omething wrong, takes a step toward her. After a moment's silence
she comes up to TIMOTHY and lays a hand on his arm.)

TIMOTHY (bewildered). What is it, Minnie?

MINNIE. Come home, father.

TIMOTHY. What is it? It's not a message ye have--it's not a message
about Bert?

(MINNIE continues to gaze at him.)

The one I'd be looking for these many days! (He seizes her.) Can't ye
speak, girl? Is the boy dead?

MINNIE. Yes, father.

TIMOTHY (puts his hand to his forehead and lets fall his hat. DR.
JONATHAN picks it up). Me boy! The dirty devils have killed him!

MINNIE. Come, father, we'll go home.

TIMOTHY. Home, is it? It's back to the shops I'm going. (To the
committee) Damn ye--we'll run the shops in spite of ye! Where's me hat?

(DR. JONATHAN hands it to him as the committee file out in silence.)

Come with me as far as the shops, Minnie. Thank you, doctor--(as DR.
JONATHAN gives him the hat)--it's you I'll be wanting to see when I get
me mind again.

(DR. JONATHAN goes with TIMOTHY and MINNIE as far as the door,
right, and then comes back thoughtfully to the bench, takes up a
test tube and holds it to the light. Presently ASHER PINDAR
appears in the doorway, right.)

ASHER. Good morning, Jonathan.

DR. JONATHAN. Good morning, Asher. I didn't know you'd got back from
Washington.

ASHER. I came in on the mail train.

DR. JONATHAN. Have you been to the office?

ASHER. No. I stopped at the house to speak to Augusta, and then--(he
speaks a trifle apologetically)--well, I went for a little walk.

DR. JONATHAN. A walk.

ASHER. I've been turning something over in my mind. And the country
looked so fine and fresh I crossed the covered bridge to the other side
of the river. When George was a child I used to go over there with him
on summer afternoons. He was such a companionable little shaver--he'd
drop his toys when he'd see me coming home from the office. I can see
him now, running along that road over there, stopping to pick funny
little bouquets--the kind a child makes, you know--ox-eyed daisies and
red clover and buttercups all mixed up together, and he'd carry them
home and put them in a glass on the desk in my study.

(A pause.)

It seems like yesterday! It's hard to realize that he's a grown man,
fighting over there in the trenches, and that any moment I may get a
telegram, or be called to the telephone--Have you seen today's paper?

DR. JONATHAN. No.

ASHER. It looks