Breavman received a letter from Mrs. Stark, Martin’s mother. It wasn’t customary for parents to reply to the official reports the counsellors were obliged to send.
Dear Mr. Breavman,
I’m sure my son Martin is in excellent hands.
I’m not anxious and I don’t expect, any further detailed communications concerning his behaviour.
Very sincerely,
R. F. STARK
“What the hell did you write her?” demanded Krantz.
“Look, Krantz, I happen to like the kid. I took a lot of trouble over the letter. I tried to show that I thought he was a very valuable human being.”
“What was I supposed to say?”
“Nothing. As little as possible. I told you what she’s like. For two months of every year she doesn’t have to look at him every day and can pretend that he’s a normal boy doing normal things with other normal boys at a normal camp.”
“Well, he isn’t. He’s much more important than that.”
“Very good, Breavman, very compassionate. But keep it to yourself, will you? It was Breavman you were pleasing, not the boy’s mother.”
They were standing on the balcony of the Administration Building. Krantz was about to announce Evening Activity over the PA.
Didn’t Krantz know what he knew about Martin? No, that wasn’t true. He didn’t know anything about the boy, but he loved him. Martin was a divine idiot. Surely the community should consider itself honoured to have him in their midst. He shouldn’t be tolerated — the institutions should be constructed around him, the traditionally incoherent oracle.
Out in the open, tempered by the dialogue, it wouldn’t sound so mad.
Krantz looked at his watch, which he wore on the inside of his wrist. As he turned to go in he caught sight of a figure lying face down in the darkness near a row of bushes at the bottom of the lawn.
“For God’s sake, Breavman, that’s the sort of thing I mean.”
Breavman walked quickly across the lawn.
“What are you doing, Martin?”
“Twenty thousand and twenty-six.”
Breavman returned to the balcony.
“He’s counting grass.”
Krantz shut his eyes and tapped the banister.
“What’s your evening activity, Breavman?”
“Scavenger hunt.”
“Well, get him over there with the rest of the group.”
“He isn’t interested in a scavenger hunt.”
Krantz leaned forward and said with an exasperated smile, “Convince him. That’s what you’re supposed to be here for.”
“What difference does it make whether he goes looking for yesterday’s newspaper or counts grass?”
Krantz leaped down the stairs, helped Martin up, and offered him a piggy-back across the field, to where Breavman’s group was assembled. Martin climbed on gleefully and as he rode stuck his index fingers in his ears for no apparent reason, squinting as if he were expecting some drum-splitting explosion.
Every night, just before he went to sleep, it was Martin’s custom to declare how much fun he had had that day. He checked it against some mysterious ideal.
“Well, Martin, how did it go today?” asked Breavman, sitting on his bed.
The mechanical voice never hesitated.
“Seventy-four per cent.”
“Is that good?
“Permissible.”