Which—­the diet—­takes me back to the famine.  After they had moved Jim, Mr. Harbison went back to the telephone, and found everything as it should be.  So he followed the telephone wire, and the rest followed him.  I did not; he had systematically ignored me all morning, after having dared to kiss me the night before.  And any other man I know, after looking at me the way he had looked a dozen times, would have been at least reasonably glad to find me free and unmarried.  But it was clear that he was not; I wondered if he was the kind of man who always makes love to the other man’s wife and runs like mad when she is left a widow, or gets a divorce.

And just when I had decided that I hated him, and that there was one man I knew who would never make love to a woman whom he thought married and then be very dignified and aloof when he found she wasn’t, I heard what was wrong with the telephone wire.

It had been cut!  Cut through with a pair of silver manicure scissors from the dressing table in Bella’s room, where Aunt Selina slept!  The wire had been clipped where it came into the house, just under a window, and the scissors still lay on the sill.

It was mysterious enough, but no one was interested in the mystery just then.  We wanted food, and wanted it at once.  Mr. Harbison fixed the wire, and the first thing we did, of course, was to order something to eat.  Aunt Selina went to bed just after luncheon with indigestion, to the relief of every one in the house.  She had been most unpleasant all morning.

When she found herself ill, however, she insisted on having Bella, and that made trouble at once.  We found Bella with her cheek against the door into Jim’s room, looking maudlin while he shouted love messages to her from the other side.  At first she refused to stir, but after Anne and Max had tried and failed, the rest of us went to her in a body and implored her.  We said Aunt Selina was in awful shape—­which she was, as to temper—­and that she had thrown a mustard plaster at Anne, which was true.

So Bella went, grumbling, and Jim was a maniac.  We had not thought it would be so bad for Bella, but Aunt Selina fell asleep soon after she took charge, holding Bella’s hand, and slept for three hours and never let go!

About two that afternoon the sun came out, and the rest of us went to the roof.  The sleet had melted and the air was fairly warm.  Two housemaids dusting rugs on the top of the next house came over and stared at us, and somebody in an automobile down on Riverside Drive stood up and waved at us.  It was very cheerful and hopelessly lonely.

I stayed on the roof after the others had gone, and for some time I thought I was alone.  After a while, I got a whiff of smoke, and then I saw Mr. Harbison far over in the corner, one foot on the parapet, moodily smoking a pipe.  He was gazing out over the river, and paying no attention to me.  This was natural, considering that I had hardly spoken to him all day.