{"id":7192,"date":"2014-11-29T20:47:26","date_gmt":"2014-11-29T20:47:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.eoisabi.org\/?p=7192"},"modified":"2020-03-30T21:11:39","modified_gmt":"2020-03-30T21:11:39","slug":"venus-plus-x-extract","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/?p=7192","title":{"rendered":"Theodore Sturgeon"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"T_Sturgeon\"<\/a><\/h5>\n

1918 – 1985<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u2190 Read (icon or below)  extract from ‘VENUS + X’<\/h6>\n

PLOT<\/strong>:<\/span><\/p>\n

Charlie Johns has been snatched from his home on 61 North 34th Street and delivered to the strange future world of Ledom. Here, violence is a vague and improbable notion. Technology has triumphed over hunger, overpopulation, pollution, even time and space. But there is a change Charlie finds even more shocking: gender is a thing of the past. Venus Plus X<\/strong> is Theodore Sturgeon<\/strong>‘s brilliant evocation of a civilization for whom tensions between male and female and the human preoccupation with sex no longer exist.<\/span><\/address>\n
 <\/address>\n
As Charlie Johns explores Ledom and its people, he finds that the human precepts he holds dear are profane in this new world. But has Charlie learned all there is to know about this advanced society? And why are the Ledom so intent on gaining Charlie’s approval?<\/span><\/address>\n

\"V+X\"<\/a><\/p>\n

\u00b6  Philo\u02bcs Manifesto<\/h5>\n

\u201c\u2026you cannot be objective about this discussion. But try. Please try . . . You cannot be objective about it because you have been indoctrinated, sermonized, drenched, imbued. inculcated and policed on the matter since first you wore blue booties.<\/p>\n

You come from a time and place in which the maleness of the male, and the femaleness of the female, and the importance of their difference, were matters of almost total preoccupation.<\/p>\n

Begin, then, with this\u2014and if you like, regard it as mainly a working hypothesis. Actually it is a truth, and if at the end it passes the tests of your own understanding, you will see that it is a truth. If you do not, the fault is not with you, but with your orientation:<\/p>\n

There are more basic similarities than differences between men and women. Read through an anatomy manual. A lung is a lung, a kidney a kidney in man or in woman. It may be that statistically, women\u02bcs bone-structure is lighter, the head smaller, and so on and on; yet it is not impossible that mankind had. for many thousands of years, bred for that. But aside from such conjectures, the variations permissible to what is called \u201cnormal\u201d structure provide many examples of women who were taller, stronger, heavier-boned than most men, and men who were smaller, slighter, lighter than most women. Many men had larger pelvic openings than many women.<\/p>\n

In the area of the secondary sexual characteristics, it is only statistically that we can note significant differences; for many women had more body hair than many men; many men had higher-pitched voices than many women\u2026 I call again on your objectivity: suspend for a moment your conviction that the statistical majority is the norm, and examine the cases, in their vast numbers, which exist outside that probable fiction, that norm. And go on:<\/p>\n

For even with the sex organs themselves, variations in development\u2014and here, admittedly, we approach the pathological\u2014have yielded countless cases of atrophied phalli, hypertrophied clitorides, perforate rathes, detached labia \u2026 all, viewed objectively, reasonably subtle variations from the norm, and capable of producing, on an initially male or female body, virtually identical urogenital triangles. It is not my intention to state that such a situation is or should be normal\u2014at least, not after the fourth fetal month, though  up to then it is not only normal but universal\u2014but only to bring out to you that its occurrence is easily within the limits of what has been, since prehistory, possible to nature.<\/p>\n

Endocrinology demonstrates a number of interesting facts. Both male and female could produce male and female hormones, and did, and as a matter of fact, the preponderance of one over the other was a subtle matter indeed. Then if you throw that delicate balance out, the changes which could be brought about were drastic. In a few months you could produce a bearded and breastless lady and a man whose nipples, no longer an atrophied insigne of the very point I am making here, could be made to lactate.<\/p>\n

These are gross and extreme examples purely for illustration. There have been many women athletes who could exceed in strength, speed, and skill the vast majority of men, but who were nonetheless what you might call \u201creal\u201d women, and many men who could, say, design clothing\u2014traditionally a woman\u02bcs specialty\u2014far better than most women, yet who were what you might call \u201creal\u201d men. For when we get into what I might broadly term cultural differences between the sexes, the subtlety of sexual distinction begins to become apparent. What say the books:<\/p>\n

Women have long hair. So have the Sikhs, whom some call the toughest breed of soldiers ever bred. So had the 18th-century cavaliers, and brocaded jackets and lace at throat and wrists as well. Women wear skirts. So does a kilted Scot, a Greek evzone, a Chinese, a Polynesian, none of whom could deserve the term \u201ceffeminate.\u201d An objective scan of human history proliferates these examples to numbers astronomical.<\/p>\n

From place to place, and in any place from time to time, the so- called \u201cprovinces\u201d of male and female rise like the salinity of a tidal river-mouth, mingling, separating, ebbing and regrouping \u2026 before your first World War, cigarettes and wrist-watches were regarded as unquestionably female appurtenances; twenty years later both were wholeheartedly adopted by the men. Europeans, especially central Europeans, were startled and very much amused to see American farmers milking cows and feeding chickens, for never in their lives had they seen that done by any but women.<\/p>\n

So it is easily seen that the sexual insignes are nothing in themselves, for any of them, in another time and place. might belong to both sexes, the other sex, or neither. In other words, a skirt does not make the social entity woman. It takes a skirt plus a social attitudeto do it. But all through history, in virtually every culture and country, there has indeed been a \u201cwoman\u02bcs province\u201d and a \u201cman\u02bcs province,\u201d and in most cases the differences between them have been exploited to fantastic, sometimes sickening extremes.<\/p>\n

 Why?<\/p>\n

First of all, it is easy to state, and easy to dispose of, the theory that in a primitive, primarily hunting-and-fishing society, a weaker, slower-moving sex, occasionally heavy with child and forced frequently to pause to nurse her young, is not as well fitted to hunt and fight as the fleeter-footed, untrammeled, hard- muscled male. However, it may well be that the primitive woman was not that much smaller, slower, weaker than her mate. Perhaps the theory confuses cause and effect, and perhaps, if some other force had not insisted upon such a development, accepted it, even bred for it, the nonparous females might have hunted with the best of the men, while those men who happened to be slower, smaller, weaker, kept house with the pregnant and nursing women. And this has happened\u2014not in the majority of cases, but many times nevertheless.<\/p>\n

The difference existed\u2014granted. But it was exploited. It was a difference which continued to exist long, long after there was any question of hunting or, for that matter, of nursing. Humanity has insisted upon it; made it an article of faith.<\/p>\n

Again: Why?<\/p>\n

It would seem that there is a force which widens and exploits this difference, and, isolated, it is deplorable, even terrifying pressure. For there is in mankind a deep and desperate necessity to feel superior. In any group there are some who genuinely are superior \u2026 but it is easy to see that within the parameters of any group, be it culture, club, nation, profession, only a few are really superior; the mass, clearly, are not.<\/p>\n

But it is the will of the mass that dictates the mores, initiated though changes may be by individuals or minorities; the individuals or minorities, more often than not, are cut down for their trouble. And if a unit of the mass wants to feel superior, it will find a way. This terrible drive has found expression in many ways, through history\u2014in slavery and genocide, xenophobia and snobbery, race prejudice and sex differentiation. Given a man who, among his fellows, has no real superiority, you are faced with a bedevilled madman who, if superiority is denied him, and he cannot learn one or earn one, will turn on something weaker than himself and make it inferior. The obvious, logical, handiest subject for this inexcusable indignity is his woman. He could not do this to anyone he loved.<\/p>\n

If, loving, he could not have insulted this close, so-little different other half of himself, he could never have done it to his fellow man. Without this force in him, he could never have warred, nor persecuted, nor in pursuit of superiority lied, cheated, murdered and stolen. It may be that the necessity to feel superior is the source of his drive, and his warring and killing have brought him to mighty places; yet it is not inconceivable that without it he might have turned to conquering his environment and learning his own nature, rising very much higher and, in the process, earning life for himself instead of extinction. And strangely enough, man always wanted to love. Right up to the end, it was idiomatic that one \u201cloved\u201d music, a color, mathematics, a certain food\u2014and aside from careless idiom, there were those who in the highest sense loved things beyond anything which even a fool would call sexual. \u201cI could not love thee, dear, so much. loved I not honor more.\u201d \u201cFor God so loved the world, he gave his only begotten son \u2026\u201d Sexual love is love, certainly. But it is more precise to say that it is loving, in the same way we might say that justice is loving, and mercy is loving, forbearance, forgiveness, and, where it is not done to maximize the self, generosity.<\/p>\n

Christianity was, at the outset, a love movement, as the slightest acquaintance with the New Testament clearly documents. What was not generally known until just before the end\u2014so fiercely was all knowledge of primitive Christianity suppressed\u2014was that it was a charitic religion\u2014that is, a religion in which the congregation participated, in the hope of having a genuine religious experience, an experience later called theolepsy, or seized of God. Many of the early Christians did achieve this state, and often; many more achieved it but seldom, and yet kept going back and back seeking it. But once having experienced it, they were profoundly changed, inwardly gratified; it was this intense experience, and its permanent effects, which made it possible for them to endure the most frightful hardships and tortures, to die gladly, to fear nothing.<\/p>\n

Few dispassionate descriptions of their services\u2014gatherings is a better term\u2014 survive, but the best accounts agree on a picture of people slipping away from fields, shops, even palaces, to be together in some hidden place\u2014a mountain glade, a catacomb, anywhere where they might be uninterrupted. It is significant that rich and poor alike mingled at these gatherings: male and female. After eating together\u2014genuinely, a love feast\u2014and invoking the spirit, perhaps by song, and very likely by the dance, one or another might be seized by what they called the Spirit. Perhaps he or she\u2014and it might be either\u2014would exhort and praise God, and perhaps the true charitic (that is, divinely gifted) expression would issue forth in what was called \u201cspeaking in tongues,\u201d but these exhibitions, when genuine, were apparently not excessive nor frenetic; there was often time for many to take their turn. And with a kiss of peace, they would separate and slip back to their places in the world until the next meeting.<\/p>\n

The primitive Christians did not invent charitic religion, by any means; nor did it cease with them. It recurs again and again throughout recorded history, and it takes many forms. Frequently they are orgiastic, Dionysic, like the worship of the Great Mother of the Gods, Cybele, which exerted an immense influence in Rome, Greece and the Orient a thousand years before Christ. Or chastity-based movements like the Cathars of the Middle Ages, the Adamites, the Brethren of the Free Spirit, the Waldenses (who tried to bring a form of apostolic Christianity into the framework of the Roman church) and many, many others appear all through history. They have in common one element\u2014the subjective, participant, ecstatic experience\u2014and almost invariably the equality of women, and they are all love religions.<\/p>\n

Without exception they were savagely persecuted. It seems that there is a commanding element in the human makeup which regards loving as anathema, and will not suffer it to live.<\/p>\n

Why?<\/p>\n

An objective examination of basic motivations \u2026 reveals the simple and terrible reason. There are two direct channels into the unconscious mind. Sex is one, religion is the other; and in pre-Christian times, it was usual to express them together. The Judeo-Christian system put a stop to it, for a very understandable reason. A charitic religion interposes nothing between the worshipper and his Divinity. A suppliant, suffused with worship, speaking in tongues, his whole body in the throes of ecstatic dance, is not splitting doctrinal hairs nor begging intercession from temporal or literary authorities. As to his conduct between times, his guide is simple. He will seek to do that which will make it possible to repeat the experience. If he does what for him is right in this endeavor, he will repeat it; if he is not able to repeat it, that alone is his total and complete punishment. He is guiltless.<\/p>\n

The only conceivable way to use the immense power of innate religiosity\u2014the need to worship\u2014for the acquisition of human power, is to place between worshipper and Divinity a guilt mechanism. The only way to achieve that is to organize and systematize worship, and the obvious way to bring this about is to monitor that other great striving of life\u2014sex.<\/p>\n

