All I had to do was turn them words around. "Life," I said. "I got that right, didn't I?"
"It isn't a matter of getting things right or wrong. But that's very interesting how you couple life and death, death and fife. You have real depths in you, Toby. You have the concept that the Chinese call yang and yin— the pairing of good and evil, light and dark, life and death. Fascinating! Now let's take the word girl."
"Bother." "Oh Toby, shame on you. I hope you don't think of all girls as a bother."
Well, she had told me not to explain things to her, so I warn't going to tell her I didn't think of girls as a bother. The way the bother come into it was if I got too close to girls and got bothered and had to use the times table. "I better not say on account of you told me not to explain," I said.
"That's right. Now let's see what you do with this word. Kiss."
"Snook."
"How intriguing! You snook a kiss. I suppose it's another way of saying snuck a kiss or sneaked a kiss."
It warn't exactly that, because what I had thought of was kissing Holly and having that big old snook on the cane pole, but like Miss Claypoole said, I warn't down as deep in my mind as she was.
"Toby, here's the next. Birds."
"Bees."
"Ah yes. Living the way you do, all nature is one. Try this word. Help."
"Help," I said.
"No, Toby, you mustn't just repeat my word. You have to tell me the first word that comes into your mind after I say help."
What had come into my mind was that when a person yells help they are likely to yell help, help, on account of folks is more likely to hear them. "All I can say is the first word that come into my mind after you said help was help." "Very well, Toby. Here's the next word. Fight."
"Team," I said, like in fight team fight.
"Steal," she said.
"Home," I said, like you would steal home in baseball.
"Kill," she said.
"Empire," I said, because when you're thinking about stealing home in baseball and somebody says kill, you think right away about killing the empire who has maybe called your feller out stealing home.
"Honest," Miss Claypoole said.
"Try," I said, on account of I try to be honest even if I do slip now and then.
"The next word is wrong."
"Done," I said, because there are lots of times I done wrong and knowed it.
"Thrifty," she said.
Right after thrifty in the Boy Scout laws is brave— trustworthy, loyal, helpful, friendly, courteous, kind, obedient, cheerful, thrifty, brave, clean and reverent. So I said, "Brave."
"Kidnap," she said.
"Them twins," I said, thinking of how them kids take naps.
"Oh dear," she said, "I'm afraid there's some of what we call wish-fulfillment in that response, Toby. You don't like the twins much, and sometimes you think it would be a relief if they were kidnapped."
"Well," I said, "I am mighty sorry to hear that. I already like them little imps pretty good but I will try to like them even better."
"I'm afraid you can't help any of your deep-down feelings, Toby. Now here's the last word on my list. Sex."
"One times one is one," I said. "One times two is two. One—"
"What a fascinating concept! Simple and primitive, but really quite beautiful. You may not realize it, but what you're doing is expressing the realization that when there is only one person or one of any species, sex is a sterile thing that can't produce anything more than the original number, one, that we started with. But as soon as there are two, sex becomes productive."
"Yes ma'am," I said. "And that is something a person has to watch out for."
"Oh, Toby, don't spoil the poetry of it. Now you're giving me a Conscious-Outer Level response. Your one times one is one response came from deep in your Unconscious-Unrecognized. Well, that's the end of my list, and I've never had such remarkable pairings of words. Do you mind if I read them over and make notes, while everything is fresh in my mind?"
"You go right ahead," I said. "And maybe you wouldn't mind telling me afterward if I done good or not."
She went to work on them words and I never seen anybody work harder. She made notes and scratched them out, and chewed on the end of her pencil, and tried to fit them words together different ways like a person doing a jigsaw puzzle.
Finally she said, "I think I have it, although it's just a preliminary diagnosis, and I'll have to check it over more carefully later."
"Well," I said, "I hope I passed."
"It isn't a matter of passing or not passing. What I have is a sort of profile of your motivations."
"I hope you're going to tell me about them so I'll know what I am like too."
"Some of them might upset you, Toby."
"Maybe if I know, I can do better next time."
"All right," she said. "Now in some ways you have very simple and direct motivations. The word eat merely means food to you. School means playing football. Your reaction to a hurt is to say ow."
"I would say I done good on them."
"As far as the outside world is concerned, you have the Kwimper family trait of setting up high barriers. To the word friend, you react with the word can't. You can't let anyone cross the barrier and make friends with you. The government, however, gets admitted to the family enclave as a sort of father-image, because when I said government you said Pop. Then there are the family traits of hostility to royalty, dating back to the Revolution or earlier. You equate king with the democratic word mister. The king's empire should be killed or, in other words, broken up. When any dispute comes up with the outside world, the family fights as a team or clan against the invaders."
"Well," I said, "if you hadn't told me I wouldn't have knowed hardly none of this, and it is really something how you work them things out."
