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bed with Mama?’
    â€˜She’s trying to get dressed. She’s got my pants on like a coat.’
    The boy was angry at his sister but at the same time amused. They had had trouble, the same trouble they had had every morning when the girl woke up and plagued the boy to notice her, to let her get in his bed, to go with her up the hall and into the living-room as they were forbidden to do, to get going.
    The boy knew the man would know that he had hit the girl again and perhaps tell him not to do that, but the man was looking at Mama, he was looking at his wife, and he was smiling a little.
    The man and the boy were naked, exactly alike, but the man was huge and hairy and all his skin was pale, and the boy was little, like a little rock, his skin dark and smooth with the darkness and smoothness of a new thing, of the man started out all over again in his son. They were each up a little where they were men, and the man said, ‘When you get up in the morning go and pee.’
    â€˜I
did
.’
    â€˜Did you lift the seat?’
    â€˜I always lift the seat.’
    â€˜Somebody’s been peeing on the seat.’
    â€˜It’s Rosey, and it’s not pee, it’s water. She fills the glass and pours it into the toilet bowl and she never lifts the seat. She says she’s peeing like me.’
    â€˜O.K., let’s go.’
    They found the little girl sitting on the floor between her crib and the boy’s bed. She was naked except for the boy’s pants which she was trying to get over her head. She had been thoughtful, as she was when she was asleep, until she had seen him with her brother and then she had laughed and got up and run to him.
    â€˜Hello, Papa.’
    He took her up and carried her to the bathroom where he went over her with a washcloth made warm but without soap. He rinsed the cloth and warmed it and wrung it out again and handed it to the boy, who finished using it in five seconds. The man then used it himself and took them back to their bedroom.
    â€˜All right. Stand right there, Rosey. Don’t move.’
    â€˜All right, Papa.’
    â€˜You, too, Johnny. That’s right. Straight. You both look fine. Now don’t move. I’m going to put my clothes on and I’ll be right back. Don’t move, just stand straight that way and wait.’
    He was dressed in not much more than forty-five seconds. When he got back to the room the girl was sitting on the floor working with the pants again and the boy was looking for something under his bed. They both jumped up and stood somewhat as they had been standing when he had left.
    â€˜O.K. Rosey first. Where’s your stuff, Rosey?’
    â€˜This is all I got,’ the little girl said, holding out her brother’s pants.
    He found her stuff all around the room and in her crib but had trouble finding one sock and then found it in the pocket of the pants.
    â€˜How did that get in there?’
    â€˜Johnny put it in.’
    â€˜I didn’t. She did.’
    â€˜And he hit me.’
    â€˜Did you?’
    â€˜It wasn’t my fault.’
    The girl was dressed now.
    â€˜All right, Rosey. You go over there and look out the window until I get Johnny dressed.’
    â€˜He hit me, Papa.’
    â€˜Did it hurt?’
    â€˜Yes, Papa,’ the girl said softly.
    â€˜I didn’t hit her hard,’ the boy said. ‘I just hit her a little one to stop her from putting her sock in my pocket.’
    â€˜It hurt, Papa.’
    â€˜Do you want me to spank him?’
    â€˜Spank him and spank him and spank him.’
    He waited a moment, then she said, as she always did, ‘But not
really
, Papa.’
    Christ, the man thought, they’re crazy about each other.
    The boy bent over the man’s knee and the man began to let him have it, easy but not too easy because it was no fun for them at all if there wasn’t a little noise. They both laughed, laughing together while the man