Homo sapiens is unique among species, extant and extinct, in having devised systems for the suppression of sex.<\/p>\n

There are only three ways of dealing with sex. It may be gratified; it may be repressed; or it may be sublimated. The latter is, through history, often an ideal and frequently a success, but it is always an instability. Simple, day-by-day gratification, as in what is called the Golden Age of Greece, where they instituted three classes of women: wives, hetaerae and prostitutes, and at the same time idealized homosexuality, may be barbaric and immoral by many standards, but produces a surprising degree of sanity. A careful look, on the other hand, at the Middle Ages, makes the mind reel; it is like opening a window on a vast insane asylum, as broad as the world and as long as a thousand years; here is the product of repression. Here are the scourging manias, when people by the thousands flogged themselves and each other from town to town, seeking penance from excesses of guilt; here is the mystic Suso, in the fourteenth century, who had made for him an undergarment for his loins, bearing a hundred and fifty brass nails filed sharp: and lest he try to ease himself in his sleep, a leather harness to hold his wrists firmly against his neck; and further, lest he try to relieve himself of the lice and fleas which plagued him, he put on leather gloves studded with sharp nails which would tear his flesh wherever he touched it; and touch it he did, and when the wounds healed he tore them open again. He lay upon a discarded wooden door with a nail-studded cross against his back, and in forty years he never took a bath. Here are saints licking out lepers\u02bc sores; here is the Inquisition. All this in the name of love. How could such a thing so change?<\/p>\n

 The examination of one sequence clearly shows how. Take the suppression of the Agape, the \u201clove feast,\u201d which seems to have been a universal and necessary appurtenance of primitive Christianity. It can be unearthed by records of edicts against this and that practice, and it is significant that the elimination of a rite so important to worship seems to have taken between three and four hundred years to accomplish, and was done by a gradualism of astonishing skill and efficiency.<\/p>\n

First of all, the Eucharist, the symbolic ritual of the body and blood of Christ, was introduced into the Agape. Next, we find the Agape better organized; there is now a bishop, without whom the Agape may not be held, for he must bless the food. A little later the bishop is traditionally kept standing through the meal, which of course keeps him separate, and above the others. After that, the kiss of peace is altered; instead of kissing one another, all the participants kiss the officiating priest, and later, they all kiss a piece of wood which is handed around and passed to the priest. And then, of course, the kiss is done away with altogether. In the year 363, the Council of Laodicea is able to establish the Eucharist as a major ritual by itself, by forbidding the Agape within a church, thus separating them. For many years the Agape was held outside the church door, but by 692 (the Trullan Council) it was possible to forbid it altogether, under the penalty of excommunication.<\/p>\n

The Renaissance cured many of the forms of insanity, but not the insanity itself. When temporal and ecclesiastical authorities still maintained control over basically sexual matters\u2014morals, and marriage, for example (although it was very late in the game when the Church actually performed marriage; marriages in England at the time of Shakespeare were by private contract valid, and by church blessing licit) guilt was still rife, guilt was still the filter between a man and his God. Love was still equated with passion and passion with sin, so that at one point it was held to be sinful for a man to love his wife with passion.<\/p>\n

Pleasure, the outer edge of ecstasy, was in the dour days of Protestantism, considered sinful in itself, wherever gained; Rome held specifically that any or all sexual pleasure was sinful. And for all this capped volcano produced in terms of bridges and houses, factories and bombs, it gouted from its riven sides a frightful harvest of neurosis. And even where a nation officially discarded the church, the same repressive techniques remained, the same preoccupation with doctrine, filtered through the same mesh of guilt. So sex and religion, the real meaning of human existence, ceased to be meaning and became means; the unbridgeable hostility between the final combatants was the proof of the identity of their aim\u2014the total domination, for the ultimate satisfaction of the will to superiority, of all human minds.<\/p>\n

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *<\/p>\n

\u00b6  We Ledom renounce the past.<\/strong><\/p>\n

We Ledom\u2026leave the past forever, and all products of the past except for naked and essential humanity.<\/p>\n

The special circumstances of our birth make this possible. We come from a nameless mountain and as a species we are unique; as all species, we are transient. Our transience is our central devotion. Transience is passage, is dynamism, is movement, is change, is evolution, is mutation, is life.<\/p>\n

The special circumstances of our birth include the blessed fact that in the germ- plasm is no indoctrination. Had homo sap. had the sense (it had the power) it could have shut off all its poisons, vanquished all its dangers, by raising one clean new generation. Had homo sap. had the desire (it had both sense and power enough) to establish a charitic religion and a culture to harmonize with it, it would in time have had its clean generations.<\/p>\n

Homo sap. claimed to be searching for a formula to end its woes. Here is the formula: a charitic religion and a culture to go with it. The Apostles of Jesus found it. Before them the Greeks found it; before them, the Minoans. Since then the Cathars found it; the Quakers, the Angel Dancers. Throughout the Orient and in Africa it has been found repeatedly \u2026 and each time it has failed to move any but those it touched directly. Men\u2014or at least, the men who moved men\u2014always found that the charitic is intolerant of doctrine, neither wanting it nor needing it. But without doctrine\u2014presbyter, interpreter, officiator\u2014the men who move men are powerless\u2014that is to say, not superior. There is nothing to gain in charitism. Except, of course, the knowledge of the soul; and everlasting life.<\/p>\n

Father-dominated people who form father-dominated cultures have father- religions: a male deity, an authoritative scripture, a strong central government, an intolerance for inquiry and research, a repressive sexual attitude, a deep conservatism (for one does not change what Father built), a rigid demarcation, in dress and conduct, between the sexes, and a profound horror of homosexuality.<\/p>\n

Mother-dominated people who form mother-dominated cultures have mother- religions: a female deity served by priestesses, a liberal government\u2014one which feeds the masses and succors the helpless\u2014a great tolerance for experimental thought, a permissive attitude toward sex, a hazy boundary between the insignes of the sexes, and a dread of incest.<\/p>\n

The father-dominated culture seeks always to impose itself upon others. The other does not. So it is the first, the patrist culture which tends to establish itself in the main stream, the matrist which rises within it, occasionally revolts, more often is killed. They are not stages of evolution, but phases marking swings of the pendulum.<\/p>\n

The patrists poison themselves. The matrists tend to decay, which is merely another kind of poison. Occasionally one will meet a person who has been equally influenced by his mother and his father, and emulates the best of both. Usually, however, people fall into one category or the other; this is a slippery fence on which to walk\u2026<\/p>\n

Except for the Ledom.<\/strong><\/p>\n

We are liberal in art and in technological research, in expression of all kinds. We are immovably conservative in certain areas; our conviction, each of us, never to lose the skills of the hand and of the land. We are raising children who will emulate neither mother images nor father-images, but parents; and our deity is the Child. We renounce and forgo all products of the past but ourselves, though we know there is much there that is beautiful; that is the price we pay for quarantine and health; that is the wall we put between ourselves and the dead hand. This is the only taboo, restriction\u2014and the only demand we have from those who bore us.<\/p>\n

For, like homo sap., we were born of earth and of the creatures of earth; we were born of a race of half-beasts, half-savages; homo sap. birthed us. Like homo sap. we are denied the names of those from whom we sprung, though, like men, we have much evidence of the probabilities. Our human parents built us a nest, and cared for us until we were fledged, but would not let us know them, because, unlike most men, they knew themselves and therefore would not be worshipped. And no one but themselves, they and the mothers, knew of us, that we were here, that we were something new on the face of earth. They would not betray us to homo sap., for we were different, and like all pack, herd, hive animals, homo sap. believes in the darkest part of the heart that whatever is different is by definition dangerous, and should be exterminated. Especially if it is similar in any important way (oh how horrible the gorilla, how contemptible the baboon) and most especially if in some way it might be superior, possessing techniques and devices surpassing their own (remember the Sputnik Reaction\u2026?) but with absolute and deadly certainty if their sex activities fall outside certain arbitrary limits; for this is the key to all unreason, from outrage to envy. In a cannibal society it is immoral not to eat human flesh.<\/p>\n

\u00a4                \u00a4                \u00a4                \u00a4<\/p>\n

\"M_T_H\"<\/a>\u00a4   ‘More Than Human’<\/h3>\n

The origins of this story lie in the novella \u00abBaby is Three\u00bb<\/em> that appeared in Galaxy<\/i> magazine.  Here comprising the middle third of the expanded story, it is the core of the story of a band of misfits who don’t fit in with normal human society because their own abilities, when taken separately, leave them disconnected from others, often to the point of being viewed as dull or mentally retarded.  The first part introduces four of the six core characters that appear here:  Lone, or the Idiot, a telepath; Janie, an eight year-old with the power of telekinesis; the nearly-mute twins Bonnie and Beanie, who possess the power of teleportation, and the \u00abMongoloid\u00bb Baby, with computer-like processing power.  Separate, each of these four are nigh useless, but as the first part, \u00abThe Fabulous Idiot,\u00bb<\/em> progresses, the four come to know each other and to realize that each is both complementary and supplementary to the others, creating a new self-consciousness that is greater than the sum of the four.<\/p>\n

\u00abBaby is Three\u00bb<\/em> explores the human gestalt<\/i>‘s expanding awareness, even as it introduces a new character, Gerry, who possesses his own telepathic powers as well as a sense of ruthlessness that was not previously present.  This section is devoted heavily to psychological themes, such as belonging and the division of the conscious and subconscious.  However, there is some plot and a little character development in this middle section.<\/p>\n

The final third, \u00abMorality,\u00bb<\/em> is concerned with the gestalt<\/i>‘s development of a conscience.  This is seen through the integration of the sixth member, Hip, into the group after initial conflict with Gerry.  This section typifies many of the strengths as well as weaknesses of Sturgeon’s work.  The idea of a group consciousness developing a conscience intrigues, but ultimately, the failing of the three sections in regards to developing complex characterizations (or perhaps super-characterization in the case of thegestalt<\/i>?) dampens the potential power of this story.  The characters rarely are more than sketchy ciphers who serve to fulfill the plot necessities; they do not feel \u00abhuman,\u00bb much less \u00abmore than human\u00bb due to this neglect to develop compelling personalities who are more than just plot vehicles.<\/p>\n

\"Listen\"<\/a>\u2022 \u2022 \u2022 <\/strong> Section 2: \u00abBaby is Three\u00bb<\/em><\/p>\n