"Now," she said, looking at me and giving my hand a pat, "we have some upsetting things about you, Toby. I hope you won't take them too hard. Most of them are the result of heredity, and you can't be expected to do anything about that. For example, when I said steal you said home, and I'm afraid that means some of the Kwimpers aren't very honest. But you want to be different, because when I said honest you said try, meaning that you really intend to do better. Your resolution isn't very firm, however, because your reaction to the word wrong is the word done. Something was wrong, but it's done, so you want to put it out of your mind and forget it. You wish the twins were out of the way, but your urge to get rid of them is inhibited by guilt feelings, so you wish somebody would kidnap them so that you wouldn't have to feel guilty. Deep down you are very self-centered. If a person calls for help, all you feel like doing is to repeat the call, and pass the responsibility for a rescue on to someone else. I had a little trouble with that thrifty-brave pairing until I realized that it must go with the help-help pairing. You can be brave, but not in any foolhardy way. You are restrained and thrifty about being brave."
"You have really got that thrifty-brave thing down right, although I don't know how you done it," I said. "But I don't feel too bad about that because I reckon there is a lot of folks that are thrifty about being brave. But some of them other things you said I don't feel good about, and I will just have to try harder."
"Poor Toby," she said, patting me again. "It really isn't your fault at all. Now we have some nicer things. You are very shy about girls, and try to pretend you aren't by thinking of them as a bother. But really you like girls very much and wouldn't mind snooking or sneaking a kiss if you had a chance."
"I hadn't thought of it that way, but them kisses that is tied up with snook is really something."
"Finally," she said, "we have those delightful and surprisingly poetic depths that I uncovered in you. The oneness of nature idea expressed in the birds-bees pairing. The yang and yin concept we find in life-death and death-life. And then the simple but perfect philosophy of sex embodied in the one times one is one thought. I'm really quite pleased with you, Toby."
"Miss
Claypoole," I said, "that is real nice of you because some folks wouldn't want nothing to do with a feller that turns out the way I done."
"I'd like you to call me Alicia."
"Yes ma'am. I'll practice on it and see if it comes out easy."
"Are you tired after that long test, Toby? Why don't you stretch out on the blanket, with your head on this pillow, and relax."
I told her I warn't really tired but she had it that I was, so I stretched out, and she set beside me and run her hand over my forehead to make me feel better. It was right nice and I was near about ready to take a nap, but she said I shouldn't be that tired and ought to stay awake which I done. Then she said she thought she would relax a little, too, and reached up and unfastened her hair. It was real pretty hair when it warn't yanked back into a knot, and it come down all bright and sunny past her shoulders.
She took off her heavy tortoise-shell glasses and bent over me and said, "Do you like me this way, Toby?"
"Yes ma'am," I said. "Only now I wouldn't take you for no County Welfare Supervisor but more like one of them close-ups in the movies where the girl comes floating at you all misty and soft."
"You may run your hand through my hair, if you like."
I reached up and started to run my hand through her hair, and it was real nice and silky, but some way my fingers got tangled in it. So when I started combing my fingers down through it, that pulled her head down too, and all of a sudden there we both was together in a kind of bright silky cave that her hair made around our faces. Well, with my head lying on the pillow like it was, there warn't no place I could have gone if I had wanted, and before either of us knowed what was happening I reckon you would have to admit we was kissing each other. It is good I can hold my breath two-three minutes under water because it come in handy.
After a while she got my hand untangled from her hair and raised her head a little and said, "Maybe I shouldn't have asked you what word came to your mind when I said kiss. Because I'm afraid you did sneak a kiss from me, Toby."
"Well," I said, "I am sorry about it, and I reckon you won't want to give me no more tests after this."
"Do you like having me give you tests, Toby?"
"Mostly I do. But right now you are giving me a test you don't know about, because the top button of your shirt has come undone and I am not doing too good trying to keep looking at your face."
"Oh dear. And I don't have very much on underneath, either."
"Yes ma'am. I wish I could say that come as a surprise to me but I'm afraid it don't."
"Oh, Toby, you're cute," she said, and giggled and bent and gave her nose a little rub against mine. "I'll button it again," she said, "and while I do, I'll keep my face down here close so you can't be bad and watch. Now I've almost got it and . . . Oh dear! My fingers are so stiff from taking notes that I can't get it buttoned. Do you think you could do it for me?"
I never had no practice buttoning up girls, so maybe that explains why I didn't do very good when I give it a try. One of the troubles was I started out by working on the wrong button. "Miss Claypoole," I said, "I hate to tell you this, but I think instead of buttoning that top one, I got the next one unbuttoned."
"Not Miss Claypoole. Alicia."
"Alicia," I said, "either you didn't hear what I said or it didn't upset you the way it had ought."
She was still bent over me so both of us was in that silky tent of her hair. "I have no right to get upset when I know your intentions are good," she said. "You'll just have to try harder." She said the words right against my mouth.
Well, I give it another try, and it was about the saddest try I ever made at anything. I kept close track of my fingers as they hunted for that button, and dog me if they didn't act like they had minds of their own and warn't taking no back talk from me. They went diving down there like they was after a fumbled football, and grabbed a button that was perfectly all right and flipped it out of the buttonhole as neat as you please. It was a kind of shocking thing, like trying to run a football team widi everybody calling different signals.
