He had finished his dinner and pushed aside the tray. He wondered where
Julian was--whether he had got his letter and whether he would care--a
little.... It was ten days now since he sent the letter--just before the
doctor told him ... that was the day Aunt Jane took charge of his case.
He smiled a little, thinking of Aunt Jane and her ways.... Since she
took him in hand, he had eaten and breathed and slept only as she
permitted.... But, after all, it was a relief to get rid of thinking and
do what one was told--like a boy.... He wished his own boy were here--to
play with.... He found his imagination always coming back to Julian. He
had hardly thought of the boy before as an individual; he had been a
responsibility--some one to be kept out of scrapes--and, in a vague way,
he was the successor to the Medfield fortune and business.... Now he
wondered what the boy was really like.... Two years might have changed
him--body and soul almost.
He closed his eyes a little wearily, and rested back against the
pillows. The room was quiet and filled with sunshine. He felt suddenly
at home in it--as he had never felt at home in his own house across the
town.... The rooms were very lonely there.... He rested quietly.
A knock came on the door--perhaps the nurse for the tray. He did not
turn his head or open his eyes. He was resting in the quiet.
A light step crossed the room and stopped--and presently Herman Medfield
looked up.