He has come back from the verge of nevermore and is changed forever, and not just for the new bumps and scars upon his young head, bumps with a story to tell. I am a boxer! Yes, Sam has a calling now and a destiny and, day by day, gains in fortitude and definition, further moved to emotion by his bosom friends and further restored to vigour in thew and sinew.

What I was really thinking,' resumes Rachel, 'is—well, that there's fate, you see. I don't dismiss it, I don't think it's idiotic. It's quite scientific, actually. What we become. Who we—meet, end up with,' she continues, flames in her cheeks.'You think we would have met, no matter what? Even if I were some lushy? Some loon? Street kid?''You're laughing at me.''Just asking,' he says.'Everyone has one person, I think. For life. That's all.

Every man has a part and a destiny, some stronger than others.

'What is the point of ducking?' says the old soldier to the young soldier. 'Each shot has a man's name on it anyway!' he laughs. 'Nothing you can do.'

How very glad I am that the boy ran into my shop! See how it ends well! I play my part! Everyone has a part and a destiny, that's my perspective.

We'll be up in a minute,' states Katya, speaking from a particular stillness, in sudden recognition of a dream made real, a dream annulled, so she had thought, by long words of the womb—'endometriosis,' 'hyperplasia'—and now made true, this vision of a boy on a staircase answering to his name, coming to her call. My son. She raises one arm slightly in front of Lev at her side, in gentle impediment. Not yet. Wait here. Let me see. This was always preordained.