II + 

Last week it had been a bad cold. The morning after Mrs. Lester’s funeral it had turned into bronchitis. Yesterday it was a touch of pneumonia. Today⁠— + 

Jane stood in the doorway of Mr. Ward’s library, holding a great sheaf of budding Ophelia roses, looking anxiously into Isabel’s worried eyes. + 

“I’m glad you came in, Jane,” said Isabel soberly. + 

“Of course I came in,” said Jane. She walked quietly across the room to her father’s desk and put her flowers down on the two days’ accumulation of mail that waited for him, propped up against the brass humidor. Then she turned again to face Isabel. + 

“I just can’t realize it,” she said. “Day before yesterday I was talking to him, here in this room.” + 

“I’m glad you came while Dr. Bancroft was here.” Isabel’s voice was as worried as her eyes. “He’s upstairs with Mamma.” + 

“How’s Mamma taking it?” asked Jane. + 

“Oh⁠—she’s fine,” said Isabel. “She always is, you know, when there’s anything really the matter. She didn’t leave Papa’s bedside all night. I don’t think she got a wink of sleep. Minnie’s been awful.” + 

“Awful?” questioned Jane. + 

“About the trained nurse. She just took one look at her and turned ugly. You know how Minnie is.” + 

“She’s very capable,” said Jane. “And she adores us all.” + 

“Yes,” said Isabel, “but she likes to run the whole show herself. Mamma’s been very silly about Minnie. She’s let her think she was indispensable.” + 

“She pretty nearly is,” sighed Jane. “She’s not really acting up, is she?” + 

“Oh, no,” said Isabel. “She’s just terribly gloomy. Goes around, you know, with a tremendous chip on her shoulder. She does what the nurse tells her to, but she does it grudgingly. She looks as if she’d like to say, ‘Don’t blame me if it rains!’ ” + 

“Does it bother Mamma?” asked Jane. + 

“Of course it does,” said Isabel. “You know she always has Minnie’s attitude on her mind.” + 

“It’s ridiculous,” said Jane, “at a time like this!” + 

“Of course it is,” said Isabel. Both women turned at the sound of a step in the hall. + 

“There’s the doctor now,” said Jane, picking up her roses. + 

Mrs. Ward entered the room, followed by Dr. Bancroft. She had on her grey silk dinner dress. Jane realized that she could not have changed it since the night before. Her face looked terribly worn and weary and worried. She had taken off the black velvet ribbon she always wore about her throat in the evening. In the slight V-shaped décollétage of the grey silk dress the cords of her neck, freed from the restraining band, hung in slack, yellow furrows. There were great brown circles under her tired eyes. Dr. Bancroft, brisk and immaculate in his blue serge morning suit, looked extremely clean and clever and competent beside her. + 

“Jane!” said Mrs. Ward. “I didn’t know you’d come.” Her face quivered, a trifle emotionally, at the sight of the roses. She kissed her younger daughter. + 

“How is he?” Jane’s eyes sought the doctor’s. + 

“Fine!” said Dr. Bancroft briskly. “In excellent shape, all things considered.” + 

“Is the second lung affected?” asked Jane. + 

“Just one tiny spot,” said Dr. Bancroft very cheerfully. + 

“Can I see him?” asked Jane. “Can I take him these roses?” + 

“Certainly,” said Dr. Bancroft. “But don’t try to talk to him.” + 

“He’s very drowsy,” said Mrs. Ward. + 

“He’s tired,” said Dr. Bancroft. “His system’s been putting up a big fight all night. His vitality is amazing for a man of his age.” He smiled pleasantly at Mrs. Ward. “Now, don’t worry. What he needs is rest. Miss Coulter will order the oxygen. You’d better lie down yourself, this morning, Mrs. Ward. You look all in.” He turned from the doorway and met Minnie on the threshold. She glanced at him inimically. Minnie looked all in, too. But very gloomy. + 

“Get a nap, yourself, Minnie,” smiled Dr. Bancroft. “There is nothing you can do.” + 

“I’ll not nap,” said Minnie briefly. + 

“I’ll drop in again after luncheon,” said the doctor casually. “And, by the way, Mrs. Ward⁠—I’m sending up a second nurse for the night work.” + 

