The Half Brother: A Novel (31 page)

aphasia.
And on the same day that Fred’s at the Royal Infirmary getting electricity in his head, a police officer comes to our class to instruct us in traffic safety. We had written
take time to trust traffic
in brightly colored letters on the board to please him. The officer has with him road signs that he explains to us, because without these we’re in trouble. We learn too how he directs the traffic at a crossroads and are taught that a bicycle has to have two brakes, a bell and a light. These are things we have to have, but gears, a bicycle kit and a baggage stand are useful too. The following period we all go up to Marienlyst, to the Little City with its streets, sidewalks, pedestrian crossings and traffic lights — just the same as in any real city — except that here everything’s much smaller, as if they’ve been out in the rain and shrunk. We eat our packed lunches and Esther waves to me from her kiosk, and for a time the rest of the class are envious because I know a lady in a kiosk full of sugar candy, ice cream and magazines. But that passes soon enough, and then it’s down to serious business. Now we have to put into practice what we learned the previous period. We’re made to stand in a long line, and the officer passes us one by one until finally he stops in front of me, smiles, and puts a hand on my shoulder. And I have to go over with him to the little crossroads. Maybe he’s heard about the accident involving the Old One, and it’s for that reason he chooses me. I know that you have to look right and left twice when you’re crossing the street. That was what the Old One forgot. A red light represents danger, yellow signals that the lights are changing, and green means that it’s safe. None of us is so busy that we can’t wait for green. That day the officer could have asked me any question he liked. “You almost could have lived here,” he says instead. He laughs and gives me a pat on the back. I look at him. I have no wish to live here. “Why?” I ask him. The officer bends down. “Why?” “Yes, why?” He straightens up once more. Knuckles stands impatiently on the pedestrian crossing. The rest of the class take a step forward. “Because here everything’s so small that it’s just big enough for you,” the officer replies. That’s how he says it, that here everything’s just big enough for me — and he laughs. Everyone laughs. I stand in the middle of the mirth, and the officer pats my curls. “But can you tell me what important things we have to remember when we’re crossing the street?” I don’t say anything. I notice how the others in the class are watching me. And I realize that in the wake of this nothing can be as it was. From now on I’m small. I’m the only inhabitant of the little city. My shortness, my lack of stature, has suddenly become visible. The police officer has pointed me out. I can feel the weight of all I don’t possess. “Answer the policeman, Barnum!” Knuckles shouts. But instead I walk away over the grass, away from the policeman, Knuckles and the class, away from the little city — and no one stops me. That’s perhaps the worst of it. I’m allowed to go. I don’t turn around. There’s no one at home when I get there. I measure my height against the door frame and draw a line with a pen where I reach to. I climb up on a stool and look at myself in the mirror. Not a lot of mirror’s required. And a pocket mirror goes a long way. And perhaps this is the first time I’ve really seen myself. I don’t want to see any more. I go back to my room, close the curtains, put out the light, creep under my quilt and shut my eyes. And isn’t it the case that everything falls together — all this that’s life itself — events that have nothing to do with each other but that are connected nonetheless in a strange order composed of coincidence, death and luck? As if the truck that knocked down the Old One caused a chain reaction through time, beginning with Fred’s muteness, the picture of Mom’s best friend in the concentration camp, the shiny button, the officer’s fearful words — and then continued with the Buick Dad lost, the course of special nutrition in the countryside, and Cliff Richard and the gramophone. Events I still know nothing about but that will soon take place and that I can’t alter, because I know nothing. And basically everything started with King Haakon the Seventh’s passing. This is my movie. And there are no living pictures. Just points, joined together, like a calendar you can flip through rapidly to see the rain turn to snow. It’s at this point I change reels — Fred comes home from the Royal Infirmary with aphasia, but despite the fact that his muteness has been given a name and address, he