He carried things I could not see and could not always reach.

I had been taught to expect that, and I did not take it personally, and I did not try to fix it with cheerfulness, which is the amateur’s mistake.

I had learned that in the training, and I had cause to be grateful for it almost daily.

The instinct, when a child you love goes dark and silent, is to try to jolly them out of it, to meet the gloom with brightness, to fix the mood the way Silas fixed a porch step.

It is the most natural impulse in the world and it is almost always wrong.