Just Plain Weird (3 page)

         
The man vanished into the other room, and when he returned, he was alone. He appeared to have been scolded for some transgression.

         
“That was my daughter, Eliza,” he said, and added, in way of an apology for her rude behavior, “She’s funny, sometimes.”

         
“She needs a suntan,” I said simply; it was as if it were a passing thought going through my mind, but somehow finding its way out my mouth before I could stop it. After I’d said it, I still wasn’t certain I’d actually said it but only thought it-- that kind of thing would happen to me now and then.

         
The man stared at me for a moment. He seemed to be earnestly dwelling on my statement, and then starting with a soft chuckle, worked his way up to a loud inexplicable guffaw. I must have stuck on something he found extremely funny. Before long, he was holding his side, and his eyes were tearing up. He nodded agreement, unable to speak.

         
Raffles shot me a side-glance that said,
Oh, yeah, he’s gone.

         
When he was able to speak, he said, “Why don’t you boys finish off your lemonade. It’s getting late. I’m sure your parents will be expecting you home for dinner.” He was still wagging his head at the comment I’d made.

         
After we finished the lemonade, he walked us to the door, which shut behind us before we had the chance to look round, say good-bye or thanks or anything.

         
“Well, that was-- interesting,” I said, as we walked back to my house.

         
Raffles probably didn’t hear me, though; he was so caught up in thought.

         
We sat out on my front porch, then. Raffles was distance for quite a while, deeply distracted by something. When he next spoke, it was with a level of seriousness I’d never before heard him speak.

         
“There is something terribly wrong going on in that house,” he said grimly.

         
Though I had to concede it had been a strange episode, I had the distinct feeling he was talking about something entirely different.

         
“What do you mean?” I asked.

         
“Well,” he said, frowning, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he took a gulp, “It doesn’t add up.” Here I ought to explain that Raffles’ mind didn’t work the way other people’s minds worked; somebody else might notice that the man seemed somewhat childlike, while his daughter seemed somewhat more the adult, or something like that. Raffles, on the other hand, was steadfastly literal: if he said that something didn’t add up, some mathematical problem was troubling him.

         
Knowing this, and not seeing how anything mathematical could be applied to the episode, I said, “You’re kidding, right?”

         
“No,” he said, and before he continued, he hedged as though afraid he might sound crazy. “Did you notice how the floor was covered in the living room?”

         
“Tiled?”

         
“Yeah.”

         
“Yeah, I thought that was unusual.”

         
“I’m not talking about style or taste,” he said. “I’m talking about area.”

         
“I don’t get you,” I said.

         
“Look,” he labored to explain, “That house is not much different from your house, right? It is built on a similar lot, with a side driveway that is approximately the same width as your driveway. Well, hard as this will be for you to believe, that living room we were sitting in is-- say-- about three feet wider than it should be.”

         
I was completely lost, and the expression on my face must have shown I didn’t have a clue what he meant.

         
“All right,” he said. “These houses are built on identical lots, right? The lots are forty to forty-five feet wide, right? The driveways are about twelve feet wide, which leaves twenty-eight to thirty-three feet for the house and a border around the house. Now, that house is about eighteen feet wide, from outer wall to outer wall, right? That’s my estimate, anyway, but I think it’s pretty close-- close enough to illustrate the problem. Now, the tiles used to finish the living room floor in that house are nine inches by nine inches. By my estimate, the living room can be no more than 21.5 tiles wide-- that’s if you allow six inches for the outer walls. But when we were in that room, I counted that the living room was about 25.5 tiles wide, which is three feet wider than it ought to be.”

         
By now I must have been looking at him as though he’d gone daffy. Who in their right mind counts the tiles on the floor when they go visiting a neighbor?

         
“I don’t get what you’re saying,” I admitted. “The living room is too wide?”

         
“That’s not quite the point,” he said, rolling his bulgy eyes, and added: “The living room is three feet wider than it can possibly be.”

         
“It can’t be that wide?” Only Raffles could make me feel this stupid.

         
“More than that, even,” he stated conclusively. “The point I’m trying to make, here, is that the house is bigger on the inside than it is on the outside.”

