20
MISS WALSH seemed startled when she found me at the office ahead of her the next morning. I blessed her for passing on to her desk without remark. I thanked her from the bottom of my soul for not compelling me to try my voice. I had spent a night of consuming self-pity, my voice I wasn't sure of it.
My fingers twitched as I moved the morning mail aimlessly to and fro about my desk. I felt the necessity of appearing busy with her eyes upon me, though, whenever I looked, she seemed considerately to be keeping them off me. In a few minutes I knew I must call her for the morning dictation. I nerved myself for it. I tried my voice in an undertone once or twice before I trusted it.
And yet it must have revealed to her my wretched, broken condition, for she rose so impetuously that her chai
