“You must have had parents. Everyone has a father and mother, haven’t they? Don’t you remember yours?”

Muddled ghost-pictures. Grown-ups leaving children. Grown-ups avoiding children, as if they feared them.

“What is the first thing you remember?”

“Big man walking with me. Carried me a bit. Walked again.”

“What happened to him?”

“Went away. Said he was sick. Might make me sick too.”

“Long ago?”

Confusion.

Pander changed his aim. “What of those other children—have they no parents either?”

“All got nobody.”