He started running again for the last little bit, past the pump that looked like an old man with a cold, with clothes draped all over it so it wouldn’t freeze; past a load of firewood standing in the farmyard, waiting for its turn in the stove. He had helped to stack it during the summer. He had pretended the pieces of wood were soldiers, and really he wanted to stand them up vertically in ranks, but that took up too much space. Work was his play and play his work. And that was perfectly fine, until his little brother was born. Then the wet diapers became pirate flags, but he was a tired little pirate who had too many enemies to overcome. And the baby was a prince, who was going to inherit a kingdom one day. John was his slave, whom he always sought for advice in difficult situations. ‘Ask my slave,’ he would say. ‘He brought me up, so he gets to decide everything.’

John lifted the door latch and stepped into the kitchen. Then he put the basket on the stove and stood there listening. There was a voice coming from the living room in addition to his mother’s. They didn’t hear him come in. He could hear it was their neighbor, Mrs Petersen, who often came by to have a cup of coffee.

‘Well, aren’t you thrilled that you were finally able to?’ To what? It wasn’t nice to eavesdrop, but it sounded so interesting.

‘Do you really have to ask, after all these years?’

‘If only you had known when you took in John!’ It sounded like a complaint, and John stiffened at hearing his own name.

‘Well,’ his mother said hesitantly, ‘we’ve never been sorry about that for a moment. He is such a nice and capable boy.’

‘He certainly has been a big help to you.’

There was something about the tone that made a little pain gnaw deep into John.

‘Well, Mrs Petersen, it’s no trouble for him. He’s never happier than when he can help us with something.’ Now his mother sounded upset, and John wanted to run in there and support her. But he wanted to hear himself praised a bit more too.

‘No, of course,’ said the other woman effusively. ‘And God knows where the poor child would have been without you. It was such a good deed you did. Is he thankful? Because he knows, doesn’t he?’

‘He is definitely thankful,’ said his mother, and out by the kitchen door John stood thankfully and in solidarity with her. ‘And of course we have told him. A child finds out those kinds of things sooner or later, and my husband also thought it was for the best.’