I finally got into see this Stern. He wasn\u2019t an old man at all. He looked up from his desk, flicked his eyes over me once, and picked up a pencil. \u201cSit over there, Sonny.\u201d
\nI stood where I was until he looked up again. Then I said, \u201cLook, if a midget walks in here, what do you say\u2014sit over there, Shorty?\u201d
\nHe put the pencil down again and stood up. He smiled. His smile was as quick and sharp as his eyes. \u201cI was wrong,\u201d he said, \u201cbut how am I supposed to know you don\u2019t want to be called Sonny?\u201d
\nThat was better, but I was still mad. \u201cI\u2019m fifteen and I don\u2019t have to like it. Don\u2019t rub my nose in it.\u201d
\nHe smiled again and said okay, and I went and sat down.
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s your name?\u201d
\n\u201cGerard.\u201d
\n\u201cFirst or last?\u201d
\n\u201cBoth,\u201d I said.
\n\u201cIs that the truth?\u201d
\nI said, \u201cNo. And don\u2019t ask me where I live either.\u201d
\nHe put down his pencil. \u201cWe\u2019re not going to get very far this way.\u201d
\n\u201cThat\u2019s up to you. What are you worried about? I got feelings of hostility? Well, sure I have. I got lots more things than that wrong with me or I wouldn\u2019t be here. Are you going to let that stop you?\u201d
\n\u201cWell, no, but\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cSo what else is bothering you? How you\u2019re going to get paid?\u201d I took out a thousand-dollar bill and laid it on the desk. \u201cThat\u2019s so you won\u2019t have to bill me. You keeptrack of it. Tell me when it\u2019s used up and I\u2019ll give you more. So you don\u2019t need my address.
\nWait,\u201d I said, when he reached towards the money. \u201cLet it lay there. I want to be sure you and I are going to get along.\u201d
\nHe folded his hands. \u201cI don\u2019t do business this way, Son\u2014I mean, Gerard.\u201d
\n\u201cGerry,\u201d I told him. \u201cYou do, if you do business with me.\u201d
\n\u201cYou make things difficult, don\u2019t you? Where did you get a thousand dollars?\u201d
\n\u201cI won a contest. Twenty-five words or less about how much fun it is to do my daintier
\nunderthings with Sudso.\u201d I leaned forward. \u201cThis time it\u2019s the truth.\u201d
\n\u201cAll right,\u201d he said.
\nI was surprised. I think he knew it, but he didn\u2019t say anything more. Just waited for me to go ahead.
\n\u201cBefore we start\u2014if we start,\u201d I said, \u201cI got to know something. The things I say to you\u2014what comes out while you\u2019re working on me\u2014is that just between us, like a priest or a lawyer?\u201d
\n\u201cAbsolutely,\u201d he said.
\n\u201cNo matter what?\u201d
\n\u201cNo matter what.\u201d
\nI watched him when he said it. I believed him.
\n\u201cPick up your money,\u201d I said. \u201cYou\u2019re on.\u201d
\nHe didn\u2019t do it. He said, \u201cAs you remarked a minute ago, that is up to me. You can\u2019t buy these treatments like a candy bar. We have to work together. If either one of us can\u2019t do that, it\u2019s useless. You can\u2019t walk in on the first psychotherapist you find in the phone book and make any demand that occurs to you just because you can pay for it.\u201d
\nI said tiredly, \u201cI didn\u2019t get you out of the phone book and I\u2019m not just guessing that you can help me. I winnowed through a dozen or more head-shrinkers before I decided on you.\u201d
\n\u201cThanks,\u201d he said, and it looked as if he was going to laugh at me, which I never like.
\n\u201cWinnowed, did you say? Just how?\u201d
\n\u201cThings you hear, things you read. You know. I\u2019m not saying, so just file that with my street address.\u201d
\nHe looked at me for a long time. It was the first time he\u2019d used his eyes on me for anything
\nbut a flash glance. Then he picked up the bill.
\n\u201cWhat do I do first?\u201d I demanded.
\n\u201cWhat do you mean?\u201d
\n\u201cHow do we start?\u201d
\n\u201cWe started when you walked in here.\u201d
\nSo then I had to laugh. \u201cAll right, you got me. All I had was an opening. I didn\u2019t know
\nwhere you would go from there, so I couldn\u2019t be there ahead of you.\u201d
\n\u201cThat\u2019s very interesting,\u201d Stern said. \u201cDo you usually figure everything out in advance?\u201d
\n\u201cAlways.\u201d
\n\u201cHow often are you right?\u201d
\n\u201cAll the time. Except\u2014but I don\u2019t have to tell you about no exceptions.\u201d
\nHe really grinned this time. \u201cI see. One of my patients has been talking.\u201d
\n\u201cOne of your ex-patients. Your patients don\u2019t talk.\u201d
\n\u201cI ask them not to. That applies to you, too. What did you hear?\u201d
\n\u201cThat you know from what people say and do what they\u2019re about to say and do, and that sometimes you let\u2019m do it and sometimes you don\u2019t. How did you learn to do that?\u201d
\nHe thought a minute. \u201cI guess I was born with an eye for details, and then let myself make
\nenough mistakes with enough people until I learned not to make too many more. How did you
\nlearn to do it?\u201d
\nI said, \u201cYou answer that and I won\u2019t have to come back here.\u201d \u201cYou really don\u2019t know?\u201d
\n\u201cI wish I did. Look, this isn\u2019t getting us anywhere, is it?\u201d
\nHe shrugged. \u201cDepends on where you want to go.\u201d He paused, and I got the eyes full
\nstrength again. \u201cWhich thumbnail description of psychiatry do you believe at the moment?\u201d
\n\u201cI don\u2019t get you.\u201d
\nStern slid open a desk drawer and took out a blackened pipe. He smelled it, turned it over
\nwhile looking at me. \u201cPsychiatry attacks the onion of the self, removing layer after layer until it gets down to the little sliver of unsullied ego. Or: psychiatry drills like an oil well, down and sidewise and down again, through all the muck and rock until it strikes a layer that yields.
\nOr: psychiatry grabs a handful of sexual motivations and throws them on the pinball machine of your life, so they bounce on down against episodes. Want more?\u201d
\nI had to laugh. \u201cThat last one was pretty good.\u201d
\n\u201cThat last one was pretty bad. They are all bad. They all try to simplify something which is complex by its very nature. The only thumbnail you\u2019ll get from me is this: no one knows what\u2019s really wrong with you but you; no one can find a cure for it but you; no one but you can
\nidentify it as a cure; and once you find it, no one but you can do anything about it.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat are you here for?\u201d
\n\u201cTo listen.\u201d
\n\u201cI don\u2019t have to pay somebody no day\u2019s wage every hour just to listen.\u201d
\n\u201cTrue. But you\u2019re convinced that I listen selectively.\u201d
\n\u201cAm I?\u201d I wondered about it. \u201cI guess I am. Well, don\u2019t you?\u201d
\n\u201cNo, but you\u2019ll never believe that.\u201d
\nI laughed. He asked me what that was for. I said, \u201cYou\u2019re not calling me Sonny.\u201d
\n\u201cNot you.\u201d He shook his head slowly. He was watching me while he did it, so his eyes slid in their sockets as his head moved. \u201cWhat is it you want to know about yourself, that made you worried I might tell people?\u201d
\n\u201cI want to find out why I killed somebody,\u201d I said right away.
\nIt didn\u2019t faze him a bit. \u201cLie down over there.\u201d
\nI got up. \u201cOn that couch?\u201d
\nHe nodded.
\nAs I stretched out self-consciously, I said, \u201cI feel like I\u2019m in some damn cartoon.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat cartoon?\u201d
\n\u201cGuy\u2019s built like a bunch of grapes,\u201d I said, looking at the ceiling. It was pale gray.
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the caption?\u201d
\n\u201c \u2018I got trunks full of \u2019em.\u2019 \u201d
\n\u201cVery good,\u201d he said quietly. I looked at him carefully. I knew then he was the kind of guy who laughs way down deep when he laughs at all.
\nHe said, \u201cI\u2019ll use that in a book of case histories some time. But it won\u2019t include yours.
\nWhat made you throw that in?\u201d When I didn\u2019t answer, he got up and moved to a chair behind me where I couldn\u2019t see him. \u201cYou can quit testing, Sonny. I\u2019m good enough for your purposes.\u201d
\nI clenched my jaw so hard, my back teeth hurt. Then I relaxed. I relaxed all over. It was wonderful. \u201cAll right,\u201d I said, \u201cI\u2019m sorry.\u201d He didn\u2019t say anything, but I had that feeling again that he was laughing. Not at me, though.
\n\u201cHow old are you?\u201d he asked me suddenly.
\n\u201cUh\u2014fifteen.\u201d
\n\u201cUh\u2014fifteen,\u201d he repeated. \u201cWhat does the \u2018uh\u2019 mean?\u201d
\n\u201cNothing. I\u2019m fifteen.\u201d
\n\u201cWhen I asked your age, you hesitated because some other number popped up. Youiscarded that and substituted \u2018fifteen.\u2019 \u201d
\n\u201cThe hell I did! I am fifteen!\u201d
\n\u201cI didn\u2019t say you weren\u2019t.\u201d His voice came patiently. \u201cNow what was the other number?\u201d
\nI got mad again. \u201cThere wasn\u2019t any other number! What do you want to go pryin\u2019 my grunts
\napart for, trying to plant this and that and make it mean what you think it ought to mean?\u201d
\nHe was silent.
\n\u201cI\u2019m fifteen,\u201d I said defiantly, and then, \u201cI don\u2019t like being only fifteen. You know that. I\u2019m not trying to insist I\u2019m fifteen.\u201d
\nHe just waited, still not saying anything.
\nI felt defeated. \u201cThe number was eight.\u201d
\n\u201cSo you\u2019re eight. And your name?\u201d
\n\u201cGerry.\u201d I got up on one elbow, twisting my neck around so I could see him. He had his
\npipe apart and was sighting through the stem at the desk lamp. \u201cGerry, without no \u2018uh!\u2019 \u201d
\n\u201cAll right,\u201d he said mildly, making me feel real foolish.
\nI leaned back and closed my eyes.
\nEight, I thought. Eight.
\n\u201cIt\u2019s cold in here,\u201d I complained.
\nEight. Eight, plate, state, hate. I ate from the plate of the state and I hate. I didn\u2019t like any of that and I snapped my eyes open. The ceiling was still gray. It was all right. Stern was somewhere behind me with his pipe, and he was all right; I took two deep breaths, three, and then let my eyes close. Eight. Eight years old. Eight, hate. Years, fears. Old, cold. Damn it! I twisted and twitched on the couch, trying to find a way to keep the cold out. I ate from the plate of the\u2014 I grunted and with my mind I took all the eights and all the rhymes and everything they stood for, and made it all black. But it wouldn\u2019t stay black. I had to put something there, so I made a great big luminous figure eight and just let it hang there. But it turned on its side and inside the loops it began to shimmer. It was like one of those movie shots through binoculars.
\nI was going to have to look through whether I liked it or not.
\nSuddenly I quit fighting it and let it wash over me. The binoculars came close, closer, and then I was there.
\nEight. Eight years old, cold. Cold as a bitch in the ditch. The ditch was by a railroad. Last year\u2019s weeds were scratchy straw. The ground was red, and when it wasn\u2019t slippery, clingy mud, it was frozen hard like a flowerpot. It was hard like that now, dusted with hoar-frost, cold as the winter light that pushed up over the hills. At night the lights were warm, and they were all in other people\u2019s houses. In the daytime the sun was in somebody else\u2019s house too, for all the good it did me.
\nI was dying in that ditch. Last night it was as good a place as any to sleep and this morning it was as good a place as any to die. Just as well. Eight years old, the sick-sweet taste of pork fat and wet bread from somebody\u2019s garbage, the thrill of terror when you\u2019re stealing a gunnysack and you hear a footstep. And I heard a footstep.
\nI\u2019d been curled up on my side. I whipped over on my stomach because sometimes they kick your belly. I covered my head with my arms and that was as far as I could get.  After a while I rolled my eyes up and looked without moving. There was a big shoe there. There was an ankle in the shoe, and another shoe close by. I lay there waiting to get tromped. Not that I cared much any more, but it was such a damn shame. All these months on my own, and they\u2019d never caught up with me, never even come close, and now this. It was such a shame I started to cry.
\nThe shoe took me under the armpit, but it was not a kick. It rolled me over. I was so stiff from the cold, I went over like a plank. I just kept my arms over my face and head and layhere with my eyes closed. For some reason I stopped crying. I think people only cry when there\u2019s a chance of getting help from somewhere.
