Werner nodded wih short, distracted movements of his head.
"I understand," he said quietly. "We received no letters, however."
They sat in the car in silence, Werner staring through the windshield, Wheeler looking at his hands.
Holger and Fanny dead, Werner was thinking. A horrible discovery to make. The boy exposed to the cruel blunderings of people who did not understand. That was, in a way, even more horrible.
Wheeler was thinking of those letters and of Cora. He should have written again. Still, those letters should have reached Europe. Was it possible they were all missent?
"Well," he said, finally, "you'll-want to see the boy."
"Yes," said Werner.
The two men pushed open the car doors and got out. They walked across the backyard and up the wooden porch steps. Have you taught him how to speak?-Werner almost said but couldn't bring himself to ask. The concept of a boy like Paal exposed to the blunt, deadening forces of usual speech was something he felt uncomfortable thinking about.
"I'll get my wife," said Wheeler. "The living room's in there."
After the sheriff had gone up the back stairs, Werner walked slowly through the hall and into the front room. There he took off his raincoat and hat and dropped them over the back of a wooden chair. Upstairs he could hear the faint sound of voices-a man and woman. The woman sounded upset.
When he heard footsteps, he turned from the window.
The sheriff's wife entered beside her husband. She was smiling politely, but Werner knew she wasn't happy to see him there.
"Please sit down," she said.
He waited until she was in a chair, then settled down on the couch.
"What is it you want?" asked Mrs. Wheeler.
"Did your husband tell you-?"
"He told me who you were," she interrupted, "but not why you want to see Paul." "Paul?" asked Werner, surprised.
"We-" Her hands sought out each other nervously. "-we changed it to Paul. It-seemed more appropriate. For a Wheeler, I mean."
"I see." Werner nodded politely.
Silence.
"Well," Werner said then, "you wish to know why I am here to see-the boy. I will explain as briefly as possible.
"Ten years ago, in Heidelberg, four married couples-the Elkenbergs, the Kalders, the Nielsens, and my wife and I-decided to try an experiment on our children-some not yet born. An experiment of the mind.
"We had accepted, you see, the proposition that ancient man, deprived of the dubious benefit of language, had been telepathic."
Cora started in her chair.
"Further," Werner went on, not noticing, "that the basic organic source of this ability is still functioning though no longer made use of-a sort of ethereal tonsil, a higher appendix-not used but neither useless.
"So we began our work, each searching for physiological facts while, at the same time, developing the ability in our children. Monthly correspondence was exchanged, a systematic methodology of training was arrived at slowly. Eventually, we planned to establish a colony with the grown children, a colony to be gradually consolidated until these abilities would become second nature to its members.
"Paal is one of these children."
Wheeler looked almost dazed.
"This is a fact?" he asked.
"A fact," said Werner.
Cora sat numbly in her chair staring at the tall German. She was thinking about the way Paal seemed to understand her without words. Thinking of his fear of the school and Miss Frank. Thinking of how many times she had woken up and gone to him even though he didn't make a sound.
"What?" she asked, looking up as Werner spoke.
"I say-may I see the boy now?"
"He's in school," she said. "He'll be home in-"
She stopped as a look of almost revulsion crossed Werner's face.
"School?" he asked.
Paal Nielsen, stand."
The young boy slid from his seat and stood beside the desk. Miss Frank gestured to him once and, more like an old man than a boy, he trudged up to the platform and stood beside her as he always did.
"Straighten up," Miss Frank demanded. "Shoulders back."
The shoulders moved, the back grew flat.
"What's your name?" asked Miss Frank.
The boy pressed his lips together slightly. His swallowing made a dry, rattling noise. "What is your name?"
Silence in the classroom except for the restive stirring of the young. Erratic currents of their thought deflected off him like random winds.
"Your name," she said.
He made no reply.
The virgin teacher looked at him and, in the moment that she did, through her mind ran memories of her childhood. Of her gaunt, mania-driven mother keeping her for hours at a time in the darkened front parlor, sitting at the great round table, her fingers arched over the smoothly worn ouija board-making her try to communicate with her dead father.