After he’d spoken I was mystified. I had no idea what he meant. Why was he so concerned about that bloody ball? So, when his attention was diverted for a moment, I kicked the ball off into the shadows. When he noticed it was gone, he began to mumble incomprehensibly and then returned home. During those days, he mumbled constantly to himself. However, neither Ah-bing nor I could make head or tail of what he said. Sometimes it seemed as though he were reciting some poem or other, at others it seemed as if he were teaching someone something. But on that day, during the incident with the ball, I was finally able to make out what he had been mumbling. This is what it was: ‘You certainly are not you … I certainly am not me … The table certainly is not a table … The blackboard certainly is not a blackboard … Today certainly is not today … The sunshine certainly is not the sunshine …’

What did this mean? It didn’t seem to be a poem, or a song, or some folk tune. Had he remembered this … whatever it was for very long? It was really strange. Once we got home I asked Father what the words meant. He gave me a vacant stare, and then asked me what I meant. I repeated to him what he had been mumbling outside. Immediately, to my surprise, his eyes became wide and round. He asked me where I had heard this, as if it were some confidential information that I shouldn’t know about. I told him the truth and his face paled with fright: he implored me to forget what I had heard, and then declared in no uncertain terms that he had never spoken these words. He acted as though he had inadvertently let slip some top-secret information. Seeing Father so alarmed and anxious, I immediately realized what this was all about, these words were somehow related to what went on behind those red walls …

Day Six

Red walls!

Red walls!

What mysteries do you keep hidden inside you?

How is it that you always make people so nervous, so strange?

I kept thinking that at his age, my father’s eccentricities were OK. I was resigned to his illness; though it was certain it had some connection to the secret work that went on behind those red walls. In other words, it was perhaps a sign of an occupational disease – the lingering traces of it. Because his occupation was so ineffable, it seemed to make sense that his illness would likewise be unusual and bizarre – something ordinary people couldn’t understand or grasp.