"No, I don't know," he replied, disturbed by her look, he did not know why, and involuntarily lowering his voice. "I came down expressly to find out."
"Fifi—She—"
"Is worse again?"
"She ... stopped breathing a few minutes ago."
"Dead!"
Sharlee winced visibly at the word, as the fresh stricken always will.
The little Doctor turned his head vaguely away. The house was so still that the creaking of the stairs as his weight shifted from one foot to another, sounded horribly loud; he noticed it, and regretted having moved. The idea of Fifi's dying had of course never occurred to him. Something put into his head the simple thought that he would never help the little girl with her algebra again, and at once he was conscious of an odd and decidedly unpleasant sensation, somewhere far away inside of him. He felt that he ought to say something, to sum up his attitude toward the unexpected event, but for once in his life he experienced a difficulty in formulating his thought in precise language. However, the pause was of the briefest.
"I think," said Sharlee, "the funeral will be Monday afternoon.... You will go, won't you?"
Queed turned upon her a clouded brow. The thought of taking personal part in such mummery as a funeral—"barbaric rites," he called them in the forthcoming Work—was entirely distasteful to him. "No," he said, hastily. "No, I could hardly do that—"
"Fifi—would like it. It is the last time you will have to do anything for her."