doesn’t start talking again because of that. He just turns around in the doorway and goes out again — no one knows where, but I figure it’s to Wester Gravlund, to the Old One’s grave. Later that evening Mom stands by my bedside. “Where’s the button?” she asks me. But I don’t answer. I don’t want to be any worse than Fred. I want my aphasia too. Mom bends down. “Barnum?” I clench my teeth. It hurts my mouth. “Are you asleep?” she whispers. I let her believe that I am. She steals out once more. I’m silent the rest of the night. Next morning I say nothing either. At school I’m equally quiet. During the first period Knuckles says I have to change desks. She points to the one nearest her table. “The smallest has to sit at the front, Barnum. So I can see you.” I pack my bag and set out on the long journey between the rows. I’m already what I’m to become — the smallest. I hear the new names for me whispered so softly yet just audible — gnat, pygmy dwarf — it’s not the last time it’ll happen, and there’ll be other names too, as if I didn’t have enough with my own name. I sit down at the new desk. Miss Knuckles smiles. She’s so close I can smell her. She doesn’t smell good. Here I’ll sit still for the rest of my life while everyone else behind me grows taller and taller, casting their shadows over me. “Now you’re sitting fine, Barnum.” I say nothing. I go home dumb. My teeth hurt. I eat dinner without saying a word. I’m on the verge of bursting into tears. And when I finally go to bed, more silent than ever, and the light’s switched off, I open my mouth with a deep groan and draw in my breath, as if I’ve been underwater since the day before. But a suspicion has crept into me. No one’s noticed that I’ve stopped talking. My silence is going by unnoticed. My aphasia is achieving nothing, neither good nor ill. I might just as well be dead. I manage to keep it up for two days. I’m sitting in the living room. Mom’s standing at the open door to the balcony, smoking a cigarette. “My pencil case,” I say. She turns toward me slowly and blows a ring of smoke that I break with my finger before it disappears into thin air. “What did you say, Barnum?” “The button’s in my pencil case,” I whisper, and stick my finger in my mouth. Mom goes out onto the balcony and waves. I follow her. Down in the street Dad’s standing polishing the Buick. Soon enough he’ll be able to see his own reflection in the hubcaps. The sky is shining on the hood. It’s spring, the month of May, a fine time — for the herbarium and for maps and plans. Mom stubs out her cigarette in the flowerpot and puts her arms around me. “Wouldn’t you like to go on a long drive in the summer?” she asks. “Where to?” “Where? You tell me, Barnum.” I didn’t want to decide on my own. “Fred and I can decide,” I tell her. Mom smiles. “That’s fine. You and Fred make up your minds.” I change mine at once. “Greenland.” Mom lets me go and lights another cigarette. “There isn’t a road to Greenland, Barnum. Think of somewhere else.” “Denmark perhaps?” Now it’s Mom’s turn to ponder. And Dad leans over the shiny car down below and shouts, “Are you coming, Barnum?” At that moment Fred crosses the road, and I look up at Mom. “Hurry,” she says. And I can see the happiness in her face; for the first time in a long while — since the death of the Old One. I hurry down, and Freds already sitting in the back. I get in the front, beside Dad, who twists his hands around the wheel and glances in the mirror. “Where do you want to drive to, Fred?” Fred doesn’t reply. He sits in the comer of the backseat, his arms folded. Dad waits, but it does no good. He turns in my direction instead and suddenly starts laughing. Then he goes out, fetches something from the trunk, and when he returns he has a large cushion with him, even bigger than the one he uses himself. “Here you are, Barnum. You want to see something yourself, don’t you?” He puts the cushion underneath me but it doesn’t make me any bigger. I get smaller; I’m not raised higher, instead I sink down into the red leather seat and Dad gives me a pat on the head. “Can you see fine now, Barnum?” I nod. All I do see is the edge of the dashboard and a sky that’s blue with fuzzy white stripes. Dad drives down to Majorstuen and turns right there, rolls back the top, keeps a hold of his hat, and continues up toward Holmonkollen and the woods. People on the sidewalks turn around after we pass and Dad delights in it each and every time. The breeze is warm and strong in my face. I have to close my eyes. I can see almost everything now. The sun fills every corner. An insect hits the windshield and gets stuck there. Dad wipes it away. But one wing remains. A car appears behind