If they would only let him stand and watch her garden, he might be able to see her there, she had spent so much time there. If they would only let him stand at the back window and look at her garden, and it was well worth looking at, he might be able to find her there, and then he might be able to begin missing her — it was the least he could do, to miss her. But he didn’t miss her, he didn’t miss her at all; everything was just the same, he didn’t miss her at all, and if he tried to stand by the window looking out into her garden, his sister or the other one would come clucking around, trying to take him out of himself. Then, before, when he had his freedom, he could have stood by that window forever without being interfered with. Then, before, he could have sat all day long in his armchair by the fire, dreaming about nothing, thinking peacefully of nothing at all, immersed in memories so confused and so alike that they were warmth to him; it was like thinking about warmth to sit there like that doing nothing and remembering, really, nothing. Then, when she was alive and he didn’t know the freedom he had, he could have sat in his chair for as long as he liked, not holding a book or a newspaper or anything, and no one would have come up talking at him and telling him he mustn’t be morbid and that he must keep busy and interested. How could they know that what was in his mind was morbid, when he did not really know himself what was in his mind. They were training him as if he were a dog, a poor unfortunate dog that had to do as he was told and not ask any questions, because he was a dog and for no other reason. Poor dog. Poor animal. It made no sense. He had to move briskly or they sighed. He had to talk distinctly and with some vivacity or they gazed at him in worry and surmise. He had to take his walk every day, not in the garden, because that was her garden and so morbid, but out — he had to go out by the front for his walk. They seemed to believe that there was no air at the back of the house anymore, but only in the front, beyond the front door, where the neighbors would come trotting up to him, people he only knew by sight, and say things to him that he hardly understood and did not want to hear, although through some miracle he kept making the correct sorrowful responses to all their sorrowful platitudes. And he felt that every word he said was a lie, and when he returned to the house he returned worn out.