\nWhen nothing happened, I opened my eyes and shifted my forearms a little so I could see up. There was a man standing over me and he was a mile high. He had on faded dungarees and an old Eisenhower jacket with deep sweat-stains under the arms. His face was shaggy, like the guys who can\u2019t grow what you could call a beard, but still don\u2019t shave.
\nHe said, \u201cGet up.\u201d
\nI looked down at his shoe, but he wasn\u2019t going to kick me. I pushed up a little and almost fell down again, except he put his big hand where my back would hit it. I lay against it for a second because I had to, and then got up to where I had one knee on the ground.
\n\u201cCome on,\u201d he said. \u201cLet\u2019s go.\u201d
\nI swear I felt my bones creak, but I made it. I brought a round white stone up with me as I stood. I hefted the stone. I had to look at it to see if I was really holding it, my fingers were that cold. I told him, \u201cStay away from me or I\u2019ll bust you in the teeth with this rock.\u201d
\nHis hand came out and down so fast I never saw the way he got one finger between my palm and the rock and flicked it out of my grasp. I started to cuss at him, but he just turned his back and walked up the embankment towards the tracks. He put his chin on his shoulder and said, \u201cCome on, will you?\u201d
\nHe didn\u2019t chase me, so I didn\u2019t run. He didn\u2019t talk to me so I didn\u2019t argue. He didn\u2019t hit me, so I didn\u2019t get mad. I went along after him. He waited for me. He put out his hand to me and I spit at it. So he went on, up to the tracks, out of my sight. I clawed my way up. The blood was beginning to move in my hands and feet and they felt like four point-down porcupines. When I got up to the road-bed, the man was standing there waiting for me.
\nThe track was level just there, but as I turned my head to look along it, it seemed to be a hill that was steeper and steeper and turned over above me. The next thing you know, I was lying flat on my back looking up at the cold sky.
\nThe man came over and sat down on the rail near me. He didn\u2019t try to touch me. I gasped for breath a couple of times and suddenly felt I\u2019d be all right if I could sleep for a minute\u2014just a little minute. I closed my eyes. The man stuck his finger in my ribs, hard. It hurt.
\n\u201cDon\u2019t sleep,\u201d he said.
\nI looked at him.
\nHe said, \u201cYou\u2019re frozen stiff and weak with hunger. I want to take you home and get you warmed up and fed. But it\u2019s a long haul up that way, and you won\u2019t make it by yourself. If I carry you, will that be the same to you as if you walked it?\u201d
\n\u201cWhat are you going to do when you get me home?\u201d
\n\u201cI told you.\u201d
\n\u201cAll right,\u201d I said.
\nHe picked me up and carried me down the track. If he\u2019d said anything else in the world, I\u2019d of laid right down where I was until I froze to death. Anyway, what did he want to ask me for, one way or the other? I couldn\u2019t of done anything.
\nI stopped thinking about it and dozed off.
\nI woke up once when he turned off the right of way. He dove into the woods. There was no path, but he seemed to know where he was going. The next time I woke from a crickling noise. He was carrying me over a frozen pond and the ice was giving under his feet. He didn\u2019t hurry. I looked down and saw the white cracks raying out under his feet, and it didn\u2019t seem to matter a bit. I bleared off again.
\nHe put me down at last. We were there. \u201cThere\u201d was inside a room. It was very warm. He put me on my feet and I snapped out of it in a hurry. The first thing I looked for was the door. I saw it and jumped over there and put my back against the wall beside it, in case I wanted to leave. Then I looked around. It was a big room. One wall was rough rock and the rest was logs with stuff shoved between them. There was a big fire going in the rock wall, not in a fireplace, exactly; it was a sort of hollow place. There was an old auto battery on a shelf opposite, with two yellowing electric light bulbs dangling by wires from it. There was a table, some boxes, and a couple of three-legged stools. The air had a haze of smoke and such a wonderful, heartbreaking, candy-and-crackling smell of food that a little hose squirted inside my mouth.
\nThe man said, \u201cWhat have I got here, Baby?\u201d
\nAnd the room was full of kids. Well, three of them, but somehow they seemed to be more than three kids. There was a girl about my age\u2014eight, I mean\u2014with blue paint on the side of her face. She had an easel and a palette with lots of paints and a fistful of brushes, but she wasn\u2019t using the brushes. She was smearing the paint on with her hands. Then there was a little Negro girl about five with great big eyes who stood gaping at me. And in a wooden crate, set up on two sawhorses to make a kind of bassinet, was a baby. I guess about three or four months old. It did what babies do, drooling some, making small bubbles, waving its hands around very aimless, and kicking. When the man spoke, the girl at the easel looked at me and then at the baby. The baby just kicked and drooled.
\nThe girl said, \u201cHis name\u2019s Gerry. He\u2019s mad.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s he mad at?\u201d the man asked. He was looking at the baby.
\n\u201cEverything,\u201d said the girl. \u201cEverything and everybody.\u201d
\n\u201cWhere\u2019d he come from?\u201d
\nI said, \u201cHey, what is this?\u201d but nobody paid any attention. The man kept asking questions at the baby and the girl kept answering. Craziest thing I ever saw.
\n\u201cHe ran away from a state school,\u201d the girl said. \u201cThey fed him enough, but no one bleshed with him.\u201d
\nThat\u2019s what she said\u2014\u2018bleshed\u2019.
\nI opened the door then and cold air hooted in. \u201cYou louse,\u201d I said to the man, \u201cyou\u2019re from the school.\u201d
\n\u201cClose the door, Janie,\u201d said the man. The girl at the easel didn\u2019t move, but the door banged shut behind me. I tried to open it and it wouldn\u2019t move. I let out a howl, yanking at it.
\n\u201cI think you ought to stand in the corner,\u201d said the man. \u201cStand him in the corner, Janie.\u201d
\nJanie looked at me. One of the three-legged stools sailed across to me. It hung in midair and turned on its side. It nudged me with its flat seat. I jumped back and it came after me. I dodged to the side, and that was the corner. The stool came on. I tried to bat it down and just hurt my hand. I ducked and it went lower than I did. I put one hand on it and tried to vault over it, but it just fell and so did I. I got up again and stood in the corner, trembling. The stool turned right side up and sank to the floor in front of me.
\nThe man said, \u201cThank you, Janie.\u201d He turned to me. \u201cStand there and be quiet, you. I\u2019ll get to you later. You shouldn\u2019ta kicked up all that fuss.\u201d And then, to the baby, he said, \u201cHe got anything we need?\u201d
\nAnd again it was the little girl who answered. She said, \u201cSure. He\u2019s the one.\u201d
\n\u201cWell,\u201d said the man. \u201cWhat do you know!\u201d He came over. \u201cGerry, you can live here. I don\u2019t come from no school. I\u2019ll never turn you in.\u201d
\n\u201cYeah, huh?\u201d
\n\u201cHe hates you,\u201d said Janie.
\n\u201cWhat am I supposed to do about that?\u201d he wanted to know.
\nJanie turned her head to look into the bassinet. \u201cFeed him.\u201d The man nodded and began fiddling around the fire. Meanwhile, the little Negro girl had been standing in the one spot with her big eyes right out on her cheekbones, looking at me. Janie went back to her painting and the baby just lay there same as always, so I stared right back at the little Negro girl. Inapped, \u201cWhat the hell are you gawking at?\u201d
\nShe grinned at me. \u201cGerry ho-ho,\u201d she said, and disappeared. I mean she really disappeared, went out like a light, leaving her clothes where she had been. Her little dress billowed in the air and fell in a heap where she had been, and that was that. She was gone.
\n\u201cGerry hee-hee,\u201d I heard. I looked up, and there she was, stark naked, wedged in a space where a little outcropping on the rock wall stuck out just below the ceiling. The second I saw her she disappeared again.
\n\u201cGerry ho-ho,\u201d she said. Now she was on top of the row of boxes they used as storage shelves, over on the other side of the room.
\n\u201cGerry hee-hee!\u201d Now she was under the table. \u201cGerry ho-ho!\u201d This time she was right in the corner with me, crowding me.
\nI yelped and tried to get out of the way and bumped the stool. I was afraid of it, so I shrank back again and the little girl was gone.
\nThe man glanced over his shoulder from where he was working at the fire. \u201cCut it out, you kids,\u201d he said.
\nThere was a silence, and then the girl came slowly out from the bottom row of shelves. She walked across to her dress and put it on.
\n\u201cHow did you do that?\u201d I wanted to know.
\n\u201cHo-ho,\u201d she said.
\nJanie said, \u201cIt\u2019s easy. She\u2019s really twins.\u201d
\n\u201cOh,\u201d I said. Then another girl, exactly the same, came from somewhere in the shadows and stood beside the first. They were identical. They stood side by side and stared at me. This time I let them stare.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s Bonnie and Beanie,\u201d said the painter. \u201cThis is Baby and that\u2014\u201d she indicated the man\u2014\u201cthat\u2019s Lone. And I\u2019m Janie.\u201d
\nI couldn\u2019t think of what to say, so I said, \u201cYeah.\u201d
\nLone said, \u201cWater, Janie.\u201d He held up a pot. I heard water trickling, but didn\u2019t see anything.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s enough,\u201d he said, and hung the pot on a crane. He picked up a cracked china plate and brought it over to me. It was full of stew with great big lumps of meat in it and thick gravy and dumplings and carrots. \u201cHere, Gerry. Sit down.\u201d
\nI looked at the stool. \u201cOn that?\u201d
\n\u201cSure.\u201d
\n\u201cNot me,\u201d I said. I took the plate and hunkered down against the wall.
\n\u201cHey,\u201d he said after a time. \u201cTake it easy. We\u2019ve all had chow. No one\u2019s going to snatch it
\naway from you. Slow down!\u201d
\nI ate even faster than before. I was almost finished when I threw it all up. Then for some reason my head hit the edge of the stool. I dropped the plate and spoon and slumped there. I felt real bad.
\nLone came over and looked at me. \u201cSorry, kid,\u201d he said. \u201cClean up, will you, Janie?\u201d
\nRight in front of my eyes, the mess on the floor disappeared. I didn\u2019t care about that or anything else just then. I felt the man\u2019s hand on the side of my neck. Then he tousled my hair.
\n\u201cBeanie, get him a blanket. Let\u2019s all go to sleep. He ought to rest a while.\u201d
\nI felt the blanket go around me, and I think I was asleep before he put me down.
\nI don\u2019t know how much later it was when I woke up. I didn\u2019t know where I was and that scared me. I raised my head and saw the dull glow of the embers in the fireplace. Lone was stretched out on it in his clothes. Janie\u2019s easel stood in the reddish blackness like some great preying insect. I saw the baby\u2019s head pop up out of the bassinet, but I couldn\u2019t tell whether he was looking straight at me or away. Janie was lying on the floor near the door and the twins were on the old table. Nothing moved except the baby\u2019s head, bobbing a little.
\nI got to my feet and looked around the room. Just a room, only the one door. I tiptoedowards it. When I passed Janie, she opened her eyes.
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter?\u201d she whispered.
\n\u201cNone of your business,\u201d I told her. I went to the door as if I didn\u2019t care, but I watched her.
\nShe didn\u2019t do anything. The door was as solid tight closed as when I\u2019d tried it before.
\nI went back to Janie. She just looked up at me. She wasn\u2019t scared. I told her, \u201cI got to go to the john.\u201d
\n\u201cOh,\u201d she said. \u201cWhy\u2019n\u2019t you say so?\u201d
\nSuddenly I grunted and grabbed my guts. The feeling I had I can\u2019t begin to talk about. I acted
\nas if it was a pain, but it wasn\u2019t. It was like nothing else that ever happened me before.
\nSomething went splop on the snow outside.
\n\u201cOkay,\u201d Janie said. \u201cGo on back to bed.\u201d
\n\u201cBut I got to\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cYou got to what?\u201d
\n\u201cNothing.\u201d It was true. I didn\u2019t have to go no place.
\n\u201cNext time tell me right away. I don\u2019t mind.\u201d
\nI didn\u2019t say anything. I went back to my blanket.
\n\u201cThat\u2019s all?\u201d said Stern. I lay on the couch and looked up at the gray ceiling. He asked, \u201cHow old are you?\u201d
