and at one point , with all those people in the room and all the goings-on , and people all over the hallway and back in the dining room and in the library and up the steps , well , with all that just going on , mary beth just moved a straight-backed chair up , right beside the coffin , and she put her hand in the coffin and clasped julien 's dead hand , and she just went to dozing right there , in that chair , with her head to one side , holding on to julien as the cousins came and went to see him , and kneel on the priedieu and so forth and so on .