"Yes, yes, I know," I pursued. "But did they show you affection—sympathy?"
Alicia was silent.
"Don't you know what I mean?" I pressed.
"Yes, sir, I think I do."
"Then why don't you answer?"
"I—it's hard to explain," and she laughed a frightened little laugh. "There is no one there to—to do those things you said. There were five hundred of us there. If you're not sick you just go on like all the rest. If you're sick they give you oil or something. Sometimes a child pretends it's sick just so the matron or a nurse might take it in her lap and make a fuss over it. And some are naughty—for the same reason."
I nodded gravely, but my heart was gripped by a poignant aching. I saw Laura's children compelled to feign illness or delinquency in order to receive a touch of individual attention which, I suppose, every child spontaneously craves.
"Were you glad to leave there?" I asked.
"Oh, yes, sir!" she answered eagerly.
"Tragic, my poor sister dying," I said, half to myself. "She was an ideal mother. Now—I hardly know what to do."