she said:

"Mamma, you all right?"

Simulating sleep, Mrs. Samstag lay tense until her daughter's breathing
resumed its light cadence.

Then at four o'clock the kind of nervousness that Mrs. Samstag had
learned to fear began to roll over her in waves, locking her throat and
curling her toes and fingers and her tongue up dry against the roof of
her mouth.

She must concentrate now--must steer her mind away from the craving!

Now then: West End Avenue. Louis liked the apartments there. Luxurious.
Quiet. Residential. Circassian walnut or mahogany dining room? Alma
should decide. A baby-grand piano. Later to be Alma's engagement gift
from "mamma and--papa." No, "mamma and Louis." Better so.

How her neck and her shoulder blade and now her elbow were flaming with
the pain. She cried a little, quite silently, and tried a poor, futile
scheme for easing her head in the crotch of her elbow.

Now then: She must knit Louis some neckties. The silk-sweater stitch
would do. Married in a traveling suit. One of those smart dark-blue
twills like Mrs. Gronauer, junior's. Topcoat--sable. Louis' hair
thinning. Tonic. O God! let me sleep! Please, God! The wheeze rising in
her closed throat. That little threatening desire that must not shape
itself! It darted with the hither and thither of a bee bumbling against
a garden wall. No! No! Ugh! the vast chills of nervousness. The flaming,