1
the ward in which felix lay was a great room with a hundred beds in it, only a few feet apart.
it was a restful place, after canal street. even the delirium of a man on the other side of the room was, after the first night, easy to disregard. those yells had no relation to felix’s life; at least, they were not eddie silver’s yells. he did not have to wake up and join in any painful festivities with that man.... in their utter aloofness from his own life, those yells seemed actually soothing, and he went to sleep to their music as to a lullaby.
2
every morning, at five o’clock, he was awakened, and a cup was put to his lips. it was merely hot tea with milk and sugar in it; but felix had never tasted any drink so good as this—so invigorating, so life-giving, so nourishing.... a wonderful drink! and when he had drained the last drop, he sank back again into a drowsy slumber like that of childhood.
it was so good to know that he did not have to get down to the office at eight o’clock. he could just stay in bed all day, and sleep, and sleep, and sleep.
his friends came ... bringing him messages from still other friends. he never had any idea that he had so many friends in chicago. he was touched by their remembering him, and caring about him. people from the settlement, and the boys from the office. clive came the first day, bringing word that mr. devoe, the managing editor, was anxious about him. his pay, clive assured him, would go on just the same while he was sick.... it seemed quite wonderful. 100felix had never realized how good people were....
his friends brought books for him to read. clive brought him “the island of doctor moreau,” which he had long ago promised to lend him. paul came with a slender volume entitled “the complete works of max beerbohm.” roger brought him “the confessions of a young man,” and don appeared with dowson’s poems. eddie silver did not come, though felix rather expected him to bring a volume of swinburne....
very nice of them, too, to think up such exotic and sophisticated books for him to read—a tribute, doubtless, to his superior tastes. but he felt, as he glanced languidly into their pages, that these were not just the kind of books a sick person wants to read. he wished somebody would bring him the saturday evening post—or the bab ballads.
3
but it was all right—he didn’t want very much to read, anyway. it was pleasanter to lie and day-dream—or watch the pretty head-nurse, who was exactly like a pretty nurse on the cover of a magazine—or think. he had a lot of time to think, now. hours. funny, how one never seemed to get time to think, outside of a hospital.
his thoughts were slow and long, reaching to places where it seemed he had not been in thought for a great while. really, a hospital was a fine place. people ought to go there once a year for a long, long week of thinking. these thoughts of his own, for instance—how glad he was about them! they would make a great difference in his life, once he got out of the hospital....
the only trouble was that when he did get out of the hospital, he never could remember what any of those thoughts were.... they had vanished, leaving apparently no trace upon his mind. and that seemed queer, too. thoughts that took such hours upon hours to think, and that seemed so wonderful at the time, oughtn’t to disappear like that....
the only thought that remained was a very small and insignificant thought, not worthy of being remembered. it 101was not really a thought at all, but only a memory: it went back to the time when he was a little boy in maple, and there was a syringa bush in front of the house, growing up to the second-story window; and he would lean out of the window to see the bird’s nest in the syringa bush, and smell the perfume of the syringa blossoms; and he would watch the mother-bird, sitting on her speckled eggs and looking back at him with bright, sharp eyes, not at all afraid of him.... out of all those profound thoughts, that was all he could ever remember.
4
on saturday morning, his fifth day at the hospital, clive came, bringing felix his pay-envelope from the chronicle.
“when do you get out?” he asked.
“some time today,” said felix. “the doctor has to formally discharge me, or something. this afternoon, i guess.”
“well, come out to my place in woods point, and rest up for a week before you go back to the office.... i’ll have something special for dinner tonight in your honour. i have a neighbour woman come in, you know, to cook for me whenever i dine at home; you needn’t be afraid you’ll have to depend on my culinary abilities. all right? good!... i must get to the office now and finish some work. oh, i forgot, here’s a letter for you. good-bye—see you this afternoon!”
the letter was from rose-ann.
“i couldn’t write,” it opened abruptly, “till today. mother died sunday. there is something very strange about death—you can’t quite believe it, or adjust yourself to it. i’ve had all sorts of queer feelings about it all. but i know now why people go through the ceremonial of funerals—it always seemed to me absurd before. but in some queer pagan way it seems to make up for all one’s ingratitude to the dead—for all the things you’ve forgotten, and only remember when it’s too late. it is, as people say, ‘all you can do.’ and in some queer way, it suffices. it enables you to think of other things again—to go back to ordinary life.
102“i shan’t have to ever quarrel with my brothers again now—that’s one of the other things i think of. i mean—i’ve a tiny legacy, enough at any rate to make me independent of them forever. father was very nice to me—i don’t think i’ve ever told you about my father; he’s a clergyman, and i suppose perhaps i didn’t want to be known as a clergyman’s daughter. but he does understand me.
“felix, i am worried about you. i suppose it’s absurd, but i keep thinking you’re in trouble of some kind. and your letters tell me nothing at all—except—but we will talk about that when i see you.
“i’m coming back to chicago as soon as ever i can.”
