by Flynn
One of the kids said, "How many times does it flap its wings in a minute?"
"Must be millions," said another kid.
Anna dashed indoors humming a low-pitched hum. I was sitting on the doorstep. With a few quick prods at the piano she had identified the note, her hum, and the drone of the bee. Coming to the door again, she said, "Can I have your slip stick?" In a moment or two she shouted out, "A bee flaps its wings such-and-such times a second." Nobody believed her, but she was only a few counts out.
Every sound that could be captured was captured. Meals began to be punctuated with such remarks as, "Do you know a mosquito flaps its wings so many times a second?" or, "a fly, so many times a second?"
All these games led inevitably to making music. Each separate note had by this time been examined minutely, and a sound depended on how many times it wiggled per second. Soon she was making little melodies to which I added the harmonies. Little pieces of music entitled "Mummy," "Mr. Jether's Dance," and "Laughter" soon began to echo around the house. Anna had begun to compose. I suppose Anna only had one problem in her little life—the lack of hours per day. There was too much to do, too many exciting things to find out.
Another of Anna's magic carpets was the microscope. It revealed .a little world made big. A world of intricate shape and pattern, a world of creatures too small to see with the naked eye; even the very dirt itself was wonderful.
Before all this adventuring into these hidden worlds, Mister God had been Anna's friend and companion, but now, well this was going a bit too far. If Mister God had done all this, he was something larger than Anna had bargained for. It needed a bit of thinking about. For the next few weeks, activity slowed down; she still played with the other children in the street; she was still as sweet and exciting as ever; but she became more inward-looking, more inclined to sit alone, high in the tree in the yard, with only Bossy as her companion. Whichever way she looked there seemed to be more and more of everything.
During these few weeks Anna slowly took stock of all she knew, walking about gently touching things as if looking for some clue that she had missed. She didn't talk much in this period. In reply to questions, she answered as simply as she could, apologizing for her absence by the gentlest of smiles, saying without words, "I'm sorry about all this. I'll be back as soon as I've sorted this little puzzle out." Finally the whole thing came to a head.
She turned to me. "Can I come to bed with you tonight?" she asked. I nodded.
"Now," she replied.
She hopped off my lap, took my hand, and pulled me to the door. I went.
I haven't told you Anna's way of solving problems, have I? If Anna was confronted with a situation that didn't come out easily, there was only one thing to do —take your clothes off. So there we were in bed, the streetlamp lighting up the room, her head cupped in. her hands, and both elbows firmly planted on my chest. I waited. She chose to remain like that for about ten minutes, getting her argument in its proper order, and then she launched forth. "Mister God made everything, didn't he?"
There was no point in saying that I didn't really know. I said "Yes."
"Even the dirt and the stars and the animals and the people and the trees and everything, and the polly-wogs?" The pollywogs were those little creatures that we had seen under the microscope.
I said, "Yes, he made everything."
She nodded her agreement. "Does Mister God love us truly?"
"Sure thing," I said. "Mister God loves everything."
"Oh," she said. "Well then, why does he let things get hurt and dead?" Her voice sounded as if she felt she had betrayed a sacred trust, but the question had been thought and it had to be spoken.
"I don't know," I replied. "There're a great many things about Mister God that we don't know about."
"Well then," she continued, "if we don't know many things about Mister God, how do we know he loves us?"
I could see that this was going to be one of those times, but thank goodness she didn't expect an answer to her question, for she hurried on: "Them pollywogs, I could love them till I bust, but they wouldn't know, would they? I'm million times bigger than they are and Mister God is million times bigger than me, so how do I know what Mister God does?"
She was silent for a little while. Later I thought that at this moment she was taking her last look at babyhood. Then she went on.
"Fynn, Mister God doesn't love us." She hesitated. "He doesn't really, you know, only people can love. I love Bossy, but Bossy don't love me. I love the pollywogs, but they don't love me. I love you, Fynn, and you love me, don't you?"
I tightened my arm about her.
"You love me because you are people. I love Mister God truly, but he don't love me."
It sounded to me like a death knell. "Damn and blast," I thought. "Why does this have to happen to people? Now she's lost everything." But I was wrong.
She had got both feet planted firmly on the next stepping-stone.
"No," she went on, "no, he don't love me, not like you do, it's different, it's millions of times bigger."
I must have made some movement or noise, for she levered herself upright and sat on her haunches and giggled. Then she launched herself at me and undid my little pang of hurt, cut out the useless spark of jealousy with the delicate sureness of a surgeon.
"Fynn, you can love better than any people that ever was, and so can I, can't I? But Mister God is different. You see, Fynn, people can only love outside and can only kiss outside, but Mister God can love you right inside, and Mister God can kiss you right inside, so it's different. Mister God ain't like us; we are a little bit like Mister God, but not much yet."
It seemed to me to reduce itself to the fact that we were like God because of some similarities, but God was not like us because of our differences. Her inner fires had refined her ideas, and like some alchemist she had turned lead into gold. Gone were all the human definitions of God, like Goodness, Mercy, Love, and Justice, for these were merely props to describe the indescribable.