us. It’s a taxi. Dad changes gears and by the next bend it’s gone. “That was that,” he says, content. The road becomes steeper. We’re alone. Soon we can see the ski-jump tower and the blue lake below the jump. Dad brakes for a second and turns around. “You’ve driven here before, Fred. Do you remember?” Fred says nothing. Dad sighs, but it’s a good sigh. “That was a fine drive, even though it began raining.” He muses a bit. “That was when Mom fell for me, Barnum.” “Even though it began raining?” I ask. He laughs. “Then it was just a case of putting up the top and driving on indoors. Isn’t that right, Fred?” But Fred is still just silent. All sound has been turned off inside him. The taxi comes into view again, moving slowly “I think someone’s following us,” I murmur. “Now you’re fantasizing on a grand scale, Barnum,” Dad tells me. He glances quickly in the mirror and drives on; we don’t stop before we’ve reached the final bend. Once there, he rolls the car forward to the edge and it’s just as if we’ve parked on a cloud, and beneath us are the fjord, the city and the woods. Dad gets out and wipes away the sticky mark on the windshield. “Have a look in the glove compartment,” he says. I open the glove compartment. There’s a bottle of cola lying in there. Carefully I take it out. Dad has a bottle opener too, and takes off the top, has a long drink himself first before handing the bottle to Fred. But Fred doesn’t want any. He’s sitting in the corner of the backseat, his arms folded, and his hair has been blown back into a high wave. Dad gives the bottle to me instead; I take a gulp, and thereafter we’re quiet for a long while, and the blue, smooth skies slide away, driven by a mild breeze that makes the treetops tremble like torches. Dad lights a cigarette and leans back against the headrest. “Now we’re having a really fine time, right boys? Don’t you agree?” I’m the only one who answers, “Yes,” I tell him. Dad lays a hand on my shoulder. “It’s good when we men get little time alone, Barnum. Because we’ll never quite understand women.” “How much?” I ask. “How much what, Barnum?” “How much can we understand, Dad?” He drinks slowly from the bottle of cola and then gives it back to me. “Two percent,” he says. “And barely even that.” Fred clambers out and goes over to a tree to relieve himself. Dad goes on smoking. “Hasn’t he spoken to you either?” he whispers. “No, Dad.” I draw in the strong, blue smoke and feel a little dizzy. It’s good. Dad’s silent himself for a time. He presses the cigarette down in the ashtray between us. When he looks over to Fred, who’s still peeing behind the tree, I swipe the cigarette end. “How’s it going at school?” Dad asks. “I’m the smallest in the class.” “That doesn’t matter, does it?” “I wish I could be a bit bigger.” Dad gives a laugh. “I was the smallest too, Barnum. And look what’s become of me!” I didn’t quite know how to respond to that, whether it was meant as a comfort or a threat. “I see,” I whisper. We sit on our respective cushions. Dad’s stomach has just enough room behind the wheel. His thigh is soft and pushes against my knee. “Once upon a time I knew the world’s tallest man,” he tells me. “And he was none the happier for his height, Barnum. Just the opposite.” “How tall was he?” Dad smiles. “There was much debate about that. But he was so tall that he couldn’t reach down to his own shoes, Barnum.” I laugh. That must have been something, not being able to reach down to your own shoes. Dads face is covered by shadow. He closes his eyes and puts on his sunglasses. And then he says something hell repeat time and again in the few years that lie between him and his own death. “It’s not what you see that matters most, Barnum,” he says, “but what you think that you see.” Fred finally finishes and sits once more in the corner of the backseat. It’s just as if a breath of cold air comes with him, as if his silence freezes our teeth. “We’re sitting here talking about life,” Dad tells him. “What would you like to say about that, Fred?” But he gets no answer. Nor is there any point in waiting for one. Fred is switched off. Dad sighs again, but it’s a heavy sigh this time. “Aphasia,” he says. “Does it hurt, or do you not really notice it?” Immediately afterward he laughs. Fred doesn’t. There’s still not a sound from him, and Dad gives up. “Once upon a time I rowed alone over the Moskenes whirlpool,” he says instead. “And the currents there are the most powerful of them all. It’s like rowing in the devil’s eye.” Now I’m silent myself. “But I got across all the same, boys. And that’s what counts. Getting there.” “Where?” I ask delicately. Dad lets go of the wheel. “Here, for example. You’re my harbor.”