\n\u201cFifteen,\u201d I said dreamily. He waited until, for me, the gray ceiling acquired walls on a floor, a rug and lamps and a desk and a chair with Stern in it. I sat up and held my head a second, and then I looked at him. He was fooling with his pipe and looking at me. \u201cWhat did you do to me?\u201d
\n\u201cI told you. I don\u2019t do anything here. You do it.\u201d
\n\u201cYou hypnotized me.\u201d
\n\u201cI did not.\u201d His voice was quiet, but he really meant it.
\n\u201cWhat was all that, then? It was… it was like it was happening for real all over again.\u201d
\n\u201cFeel anything?\u201d
\n\u201cEverything.\u201d I shuddered. \u201cEvery damn thing. What was it?\u201d
\n\u201cAnyone doing it feels better afterwards. You can go over it all again now any time you want to, and every time you do, the hurt in it will be less. You\u2019ll see.\u201d
\nIt was the first thing to amaze me in years. I chewed on it and then asked, \u201cIf I did it by myself, how come it never happened before?\u201d
\n\u201cIt needs someone to listen.\u201d
\n\u201cListen? Was I talking?\u201d
\n\u201cA blue streak.\u201d
\n\u201cEverything that happened?\u201d
\n\u201cHow can I know? I wasn\u2019t there. You were.\u201d
\n\u201cYou don\u2019t believe it happened, do you? Those disappearing kids and the footstool and all?\u201d
\nHe shrugged. \u201cI\u2019m not in the business of believing or not believing. Was it real to you?\u201d
\n\u201cOh, hell, yes!\u201d
\n\u201cWell, then, that\u2019s all that matters. Is that where you live, with those people?\u201d
\nI bit off a fingernail that had been bothering me. \u201cNot for a long time. Not since Baby was three.\u201d I looked at him. \u201cYou remind me of Lone.\u201d
\n\u201cWhy?\u201d
\n\u201cI don\u2019t know. No, you don\u2019t.\u201d I added suddenly. \u201cI don\u2019t know what made me say that.\u201d I lay down abruptly.
\nThe ceiling was gray and the lamps were dim. I heard the pipe-stem click against his teeth.
\nI lay there for a long time. \u201cNothing happens,\u201d I told him.
\n\u201cWhat did you expect to happen?\u201d
\n\u201cLike before.\u201d
\n\u201cThere\u2019s something there that wants out. Just let it come.\u201d
\nIt was as if there was a revolving drum in my head, and on it were photographed the places and things and people I was after. And it was as if the drum was spinning very fast, so fast I couldn\u2019t tell one picture from another. I made it stop, and it stopped at a blank segment. I spun it again, and stopped it again.
\n\u201cNothing happens,\u201d I said.
\n\u201cBaby is three,\u201d he repeated.
\n\u201cOh,\u201d I said. \u201cThat.\u201d I closed my eyes.
\nThat might be it. Might, sight, night, light. I might have the sight of a light in the night.
\nMaybe the baby. Maybe the sight of the baby at night because of the light…
\nThere was night after night when I lay on that blanket, and a lot of nights I didn\u2019t. Something was going on all the time in Lone\u2019s house. Sometimes I slept in the daytime. I guess the only time everybody slept at once was when someone was sick, like me the first time I arrived there. It was always sort of dark in the room, the same night and day, the fire going, the two old bulbs hanging yellow by their wires from the battery. When they got too dim, Janie fixed the battery and they got bright again.
\nJanie did everything that needed doing, whatever no one else felt like doing. Everybody else did things, too. Lone was out a lot. Sometimes he used the twins to help him, but you never missed them, because they\u2019d be here and gone and back again bing! like that. And Baby, he just stayed in his bassinet.
\nI did things myself. I cut wood for the fire and I put up more shelves, and then I\u2019d go swimming with Janie and the twins sometimes. And I talked to Lone. I didn\u2019t do a thing that the others couldn\u2019t do, but they all did things I couldn\u2019t do. I was mad, mad all the time about that. But I wouldn\u2019t of known what to do with myself if I wasn\u2019t mad all the time about something or other. It didn\u2019t keep us from bleshing. Bleshing, that was Janie\u2019s word. She said Baby told it to her. She said it meant everyone all together being something, even if they all did different things. Two arms, two legs, one body, one head, all working together, although a head can\u2019t walk and arms can\u2019t think. Lone said maybe it was a mixture of \u201cblending\u201d and \u201cmeshing\u201d, but I don\u2019t think he believed that himself. It was a lot more than that.
\nBaby talked all the time. He was like a broadcasting station that runs twenty-four hours a day, and you can get what it\u2019s sending any time you tune in, but it\u2019ll keep sending whether you tune in or not. When I say he talked, I don\u2019t mean exactly that. He semaphored mostly. You\u2019d think those wandering vague movements of his hands and arms and legs and head were meaningless, but they weren\u2019t. It was semaphore, only instead of a symbol for a sound, or such like, the movements were whole thoughts.
\nI mean spread the left hand and shake the right high up, and thump with the left heel, and it means, \u201cAnyone who thinks a starling is a pest just don\u2019t know anything about how a starling thinks\u201d or something like that. Janie said she made Baby invent the semaphore business. She said she used to be able to hear the twins thinking\u2014that\u2019s what she said; hear them thinking\u2014and they could hear Baby. So she would ask the twins whatever she wanted to know, and they\u2019d ask Baby, and then tell her what he said. But then as they grew up they began to lose the knack of it. Every young kid does. So Baby learned to understand when someone talked, and he\u2019d answer with this semaphore stuff.
\nLone couldn\u2019t read the stuff and neither could I. The twins didn\u2019t give a damn. Janie used to watch him all the time. He always knew what you meant if you wanted to ask him something, and he\u2019d tell Janie and she\u2019d say what it was. Part of it, anyway. Nobody could get it all, noteven Janie.  All I know is Janie would sit there and paint her pictures and watch Baby, and sometimes she\u2019d bust out laughing.
\nBaby never grew any. Janie did, and the twins, and so did I, but not Baby. He just lay there.
\nJanie kept his stomach full and cleaned him up every two or three days. He didn\u2019t cry and he didn\u2019t make any trouble. No one ever went near him. Janie showed every picture she painted to Baby, before she cleaned the boards and painted new ones. She had to clean them because she only had three of them. It was a good thing, too, because I\u2019d hate to think what that place would of been like if she\u2019d kept them all; she did four or five a day. Lone and the twins were kept hopping getting turpentine for her.
\nShe could shift the paints back into the little pots on her easel without any trouble, just by looking at the picture one color at a time, but turps was something else again. She told me that Baby remembered all her pictures and that\u2019s why she didn\u2019t have to keep them. They were all pictures of machines and gear-trains and mechanical linkages and what looked like electric circuits and things like that. I never thought too much about them.
\nI went out with Lone to get some turpentine and a couple of picnic hams one time. We went through the woods to the railroad track and down a couple of miles to where we could see the glow of a town. Then the woods again, and some alleys, and a back street.
\nLone was like always, walking along, thinking, thinking.
\nWe came to a hardware store and he went up and looked at the lock and came back to where I was waiting, shaking his head. Then we found a general store. Lone grunted and we went and stood in the shadows by the door. I looked in.
\nAll of a sudden Beanie was in there, naked like she always was when she travelled like that. She came and opened the door from the inside. We went in and Lone closed it and locked it.
\n\u201cGet along home, Beanie,\u201d he said, \u201cbefore you catch your death.\u201d
\nShe grinned at me and said, \u201cHo-ho,\u201d and disappeared.
\nWe found a pair of fine hams and a two-gallon can of turpentine. I took a bright yellow ballpoint pen and Lone cuffed me and made me put it back.
\n\u201cWe only take what we need,\u201d he told me.
\nAfter we left, Beanie came back and locked the door and went home again. I only went with Lone a few times, when he had more to get than he could carry easily.
\nI was there about three years. That\u2019s all I can remember about it. Lone was there or he was out, and you could hardly tell the difference. The twins were with each other most of the time. I got to like Janie a lot, but we never talked much. Baby talked all the time, only I don\u2019t know what about.
\nWe were all busy and we bleshed. I sat up on the couch suddenly.
\nStern said, \u201cWhat\u2019s the matter?\u201d
\n\u201cNothing\u2019s the matter. This isn\u2019t getting me any place.\u201d
\n\u201cYou said that when you\u2019d barely started. Do you think you\u2019ve accomplished anything since then?\u201d
\n\u201cOh, yeah, but\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cThen how can you be sure you\u2019re right this time?\u201d When I didn\u2019t say anything, he asked me,
\n\u201cDidn\u2019t you like this last stretch?\u201d
\nI said angrily, \u201cI didn\u2019t like or not like. It didn\u2019t mean nothing. It was just\u2014just talk.\u201d
\n\u201cSo what was the difference between this last session and what happened before?\u201d
\n\u201cMy gosh, plenty! The first one, I felt everything. It was all really happening to me. But this time\u2014nothing.\u201d \u201cWhy do you suppose that was?\u201d
\n\u201cI don\u2019t know. You tell me.\u201d
\n\u201cSuppose,\u201d he said thoughtfully, \u201cthat there was some episode so unpleasant to you that you wouldn\u2019t dare relive it.\u201d
\n\u201cUnpleasant? You think freezing to death isn\u2019t unpleasant?\u201d
\n\u201cThere are all kinds of unpleasantness. Sometimes the very thing you\u2019re looking for\u2014the thing that\u2019ll clear up your trouble\u2014is so revolting to you that you won\u2019t go near it. Or you try to hide it. Wait,\u201d he said suddenly, \u201cmaybe \u2018revolting\u2019 and \u2018unpleasant\u2019 are inaccurate words to use. It might be something very desirable to you. It\u2019s just that you don\u2019t want to get straightened out.\u201d
\n\u201cI want to get straightened out.\u201d
\nHe waited as if he had to clear something up in his mind, and then said, \u201cThere\u2019s something in that \u2018Baby is three\u2019 phrase that bounces you away. Why is that?\u201d
\n\u201cDamn if I know.\u201d
\n\u201cWho said it?\u201d
\n\u201cI dunno… uh…\u201d
\nHe grinned. \u201cUh?\u201d
\nI grinned back at him. \u201cI said it.\u201d
\n\u201cOkay. When?\u201d
\nI quit grinning. He leaned forward, then got up.
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter?\u201d I asked.
\nHe said, \u201cI didn\u2019t think anyone could be that mad.\u201d I didn\u2019t say anything. He went over to his desk. \u201cYou don\u2019t want to go on any more, do you?\u201d
\n\u201cNo.\u201d
\n\u201cSuppose I told you you want to quit because you\u2019re right on the very edge of finding out what you want to know?\u201d
\n\u201cWhy don\u2019t you tell me and see what I do?\u201d
\nHe just shook his head. \u201cI\u2019m not telling you anything. Go on, leave if you want to. I\u2019ll give you back your change.\u201d
\n\u201cHow many people quit just when they\u2019re on top of the answer?\u201d
\n\u201cQuite a few.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, I ain\u2019t going to.\u201d I lay down.
\nHe didn\u2019t laugh and he didn\u2019t say, \u201cGood,\u201d and he didn\u2019t make any fuss about it. He just picked up his phone and said, \u201cCancel everything for this afternoon,\u201d and went back to his chair, up there out of my sight.
\nIt was very quiet in there. He had the place soundproofed.
\nI said, \u201cWhy do you suppose Lone let me live there so long when I couldn\u2019t do any of the things that the other kids could?\u201d
\n\u201cMaybe you could.\u201d
\n\u201cOh, no,\u201d I said positively. \u201cI used to try. I was strong for a kid my age and I knew how to keep my mouth shut, but aside from those two things I don\u2019t think I was any different from any kid. I don\u2019t think I\u2019m any different right now, except what difference there might be from living with Lone and his bunch.\u201d
\n\u201cHas this anything to do with \u2018Baby is three\u2019?\u201d
\nI looked up at the gray ceiling. \u201cBaby is three. Baby is three. I went up to a big house with a winding drive that ran under a sort of theater marquee thing. Baby is three. Baby…\u201d
\n\u201cHow old are you?\u201d
\n\u201cThirty-three,\u201d I said, and the next thing you know I was up off that couch like it was hot and heading for the door.
\nStern grabbed me. \u201cDon\u2019t be foolish. Want me to waste a whole afternoon?\u201d \u201cWhat\u2019s that to me? I\u2019m paying for it.\u201d
