all. Weâre just making a fuss over nothing and making Maggy feel bad. I bet I can make him work.â
âOkay, Doc,â I said. âYou try.â
âWell â¦â Suzy said, when she realized the music-box part of Elephantâs Child was indeed broken.
Rob had stopped yelling. He took Elephantâs Child from Suzy and held him close and went into the study and sat down in the big black leather chair and put his head down against Elephantâs Child, and I could see that his lip was quivering and tears were sliding down his cheeks, but he wasnât making any sound.
And I wasnât feeling any empathy about Maggy at all.
âWhat a lot of fuss about a stupid old toy,â Maggy said crossly. âCanât your mother and father get him another?â
âI suppose if you break a toy you just get another one?â I demanded angrily.
âOf course.â
There was no use saying that we didnât, and that even if Mother and Daddy could get Rob another Elephantâs Child it wouldnât be the same.
âMaggy didnât mean to break it,â Suzy said, but her voice was uncertain. âDonât make her feel bad.â
As far as I could see, Maggy didnât feel bad at all. âDo you two have any homework?â I asked them.
âJust some spelling words.â
âWell, get them done, then.â
âLetâs play first,â Maggy said. âWe can play hospital again. Come on, Suzy.â
âWeâre supposed to do our homework before we play,â I said.
But Maggy had already started upstairs, and Suzy went after her.
âSuzy,â I shouted, âMotherâll be furious if you donât get your homework done.â
âIâll do it later, silly,â Suzy called back, and ran after Maggy.
I went in to Rob. He was still crying silently, and when I tried to comfort him he pushed me away. I brought in my homework and sat down at the desk near him, but I couldnât concentrate on anything properly. After a while he got up and
climbed into my lap and put his arms around my neck and I felt better.
Â
I thought I ought to go upstairs and check on Suzy and Maggy, but I could hear them playing, and I decided that as long as there werenât any horrible screams Iâd just leave them alone. Rob got out his wooden trains and set them up on the floor by me, and I worked on my homework till John got home.
I could hear him hanging up his things, and then he came into the study and dumped his books down. âHowâre you making out, Vicky? Everything sounds okay. Hi, Robbie, old man.â
I looked at him glumly. âAs a baby sitter Iâm a complete flop.â
âWhy?â
I told him what had happened. âAnd I wasnât any help at all,â I finished. âI was worse than no good. Thank heavens youâre home, John. I donât know what Iâd have done if she started anything else.â
John was examining Elephantâs Child. âOne thingâs for sure,â he said, putting Elephantâs Child down. âSheâs a spoiled brat from way back.â
âWhatâs the matter with her, anyhow?â I asked John. âDo you suppose this is just the way she isâI mean, spoiled rotten and everythingâor do you suppose itâs because of her mother and father?â
âWell,â John said slowly, âhow would we feel if â¦â
âStop,â I said quickly. âStop.â
âShe does make it rough,â John said. âI know Iâm not as sorry for her as I ought to be.â
âYeah, that worries me,â I said. âSuzy feels all sorry for her the way I ought to, and I canât seem to make myself.â
âI suppose the thing to do,â John said, âis to try to think how weâd feel if it was one of us. I mean, if there werenât four of us, if none of the rest of you had been born, I might be
Learning to Kill: Stories