature up. Nobody is going to comb your hair, man.”