\n\u201cAll right, it\u2019s up to you.\u201d
\nI went back. \u201cI don\u2019t like any part of this,\u201d I said.
\n\u201cGood. We\u2019re getting warm then.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat made me say \u2018Thirty-three\u2019? I ain\u2019t thirty-three. I\u2019m fifteen. And another thing…\u201d
\n\u201cYes?\u201d
\n\u201cIt\u2019s about that \u2018Baby is three.\u2019 It\u2019s me saying it, all right. But when I think about it\u2014it\u2019s not my voice.\u201d
\n\u201cLike thirty-three\u2019s not your age?\u201d
\n\u201cYeah,\u201d I whispered.
\n\u201cGerry,\u201d he said warmly, \u201cthere\u2019s nothing to be afraid of.\u201d
\nI realized I was breathing too hard. I pulled myself together. I said, \u201cI don\u2019t like remembering saying things in somebody else\u2019s voice.\u201d
\n\u201cLook,\u201d he told me. \u201cThis head-shrinking business, as you called it a while back, isn\u2019t what most people think. When I go with you into the world of your mind\u2014or when you go yourself, for that matter\u2014what we find isn\u2019t so very different from the so-called real world. It seems so at first, because the patient comes out with all sorts of fantasies and irrationalities and weird experiences. But everyone lives in that kind of world. When one of the ancients coined the phrase \u2018truth is stranger than fiction\u2019, he was talking about that.
\n\u201cEverywhere we go, everything we do, we\u2019re surrounded by symbols, by things so familiar we don\u2019t ever look at them or don\u2019t see them if we do look. If anyone ever could report to you exactly what he saw and thought while walking ten feet down the street, you\u2019d get the most twisted, clouded, partial picture you ever ran across. And nobody ever looks at what\u2019s around him with any kind of attention until he gets into a place like this. The fact that he\u2019s looking at past events doesn\u2019t matter; what counts is that he\u2019s seeing clearer than he ever could before, just because, for once, he\u2019s trying.
\n\u201cNow\u2014about this \u2018thirty-three\u2019 business. I don\u2019t think a man could get a nastier shock than to find he has someone else\u2019s memories. The ego is too important to let slide that way. But consider: all your thinking is done in code and you have the key to only about a tenth of it. So you run into a stretch of code which is abhorrent to you. Can\u2019t you see that the only way you\u2019ll find the key to it is to stop avoiding it?\u201d
\n\u201cYou mean I\u2019d started to remember with… with somebody else\u2019s mind?\u201d
\n\u201cIt looked like that to you for a while, which means something. Let\u2019s try to find out what.\u201d
\n\u201cAll right.\u201d I felt sick. I felt tired. And I suddenly realized that being sick and being tired
\nwas a way of trying to get out of it.
\n\u201cBaby is three,\u201d he said.
\nBaby is maybe. Me, three, thirty-three, me, you Kew you.
\n\u201cKew!\u201d I yelled. Stern didn\u2019t say anything. \u201cLook, I don\u2019t know why, but I think I know how to get to this, and this isn\u2019t the way. Do you mind if I try something else?\u201d
\n\u201cYou\u2019re the doctor,\u201d he said.
\nI had to laugh. Then I closed my eyes.
\nThere, through the edges of the hedges, the ledges and wedges of windows were shouldering up to the sky. The lawns were sprayed-on green, neat, and clean, and all the flowers looked as if they were afraid to let their petals break and be untidy.
\nI walked up the drive in my shoes. I\u2019d had to wear shoes and my feet couldn\u2019t breathe. I didn\u2019t want to go to the house, but I had to.  I went up the steps between the big white columns and looked at the door. I wished I could see through it, but it was too white and thick. There was a window the shape of a fan over it, too high up though, and a window on each side of it, but they were all crudded up withcolored glass. I hit on the door with my hand and left dirt on it.
\nNothing happened so I hit it again. It got snatched open and a tall, thin colored woman stood there. \u201cWhat you want?\u201d
\nI said I had to see Miss Kew.
\n\u201cWell, Miss Kew don\u2019t want to see the likes of you,\u201d she said. She talked too loud. \u201cYou got a dirty face.\u201d
\nI started to get mad then. I was already pretty sore about having to come here, walking around near people in the daytime and all. I said, \u201cMy face ain\u2019t got nothin\u2019 to do with it.
\nWhere\u2019s Miss Kew? Go on, find her for me.\u201d
\nShe gasped. \u201cYou can\u2019t speak to me like that!\u201d
\nI said, \u201cI didn\u2019t want to speak to you like any way. Let me in.\u201d I started wishing for Janie.
\nJanie could of moved her. But I had to handle it by myself. I wasn\u2019t doing so hot, either. She slammed the door before I could so much as curse at her.  So I started kicking on the door. For that, shoes are great. After a while, she snatched the door open again so sudden I almost went on my can. She had a broom with her. She screamed at me, \u201cYou get away from here, you trash, or I\u2019ll call the police!\u201d She pushed me and I fell.
\nI got up off the porch floor and went for her. She stepped back and whupped me one with the broom as I went past, but anyhow I was inside now. The woman was making little shrieking noises and coming for me. I took the broom away from her and then somebody said,
\n\u201cMiriam!\u201d in a voice like a grown goose.
\nI froze and the woman went into hysterics. \u201cOh, Miss Alicia, look out! He\u2019ll kill us all. Get the police. Get the\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cMiriam!\u201d came the honk, and Miriam dried up.
\nThere at the top of the stairs was this prune-faced woman with a dress on that had lace on it. She looked a lot older than she was, maybe because she held her mouth so tight. I guess she was about thirty-three\u2014thirty-three. She had mean eyes and a small nose.
\nI asked, \u201cAre you Miss Kew?\u201d
\n\u201cI am. What is the meaning of this invasion?\u201d
\n\u201cI got to talk to you, Miss Kew.\u201d
\n\u201cDon\u2019t say \u2018got to\u2019. Stand up straight and speak out.\u201d
\nThe maid said, \u201cI\u2019ll get the police.\u201d
\nMiss Kew turned on her. \u201cThere\u2019s time enough for that, Miriam. Now, you dirty little boy, what do you want?\u201d
\n\u201cI got to speak to you by yourself,\u201d I told her.
\n\u201cDon\u2019t you let him do it, Miss Alicia,\u201d cried the maid.
\n\u201cBe quiet, Miriam. Little boy, I told you not to say \u2018got to\u2019. You may say whatever you have to say in front of Miriam.\u201d
\n\u201cLike hell.\u201d They both gasped. I said, \u201cLone told me not to.\u201d
\n\u201cMiss Alicia, are you goin\u2019 to let him\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cBe quiet, Miriam! Young man, you will keep a civil\u2014\u201d Then her eyes popped up real round. \u201cWho did you say…\u201d
\n\u201cLone said so.\u201d
\n\u201cLone.\u201d She stood there on the stairs looking at her hands. Then she said, \u201cMiriam, that will be all.\u201d And you wouldn\u2019t know it was the same woman, the way she said it.
\nThe maid opened her mouth, but Miss Kew stuck out a finger that might as well of had a rifle-sight on the end of it. The maid beat it.
\n\u201cHey,\u201d I said, \u201chere\u2019s your broom.\u201d I was just going to throw it, but Miss Kew got to me and took it out of my hand.
\n\u201cIn there,\u201d she said.
\nShe made me go ahead of her into a room as big as our swimming hole. It had books allover and leather on top of the tables, with gold flowers drawn into the corners.
\nShe pointed to a chair. \u201cSit there. No, wait a moment.\u201d She went to the fireplace and got a newspaper out of a box and brought it over and unfolded it on the seat of the chair. \u201cNow sit down.\u201d
\nI sat on the paper and she dragged up another chair, but didn\u2019t put no paper on it.
\n\u201cWhat is it? Where is Lone?\u201d
\n\u201cHe died,\u201dI said.
\nShe pulled in her breath and went white. She stared at me until her eyes started to water.
\n\u201cYou sick?\u201d I asked her. \u201cGo ahead, throw up. It\u2019ll make you feel better.\u201d
\n\u201cDead? Lone is dead?\u201d
\n\u201cYeah. There was a flash flood last week and when he went out the next night in that big wind, he walked under a old oak tree that got gullied under by the flood. The tree come down on him.\u201d
\n\u201cCame down on him,\u201d she whispered. \u201cOh, no… it\u2019s not true.\u201d
\n\u201cIt\u2019s true, all right. We planted him this morning. We couldn\u2019t keep him around no more.
\nHe was beginning to st\u2014\u201d
\n\u201cStop!\u201d She covered her face with her hands.
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter?\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019ll be all right in a moment,\u201d she said in a low voice. She went and stood in front of the fireplace with her back to me. I took off one of my shoes while I was waiting for her to come back. But instead she talked from where she was. \u201cAre you Lone\u2019s little boy?\u201d
\n\u201cYeah. He told me to come to you.\u201d
\n\u201cOh, my dear child!\u201d She came running back and I thought for a second she was going to pick me up or something, but she stopped short and wrinkled up her nose a little bit.
\n\u201cWh-what\u2019s your name?\u201d
\n\u201cGerry,\u201d I told her.
\n\u201cWell, Gerry, how would you like to live with me in this nice big house and\u2014and have new clean clothes\u2014and everything?\u201d
\n\u201cWell, that\u2019s the whole idea. Lone told me to come to you. He said you got more dough than you know what to do with, and he said you owed him a favor.\u201d
\n\u201cA favor?\u201d That seemed to bother her.
\n\u201cWell,\u201d I tried to tell her, \u201che said he done something for you once and you said some day you\u2019d pay him back for it if you ever could. This is it.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat did he tell you about that?\u201d She\u2019d got her honk back by then.
\n\u201cNot a damn thing.\u201d
\n\u201cPlease don\u2019t use that word,\u201d she said, with her eyes closed. Then she opened them and nodded her head. \u201cI promised and I\u2019ll do it. You can live here from now on. If\u2014if you want to.\u201d
\n\u201cThat\u2019s got nothin\u2019 to do with it. Lone told me to.\u201d
\n\u201cYou\u2019ll be happy here,\u201d she said. She gave me an up-and-down. \u201cI\u2019ll see to that.\u201d
\n\u201cOkay. Shall I go get the other kids?\u201d
\n\u201cOther kids\u2014children?\u201d
\n\u201cYeah. This ain\u2019t for just me. For all of us\u2014the whole gang.\u201d
\n\u201cDon\u2019t say \u2018ain\u2019t\u2019.\u201d She leaned back in her chair, took out a silly little handkerchief and dabbed her lips with it, looking at me the whole time. \u201cNow tell me about these\u2014these other children.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, there\u2019s Janie, she\u2019s eleven like me. And Bonnie and Beanie are eight, they\u2019re twins, and Baby. Baby is three.\u201d
\nI screamed. Stern was kneeling beside the couch in a flash, holding his palms against myheeks to hold my head still; I\u2019d been whipping it back and forth.
\n\u201cGood boy,\u201d he said. \u201cYou found it. You haven\u2019t found out what it is, but now you know where it is.\u201d
\n\u201cBut for sure,\u201d I said hoarsely. \u201cGot water?\u201d
\nHe poured me some water out of a thermos flask. It was so cold it hurt. I lay back and rested, like I\u2019d climbed a cliff. I said, \u201cI can\u2019t take anything like that again.\u201d
\n\u201cYou want to call it quits for today?\u201d
\n\u201cWhat about you?\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019ll go on as long as you want me to.\u201d
\nI thought about it. \u201cI\u2019d like to go on, but I don\u2019t want no thumping around. Not for a while yet.\u201d
\n\u201cIf you want another of those inaccurate analogies,\u201d Stern said, \u201cpsychiatry is like a road map. There are always a lot of different ways to get from one place to another place.\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019ll go around by the long way,\u201d I told him. \u201cThe eight-lane highway. Not that track over the hill. My clutch is slipping. Where do I turn off?\u201d
\nHe chuckled. I liked the sound of it. \u201cJust past that gravel driveway.\u201d
\n\u201cI been there. There\u2019s a bridge washed out.\u201d
\n\u201cYou\u2019ve been on this whole road before,\u201d he told me. \u201cStart at the other side of the bridge.\u201d
\n\u201cI never thought of that. I figured I had to do the whole thing, every inch.\u201d
\n\u201cMaybe you won\u2019t have to, maybe you will, but the bridge will be easy to cross when you\u2019ve covered everything else. Maybe there\u2019s nothing of value on the bridge and maybe there is, but you can\u2019t get near it till you\u2019ve looked everywhere else.\u201d
