Something had changed in Dom over the winter without him knowing it. He was not shocked any longer by the things he saw people do or by what happened to them. He guessed that he had become a man, and it was a sorry state, was all he could conclude. He’d seen too much and too little pleasure had come his way of late to keep him an adolescent. But he wasn’t a man as long as he couldn’t provide for his loved ones. He sensed the doctor would have had him stay on the farm and learn all he could and take over the running of it some day, but there was something inside of him that couldn’t accept that; he needed to find his own livelihood, and if he tried and failed, at least he would have tried.

     He stayed at the farm long enough to see his mother and Bridget get settled. Gradually he began to see glimpses of his mother of old, which made him happy. The first day she acknowledged that her husband was dead was a good one but a sad one. She became a great help to Mrs. Keating and Claire, both of whom were glad to have a new companion and workmate.

     Dom went with Dr. Fitzgibbons on his daily visits. Luckily, neither of them caught a fever or dysentery, but they saw the same horrible things Dom had seen in Cork. When he saw how fast typhus killed, he felt extremely lucky to have avoided it. Each evening when they got home, the two of them would be asked what had happened that day. If they had to, they would make up something positive to tell; of someone who’d fought a fever long and had survived, or of a youngster who had grown a full two inches since the doctor was there last. But on the way home, they’d talk to each other about the horrible things they’d witnessed that day, hoping that by reviewing things they would lose their memories faster.