"You see, Fynn, Mister God is different from us because he can finish things and we can't. I can't finish ■ loving you because I shall be dead millions of years before I can finish, but Mister God can finish loving you, and so it's not the same kind of love, is it? Even Mister Jether's love is not the same as Mister God's because he only came here to make us remember."
The first salvo was enough for me; it all needed a bit of thinking about, but I wasn't going to be spared the rest of her artillery.
"Fynn, why do people have fights and wars and things?"
I explained to the best of my ability.
"Fynn, what is the word for when you see it in a different way?"
After a minute or two scrabbling about, the precise
phrase she wanted was dredged out of me, the phrase, point of view.
"Fynn, that's the difference. You see, everybody has got a point of view, but Mister God hasn't. Mister God has only points to view."
At this moment my one desire was to get up and go for a long, long walk. What was this child up to? What had she done? In the first place, God could finish things off, I couldn't. I'll accept that, but what did it mean? It seemed to me that she had taken the whole idea of God outside the limitation of time and placed him firmly in the realm of eternity.
What about this difference between a point of view and points to view? This stumped me, but a little further questioning cleared up the mystery. Points to view was a clumsy term. She meant viewing points. The second salvo had been fired. Humanity in general had an infinite number of points of view, whereas Mister God had an infinite number of viewing points. When I put it to her this way and asked her if that was what she meant, she nodded her agreement and then waited to see if I enjoyed the taste. Let me see now. Humanity has an infinite number of points of view. God has an infinite number of viewing points. That means that —God is everywhere. I jumped.
Anna burst into peals of laughter. "You see," she said, "you see?" I did, too.
Another fifteen minutes or so were spent in polishing up these arguments and then, with an "Isn't it lovely?" she kissed me and tucked herself under my arm, ready for sleep.
About ten minutes later: "Fynn?"
"Fynn, you know that book about four dimensions?"
"Yes, what about it?"
"I know where number four is; it goes inside me."
I'd had enough for that night, and said with all the
firmness and authority I could muster, "Go to sleep
now. That's enough talking for tonight. Go to sleep or
I'll paddle your bottom."
She made a little screech, looked at me, and grinned and squirmed in closer to me. "You wouldn't!" she said sleepily.
Anna's first summer with us was days of adventures and visits. We visited Southend-on-Sea, Kew Gardens, the Kensington Museum, and a thousand other places, most times alone, but sometimes with a gang of other kids. Our first excursion outside the East End was "up the other end." For anyone not familiar with that term, it simply means west of Aldgate pump.
On this occasion she was dressed in a tartan skirt with shirtblouse, a black tammy, black shoes with large shiny buckles, and tartan socks. The shirt was tightly pleated so that a twirl produced a parachutelike effect. Anna walked like a pro, jumped like Bambi, flew like a bird, and balanced like a daring tightrope walker on the curbs. Anna copied her walk from Millie, who was a pro—head held high, the slight sway of body making her skirts swing, a smile on her face, a twinkle in her eye—and you were defenseless. People looked and people smiled. Anna was a burst of sunlight after weeks of gloom. Of course people smiled, they couldn't help it. Anna was completely aware of these glances from passersby, occasionally turning her head to look at me with a big, big grin of pleasure. Danny said she never walked, she made a royal progress. Her progress was halted from time to time by her subjects: stray pussies, dogs, pigeons, and horses, to say nothing of postmen, milkmen, bus conductors, and policemen.
As we walked west of Aldgate pump the buildings got grander and bigger and Anna's mouth opened further and further. She walked round and round in small circles, she walked backward, sideways, and every way. Finally she stopped in bewilderment, rugged at my sleeve, and asked, "Does kings and queens live in them and are they all palaces?"
She didn't find the Bank of England very impressive, nor for that matter, St. Paul's; the pigeons won hands down. After a little talk we decided to go into the service. She was very uncomfortable, fidgeting about the whole while. As soon as the service was over we hurried outside and made straight for the pigeons. She sat on the pavement and fed them with great pleasure. I stood a few paces off and just watched her. Her eyes flicked from place to place: at the doors of the cathedral, the passersby, the traffic, and the pigeons. Occasionally she tossed her head in disapproval of something. I looked about me to see what it was that affected her so much. There was nothing that I could see which would account for her mood.
After some months I could now read her distress signal accurately. That sharp little toss of the head wasn't a good sign. To me, it always looked as if she was trying to dislodge some unpleasant thought in the same way that one might shake a money box to get the coins out.
I went over to her and stood waiting. Most times just being near her was all the trigger she needed. The move toward her wasn't in order to give her counsel. Long ago I had given that up. Her reply to the question, "What's up, Tich?" was invariably the same: "I can get it, I think." On those occasions when she couldn't get the answers, then and only then would she ask questions. No, my reason for moving over to her was simply that my ears were at the ready if she needed them. She didn't, and that was a very bad sign.
From St. Paul's we moved off toward Hyde Park. After all these months I was beginning to be rather proud of the fact that more and more I was learning to think along with Anna. I was beginning to understand the way she thought and the way she said things.
