all the same , it was wrong to eavesdrop , even if it was just to hear another voice when you were alone in the house , alone except for gramma , the fat thing sleeping in the hospital bed in the other room ; even when it seemed almost necessary to hear another human voice because your mom was in lewiston and it was going to be dark soon and gramma was in the other room and gramma looked like ( yes oh yes she did ) a she-bear that might have just one more murderous swipe left in her old clotted claws .