The hours that follow are so long they seem to contain the same incidents over and over. Back in the house, Janice and her mother merge and re?merge in soft little conversations that take them from room to room. They seem to be worrying what Janice will wear. The two of them go upstairs and in half an hour Janice comes down in a pinned?in black dress of her mother's that makes her look like her mother. "Harry. Does it look all right?"

"What in hell do you think this is going to be? A fashion show?" He adds regretfully, "You look fine," but the damage is done. Janice emits a long startled whimper and goes upstairs and collapses into her mother. Mrs. Springer revokes the small measure of pardon she had extended him. The house again fills with the unspoken thought that he is a murderer. He accepts the thought gratefully; it's true, he is, he is, and hate suits him better than forgiveness. Immersed in hate he doesn't have to do anything; he can be paralyzed, and the rigidity of hatred makes a kind of shelter for him.

It becomes one o'clock. Mrs. Springer comes into the room where he is sitting and asks, "Do you want a sandwich?"

"Thanks, I can't eat anything."

"You better have something." He finds this insistence so strange he goes into the kitchen to see what is there. Nelson is having soup and raw carrots and a Lebanon baloney sandwich by himself at the table. He seems uncertain if he should smile at his father or not. Mrs. Springer keeps her back turned.

Harry asks, "Has the kid had a nap?"

"You might take him up," she says, without turning. Upstairs in the room with the one?eyed teddy bear Harry reads the boy a Little Golden Book about a little choo?choo who was afraid of tunnels. By the time the choo?choo has proved he is no longer afraid Nelson has fallen asleep under his father's arm. Harry goes downstairs again. Janice is having a rest in her room and the sound of Mrs. Springer's sewing machine, as it adjusts the dress for Janice to wear, spins out into the birdsong and murmur of the early afternoon.

The front door slams and Springer comes into the living room. None of the shades has been pulled up and he starts at seeing Harry in a chair. "Harry! Hello!"

"Hello."

"Harry, I've been down at Town Hall talking to Al Horst. He's the coroner. Al looked the little body over and he's satisfied. No marks. Accidental drowning. He promised there won't be a manslaughter charge. He's been talking to just about everybody and wants to talk to you sometime. Unofficially."

"O.K." Springer hangs there, expecting some kind of congratulation. "Why don't they just lock me up?" Harry adds.

"Harry, that's a very negative way to think. The question I always ask myself in a bad situation is, How do we cut the losses from here on in?"

"You're right. I'm sorry." It disgusts him to feel the net of law slither from him. They just won't do it for you, they just won't take you off the hook.

Springer trots upstairs to his women. Footfalls pad above. Fancy dishes in the glass?fronted cupboard behind Harry vibrate. It's not yet two o'clock, he sees by the little silver?faced clock on the mantel of the fake fireplace.

He wonders if the pain in his stomach comes from eating so little in the last two days and goes out to the kitchen and eats two crackers. He can feel each bite hit a scraped floor inside. The pain increases. The bright porcelain fixtures and metal surfaces seem charged with a negative magnetism that pushes against him and makes him extremely thin. He goes into the shadowy living room and pulls the shade and at the front window watches two teenage girls in snug shorts shuffle by on the sunny sidewalk. Their bodies are already there but their faces are still this side of being good. Funny about girls about fourteen, their faces have this kind of eager bunchy business. Too much candy, sours their ............