After slipping on a lemon peel and breaking his leg, Flemming has been ordered to remain at his New York City home for three to four weeks, confined to a couch. A robust, normally active young man of twenty-four, he finds his confinement at best tedious, at worst intolerable, and becomes extremely moody. When his sister Fanny comes home from the family’s summer resort to care for him, he drives her away in tears. Flemming’s servant Watkins then bears the brunt of his melancholy and sudden, unreasonable anger. The convalescent repeatedly pelts Watkins with volumes from the complete works of Honoré de Balzac. Hoping to calm his patient, Dr. Dillon encourages Delaney to write to him to buoy his spirits and still his rage...
