He said he could spare a few minutes and I followed him inside. I don’t know what I expected but I was surprised by the shining wooden floors and thick rugs and stuffed sofas. An interesting form of the subjunctive is not something you can bring back as a trophy but still this was not what I had expected.
We went into a room with a black and white marble floor and a pale yellow sofa and he gestured to the sofa and said again What do you want.
I looked into that face of stone and knew I was about to die. He would see instantly through the lie and be filled with contempt. I thought of him walking across China with the boy, and walking across Kazakhstan with a tiny band of men; it was cheap and contemptible to play a trick on someone like that. I should make some excuse and leave.
Kambei tells Rikichi to call a samurai to a fight. He sits inside waiting. He tells Katsushiro to stand just inside the door with a stick. A good samurai will parry the blow.
I thought that if I were a coward I really would be my father’s son.
I said: I wanted to see you because I’m your son.
You’re my—
I was dead.
Eyes like the burnished blade of a sword blazed in his hard face. I was dead.
His mouth tightened. I was dead.
At last he spoke.
How the hell did that happen? he said irritably. She told me she had everything taken care of.
She forgot that she’d taken the pill a day late the day before, I said truthfully. I couldn’t believe this was happening.
Women! he said contemptuously. You must be older than you look, it can’t have been later than 83 which would make you—
13 and 10 months, I said. I look young for my age.
Well, and so tell me about yourself, he said heartily. Where do you go to school? What are your interests?
I don’t go to school, I said. I study at home.
I was about to explain that I already knew Greek, French, Hebrew, Arabic, Japanese, Spanish, Russian and some Latin (in no particular order), plus a smattering of 17 or 18 others, when he exploded.
Oh my GOD! he exclaimed in horror. What is the stupid woman thinking of? Do you know ANYTHING? What’s 6 × 7?
What do you mean? I asked cautiously. I hadn’t done much on philosophy of number yet.
Oh—my—God.
He began pacing up and down the room, with a heavy-footed, slightly lame step—I remembered that he had covered thousands of miles on foot. He said: We’ve got to get you into a school pronto, my young friend. He said: Don’t get any ideas. I couldn’t possibly stump up school fees. He said: I hear some of the state schools aren’t bad. He said: My God, I knew the whole times table up to 12 by the time I was 6.
I’d known the times table up to 20 by the time I was 4, but I was too disgusted to say so. I said: Oh, you mean you wanted to know the product of 6 and 7.
What did you think I meant? he asked.
I don’t know, that’s why I asked what you meant, I said.
You’ll soon get that sort of nonsense knocked out of you at school, he said.
I said I had always heard that logical thought was discouraged in schools. I could not believe someone so stupid had been to find the lost silent tribe; no wonder they hadn’t wanted to talk to him.
He kept shooting me fierce glances out of narrowed eyes as he stumped up and down. What’s the capital of Peru? he said abruptly.
Oh, does it have a capital? I said.
Oh—my—God.
Madrid? I said. Barcelona? Kiev?
What is the country coming to?
Buenos Aires! I said. Santiago! Cartagena—no that’s Brazil isn’t it don’t tell me I’ll have it in a minute it isn’t, it wouldn’t be Acapulco would it no forget I said that it’s on the tip of my tongue don’t tell me it’s coming ancient holy city of the Zincas Casablanca.
He said: Lima.
I said: I thought Casablanca didn’t sound quite right, ask me another one.
He said I must give him my mother’s phone number and he would have a word with her.
I said I would rather not.
He said: What you want is neither here nor there.
I wanted to get this over. I hadn’t come for money but I had to say something so I said: Look, I really didn’t come here to discuss my education. I know the product of 7 and 6 is 42, and 13 × 17 is 221 and 18 × 19 is 342 and I know the binomial theorem and I know
is the Bernoulli equation for inviscid incompressible irrotational flow. I plan to learn to work as a member of a team when the other members of the team are out of their teens. My mother doesn’t know I came here, she didn’t want you to be bothered. But she’s going insane at her work. I want to buy a mule and go down the Andes. I thought you might help.
The last thing I wanted was to be alone in the Transural with this lunatic. I also couldn’t see myself confiding my ambition to go to Oxford at the age of 11. But I had to say something.
Go down the Andes on a mule? That doesn’t sound very in character, he said. Are you sure this isn’t something you want?
Yes it’s something I want, I said.
Well, the best piece of advice I can give you is never rely on anyone but yourself for anything you want out of life, he said. Everything I’ve got I’ve got by my own efforts. You don’t grow up by having people hand you things on a platter.
By the time I grow up it may be too late, I said.
You’ve got your whole life ahead of you, he said, and he stopped pacing to stand beside me. One hand gripped the back of the sofa; I saw that a finger was missing. He’d probably offered a piece of advice to a member of the Lost Silent Tribe.
That’s what worries me, I said.
Well there’s nothing I can do, he said. Nobody ever did anything for me and it never did me any harm. It made me what I am today.
I was glad we weren’t fighting with real swords. If we had been this might have killed me. I said I would bear that in mind.
He said: I’ve got a son already. He’d be older than you are if he’s still alive. Not by much, but he’s already a man—they grow up fast.
He said: When a boy reaches 12 he goes through an initiation ceremony. He’s stripped to the waist and flogged—not a lot, just five or six welts to make the back bleed. Then he’s tied up. There’s a beastly stinging fly that’s attracted by blood—of course they gather. If the boy cries out he gets another lash. It’s over when he’s been silent for a day. You’ll see them stretched out, backs solid with the feeding flies—sometimes they’re unconscious for the last 12 hours or so, sometimes the father will slap a boy awake to make sure they don’t get off lightly. It’s hard to be a man there.
I said: Yeah, I hear they don’t even use case endings.
He said: Who told you that?
It’s in the book, I said.
No it’s not in the book, he said.
I heard it somewhere, I said.
She must have told you. I don’t suppose she told you how I found out.
He grinned at me; his teeth were yellow and brown beneath the moustache.
She said you hid behind a tent, I said.
I tried that, he said. I got nowhere. Then one day the mother of the boy came to me. She’d sold him again to some traders—they don’t like impure blood in the tribe. But she was curious all the same—that’s what had got her in trouble the first time. She couldn’t stay away. I got her to teach me a few words and one thing led to another. The women spat at her and pulled her hair when they found out. Anyway we’d lie about in the grass and I’d copy something she’d said and she’d slap me or laugh at me for copying her. Then I overheard a couple of men talking to each other and realised what was going on. I laughed till I cried. Then she got pregnant. She made me leave. Probably sold the little bastard to the Chinese. If so he won’t have been initiated, he said, and he grinned, and he said, If these things happen to anyone why shouldn’t they happen to my son?