Summary:

Chapter 14

John Hurries to the Park Lane Hospital for the Dying. He urgently whispers to the nurse that he wants to see his mother. The nurse seems embarrassed at such a thing, but she leads him to LindaÕs bed. John sits in emotional agony trying to keep the best times at heart. A group of Bokanovsky boys gather around her bed and ask why she is so fat and ugly. John hits a particularly offensive boy, which angers the nurse, and she tells John that he might have interfered with the childrenÕs death conditioning, and takes the boys away. Linda mistakes John for PopeÕ and he shakes her angrily demanding she recognize her own son. She begins incoherently babbling and then begins to choke. John rushes to get help, but by the time he returns with a nurse Linda is dead. John weeps with grief, while the nurse worries about the damage done with the death conditioning. One of the boys asks ÒIs she dead?Ó John pushes him to the ground, and leaves the ward.