things?â
âJourneys.â
âArchaeologists?â
âYears.â
âNurses?â
âDoses.â
âI could be an escape artist and you could be my assistant.â
âFor a reasonable price. Letâs talk figures.â
She kissed me, tucked me in and told me that she loved me. I must have fallen asleep in her arms. My sun was different from the Midgetâs.
Señora Vicente was a very good mother.
31
A FOOLPROOF PLAN
That night another toad drowned in the swimming pool. Without even waiting for breakfast, me and the Midget decided to put a stop to this.
It was tempting to create a physical barrier to stop the toads from getting into the water, a solution as drastic as it would be effective. But I didnât want to alter the course of their lives, to usurp the preeminent role of Destiny. Besides, the swimming pool might be of crucial importance to the toads without my knowing â it might be full of their eggs.
Consequently we opted for a middle way, which also had the benefit of being practical. Using an old wooden board we found in the shed and a length of wire, we managed to make a diving board that worked in reverse. Whereas diving boards were designed for men to launch themselves into the water, our reverse diving board would be used by toads to launch themselves onto dry land.
I used the wire to attach the board between the handrails of the ladder. This way, one end of the plank stuck out into the air. The other end dipped below the surface of the water.
Until now, if a toad fell into the pool it was bound to die. It would swim around, exhausted, searching vainly for a way out, crashing into the sides of the pool until finally it went under. The reversediving board offered the toads the way out that they hadnât had up until then. If they swam up to it, they could clamber onto the plank and breathe and they could climb up to the other end and leap into the long grass whenever they wanted, as often as they wanted.
Some of them would still die. They wouldnât notice the plank, or they wouldnât understand its potential. But the lucky toads would use the reverse diving board to save themselves, and the cleverest toads, hearing the word âEurekaâ in their tiny brains, would save themselves a second time, and a third time. Their offspring (I was still a Lamarckian back then) would be born with an innate âEurekaâ and they would know what to do, what to look for whenever they fell into this swimming pool which had proved so lethal to their forebears.
âWhen you have no choice but to change, you change. Thatâs what Señorita Barbeito told me. Itâs called the principle of necessity. The toads have to change so they wonât die. All they need is a chance,â I explained to the Midget.
âDâyou think that weâre as disgusting to God as toads are to me?â asked the Midget.
âRight, thatâs it,â I said, giving the wire a last twist.
All that was needed now was time.
32
CYRUS AND THE RIVER
When one of his favourite horses drowned while attempting to cross it, Cyrus the Great, king of the Persians, furious with rage, vowed to humble the river Gyndes. He stopped his army, who were marching on Babylonia, and forced his soldiers to divert the course of the river, digging 360 trenches to channel the water away. Cyrus wanted the waters to dissipate onto the plain, pooling in swamps and marshes, and for the original riverbed to run dry. The extent of the humiliation he inflicted on the river was precise: at its deepest point the river Gyndes was not to come above a womanâs knee.
This story is usually told to emphasize the power of Cyrus, the king who mutilated a river, who had his soldiers work like slaves to avenge a horse. The leader of the most powerful army in the world, whose hail of arrows could eclipse the sun, Cyrus would have punished the sun for its envy, or the moon, or the
âJourneys.â
âArchaeologists?â
âYears.â
âNurses?â
âDoses.â
âI could be an escape artist and you could be my assistant.â
âFor a reasonable price. Letâs talk figures.â
She kissed me, tucked me in and told me that she loved me. I must have fallen asleep in her arms. My sun was different from the Midgetâs.
Señora Vicente was a very good mother.
31
A FOOLPROOF PLAN
That night another toad drowned in the swimming pool. Without even waiting for breakfast, me and the Midget decided to put a stop to this.
It was tempting to create a physical barrier to stop the toads from getting into the water, a solution as drastic as it would be effective. But I didnât want to alter the course of their lives, to usurp the preeminent role of Destiny. Besides, the swimming pool might be of crucial importance to the toads without my knowing â it might be full of their eggs.
Consequently we opted for a middle way, which also had the benefit of being practical. Using an old wooden board we found in the shed and a length of wire, we managed to make a diving board that worked in reverse. Whereas diving boards were designed for men to launch themselves into the water, our reverse diving board would be used by toads to launch themselves onto dry land.
I used the wire to attach the board between the handrails of the ladder. This way, one end of the plank stuck out into the air. The other end dipped below the surface of the water.
Until now, if a toad fell into the pool it was bound to die. It would swim around, exhausted, searching vainly for a way out, crashing into the sides of the pool until finally it went under. The reversediving board offered the toads the way out that they hadnât had up until then. If they swam up to it, they could clamber onto the plank and breathe and they could climb up to the other end and leap into the long grass whenever they wanted, as often as they wanted.
Some of them would still die. They wouldnât notice the plank, or they wouldnât understand its potential. But the lucky toads would use the reverse diving board to save themselves, and the cleverest toads, hearing the word âEurekaâ in their tiny brains, would save themselves a second time, and a third time. Their offspring (I was still a Lamarckian back then) would be born with an innate âEurekaâ and they would know what to do, what to look for whenever they fell into this swimming pool which had proved so lethal to their forebears.
âWhen you have no choice but to change, you change. Thatâs what Señorita Barbeito told me. Itâs called the principle of necessity. The toads have to change so they wonât die. All they need is a chance,â I explained to the Midget.
âDâyou think that weâre as disgusting to God as toads are to me?â asked the Midget.
âRight, thatâs it,â I said, giving the wire a last twist.
All that was needed now was time.
32
CYRUS AND THE RIVER
When one of his favourite horses drowned while attempting to cross it, Cyrus the Great, king of the Persians, furious with rage, vowed to humble the river Gyndes. He stopped his army, who were marching on Babylonia, and forced his soldiers to divert the course of the river, digging 360 trenches to channel the water away. Cyrus wanted the waters to dissipate onto the plain, pooling in swamps and marshes, and for the original riverbed to run dry. The extent of the humiliation he inflicted on the river was precise: at its deepest point the river Gyndes was not to come above a womanâs knee.
This story is usually told to emphasize the power of Cyrus, the king who mutilated a river, who had his soldiers work like slaves to avenge a horse. The leader of the most powerful army in the world, whose hail of arrows could eclipse the sun, Cyrus would have punished the sun for its envy, or the moon, or the
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