It’s then the two men appear. They come out of the woods. They stop for a moment, look around them, or else at each other, and then continue in our direction. They’re wearing dark clothes, and they keep in step with each other. I just manage to catch a glimpse of Dad as he’s about to turn the key in the ignition, but it’s too late. He lets go, pulls the cushion from beneath me and puts it instead on his own seat, draws himself up and turns toward the two men — one cushion taller than normal. “A lovely day,” he says in a loud voice. “Arnold Nilsen?” “Yes, the name sounds familiar.” The other man opens the door. “We want to have a chat with you,” he says. Dad just sits there. It’s as if he’s keeping himself together by clinging to the steering wheel. His face becomes devoid of expression. And so he goes off with them, and they disappear between the trees. I don’t know what’s going to happen. Only that it can’t be any good because I’d seen Dad’s face. I’m afraid in a different way. Now Fred
has
to say something. “Say something,” I hiss. But he doesn’t. Isn’t he afraid? I turn around. I can’t distinguish any change, except that there’s a hint of a smile there. His lips curl around his mouth. I grow even more afraid. Whatever happens, I mustn’t make a mess in my pants or start crying. If I pulled up the handbrake between the seats now, the car would roll out and perhaps it wouldn’t stop before it landed with its front wheels in the Oslo Fjord. I clasp the lever; it’s warm to the touch, and I can feel it trembling between my fingers. Now I can break all the traffic rules. I get goosebumps down both arms. Suddenly Fred knocks me in the back of the head. I feel so happy. I let go my hand and want to thank him. But there isn’t time for that. Dad’s coming back with the two others. He stops by the open door and looks down at us. His pants are filthy. He’s lost his hat. His hair is in a mess. He tries to laugh, but all he can do is make the attempt. “Think you’re going to have to get out of the car, boys,” he says. I go and stand beside him. Fred doesn’t move from the backseat. “Get out of the car,” Dad says again. Is Fred going to begin talking again now? Is it at this moment he’ll say something to make the men flee, to make us laugh, and to make everything be the way it was before? That’s what I hope. It’s this liberating moment I’m always waiting for. But it never comes. Fred is no less silent. He’s just dawdling. Dad bends inside the door. “Please,” he whispers. Fred shrugs his shoulders, as if all this is beginning to bore him, and finally gets out of the car. The two men shove Dad out of the way and get in. The one who hasn’t gotten behind the wheel tosses the cushions out and roars with laughter. Then they drive off. They drive off in Dad’s Buick and disappear around the bend. We’re left standing there. It’s incomprehensible. It’s that scorching smell of sun and gas. Dad goes back into the woods to find his hat. It’s dented. “The cushions,” he whispers. I pick them up. We start down toward the city. None of us says a word. Dad leads the way; his breathing is heavy and his neck is wet — he’s a black square in the hot light. I walk in the middle. I carry the cushions. And its as I walk, a heavy cushion in each hand, that I decide to stop eating. There’s nothing else for it. Why didn’t I think of it before? It’s so simple. If I don’t eat, then I’ll get taller. Instead of growing outward (just as Dad might have done over the years, pressed down by his own weight), I’ll stretch, thin and weightless — hunger will raise me aloft. Dad wants to go into a place called the Bakkekro. He buys a beer for himself there. But before he drinks it, he disappears to the bathroom. Fred and I sit at a table by the window. A decoration of faded flowers is between us on the table. I’m sitting on the cushions. Soon I won’t need them anymore. When Dad comes back he’s combed his hair, straightened his hat, polished his shoes and cleaned his pants. He looks more like himself again, and yet not quite. There’s a shadow under his eyes he can’t get rid of. “Do you boys want a sandwich?” he asks. “No, thank you,” I reply. I’ve already begun not eating. I imagine I can almost feel myself growing. Dad drinks the dark beer in one gulp and puts down the glass carefully once more, as if the smallest sound could destroy everything, or else the little that still remains that hasn’t been destroyed a long time ago. Dad looks at me. “We’re not going to say anything about this to Mom,” he whispers. I shake my head many times. Dad nods and turns abruptly to Fred. “And if you start talking again now, then you’ve chosen the wrong time to do so! Keep up your aphasia!” Then we go home. Mom’s waiting for us. “What a long time you’ve been,” she says. Dad takes the cushions from me, goes straight into the living room and lies down on the divan. Mom watches him go, amazed. Fred changes his shoes and goes off again. I’m the one left standing there. “Was it a good trip?” she asks. “Oh, yes, Mom.” I have to think so hard so as not to say anything silly, something I shouldn’t. I mustn’t say too much. “Where did you drive