Page 149 - Rainbow County and Other Stories

Rainbow County 137

“Operation,” Lloyd said. “Eyes. Yeah. Wouldn’t be able to see
today but for those two operations.”
He smiled with such a general gratitude for his health that
Robert, who in his own life was grateful for nothing, felt uncom-
fortable. Robert wished for another customer, preferably a mother
with a small boy who would have to be hoisted to a kid’s chair
inside the big one. With commotion like that he could easily slip
one or two of the crummy nudist magazines into the sleeve of his
jacket.
“I always figured,” Robert said, “that little boys always under-
stand the world earlier and better than little girls.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because little boys get taken younger to barber shops. You
sit them up on that little chair. You wrap that big cloth around
them. All of a sudden they see what it’s like to be a disembodied
head caught between two mirrors. That’s why little boys cry at the
barber shop, because, all of a sudden, they’re scared. They’re face
to face with the secret how we’re all just curving off into infinity.”
“I like that myself,” Lloyd said.
“Maybe that’s why you barber.”
“Could be.” Lloyd looked up at a hundred mirrored images
of himself.
“To tell the truth,” Robert said, “I think everybody ought to
have two full-length mirrors facing each other in their house.”
“Why’s that?”
“So in case you ever need to escape for any reason, like, you
know, to get away from whoever’s after you, you can just stand
yourself between the two mirrors and walk right out of space and
time into some infinite dimension.”
“That sure is another reason to be able to see,” Lloyd said. “If
I was blind, I’d never know if you were telling me the truth about
mirrors or not.”
“You are so right,” Robert said.
“Of course,” Lloyd continued, “more practically speaking, if
I was blind, I couldn’t barber. Whoever heard of a blind barber?”
He thought a moment. “Guess it’s possible to have, you know,
the touch without the eye for it.” He paused lost in the thought.

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