She seemed to feel that if anybody said anything about it the child would probably grow self-conscious and collapse. There appeared to be a certain sagacity in that. It was not an experiment but an adventure. One step led to another. At terrific speed Pat went round and round the room. He might have been Bobby Walthour trying to steal a lap in a six day race. Kate and Peter watched him breathlessly from behind the curtains of the living-room.
"How long has this been going on?" Peter wanted to know.
"It's these ten minutes."
Peter pulled out his gold stop watch and created thereby a psychic crisis. Perhaps Pat felt that his amateur standing was in jeopardy. At any rate he tripped on the edge of a rug, almost turned a somersault, blacked his eye and cried for half an hour.
He did not even attempt to walk again for a week. After that it became habitual. Up to this time Peter had never said much to anybody about his son. He did not talk to the men at the office about the child. There wouldn't be any sense in interrupting Charlie Hall in the middle of a story about city politics with, "My son's got two teeth." They were all busy men and it was not conceivable that they would care how much Pat Neale weighed.
Walking was a little different. Maybe it wasn't exactly a first page story but still Peter wanted to tell somebody about it. For the first time he was disposed to show off Pat—in person. Of course eleven months and eights days wasn't a record. Peter would have to look into that and find out the best accepted performance. He remembered being told that his own brother had walked at eight months but he had no means of knowing whether or not that was authentic.
The desire to confide in somebody eventually took Peter around to a stage door, though not the one at the end of the alley. From a Sunday graphic section he had noticed that Vonnie Bandana was playing in a musical show called "Harvest Moon." Vonnie Bandana wasn't really her name. The caption said Vonnie Ryan and Peter was sure it was the same girl. Evidently the Eight Bandana Sisters had gone the way of Brook Farm and Halcyon Hall and many another experiment in co-operation. Vonnie knew him all right.
"You're the man that married Maria Algarez," she said.
"Yes, but she's gone away."
"I'm sorry."