“A second⁠—nurse?” faltered Mrs. Ward. + 

Jane and Isabel looked into each other’s eyes. + 

“Just to spare you,” said Dr. Bancroft. “You must save your strength.” He smiled pleasantly at Jane and Isabel. “Good morning.” He brushed by Minnie’s outraged figure and was gone. + 

Jane stood a moment in silence, fingering her roses. Her father had pneumonia⁠—double pneumonia. And all because of the folly of going to Mrs. Lester’s funeral. Standing beside an open grave for twenty minutes, bareheaded in the February breeze, ankle-deep in the February slush of a Graceland lot. Paying the last tribute, of course, to the friendship of a lifetime. But twenty minutes⁠—by the grave of an old, old lady whose life was over⁠—and now⁠—double pneumonia. + 

“Well⁠—I guess I’ll go up,” said Jane. How long had they all been staring in silence at the door that had closed behind the doctor? + 

“I’ll take you, Mrs. Carver,” said Minnie officiously. + 

Jane looked steadily into her eager, resentful face. Dear old Minnie, who had been with them all for more than thirty years! Jane slipped her arm around the plump waist above the white apron strings. + 

“Thank you, Minnie,” she said. + 

As she left the room, she saw her mother sink into her father’s leather armchair. She walked slowly down the hall and up the stairs with Minnie. She had a queer dazed feeling that this⁠—this couldn’t be happening. Not to her father. Not to the Wards. Nothing⁠—nothing⁠—really serious had ever happened to them. Jimmy’s death, of course. But that had only happened to her. It had not torn the fabric of family life⁠—it had not uprooted the associations of her earliest childhood. Cicily’s marriage⁠—worrying, perplexing, of course, but not⁠—not terrifying, like this sort of worry. + 

The house seemed quieter than usual. Hushed. Expectant. Jane suddenly remembered the sinister silence of the upper corridor of Flora’s house that April morning twenty-two years ago, when she had walked out under the budding elm trees for her first encounter with death. The battered door⁠—the smell of gas⁠—the feeling of little living Folly beneath her feet⁠—the incredulity⁠—the finality⁠—the horror. And Stephen⁠—hushed young Stephen⁠—standing so gravely between the green-and-gold portieres in Flora’s hall. The terrible vividness of youthful impressions! But why did it all come back to her now? Now⁠—when she was trying to fight off this senseless sense of impending tragedy⁠—of terror. + 

Jane tapped lightly on her father’s door. It was opened by Miss Coulter, in crisp, starched linen. Her smile, as she took the roses, was just as brisk, just as cheerful as Dr. Bancroft’s had been. Jane entered her father’s room. He was lying, under meticulously folded sheets, in the big double black walnut bedstead that he had shared with Jane’s mother since Jane’s earliest memory. His eyes were closed and he was resting easily. His breath came curiously, however, in long, slow gasps. His breast, beneath the meticulously folded sheets, rose and fell, laboriously, with the effort of his breathing. + 

Nevertheless, at the sight of him, Jane felt a sudden flood of reassurance. He did not look very ill. His face, beneath his neatly combed white hair, was smoothly relaxed in sleep. + 

It looked unnatural only because Miss Coulter had removed his gold-framed spectacles. + 

The nurse came softly to the bedside, the roses in a glass vase in her hand. She placed them on the bed table. + 

“I’ll tell him that you brought them, Mrs. Carver,” she murmured. “I think you hadn’t better stay just now.” + 

All sense of reassurance fell away from Jane at her hushed accents. Of course, he was terribly ill. He was seventy-three years old and he had double pneumonia. She would not kiss him⁠—she would not touch him⁠—she would not disturb him. He must have every chance. Jane turned from the bedside and joined Minnie on the threshold. With an air of crisp and kindly competence, Miss Coulter noiselessly closed the bedroom door. + 

When Jane reentered the library, her mother was crying in her father’s armchair. Isabel, standing on the hearthrug, was looking at her a little helplessly. She turned to stare at Jane’s sober face. Jane realized, with a sudden sense of shock, that she had not seen her mother cry since her own wedding day. + 

“Mamma⁠—don’t,” she said brokenly, as she sank down on the arm of her father’s chair. “I think he looks very well⁠—” + 

Mrs. Ward only shook her grey head and went on silently crying. Isabel still stared helplessly from the hearthrug. A curious little flame of macabre excitement was flickering about the ashes of pity and grief and terror that choked Jane’s heart. Her father had double pneumonia. Her father might be going to die. Something really serious had happened to the Wards. + 