to?” “To the same place where you fell for Dad, Mom.” For a second she’s taken aback and has to stop and think herself. Then she comes closer. “The button wasn’t in your pencil case, Barnum.” She turns toward Dad, who’s lying on the divan with the cushions pillowing his head and with the newspaper over his face. The pages flutter. “What do you want with the button?” I inquire. “Wash your hands,” she tells me. She hurries out to the kitchen because there’s a smell of something burning. I go into our room and get out my pencil case. She’s right. The button isn’t there. Either I’ve lost it at school, or else I know who’s taken it. And a long while will pass and a good number of years skip by before that button shows up again, like a little wheel that’s rolled through our lives. “The food’s getting cold!” Mom shouts. Dads wasting time in the living room. I’m wasting time in my room. I stand against the door frame and lay my hand flat on my head, but my height’s just the same, even if I add my curls. But then I’ve only just begun to starve myself, and saying no thanks to one simple sandwich at the Bakkekro can’t be expected to add any great degree of height. More food than that is going to have to be refused. Mom gets impatient and shouts even more loudly We sit down at the kitchen table. It’s fishballs again. Both Fred’s and Boletta’s places are empty. Mom pours water into our glasses. “Where have you parked the car?” she asks. Dad chews slowly — no, he just breaks the fishballs between his teeth. “Boletta’s back at the North Pole, is she?” he asks. Mom doesn’t reply. Dad fills his mouth with more fishballs. “Do you really think she should be there at her age?” Mom’s brow grows rigid. “I asked you where you’d parked the car,” she says again. And it strikes me that neither of them answers the questions they’ve been asked, and reply instead by asking something else. I’ve never seen Dad like this before. He doesn’t even manage to laugh it off. His eyes are restive the whole time. “It’s at the garage,” he mumbles. Mom leans across the table. “What did you say?” “It’s at the garage, damn it!” Now he’s doing anything but mumbling. He shouts. Mom crumples slightly “The garage? Did you break down?” Dad glances at me, as if he’s stuck. “The handbrake was making a noise,” I say Mom shrugs her shoulders and passes the dish around. I pass it on. “Aren’t you eating, Barnum?” “We had a sandwich at the Bakkekro,” Dad says. “Just beside the garage.” There’s quiet for a while. It’s as if peace has descended on us once more. But it doesn’t last long. “Was the handbrake making a noise?” she asks. Dad can’t take any more. “Since when have you been so knowledgeable about cars?” he asks testily. “I never said I was.” “Well, shut up, then!” Mom puts down her knife and fork and just stares at him. His neck becomes a bow from which his head hangs low. “I shouldn’t have said that,” he whispers. “No, you shouldn’t have,” Mom says, and goes off into her bedroom and locks the door behind her. She doesn’t open it again until the following morning. Dad’s taken the whole night to work out what to say. “I’ve sold the car,” he tells her. Mom looks at him. Dad looks at me. Boletta gets up from the divan. Fred comes out from the bathroom. “Sold the car?” Mom breathes. Dad nods. Mom can’t believe her ears. “I thought we were going on a long drive this summer,” she says. Dad looks down. “Perhaps next summer, dear.” Mom slams the door and opens it again just as quickly. “Next summer? When I’ve promised Barnum we’d go this summer!” Dad turns to look at me. “It doesn’t matter,” I whisper. Dad gives a smile, his mouth heavy. “There you are,” he says. “But why did you sell the car?” Boletta asks him. Dad takes a deep breath. “Because we needed the money.” Mom stamps the floor and becomes enraged. “That’s a lie!” she shrieks. “You’re lying through your teeth!” Dad doesn’t know where to look or what to say. Instead he pretends to be deeply offended and that makes Mom all the angrier. I go between them. “It’s not what you see that matters most,” I say “but rather what you think that you see.” Dad lays his smooth, stiff hand in gratitude on my shoulder, but Mom just shakes her head and is mad for at least a month more. She goes out loudly to the kitchen and makes up a packed lunch for me, which I chuck in the nearest garbage can as soon as I know no one’s watching. In fact no one paid particular attention to the fact that I’d stopped eating, any more than they had noticed my muteness. But I held out longer. I starved in silence. Now I had my own aphasia, the aphasia of the stomach and the intestine. And I set to work on it with a will. If I got sweets from Esther, I’d hide the bag under a stone behind the broadcasting center. At the school cafeteria, I made as if to eat a sandwich with roe spread and some carrots, but I went to the bathroom afterward and vomited everything up again. At home I just passed the pots and dishes on and no one said a thing. I was invisible. Hunger made me see-through and hollow. Each evening I’d measure my height against the door frame but still couldn’t notice any change. My mark remained