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Lorraine said. Her pointy smile was very tired.
    One more thing, though. “I don’t know what to do about Darlene. She wants to see you, of course. Should I put her off, or bring her in?”
    “Don’t bring Trevor, not right now. But you could bring Darlene. I need her to get some stuff from the car, now that I think of it. Good thing you said.”
    Clara had forgotten their car, in the impound lot. “They gave us the knapsacks, that first day…I’ve got the children’s things.”
    “Yeah, but I got some stuff hidden in there, in the Dart. We were living in there for the last couple weeks. You know how it is. You have to keep your stuff somewhere.”
    From her tone Clara supposed it was money, or even drugs. But she would not be a good judge. Maybe papers, that kind of treasure. “I’ll bring Darlene tomorrow. I meant to ask if there is anyone that I should call for you. I’m not sure if Clayton has had a chance to do that.”
    “Nice way of putting it,” Lorraine said. “No, there’s no one. No one that I know where they are, anyways.”
    This time Clara stopped herself from saying she was sorry. She decided again not to get into Clayton’s absence. “You look like you could sleep,” she said. “I’ll bring books tomorrow.”
    “Yeah,” Lorraine said. “I’ll catch up on that summer reading I’ve been meaning to get to. Don’t bring Pearce. That would be hard on him.”
    “All right,” Clara said. “I’ll keep him at home. He’s good, he’s doing well.”
    “Thank you.” Lorraine closed her eyes and turned her head away from Clara before she opened them again. The window looked out on all the lights across the river, a million glinting sparks.
     
    Walking down the hall, thinking ahead to breakfast for the children, Clara did not see Paul Tippett until he took her arm, right beside her. She jumped, and he apologized, both of them speaking in whispers because it seemed so late. The hospital was closing down around them, patients being put into storage for the night.
    “How is your family?” he asked.
    “The mother, Lorraine, is not doing very well,” Clara said. It felt disloyal, to say it out loud. Superstition. She was as bad as anyone.
    Paul Tippett looked sad, the clear lines of his face blurred. She was sorry, because she liked him, as far as she knew him. He seemed crippled by diffidence, but always kind.
    “Will you do something for me?” she asked. “Will you visit her?” She could see him pull away involuntarily, like she had pulled away from Darlene’s snatching hand. “Tomorrow, I mean, or—not as a parishioner, to comfort her—but I’ve got her children, and her husband’s gone—oh, but don’t tell her that. Just to ease her mind, that I’m not a monster, because she has no choice, she has to put them somewhere, and I’m the only—” Clara stopped. She was making a fool of herself.
    He stared at her, in the lowered light of the night hall. “The husband has gone?”
    “Yes,” she said, not mentioning the car, or the teapot, or his weak threat. “But he might come back.”
    Paul thought Clara Purdy had experienced a radical change since he’dlast seen her. She seemed charged with energy. The force that through the green fuse drives the flower . It was involvement that put you into time, perhaps. He shook his head, astonished at the brightness of her face, then saw that she thought he was refusing her request.
    “No, no—I will,” he said quickly. “I will visit her. Sorry, I was thinking of something else. I’ll tell her how fortunate her family is, to be with you.”
    He couldn’t remember her house. A bungalow. “You have enough room for all of them, do you? What’s her last name?”
    “Gage. Lorraine Gage—in this ward.”
    He wrote it in his little calendar book and gave her a quick apologetic smile, for his reluctance. She could not help smiling back. She did like him. Too bad about Mrs. Tippett, that cold fish.
     
    Lorraine lay in bed