         
“Let me get this straight,” I said. “I notice that these people are acting a little weird. You twist my arm to go over there, just to prove to me that I’m imagining things. And now you’re coming back with there is nothing wrong with the people, but the house-- there’s something wrong with the house they’re living in. Does that about cover it?”

         
“Oh, no,” Raffles was quick to correct me. “At this point I almost have to concede you were right about the people. There almost has to be something amiss with them, given the fact that their house appears to be violating the laws of physics. They almost have to be aware of this. Look,” he said, “I don’t think you fully understand what it all means.”

         
“Yeah, I’m stupid,” I said, my annoyance growing by the second.

         
“I’m not saying you’re stupid--exactly,” he went on. “You’re typical, I’d say, for a jock.”

         
I had to think about that. I was sure there was a further insult in his statement, but couldn’t pinpoint it.

         
“Nobody would expect you to know such things,” he added. “I think the best way to get you to understand is by illustration.” He looked around a moment, searching with his eyes, and then said, “Kitchen. We need to go to your kitchen.”

         
“My mom’s making dinner,” I said-- more like warned, actually.

         
“It’s all right,” he said. “We won’t bother her.”

         
We walked round the side of the house, and entered by the back door, which opened directly on the kitchen. My mother was standing at the stove, stirring something in a frying pan. Whatever she was frying was smoking a little too much, and the fan in the hood over the stove couldn’t clear the smoke fast enough. So the kitchen seemed a little foggy as we entered it.

         
“Boys,” she said over her shoulder, too occupied to turn round and face us.

         
“Raffles wanted to illustrate something to me,” I told her, as though she’d really be interested.

         
She just shrugged and kept frying whatever she was frying.

         
Raffles went to the refrigerator. He ended up pulling out a gallon of milk and a pound package of butter.

         
“This should do it,” he said, and I followed him out into the back yard.

         
We sat at the picnic table on the patio, with the milk and butter between us.

         
“All right,” he began. “Which container is bigger?”

         
“The milk,” he said; actually, I sort of growled it, because I was starting to feel pretty dumb. If Raffles had any sense of humor at all-- which he didn’t-- I would have already been expecting some elaborate practical joke at my expense.

         
“All right, you take the butter,” he said, and handed me the pound of butter. “Now the question is, is there any way this,” he said, holding up the plastic milk gallon, “can possibly fit into that--” he motioned toward the pound of butter-- “package?”

         
“Of course not,” I said.

         
“Why?”

         
“Because the gallon is way bigger.”

         
“Is there any way you can make that package big enough so that you can fit the gallon of milk in it.”

         
“No, it’s impossible.”

         
“Is it possible to make the gallon of milk small enough to fit into the butter package?”

         
“Well, if you empty out the milk, and crush down--”

         
Raffles was already shaking his head.

         
“No, I mean without changing a thing.”

         
“No,” I said, certain. “That’s just as impossible.”

         
“You sure?” he asked.

         
“Yeah.”

         
“Let me show you something,” he said, and then stood up. He grabbed the carton of milk, and started walking out into the middle of the back yard. When he was a good forty feet away, he stopped and turned round. He held up the gallon of milk. “What about now?” he called back to me.

         
I must have looked at him as if he were crazy.

         
“What about now?” he repeated.

         
“Well… yeah, but that’s only because it’s farther away-- the farther away it is, the smaller it looks.”

         
Raffles walked back to the picnic table. He set the gallon of milk on it, and looked down at me.

         
“And now you’re getting it,” he said.

         
“Getting it-- getting what?” Actually, the only thing I was getting was a dull throbbing pain between my eyes.

         
“If the gallon of milk is far enough away, it will be small enough to fit into the butter package.”

         
“But that’s like-- what do you call it?-- an optical
 
illusion. It’s not really that small; it just looks that small. In that case, you could take an aircraft carrier, if it was far enough away, and put it in your pocket.”

         
“Exactly-- that’s exactly right,” he piped, very pleased. “Now you have a grip on the concept.”

         
“But you can’t do it, because when it’s here, it’s too big.”

         
“Well, that’s what makes it all theoretical,” he said, with a wave of his bony hand. “If you could get the gallon of milk while it’s occupying space over there, and the package of butter while it’s occupying space over here-- well, if you could bring them both together without crossing the space in between, it’s possible.”