\n\u201cLet\u2019s go.\u201d I was real eager, somehow.
\n\u201cMind a suggestion?\u201d
\n\u201cNo.\u201d
\n\u201cJust talk,\u201d he said. \u201cDon\u2019t try to get too far into what you\u2019re saying. That first stretch, when you were eight\u2014you really lived it. The second one, all about the kids, you just talked about. Then, the visit when you were eleven, you felt that. Now just talk again.\u201d
\n\u201cAll right.\u201d
\nHe waited, then said quietly, \u201cIn the library. You told her about the other kids.\u201d
\nI told her about… and then she said… and something happened, and I screamed. She comforted me and I cussed at her.
\nBut we\u2019re not thinking about that now. We\u2019re going on.
\nIn the library. The leather, the table, and whether I\u2019m able to do with Miss Kew what Lone said.
\nWhat Lone said was, \u201cThere\u2019s a woman lives up on the top of the hill in the Heights section, name of Kew. She\u2019ll have to take care of you. You got to get her to do that. Do everything she tells you, only stay together. Don\u2019t you ever let any one of you get away from the others, hear? Aside from that, just you keep Miss Kew happy and she\u2019ll keep you happy.
\nNow you do what I say.\u201d That\u2019s what Lone said. Between every word there was a link like steel cable, and the whole thing made something that couldn\u2019t be broken. Not by me it couldn\u2019t.
\nMiss Kew said, \u201cWhere are your sisters and the baby?\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019ll bring \u2019em.\u201d
\n\u201cIs it near here?\u201d
\n\u201cNear enough.\u201d She didn\u2019t say anything to that, so I got up. \u201cI\u2019ll be back soon.\u201d
\n\u201cWait,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2014really, I haven\u2019t had time to think. I mean\u2014I\u2019ve got to get things ready, you know.\u201d
\nI said, \u201cYou don\u2019t need to think and you are ready. So long.\u201d From the door I heard her saying, louder and louder as I walked away, \u201cYoung man, if you\u2019re to live in this house, you\u2019ll learn to be a good deal better mannered\u2014\u201d and a lot more of the same.
\nI yelled back at her, \u201cOkay, okay!\u201d and went out.
\nThe sun was warm and the sky was good, and pretty soon I got back to Lone\u2019s house. The fire was out and Baby stunk. Janie had knocked over her easel and was sitting on the floor by the door with her head in her hands. Bonnie and Beanie were on a stool with their arms around each other, pulled up together as close as they could get, as if it was cold in there, although it wasn\u2019t.
\nI hit Janie in the arm to snap her out of it. She raised her head. She had gray eyes\u2014or maybe it was more a kind of green\u2014but now they had a funny look about them, like water in a glass that had some milk left in the bottom of it.
\nI said, \u201cWhat\u2019s the matter around here?\u201d
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter with what?\u201d she wanted to know.
\n\u201cAll of yez,\u201d I said.
\nShe said, \u201cWe don\u2019t give a damn, that\u2019s all.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, all right,\u201d I said, \u201cbut we got to do what Lone said. Come on.\u201d
\n\u201cNo.\u201d I looked at the twins. They turned their backs on me. Janie said, \u201cThey\u2019re hungry.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, why not give \u2019em something?\u201d
\nShe just shrugged. I sat down. What did Lone have to go get himself squashed for?
\n\u201cWe can\u2019t blesh no more,\u201d said Janie. It seemed to explain everything.
\n\u201cLook,\u201d I said, \u201cI\u2019ve got to be Lone now.\u201d
\nJanie thought about that and Baby kicked his feet. Janie looked at him. \u201cYou can\u2019t,\u201d she said.
\n\u201cI know where to get the heavy food and the turpentine,\u201d I said. \u201cI can find that springy moss to stuff in the logs, and cut wood, and all.\u201d
\nBut I couldn\u2019t call Bonnie and Beanie from miles away to unlock doors. I couldn\u2019t just say a word to Janie and make her get water and blow up the fire and fix the battery. I couldn\u2019t make us blesh.
\nWe all stayed like that for a long time. Then I heard the bassinet creak. I looked up. Janie was staring into it.
\n\u201cAll right,\u201d she said. \u201cLet\u2019s go.\u201d
\n\u201cWho says so?\u201d
\n\u201cBaby.\u201d
\n\u201cWho\u2019s running things now?\u201d I said, mad. \u201cMe or Baby?\u201d
\n\u201cBaby,\u201d Janie said.
\nI got up and went over to bust her one in the mouth, and then I stopped. If Baby could make them do what Lone wanted, then it would get done. If I started pushing them all around, it wouldn\u2019t. So I didn\u2019t say anything. Janie got up and walked out the door. The twins watched her go. Then Bonnie disappeared. Beanie picked up Bonnie\u2019s clothes and walked out. I got Baby out of the bassinet and draped him over my shoulders.
\nIt was better when we were all outside. It was getting late in the day and the air was warm. The twins flitted in and out of the trees like a couple of flying squirrels, and Janie and I walked along like we were going swimming or something. Baby started to kick, and Janie looked at him a while and got him fed, and he was quiet again.
\nWhen we came close to town, I wanted to get everybody close together, but I was afraid to say anything. Baby must of said it instead. The twins came back to us and Janie gave them their clothes and they walked ahead of us, good as you please. I don\u2019t know how Baby did it.
\nThey sure hated to travel that way. We didn\u2019t have no trouble except one guy we met on the street near Miss Kew\u2019s place.He stopped in his tracks and gaped at us, and Janie looked at him and made his hat go so far down over his eyes that he like to pull his neck apart getting it back up again.
\nWhat do you know, when we got to the house somebody had washed off all the dirt I\u2019d put on the door. I had one hand on Baby\u2019s arm and one on his ankle and him draped over my neck, so I kicked the door and left some more dirt.
\n\u201cThere\u2019s a woman here name of Miriam,\u201d I told Janie. \u201cShe says anything, tell her to go to hell.\u201d
\nThe door opened and there was Miriam. She took one look and jumped back six feet. We all trailed inside. Miriam got her wind and screamed, \u201cMiss Kew! Miss Kew!\u201d
\n\u201cGo to hell,\u201d said Janie, and looked at me. I didn\u2019t know what to do. It was the first time Janie ever did anything I told her to.
\nMiss Kew came down the stairs. She was wearing a different dress, but it was just as stupid and had just as much lace. She opened her mouth and nothing came out, so she just left it open until something happened. Finally she said, \u201cDear gentle Lord preserve us!\u201d
\nThe twins lined up and gawked at her. Miriam sidled over to the wall and sort of slid along it, keeping away from us, until she could get to the door and close it. She said, \u201cMiss Kew, if those are the children you said were going to live here, I quit.\u201d
\nJanie said, \u201cGo to hell.\u201d
\nJust then Bonnie squatted down on the rug. Miriam squawked and jumped at her. She grabbed hold of Bonnie\u2019s arm and went to snatch her up. Bonnie disappeared, leaving Miriam with one small dress and the damnedest expression on her face. Beanie grinned enough to split her head in two and started to wave like mad. I looked where she was waving, and there was Bonnie, naked as a jaybird, up on the banister at the top of the stairs.
\nMiss Kew turned around and saw her and sat down plump on the steps. Miriam went down, too, like she\u2019d been slugged. Beanie picked up Bonnie\u2019s dress and walked up the steps past Miss Kew and handed it over. Bonnie put it on. Miss Kew sort of lolled around and looked up. Bonnie and Beanie came back down the stairs hand in hand to where I was. Then they lined up and gaped at Miss Kew.
\n\u201cWhat\u2019s the matter with her?\u201d Janie asked me.
\n\u201cShe gets sick every once in a while.\u201d
\n\u201cLet\u2019s go back home.\u201d
\n\u201cNo,\u201d I told her.
\nMiss Kew grabbed the banister and pulled herself up. She stood there hanging on to it for a while with her eyes closed. All of a sudden she stiffened herself. She looked about four inches taller. She came marching over to us.
\n\u201cGerard,\u201d she honked.
\nI think she was going to say something different. But she sort of checked herself and pointed. \u201cWhat in heaven\u2019s name is that?\u201d And she aimed her finger at me.
\nI didn\u2019t get it right away, so I turned around to look behind me. \u201cWhat?\u201d
\n\u201cThat! That!\u201d
\n\u201cOh!\u201d I said. \u201cThat\u2019s Baby.\u201d
\nI slung him down off my back and held him up for her to look at. She made a sort of moaning noise and jumped over and took him away from me. She held him out in front of her and moaned again and called him a poor little thing, and ran and put him down on a long bench, with cushions under the colored-glass window. She bent over him and put her knuckle in her mouth and bit on it and moaned some more. Then she turned to me.
\n\u201cHow long has he been like this?\u201d
\nI looked at Janie and she looked at me. I said, \u201cHe\u2019s always been like he is.\u201d
\nShe made a sort of cough and ran to where Miriam was lying flaked out on the floor. She slapped Miriam\u2019s face a couple of times back and forth. Miriam sat up and looked us over. Shelosed her eyes and shivered and sort of climbed up Miss Kew hand over hand until she was on her feet.
\n\u201cPull yourself together,\u201d said Miss Kew between her teeth. \u201cGet a basin with some hot water and soap. Washcloth. Towels. Hurry!\u201d She gave Miriam a big push. Miriam staggered and grabbed at the wall, and then ran out.  Miss Kew went back to Baby and hung over him, titch-titching with her lips all tight.
\n\u201cDon\u2019t mess with him,\u201d I said. \u201cThere\u2019s nothin\u2019 wrong with him. We\u2019re hungry.\u201d
\nShe gave me a look like I\u2019d punched her. \u201cDon\u2019t speak to me!\u201d
\n\u201cLook,\u201d I said, \u201cwe don\u2019t like this any more \u2019n you do. If Lone hadn\u2019t told us to, we wouldn\u2019t never have come. We were doing all right where we were.\u201d
\n\u201cDon\u2019t say \u2018wouldn\u2019t never\u2019,\u201d said Miss Kew. She looked at all of us, one by one. Then she took that silly little hunk of handkerchief and pushed it against her mouth.
\n\u201cSee?\u201d I said to Janie. \u201cAll the time gettin\u2019 sick.\u201d
\n\u201cHo-ho,\u201d said Bonnie.
\nMiss Kew gave her a long look. \u201cGerard,\u201d she said in a choked sort of voice, \u201cI understood
\nyou to say that these children were your sisters.\u201d
\n\u201cWell?\u201d
\nShe looked at me as if I was real stupid. \u201cWe don\u2019t have little colored girls for sisters,
\nGerard.\u201d
\nJanie said, \u201cWe do.\u201d
\nMiss Kew walked up and back, real fast. \u201cWe have a great deal to do,\u201d she said, talking to herself.
\nMiriam came in with a big oval pan and towels and stuff on her arm. She put it down on the bench thing and Miss Kew stuck the back of her hand in the water, then picked up Baby and dunked him right in it. Baby started to kick.
\nI stepped forward and said, \u201cWait a minute. Hold on now. What do you think you\u2019re doing?\u201d
\nJanie said, \u201cShut up, Gerry. He says it\u2019s all right.\u201d
\n\u201cAll right? She\u2019ll drown him.\u201d
\n\u201cNo, she won\u2019t. Just shut up.\u201d
\nWorking up a froth with the soap, Miss Kew smeared it on Baby and turned him over a couple of times and scrubbed at his head and like to smothered him in a big white towel.
\nMiriam stood gawking while Miss Kew lashed up a dish-cloth around him so it come out pants. When she was done, you wouldn\u2019t of known it was the same baby. And by the time Miss Kew finished with the job, she seemed to have a better hold on herself. She was breathing hard
\nand her mouth was even tighter. She held out the baby to Miriam.
\n\u201cTake this poor thing,\u201d she said, \u201cand put him\u2014\u201d
\nBut Miriam backed away. \u201cI\u2019m sorry, Miss Kew, but I am leaving here and I don\u2019t care.\u201d
\nMiss Kew got her honk out. \u201cYou can\u2019t leave me in a predicament like this! These children need help. Can\u2019t you see that for yourself?\u201d
\nMiriam looked me and Janie over. She was trembling. \u201cYou ain\u2019t safe, Miss Alicia. They ain\u2019t just dirty. They\u2019re crazy!\u201d
\n\u201cThey\u2019re victims of neglect, and probably no worse than you or I would be if we\u2019d been
\nneglected. And don\u2019t say \u2018ain\u2019t\u2019. Gerard!\u201d
\n\u201cWhat?\u201d
\n\u201cDon\u2019t say\u2014oh, dear, we have so much to do. Gerard, if you and your\u2014these other children are going to live here, you shall have to make a great many changes. You cannot live under this roof and behave as you have so far. Do you understand that?\u201d