This particular afternoon I had forgotten, no, not forgotten, hadn't realized one simple fact. It was this: up to now Anna's visual horizon had been one of houses, factories, cranes, and a toppling inward of structure. Suddenly there were the open, and to her, the very open spaces of the park. I wasn't ready for her reaction. She took one look, buried her face in my stomach, grabbed me with both hands, and howled. I picked her up and she clung to me like a limpet, arms tight around my neck, and legs around my waist, sobbing into my neck. I made all the appropriate noises, but this didn't help much.
After a few minutes she took a sneaky look over her shoulder and stopped crying.
I said, "Want to go home, Tich?" and she shook her head.
"You can put me down now," she said. I think I had expected her to give one whoop and gallop off across the grass. A couple of hearty sniffs and a moment or two to gain her composure, and we started off to explore the park, but she held on to my hand very tightly. Like any other child, Anna had her fears, but unlike most children, she recognized them. And with this recognition came the realization that she could go on in spite of them.
How can any adult know the exact weight of that fright? Does it mean that the child is timid, alarmed, anxious, petrified, or frozen stiff with terror? Is a ten-headed monster more frightening than an idea? If she hadn't exactly mastered her fear, whatever it was, she had got it well under control. By now she was prepared to let go of my hand, to make a little sortie after something that interested her, always looking back to make sure I was there. So I stopped in my tracks and waited for her. She was still a little bit scared and she knew that I was aware that she was scared too. The fact that I stopped whenever she let go of my hand brought forth a grateful little smile of acknowledgement.
My mind flipped back to the time when I was her age. My mother and father had taken me to South-end-on-Sea. The sight of the sea and the press of all those people was like being hit by a bus. I had been holding my father's hand when I first had a sight of the sea, and then, suddenly, I was holding a stranger's hand. I can't remember very much except that then and there the world came to an end. So I did have some inkling of her fears, whatever they were.
Her little explorations were slowly bringing things back to normal. She'd return with her usual treasures, different-shaped leaves, stone, bits of twigs, etc. Her enthusiasm could not be restrained any longer.
Suddenly I heard the gruff shout of a park keeper. I turned, and there she was, kneeling in front of a flower bed. I had forgotten to tell her to keep off the grass. Anna would not have given way to Lucifer himself and certainly not to a park keeper. Having negotiated one catastrophe, I didn't want to face another. I ran and scooped her into my arms and stood her down on the pathway.
"He," she said indignantly, pointing an accusing finger, "told me to get off the grass."
"Yes," I replied, "you're not supposed to be on this bit of grass."
"But it's the best bit," she said.
"See those words." I pointed to the notice. "They
Say KEEP OFF THE GRASS."
She studied the notice with great concentration as I spelled out the words for her.
Later that afternoon, while we were sitting on the grass eating chocolate, she said, "Them words."
"What words?" I asked.
"Them words that say keep off the grass—them words are like that church we went to this morning."
Then it all became apparent. Like the flower beds, the church service had been to Anna nothing less than a notice saying keep off the grass. She couldn't get at the best bits. To be inside a church—not at a church service, but simply to be inside—was for Anna like visiting a very, very special friend, and visiting a very special friend is a happy occas
ion; and that, surely, is a good enough reason to dance. Inside a church Anna danced; it was the. best bit. Church services, therefore, like the Keep Off the Grass notices, did not allow her to have the best bit. I smiled as I pictured the kind of service that Anna would have liked. I'm not so sure that Mister God wouldn't have preferred it too!
Having started to unburden herself, she pressed on with, "You know when I cried?"
I grunted my attention.
"It didn't half make me small, so small I nearly got lost." This, in a small and far-off voice; and then zooming back from an infinity of space and landing with a thump on my chest, she went on triumphantly, "But I didn't, did I?"
It was sometime toward the end of this first summer that she made two most startling discoveries. The first was seeds—that things grew from seeds, that all this beauty, these flowers, these trees, this lovely grass, came from seeds, and moreover that you could actually hold these seeds in your hands. The second major discovery was writing—that books and writing in general had a much more exciting aspect to them than merely being the machinery for telling stories. She saw writing as a portable memory, as a means of exchanging information.
These two discoveries started off a frenzy of activity. Anna's thought processes and bodily activity were such that on occasions it was very nearly possible actually to see the pictures in her mind.
The first day she held flower seeds in her hand was such a time. There was no need for words; her actions and thoughts spoke for themselves. There she was in front of some wild flowers, kneeling down with a sprinkling of seeds in her hands. Her eyes located her thoughts; she looked at the seeds and her brows furrowed. She looked over her shoulder into the distance and her eyes popped in amazement, back to the seeds, back over her shoulder. Finally she stood up, looked outward—where to, I do not know—and slowly turned a full circle. By the time she faced me, her inner lamps had been turned full on.
I didn't have to be told what was going on in her head; it was plain to see. The sharp needle of her thoughts had sewn together this flower-filled scene that we now occupied with the bare patches of land in the East End. Of course seeds could be transported from one place to another, so why not do it? She looked at me with large question marks in her eyes, and without a word I gave her my clean pocket handkerchief. She spread this on the ground, and with infinite care shook the seed pods. The white handkerchief was soon covered with the dark grains of the seeds.