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 stances’ to be mitigating, and if I really turned out, say in about a year from now, to be a sound man, maybe she could overlook my scars and maybe she could explain, and maybe we could find something really beautiful in life together?”

Then the mocking bird remembered a particularly brilliant performance he had heard on a date palm down in Mexico from a bloody red bird and threw a repetition straight at Jamie’s head, “Good cheer! Good cheer! Good cheer!”

So Jamie looked at his flowers again and saw that they were beginning to droop their lovely heads. He got up and hurried to find the little copper bowl in order to put them in water. When he had very carefully arranged them in the bowl, he carried it to the bedroom and set it on the stand beside the bed that could be drawn close to his pillow.

All the rest of that day, Jamie stumbled as he walked, not because of weakness, but because he was dreaming a peculiarly absorbing dream.