It's more important that he should get strong than anything else is.

You can talk to me all you like when I come down.
Come, Vin." When they were up-stairs, and she was tucking him up on his sofa, he asked gently: "What did that boy want ?" Adelaide made a little face.
"Nothing of any importance," she said.
Things had indeed changed between them if he would accept such an answer as that.

She thought his indifference like the studied oblivion of the debtor who says, "Don't I owe you something ?" and is content with the most non-committal reply.

He lay back and smiled at her.

His expression was not easy to read.
She went down-stairs, where conversation had not prospered.