I found a complete
set of Hawthorne and straightway became a moody and sombre Puritan ...
and I wrote in Hawthornian prose, quaint essays and stories. And I lived
in a world of old lace and lavender, of crinoline and brocade.
And then I discovered my uncle's books on gynecology and obstetrics ...
full of guilty fevers I waited until he had gone out on a call and then
slunk into his office to read....
One afternoon my doctor-uncle came suddenly upon me, taking me unaware.
* * * * *
"Johnnie, what are you up to?"
"--was just reading your medical books."
"Come over here," already seated at his desk, on his swivel-chair, he
motioned me to a seat.
"Sit down!"
I obeyed him in humiliated silence.
He rose and closed the door, hanging the sign "Busy" outside.
* * * * *
At last I learned about myself and about life.
* * * * *
The harvesting over, Anders began to chum with me. We took long walks
together, talking of many things ... but, chiefly, of course, of those
things that take up the minds of adolescents ... of the mysteries of
creation, of life at its source ... of why men and women are so ... and
I took it for granted, after he confessed that he had fallen into the
same mistakes as I, suffering similar agonies, that he had been set
right by his father, the doctor, as I just had.
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