The worst time was at night, when the baby sister was asleep and the parents were grimly eating and reading and dancing and drinking, until they were ready to drop. And of all bad nights, the night before his twelfth birthday was perhaps Sonny's worst. He was old enough to know what a birthday party was like.
It would be cake and candy, shows and games. It would be presents, presents, presents.
It would be a terrible, endless day.
He switched off the color-D television and the recorded tapes of sea chanteys and, with an appearance of absent-mindedness, walked toward the door of his playroom.
Davey Crockett got up from beside the model rocket field and said, "Hold on thar, Sonny. Mought take a stroll with you." Davey, with a face as serene and strong as a Tennessee crag, swung its long huntin' rifle under one arm and put its other arm around Sonny's shoulders. "Where you reckon the two of us ought to head?"
Sonny shook Davey Crockett's arm off. "Get lost," he said petulantly. "Who wants you around?"
Long John Silver came out of the closet, hobbling on its wooden leg, crouched over its knobby cane. "Ah, young master," it said reproachfully, "you shouldn't ought to talk to old Davey like that! He's a good friend to you, Davey is. Many's the weary day Davey and me has been a-keepin' of your company. I asks you this, young master: Is it fair and square that you should be a-tellin' him to get lost? Is it fair, young master? Is it square?"
Sonny looked at the floor stubbornly and didn't answer. What was the use of answering dummies like them? He stood rebelliously silent and still until he just felt like saying something. And then he said: "You go in the closet, both of you. I don't want to play with you. I'm going to play with my trains."
Long John said unctuously: "Now there's a good idea, that is! You just be a-havin' of a good time with your trains and old Davey and me'll—"
"Go ahead!" shouted Sonny. He kept stamping his foot until they were out of sight.
His fire truck was in the middle of the floor; he kicked at it, but it rolled quickly out of reach and slid into its little garage under the tanks of tropical fish.
He scuffed over to the model railroad layout and glared at it. As he approached, the Twentieth Century Limited came roaring out of a tunnel, sparks flying from its stack. It crossed a bridge, whistled at a grade crossing, steamed into the Union Station. The roof of the station glowed and suddenly became transparent, and through it Sonny saw the bustling crowds of redcaps and travelers—
"I don't want that," he said. "Casey, crack up old Number Ninety-Nine again."
Obediently the layout quivered and revolved a half-turn. Old Casey Jones, one and an eighth inches tall, leaned out of the cab of the S.P. locomotive and waved good-bye to Sonny. The locomotive whistled shrilly twice and picked up speed—
It was a good crackup. Little old Casey's body, thrown completely free, developed real blisters from the steam and bled real blood. But Sonny turned his back on it. He had liked that crackup for a long time—longer than he liked almost any other toy he owned. But he was tired of it.
He looked around the room.
Tarzan of the Apes, leaning against a foot-thick tree trunk, one hand on a vine, lifted its head and looked at him; but Tarzan was clear across the room. The others were in the closet.
Sonny ran out and slammed the door. He saw Tarzan start to come after him, but even before Sonny was out of the room, Tarzan slumped and stood stockstill.
It wasn't fair, Sonny thought angrily. They wouldn't even chase him, so that at least he could have some kind of chance to get away by himself. They'd just talk to each other on their little radios, and in a minute one of the tutors, or one of the maids, or whatever else happened to be handy would vector in on him—
But, for the moment, he was free.
He slowed down and walked along the Great Hall toward his baby sister's room. The fountains began to splash as he entered the hall; the mosaics on the wall began to tinkle music and sparkle with moving colors.
"Now, chile, whut you up to?"
He turned around, but he knew it was Mammy coming toward him. It was slapping toward him on big, flat feet, its pink-palmed hands lifted to its shoulders. The face under the red bandanna was frowning, its gold tooth sparkling as Mammy scolded: "Chile, you is got usns so worried, we's fit to die! How you 'speck us to take good keer of you efn you run off lak that? Now you jes come on back to your nice room with Mammy an' we'll see if there ain't some real nice program on the TV."
Sonny stopped and waited for it, but he wouldn't give it the satisfaction of looking at it. Slap-slap, the big feet waddled cumbersomely toward him; but he didn't have any illusions. Waddle, big feet, 300 pounds and all, Mammy could catch him in 20 yards with a ten-yard start. Any of them could.
He said in his best icily indignant voice: "I was just going in to look at my baby sister."
Pause. "You was?" The plump black face looked suspicious.
"Yes, I was. Doris is my own sister and I love her."
Pause—long pause. "Dat's nice," said Mammy, but its voice was still doubtful. "I 'speck I better come 'long with you. You wouldn't want to wake your lil baby sister up. Ef I come, I'll he'p you keep real quiet."
Sonny shook free of it—they were always putting their hands on kids! "I don't want you to come with me, Mammy!"
"Aw, now, honey! Mammy ain't gwine bother nothin', you knows that!"
Sonny turned his back on it and marched grimly toward his sister's room. If only they would leave him alone! But they never did.
It was always that way, always one darn old robot—yes, robot, he thought, savagely tasting the naughty word. Always one dam robot after another. Why couldn't Daddy be like other daddies, so they could live in a decent little house and get rid of those dam robots—so he could go to a real school and be in a class with other boys, instead of being taught at home by Miss Brooks and Mr. Chips and all those other robots?
They spoiled everything. And they would spoil what he wanted to do now. But he was going to do it all the same, because there was something in Doris's room that he wanted very much.
It was probably the only tangible thing he wanted in the world.
As he and Mammy passed the imitation tumbled rocks of the Bear Cave, Mama Bear poked its head out and growled: "Hello, Sonny. Don't you think you ought to be in bed? It's nice and warm in our hear bed, Sonny."
He didn't even look at it. Time was when he had liked that sort of thing, too, but he wasn't a four-year-old like Doris any more. All the same, there was one thing a four-year-old had—
He stopped at the door of her room. "Doris?" he whispered.
Mammy scolded: "Now, chile, you knows that lil baby is asleep! How come you tryin' to wake her up?"
"I won't wake her up." The furthest thing from Sonny's mind was to wake his sister up. He tiptoed into the room and stood beside the little girl's bed. Lucky kid! he thought enviously. Being four, she was allowed to have a tiny little room and a tiny bed—while Sonny had to wallow around in a 40-foot bedchamber and a bed eight feet long.
He looked down at his sister. Behind him, Mammy clucked approvingly. "Dat's nice when chilluns loves each other lak you an' that lil baby," it whispered.
Doris was sound asleep, clutching her teddy bear. It wriggled slightly and opened an eye to look at Sonny, but it didn't say anything.
Sonny took a deep breath, leaned forward and gently slipped the teddy bear out of the bed.
It scrambled pathetically, trying to get free.
Mammy whispered urgently: "Sonny! Now you let dat old teddy bear alone, you heah me?"