the same. My curly shortness remained rock solid. Growing is a slow process. And fortunately everyone had other things to think about. Mom was still livid because of the whole business about the car, and Dad did his level best to make her happy again — he bought flowers, was home each evening, cleaned the windows, said she was more lovely than ever — but it was all to no avail. Mom’s rage couldn’t simply be interrupted; it had to run its course until nothing more remained. Boletta drank her beer at the North Pole, and Fred was just taken up with his own silence. One evening I felt he looked at me with new eyes all the same, and I thought that perhaps he was going to say something — but no. I d lost several pounds. I wanted to trade them in for inches, but I was still waiting. To start with I became lethargic. I managed to get up all right in the mornings. Everything was focused on not eating. Hunger was my one thought. I had to go to the toilet a lot too. Something had to give soon. There was nothing to come out. It was like a piece of addition — it kept on increasing. Except that I still hadn’t gotten any taller. But I didn’t give up. I’ve never not eaten so much. I became a small shadow in the spring sunlight. No one saw my starvation until the moment I collapsed in Knuckles’ arms in Religious Education on the last Friday before the summer holidays and was carried down to the school doctor. I came to on a mattress there. Hunger was a strange song in my head. The doctor took in my thin, stubby body with large, worried eyes. “How long is it since you last ate?” he asked. “A long time,” I whispered. The school doctor shook his head. “But why not?” That I couldn’t answer. I couldn’t tell him the real reason. He wouldn’t have believed me. “Don’t know,” I replied quietly. The doctor placed a finger on my wrist and counted out loud. “Do you get food at home?” he asked when the counting was done. It was now that I gave the wrong answer. I knew it as soon as the words were out. The lie was born in my mouth, and that lie would leave its own trail of consequences in its wake. “Not much,” I answered. The school doctor glanced at the nurse, who stood by the door with her arms folded. She phoned Mom right away. I was weighed and was allowed to get dressed again. Mom came within the hour. First she had to have a long talk with the school doctor and the head teacher. I was waiting on the mattress. The nurse kept an eye on me. Did she really think I was going to run away? Not a chance — she could be more than certain of that. I didn’t have the strength. I barely managed to lift my hand to scratch my nose. “So you don’t get fed at home?” she said. I wanted to say something, that that wasn’t true, that our table was positively groaning with food — fishballs, chops, stew, cauliflower soup and pickled gherkins. But then Mom appeared from the office — hunched, red-faced, bowed with shame. Not only did she have a son with aphasia, but she had another son who was both short and malnourished. But suddenly she straightened up and blew back the hair from her brow, and her eyes became clear and strong. “What did we have for dinner yesterday Barnum?” “Leftovers,” I whispered. Then she took my hand and left with me. But by the time we got to the park she couldn’t take any more; she sat down on a bench and began crying. “How could you say that? That you didn’t get fed?” “I didn’t mean to,” I murmured. Mom wrung her hands. “What is it I’ve done wrong?” she sobbed. I went closer. “You haven’t done anything wrong, Mom.” She looked up and it was just as if she first noticed at that moment how thin I’d grown. She hugged me, felt my ribs like the frame of an abacus under my shirt and cried even more. “What are we to do with you, Barnum?” She’d find out soon enough. A letter came to Mom and Dad from the school doctor. I was to be sent to a farm for twelve days to be fattened up. Now it was Dad’s turn to become livid. He banged the table and refused point blank, but they had no choice. I’ll say no more at this stage; I’ll just say Weir Mitchel’s Remedy, and that it was Mom who took me to the train. I had with me a rucksack with clothes, toothpaste and a ruler; and I was met at Dal station by the farmer himself, and driven in a truck to the farm by Lake Hurdal. I could see the lake in the evening from my room. Fish floated there in the moonlight. The farmer had a wife with large hands. There were two other boys there too. I was thinner than they were. When I came home, I was a butterball. But before school started up again I was myself once more, neither taller nor smaller, neither more nor less — I was Barnum once and for all, as if nothing had happened, as if Weir Mitchel’s Remedy in Hurdal had been but a dream. I was called in to see the school doctor, and he examined everything from my bum to my back teeth and pronounced that I’d improved, that the Remedy had been a success; the fat was plentifully distributed over my body, and the intestinal pistons were working so well they were a joy to behold. “Was it fun to be on the farm?” the school doctor asked. I couldn’t answer. I just nodded. Mom and Dad