"Alicia," I said, "things are getting worse, and you could almost say my fingers has taken things into their own hands. Another button just went."
"Oh dear," she said. "What will we do about it?"
There was only one thing to do and that was to get my hands out of there, because they was already picking up bits of information I hadn't asked them for, like the fact that Miss Claypoole or Alicia as she would rather have me say was really built along pin-up lines. But I didn't know what to do with my hands. If I put them back of my head they wouldn't get in no trouble but maybe Alicia's hands might, on account of it felt like she was counting my ribs to see if they was all there and if she found one missing I didn't want her to go looking for it. So what I done was maybe the wrong thing but it was all I could figure out right then. I pulled her hands down to her sides and I am sorry to say we ended up stretched out side by side and with her in my arms.
"Oh Toby," she whispered, "you may be a primitive but you're such a beautiful primitive. Isn't it nice to be here together and not be one times one is one?"
She couldn't have done anything handier for me than start me off on the times table, on account of I had been getting so bothered I hadn't even been able to think of it. So I lay there holding her so she couldn't move, and started through it. Up to four times five I was getting along good and in a few more I would have been real calm, but she done a little wriggling in my arms and I clean forgot what come after four times five is twenty. I lay there saying to myself what comes after four times five, and I was kind of losing ground.
"Toby," she said, "are you sick or anything?"
"Six!" I said. "That's the one! Four times six is twenty- four!"
I felt so good about getting it that it warn't no trouble at all to get untangled and jump up and run down into the water for a good swim. While I was paddling around out there, Alicia called to me she would come in too if I didn't mind her not having no bathing suit, but I called back there was a couple sharks out near me and I warn't sure she could outswim them like I could. So she didn't come in after all. When I finally come ashore, she was all dressed proper and acted pretty cool and we drove back home without nothing more happening.
11
ALL through August Miss Claypoole come to see us two-three times a week, but she didn't get much out of it. The twins run out of things they could dream up for her. Pop wouldn't gossip about the Kwimpers. I didn't want to go off on no more trips with her to make tests.
"The trouble is," Miss Claypoole said, when we was setting on the porch one day, "as far as my research is concerned, this is a hostile environment."
"If them twins has been talking back to you," I said, "I will give them a piece of my mind, and I will give it to them with my hand on the seat of their pants."
"Oh no, Toby. Children mustn't be spanked. It's likely to give them repressions. And anyway I wasn't talking just about the twins. The whole spirit here is one of non- cooperation with any and all representatives of the government."
"Well, Pop helped out the government for years and years, and then it turned agin him."
"Oh, that was really just Arthur King. I admit he took the wrong tack with you. Those planned economy people always try to order everybody around. In Public Welfare we know you have to win trust and cooperation. I have
a very interesting idea I want to propose to your father. Do you think you can find him for me?"
I had heard hammering a while before, so I went around to the side of the shack and found Pop building a walk-way to the rest room, so we wouldn't have to go down steps from the shack and climb steps to the rest room. I told Pop Miss Claypoole wanted to talk to him.
Pop said, "It won't do no good for her to ask me again if many Kwimper girls has babies before they get married, because I look on that as a private thing between the girl and the feller she is not yet married to."
I told him this was something else, so he left off his wor
k and come around to the porch.
Miss Claypoole give Pop one of them smiles of hers where it looks like she is getting ready to brush her teeth, and said, "Mr. Kwimper, how would you like to start receiving Aid to Dependent Children again, for the twins?"
"Well," Pop said, "me and the government is on the outs, so it ain't a matter of would I like or wouldn't I like. If the government comes around and says it is sorry and can't me and it get together, I wouldn't want to be highhanded and tell it to clear out. But I wouldn't promise to help the government by taking Aid to Dependent Children again."
"I quite understand," Miss Claypoole said. "You have your pride, and I don't blame you for it. Now suppose, in addition to Aid to Dependent Children, you were also offered General Assistance, or what is popularly called relief, for yourself? How would you react to that?" "I might start feeling a little more friendly toward the government."
"And on top of that," Miss Claypoole said, "suppose that arrangements could also be made to reinstate Toby's Disability payments from the Veterans Administration?"
Pop said, "There ain't much point in supposing all this, is there?"
"Under certain circumstances," Miss Claypoole said, "I can arrange these things."
Pop looked at her like she had offered him two five- dollar bills for a quarter, and said, "I'd admire to know why."
"Mr. Kwimper, I'm County Welfare Supervisor. It worries me to see a fine family like yours living here from hand to mouth and working your hearts out."
Pop said, "Four months ago I would have worried right along with you, but it has turned out to be more fun than you would think and pretty good on the pay. How much money did we make last week, Toby?"
"Near about forty dollars, Pop. And we got more than a hundred in the bank and we been making payments right along on that loan the bank give us."
"But suppose a hurricane comes along and wipes you out? Or suppose we have another red tide that kills most of the fish? Or suppose you have a long spell of sickness? Hundreds of things could go wrong, couldn't they?"
Pop said, "I reckon they could. I reckon hundreds of things could go right, too."
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