\n\u201cOh, sure. Lone said we was to do whatever you say and keep you happy.\u201d
\n\u201cWill you do whatever I say?\u201d \u201cThat\u2019s what I just said, isn\u2019t it?\u201d
\n\u201cGerard, you shall have to learn not to speak to me in that tone. Now, young man, if I told you to do what Miriam says, too, would you do it?\u201d
\nI said to Janie, \u201cWhat about that?\u201d
\n\u201cI\u2019ll ask Baby.\u201d Janie looked at Baby and Baby wobbled his hands and drooled some. She said, \u201cIt\u2019s okay.\u201d
\nMiss Kew said, \u201cGerard, I asked you a question.\u201d
\n\u201cKeep your pants on,\u201d I said. \u201cI got to find out, don\u2019t I? Yes, if that\u2019s what you want, we\u2019ll listen to Miriam too.\u201d
\nMiss Kew turned to Miriam. \u201cYou hear that, Miriam?\u201d
\nMiriam looked at Miss Kew and at us and shook her head. Then she held out her hands a bit to Bonnie and Beanie.
\nThey went right to her. Each one took hold of a hand. They looked up at her and grinned.
\nThey were probably planning some sort of hellishness, but I guess they looked sort of cute.
\nMiriam\u2019s mouth twitched and I thought for a second she was going to look human. She said, \u201cAll right, Miss Alicia.\u201d
\nMiss Kew walked over and handed her the baby and she started upstairs with him. Miss Kew herded us along after Miriam. We all went upstairs.
\nThey went to work on us then and for three years they never stopped.
\n\u201cThat was hell,\u201d I said to Stern.
\n\u201cThey had their work cut out.\u201d
\n\u201cYeah, I s\u2019pose they did. So did we. Look, we were going to do exactly what Lone said.
\nNothing on earth could of stopped us from doing it. We were tied and bound to doing every last little thing Miss Kew said to do. But she and Miriam never seemed to understand that. I guess they felt they had to push every inch of the way. All they had to do was make us understand what they wanted, and we\u2019d of done it. That\u2019s okay when it\u2019s something like telling me not to climb into bed with Janie. Miss Kew raised holy hell over that. You\u2019d of thought I\u2019d robbed the Crown Jewels, the way she acted.
\n\u201cBut when it\u2019s something like, \u2018You must behave like little ladies and gentlemen,\u2019 it just doesn\u2019t mean a thing. And two out of three orders she gave us were like that. \u2018Ah-ah!\u2019 she\u2019d say.
\n\u2018Language, language!\u2019 For the longest time I didn\u2019t dig that at all. I finally asked her what the hell she meant, and then she finally came out with it. But you see what I mean.\u201d
\n\u201cI certainly do,\u201d Stern said. \u201cDid it get easier as time went on?\u201d
\n\u201cWe only had real trouble twice, once about the twins and once about Baby. That one was real bad.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat happened?\u201d
\n\u201cAbout the twins? Well, when we\u2019d been there about a week or so we began to notice something that sort of stunk. Janie and me, I mean. We began to notice that we almost never got to see Bonnie and Beanie. It was like that house was two houses, one part for Miss Kew and Janie and me, and the other part for Miriam and the twins. I guess we\u2019d have noticed it sooner if things hadn\u2019t been such a hassel at first, getting us into new clothes and making us sleep all the time at night, and all that. But here was the thing: We\u2019d all get turned out in the side yard to play, and then along comes lunch, and the twins got herded off to eat with Miriam while we ate with Miss Kew. So Janie said, \u2018Why don\u2019t the twins eat with us?\u2018
\n\u201c \u2018Miriam\u2019s taking care of them, dear,\u2019 Miss Kew says.
\n\u201cJanie looked at her with those eyes. \u2018I know that. Let \u2019em eat here and I\u2019ll take care of \u2019em.\u2019
\n\u201cMiss Kew\u2019s mouth got all tight again and she said, \u2018They\u2019re little colored girls, Jane. Now eat your lunch.\u2019 \u201cBut that didn\u2019t explain anything to Janie or me, either. I said, \u2018I want \u2019em to eat with us.
\nLone said we should stay together.\u2019
\n\u201c \u2018But you are together,\u2019 she says. \u2018We all live in the same house. We all eat the same food.
\nNow let us not discuss the matter.\u2019
\n\u201cI looked at Janie and she looked at me and she said, \u2018So why can\u2019t we all do this livin\u2019 and eatin\u2019 right here?\u2019
\n\u201cMiss Kew put down her fork and looked hard. \u2018I have explained it to you and I have said that there will be no further discussion.\u2019
\n\u201cWell, I thought that was real nowhere. So I just rocked back my head and bellowed,
\n\u2018Bonnie! Beanie!\u2019 And bing, there they were.
\n\u201cSo all hell broke loose. Miss Kew ordered them out and they wouldn\u2019t go, and Miriam come steaming in with their clothes, and she couldn\u2019t catch them, and Miss Kew got to honking at them and finally at me. She said this was too much. Well, maybe she\u2019d had a hard week, but so had we. So Miss Kew ordered us to leave.
\n\u201cI went and got Baby and started out, and along came Janie and the twins. Miss Kew waited till we were all out the door and next thing you know she ran out after us. She passed us and got in front of me and made me stop. So we all stopped.
\n\u201c \u2018Is this how you follow Lone\u2019s wishes?\u2019 she asked.
\n\u201cI told her yes. She said she understood Lone wanted us to stay with her. And I said, \u2018Yeah, but he wanted us to stay together more.\u2019
\n\u201cShe said come back in, we\u2019d have a talk. Janie asked Baby and Baby said okay, so we went back. We had a compromise. We didn\u2019t eat in the dining room no more. There was a side porch, a sort of verandah thing with glass windows, with a door to the dining room and a door to the kitchen, and we all ate out there after that. Miss Kew ate by herself.
\n\u201cBut something funny happened because of that whole cockeyed hassel.\u201d
\n\u201cWhat was that?\u201d Stern asked me.
\nI laughed. \u201cMiriam. She looked and sounded like always but she started slipping us cookies between meals. You know, it took me years to figure out what all that was about. I mean it.
\nFrom what I\u2019ve learned about people, there seems to be two armies fightin\u2019 about race. One\u2019s fightin\u2019 to keep \u2019em apart, and one\u2019s fightin\u2019 to get \u2019em together. Butdon\u2019t see why both sides are so worried about it! Why don\u2019t they just forget it?\u201d
\n\u201cThey can\u2019t. You see, Gerry, it\u2019s necessary for people to believe they are superior in some fashion. You and Lone and the kids\u2014you were a pretty tight unit. Didn\u2019t you feel you were a little better than all of the rest of the world?\u201d
\n\u201cBetter? How could we be better?\u201d
\n\u201cDifferent, then.\u201d
\n\u201cWell, I suppose so, but we didn\u2019t think about it. Different, yes. Better, no.\u201d
\n\u201cYou\u2019re a unique case,\u201d Stern said. \u201cNow go on and tell me about the other trouble you had.
\nAbout Baby.\u201d
\n\u201cBaby. Yeah. Well, that was a couple of months after we moved to Miss Kew\u2019s. Things were already getting real smooth, even then. We\u2019d learned all the \u2018yes, ma\u2019am, no, ma\u2019am\u2019 routines by then and she\u2019d got us catching up with school\u2014regular periods morning and afternoon, five days a week. Janie had long ago quit taking care of Baby, and the twins walked to wherever they went. That was funny. They could pop from one place to another right in front of Miss Kew\u2019s eyes and she wouldn\u2019t believe what she saw. She was too upset about them suddenly showing up bare. They quit doing it and she was happy about it. She was happy about a lot of things. It had been years since she\u2019d seen anybody\u2014years. She\u2019d even had the meters put outside the house so no one would ever have to come in. But with us there, she began to liven up. She quit wearing those old-lady dresses and began to look halfway human.
\nShe ate with us sometimes, even. \u201cBut one fine day I woke up feeling real weird. It was like somebody had stolen something from me when I was asleep, only I didn\u2019t know what. I crawled out of my window and along the ledge into Janie\u2019s room, which I wasn\u2019t supposed to do. She was in bed. I went and woke her up. I can still see her eyes, the way they opened a little slit, still asleep, and then popped up wide. I didn\u2019t have to tell her something was wrong. She knew, and she knew what it was.
\n\u201c \u2018Baby\u2019s gone!\u2019 she said.
\n\u201cWe didn\u2019t care then who woke up. We pounded out of her room and down the hall and into the little room at the end where Baby slept. You wouldn\u2019t believe it. The fancy crib he had and the white chest of drawers and all that mess of rattles and so on, they were gone, and there was just a writing desk there. I mean it was as if Baby had never been there at all.
\n\u201cWe didn\u2019t say anything. We just spun around and busted into Miss Kew\u2019s bedroom. I\u2019d never been in there but once and Janie only a few times. But forbidden or not, this was different. Miss Kew was in bed, with her hair braided. She was wide awake before we could get across the room. She pushed herself back and up until she was sitting against the headboard. She gave the two of us the cold eye.
\n\u201c \u2018What is the meaning of this?\u2019 she wanted to know.
\n\u201c \u2018Where\u2019s Baby?\u2019 I yelled at her.
\n\u201c \u2018Gerard,\u2019 she says, \u2018there is no need to shout.\u2019
\n\u201cJanie was a real quiet kid, but she said, \u2018You better tell us where he is, Miss Kew,\u2019 and it would of scared you to look at her when she said it.
\n\u201cSo all of a sudden Miss Kew took off the stone face and held out her hands to us.
\n\u2018Children,\u2019 she said, \u2018I\u2019m sorry. I really am sorry. But I\u2019ve just done what is best. I\u2019ve sent Baby away. He\u2019s gone to live with some children like him. We could never make him really happy
\nhere. You know that.\u2019
\n\u201cJanie said, \u2018He never told us he wasn\u2019t happy.\u2019
\n\u201cMiss Kew brought out a hollow kind of laugh. \u2018As if he could talk, the poor little thing!\u2019
\n\u201c \u2018You better get him back here,\u2019 I said. \u2018You don\u2019t know what you\u2019re fooling with. I told you we wasn\u2019t ever to break up.\u2019\u201cShe was getting mad, but she held on to herself. \u2018I\u2019ll try to explain it to you, dear,\u2019 she said.
\n\u2018You and Jane here and even the twins are all normal, healthy children and you\u2019ll grow up to be fine men and women. But poor Baby\u2019s\u2014different. He\u2019s not going to grow very much more, and he\u2019ll never walk and play like other children.\u2019
\n\u201c \u2018That doesn\u2019t matter,\u2019 Janie said. \u2018You had no call to send him away.\u2019
\n\u201cAnd I said, \u2018Yeah. You better bring him back, but quick.\u2019
\n\u201cThen she started to jump salty. \u2018Among the many things I have taught you is, I am sure, not to dictate to your elders. Now then, you run along and get dressed for breakfast, and we\u2019ll say no more about this.\u2019
\n\u201cI told her, nice as I could, \u2018Miss Kew, you\u2019re going to wish you brought him back right now. But you\u2019re going to bring him back soon. Or else.\u2019
\n\u201cSo then she got up out of her bed and ran us out of the room.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\n

1918 – 1985<\/p>\n

\u2190 Read (icon or below)  extract from ‘VENUS + X’ <\/p>\n

PLOT:<\/p>\n

Charlie Johns has been snatched from his home on 61 North 34th Street and delivered to the strange future world of Ledom. Here, violence is a vague and improbable notion. Technology has triumphed over hunger, overpopulation, pollution, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":28,"featured_media":37610,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[170],"tags":[175,266,313],"class_list":["post-7192","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-stories","tag-story","tag-modern_writers","tag-america","odd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7192","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/28"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7192"}],"version-history":[{"count":54,"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7192\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51265,"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7192\/revisions\/51265"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/37610"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7192"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7192"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/englishroam.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7192"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}