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 predict; he knew. A nurse, in her white uniform, and one of the interns came out of the office and passed, chattering and laughing, up the stairs. It was in this mood, Gareth reflected, that they were about to enter the doomed woman's chamber.

The boy had a moment of bitter realization when he felt that everything he cared about in life was passing. So far there had been only his mother. She had been the only human being capable of inspiring love in him. He reviewed her meagre life with his stupid, ununderstanding father, and he regretted so fondly, so vainly, that he had not done more himself to make her happy. Ten minutes before when he had kissed her and promised her that he would wait, she had assured him that it was he who had given her existence beauty and meaning, but he recognized in this only an attempt to comfort from a worgan on her deathbed. It was his nature only to take, never to give, but it was ironic that this quality, consistently enough, had prevented his giving in the one instance in which he would have been capable. She it was who had given freely, given everything, to him, and just now it could not occur to Gareth that this had been her only pleasure. By actepting what she had to offer he had given her all that it was in her power to appreciate.

As he paced interminably from one end of the narrow hallway to the other he became, for the first time in his life (and quite possibly the last)