experiment.
Dr Conroy: It’s important, Victor. We spoke about it last week, do you remember?
No. 6: Yes, I remember.
Dr Conroy: Then we’ve agreed. Mr Fanabarzra, where do you want the patient to sit?
Fanabarzra: He’ll be most comfortable lying down. It’s important for him to be as relaxed as possible.
Dr Conroy: On the bed, then. You can lie down, Victor.
No. 6: As you wish.
Fanabarzra: Very well, Victor. I am going to show you a pendulum. Could you lower the blind a little, doctor? That’s enough. Victor, watch the pendulum, if you’d be so kind.
[ Transcription omits Fanabarzra’s process of hypnosis, at his request. Pauses between responses have also been eliminated for the sake of brevity.]
Fanabarzra: All right then . . . it’s 97. What do you remember from this period?
No. 6: My father . . . He was never at home. Sometimes the whole family went to wait for him at the factory on Friday afternoon. Mother said he was a good for nothing and if we found him we’d stop him spending our money in the bars. It was cold outside. One day we waited and waited. We stamped our feet on the ground to keep our toes from freezing. Emil asked me for my scarf because he was cold. I didn’t give it to him. My mother rapped me on the head and told me to give it to him. Finally we got tired of waiting and we left.
Dr Conroy: Ask him where his father was.
Fanabarzra: Do you know where your father was?
No. 6: He’d been fired from his job. He came back home two days later in bad shape. Mother said he’d been drinking and sleeping with strangers. They’d given him a cheque but there wasn’t much left. We’d go to Social Security to get Dad’s benefit but sometimes he got there first and he drank it. Emil didn’t understand how someone could drink a piece of paper.
Fanabarzra: Did you ask for help?
No. 6: Sometimes the parish gave us clothes. Other kids got their clothes at the Salvation Army, because they had better clothes there. But Mother said that they were heretics and pagans and it was better to wear decent Christian clothes. Beria said that his decent Christian clothes were full of holes. That’s why he hated them. Fanabarzra: Were you happy when Beria left?
No. 6: I was in bed. I saw him walk across the bedroom in the dark, carrying his boots in one hand. He gave me his key chain with a silver bear and told me I could put the keys I needed on it. In the morning, Emil was crying because he hadn’t said goodbye to Beria, so I gave him the key chain. But he kept crying and threw the key chain away. He cried all day. I tore up a book of stories he was reading, just to get him to shut up. I cut it into pieces with a pair of scissors. My father locked me in his room.
Fanabarzra: Where was your mother?
No. 6: Playing bingo at the parish hall. It was Tuesday. She always played bingo on Tuesdays. Each card cost a penny.
Fanabarzra: What happened in your father’s room?
No. 6: Nothing. I sat around.
Fanabarzra: Victor, you have to tell me.
No. 6: Nothing happened. Do you understand, sir? Nothing.
Fanabarzra: Victor, you have to tell me. Your father locked you in his room and he did something to you. Correct?
No. 6: You don’t understand. I deserved it.
Fanabarza: What did you deserve?
No. 6: To be punished. I had to be punished so many times so that I would repent for all the bad things I’d done.
Fanabarza: What bad things?
No. 6: So many bad things. The bad person I was. The things I did to the cat. I threw a cat into a rubbish bin full of old newspapers all crumpled up and set the paper on fire. The cat howled. It sounded like a human voice. And for what I did to the book of stories.
Fanabarzra: What was the punishment, Victor?
No. 6: Hurt. He hurt me. And he liked it, I know that. He told me that it hurt him too, but that was a lie. He said it in Polish. He didn’t know how to lie in English, he got the words all mixed up. He always spoke in Polish when he was punishing me.
Fanabarzra: He touched you?
No. 6: He gave
Dr Conroy: It’s important, Victor. We spoke about it last week, do you remember?
No. 6: Yes, I remember.
Dr Conroy: Then we’ve agreed. Mr Fanabarzra, where do you want the patient to sit?
Fanabarzra: He’ll be most comfortable lying down. It’s important for him to be as relaxed as possible.
Dr Conroy: On the bed, then. You can lie down, Victor.
No. 6: As you wish.
Fanabarzra: Very well, Victor. I am going to show you a pendulum. Could you lower the blind a little, doctor? That’s enough. Victor, watch the pendulum, if you’d be so kind.
[ Transcription omits Fanabarzra’s process of hypnosis, at his request. Pauses between responses have also been eliminated for the sake of brevity.]
Fanabarzra: All right then . . . it’s 97. What do you remember from this period?
No. 6: My father . . . He was never at home. Sometimes the whole family went to wait for him at the factory on Friday afternoon. Mother said he was a good for nothing and if we found him we’d stop him spending our money in the bars. It was cold outside. One day we waited and waited. We stamped our feet on the ground to keep our toes from freezing. Emil asked me for my scarf because he was cold. I didn’t give it to him. My mother rapped me on the head and told me to give it to him. Finally we got tired of waiting and we left.
Dr Conroy: Ask him where his father was.
Fanabarzra: Do you know where your father was?
No. 6: He’d been fired from his job. He came back home two days later in bad shape. Mother said he’d been drinking and sleeping with strangers. They’d given him a cheque but there wasn’t much left. We’d go to Social Security to get Dad’s benefit but sometimes he got there first and he drank it. Emil didn’t understand how someone could drink a piece of paper.
Fanabarzra: Did you ask for help?
No. 6: Sometimes the parish gave us clothes. Other kids got their clothes at the Salvation Army, because they had better clothes there. But Mother said that they were heretics and pagans and it was better to wear decent Christian clothes. Beria said that his decent Christian clothes were full of holes. That’s why he hated them. Fanabarzra: Were you happy when Beria left?
No. 6: I was in bed. I saw him walk across the bedroom in the dark, carrying his boots in one hand. He gave me his key chain with a silver bear and told me I could put the keys I needed on it. In the morning, Emil was crying because he hadn’t said goodbye to Beria, so I gave him the key chain. But he kept crying and threw the key chain away. He cried all day. I tore up a book of stories he was reading, just to get him to shut up. I cut it into pieces with a pair of scissors. My father locked me in his room.
Fanabarzra: Where was your mother?
No. 6: Playing bingo at the parish hall. It was Tuesday. She always played bingo on Tuesdays. Each card cost a penny.
Fanabarzra: What happened in your father’s room?
No. 6: Nothing. I sat around.
Fanabarzra: Victor, you have to tell me.
No. 6: Nothing happened. Do you understand, sir? Nothing.
Fanabarzra: Victor, you have to tell me. Your father locked you in his room and he did something to you. Correct?
No. 6: You don’t understand. I deserved it.
Fanabarza: What did you deserve?
No. 6: To be punished. I had to be punished so many times so that I would repent for all the bad things I’d done.
Fanabarza: What bad things?
No. 6: So many bad things. The bad person I was. The things I did to the cat. I threw a cat into a rubbish bin full of old newspapers all crumpled up and set the paper on fire. The cat howled. It sounded like a human voice. And for what I did to the book of stories.
Fanabarzra: What was the punishment, Victor?
No. 6: Hurt. He hurt me. And he liked it, I know that. He told me that it hurt him too, but that was a lie. He said it in Polish. He didn’t know how to lie in English, he got the words all mixed up. He always spoke in Polish when he was punishing me.
Fanabarzra: He touched you?
No. 6: He gave
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