Slapstick, Or, Lonesome No More! - Kurt Vonnegut [16]
“It was as though a devil all of a sudden got inside of me,” she said.
“That’s what it was, Tish,” he said.
Her madness was subsiding now. “Oh, Caleb—” she said.
• • •
Lest I seem to be fishing for sympathy, let me say right now that Eliza and I in those days were about as emotionally vulnerable as the Great Stone Face in New Hampshire.
We needed a mother’s and father’s love about as much as a fish needs a bicycle, as the saying goes.
So when our mother spoke badly of us, even wished we would die, our response was intellectual. We enjoyed solving problems. Perhaps Mother’s problem was one we could solve—short of suicide, of course.
She pulled herself together again eventually. She steeled herself for another hundred birthdays with Eliza and me, in case God wished to test her in that way. But, before she did that, she said this:
“I would give anything, Caleb, for the faintest sign of intelligence, the merest flicker of humanness in the eyes of either twin.”
• • •
This was easily arranged.
Hi ho.
• • •
So Eliza and I went back to Eliza’s room, and we painted a big sign on a bedsheet. Then, after our parents were sound asleep, we stole into their room through the false back in an armoire. We hung the sign on the wall, so it would be the first thing they saw when they woke up.
This is what it said:
DEAR MATER AND PATER: WE CAN NEVER BE PRETTY BUT WE CAN BE AS SMART OR AS DUMB AS THE WORLD REALLY WANTS US TO BE.
YOUR FAITHFUL SERVANTS,
ELIZA MELLON SWAIN
WILBUR ROCKEFELLER SWAIN
Hi ho.
11
THUS DID ELIZA AND I destroy our Paradise—our nation of two.
• • •
We arose the next morning before our parents did, before the servants could come to dress us. We sensed no danger. We supposed ourselves still to be in Paradise as we dressed ourselves.
I chose to wear a conservative blue, pinstripe, three-piece suit, I remember. Eliza chose to wear a cashmere sweater, a tweed skirt, and pearls.
We agreed that Eliza should be our spokesman at first, since she had a rich alto voice. My voice did not have the authority to announce calmingly but convincingly that, in effect, the world had just turned upside down.
Remember, please, that almost all that anyone had ever heard us say up to then was “Buh” and “Duh,” and so on.
Now we encountered Oveta Cooper, our practical nurse, in the colonnaded green marble foyer. She was startled to see us up and dressed.
Before she could comment on this, though, Eliza and I leaned our heads together, put them in actual contact, just above our ears. The single genius we composed thereby then spoke to Oveta in Eliza’s voice, which was as lovely as a viola.
This is what that voice said:
“Good morning, Oveta. A new life begins for all of us today. As you can see and hear, Wilbur and I are no longer idiots. A miracle has taken place overnight. Our parents’ dreams have come true. We are healed.
“As for you, Oveta: You will keep your apartment and your color television, and perhaps even receive a salary increase—as a reward for all you did to make this miracle come to pass. No one on the staff will experience any change, except for this one: Life here will become even easier and more pleasant than it was before.”
Oveta, a bleak, Yankee dumpling, was hypnotized—like a rabbit who has met a rattlesnake. But Eliza and I were not a rattlesnake. With our heads together, we were one of the gentlest geniuses the world has ever known.
• • •
“We will not be using the tiled diningroom any more,” said Eliza’s voice. “We have lovely manners, as you shall see. Please have our breakfast served in the solarium, and notify us when Mater and Pater are up and around. It would be very nice if, from now on, you would address my brother and me as ‘Master Wilbur’ and ‘Mistress Eliza.’
“You may go now, and tell the others about the miracle.”
Oveta remained transfixed. I at last had to snap my fingers under her nose to wake her up.
She curtseyed. “As you wish, Mistress Eliza,” she said. And she went to spread the news.
• • •
As we settled ourselves in the solarium, the rest of the staff