Let's Go Play at the Adams'

fascinating things Cindy would have someday for 48

herself. Barbara swished and ordered, kissed and patted-she brought real life into the

house. She could even drive the station wagon. And now Barbara was gone-at least for

practical purposes-and Cindy missed her most.

Of the wonderful surprise, the pretty big sister, there was little recognizable in the person

tied to the guest-room bed, led by a rope; and fed like a pet. Except that Cindy was one of

the kids and had her part to do in Freedom Five's adventure, she would gladly untie

Barbara and set things running again. Lonely enough, angry enough-just let them call her

stupid one more time-she just might do it to show them. But not yet. Cindy sighed: she

would just have to make do with old Bobby.

That evening they had frozen TV dinners. Bobby carefully and methodically heated them in

the oven, and he and Cindy ate them from the foil trays while they watched a twilight serial

on the tube. After they cleaned up, Bobby went to his room and tried to take a nap while

Cindy sat up to be the guard. Now the whole house, the television set and living room were

hers as well, and she had the same unpleasant feeling of being bored.

Having fed Barbara a sandwich and a Coke, the kids had gagged her again, engineered her

to bed, spread-eagled and tied her there. Afterwards-from her point of view-she was very

nearly forgotten, discarded as simply and with as little thought as a toy. She was

embarrassed and angry-indeed, she had been mostly so all day-but at the same time, she

was strangely relieved. After the morning's shocks of discovery, the hours of discomfort

sitting in that chair, the ordeal of being watched and guarded all the time, she was almost

pleased to be lying down again, quiet and-for the instant-alone. The same position that had

seemed intolerable before now seemed bearable.

That's not true, Barbara said. People who are tied up don't just lie around in comfort. Soon

enough the 49

muscles around her underarms and in her .hips would begin to ache, and the blood would

slow down and her hands and feet grow numb. It would hurt. Above all, however, was the

burden of time to be passed. If the same pattern were followed tomorrow as had been set

today, it could be sixteen hours-twilight, evening, night, morning, and midmorning-before

she would be allowed the barest movement, and that would only be to the end of the

hallway and back again. Fear-leading to-panic can begin in soft, quiet ways, and it began

now liked a velvety moth circling around in her mind.

Sixteen hours, Barbara was appalled. Yes, that's the very soonest too. Maybe more. I can't

stand it, Barbara said. But it's going to happen anyway.

The anticipation alone was enough to throw her into unreasonable hysteria, make her exert

every ounce of her energy in one more desperate struggle to be free. Young Bobby was

improving as a jailer, however; he had used his longest length of rope this time, and her

wrists were tied with hitches in the middle and the ends out of sight somewhere behind the

headboard. There was nothing to tempt her or raise hopes. And she could not even sleep.

Out in the kitchen Bobby and Cindy clattered and bickered over their simple dinner.

Barbara's nose, sharpened by a day's unsatisfied hunger now, could smell it nearly the

moment they peeled off the foilfried chicken. When Cindy came to check the prisoner, her

fingers and mouth were greasy with it, and she seemed to reek of food. Barbara bad the

disgusting thought that if she were free just then, she'd take a bite out of the child as if

Cindy were a plump little chicken herself. And the TV blared.

During dinner the children had silently watched the old TV reruns. Later, after they cleaned

up and Bobby went to his room to nap, Cindy sat vacuously through the whole long

evenings of shows, one after the other, favoring those on which there were child or animal

characters and after that, the most exciting and violent. Often-perhaps simply to exercise

her exclusive

50

control over all the 'knobs of the set-she switched from channel to channel seemingly able

to follow all the simple stories at once. At one point, she dawdled away a long commercial

break by also trying to play "The Happy Farmer" on the piano. It gave Barbara a headache.

The child's mind was obviously spinning loosely, shallowly, from this to that to this to that

without any anchor of attention to hold it, and she was the jailer and Barbara the captive. It

was insane.

Finally, during the late-late show, things steadied down, and there was no further

movement from the living room. Planes dove and strafed; Japanese died with endless

screams; the surviving Marines formed up and marched out presumably to new battles; the

Orioles beat the A's 9-5 to keep their hold on first place; the dollar was again under attack