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 been living for nearly ten years now, in the crowded, wooden-apartment district on the edge of Boston, as far removed as possible from the desirable suburbs; and ideally inconveniently located in relation to the automobile road to Wallbridge. Her old friends had not attempted to look her up. She had practically no callers. Even her own mother, before she had died, had come very seldom. There was no necessity for making the beds at all. Why did she keep on doing it morning after morning? The woman downstairs didn't.

She was again leaning against a table, waiting to rise to the surface of the dizziness into which again she had plunged (after having captured an elusive shoe from under the far corner of one of the beds), when she heard the screen door to the back porch slam. And steps. A child's steps. Roddie's she thought. Why was he home from school so early? She went to the kitchen door. Yes, Roddie crying. Standing in the middle of the kitchen, his face all red and distorted, like one of those toy faces made of pliable red rubber that can be squeezed into unpleasant expressions, both his hands shoved into his trousers pockets. Baggy trousers. Too big for him. So was the coat.

Most of Roddie's clothes were too big. Felix's sister Gretchen had a boy a few years older than Roddie. It was very kind of Gretchen to send Sam's