``You don't eat enough, honey. Try to get that down.''

Rachel, observing, would say, ``He has to rediscover his own capacity. It'll take time.''

Virginia and Rachel talked to each other quietly now, as allies who are political rather than natural might in a war atmosphere. Both watched Scotty constantly, Rachel without seeming to, Virginia openly, her eyes filled with concern. Scotty was neutral. He did not resent their supervision or Virginia's sometimes tiring sympathy. He ate what he felt like, slept as much or as little as he pleased, and moved about the draughty rooms of the house, when he was not in bed, with slow dubious steps, like an elderly tourist in a cathedral. His energy was gone. He was able, now, to sit for hours in a chair in the living room and stare out at the bleak yard without moving. His hands lay loosely, yet stiffly -- they were like wax hands: almost lifelike, not quite -- folded in his lap; his mouth hung slightly open. When he was asked a question or addressed in such a way that some response was inescapable, he would answer; if, as often happened, he had to repeat because he had spoken too softly, he would repeat his words in the same way, without emphasis or impatience, only a little louder.

He had not mentioned Kate. He had not even thought about her much except once or twice at night in bed when his slowly ranging thoughts would abruptly, almost accidentally, encounter her. At these times he felt a kind of pain in his upper chest, but it was an objective pain, in no way different from others in intensity and not different in kind; it was like the bandaged wound on the back of his head which occasionally throbbed; it was merely another part of his weakness. He was calm, drugged, and lazy. He did not care.