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turn in that crazy woman was a neighbor. She ended up giving me my name. It wasn’t anything formal. By that time I was one, and she decided to call me Mike. She didn’t have a husband. Only boyfriends. She died when I was seven.”
    “She died?”
    “Murdered. One of her boyfriends pushed her out a window.”
    “My God. You saw that?”
    He nodded. “Weird, huh?”
    “Where was this?”
    “Philadelphia.”
    “‘All in all, I’d rather be in Philadelphia,’” Cooper said, as if his own inner tension required an interjection of calming humor. “W. C. Fields had that put on his tombstone.”
    “Yeah.”
    Parrish got up, poured water over his head, then over the coals. Again, he stretched out on the top bench. Cooper cautioned himself not to get impatient. It was perhaps the suspenseful way in which Parrish was doling out the information slowly, perhaps he was relishing the idea of torturing Cooper with curiosity, or perhaps Cooper was giving Parrish a much awaited opportunity for a confession. Only, it wasn’t a sin to have been stolen. There was no shame in this confession. It was more like an unburdening.
    “The boyfriend took off to Baltimore,” Parrish continued. “Took me along.”
    “I’m surprised. You were a witness.”
    “He wasn’t a real killer type. She just pissed him off.” An odd laugh erupted from deep within Parrish’s throat. “His name was Nick…Italian guy. He liked me. Knew I wouldn’t tell anyone. Saying anything now wouldn’t do a thing. It was all over a long time ago. In the end, he couldn’t take care of me so he gave me to his buddy and his wife. The Caluccis.”
    “Just like that?” Cooper asked. “Passed you around like a piece of meat?”
    “Wasn’t bad at all,” Parrish said. “Everybody was nice to me. I was a cute kid, although I don’t have any pictures to prove it.”
    “I was a cute kid,” Cooper said inexplicably. “And I have the pictures to prove it.”
    “But baby, look at you now,” Parrish said, chuckling. Cooper marked the moment as genuine warmth between them. He wanted to hear Parrish call him ‘Brother’ again.
    “So the Caluccis raised you?”
    Parrish shook his head. Cooper waited. Parrish remained silent for a long time.
    Not again , Cooper thought.
    “I think they sold me,” Parrish said.
    “Sold you?”
    “I guess they needed money. They went off to live in Nevada somewhere. I never heard from them again.”
    “Who did they…?”
    “To this couple in Vineland, New Jersey. They were old, in their sixties. Mr. and Mrs. Baxter. Never had kids. Made me call them ‘Gramps’ and ‘Granny.’ Told everybody I was their daughter’s child, and that she had died. They were always hinting that I was well worth it.”
    Parrish’s story was a whopper. But it seemed all so far-fetched that Cooper was slightly skeptical. Stolen? Passed around from person to person? True or not, it was the longest Parrish had ever spoken.
    Once again, the sauna’s heat made it unbearable to stay any longer, and they moved out to the shower stalls, then shaved, and met again at the lunch counter. Cooper assumed that the camaraderie in the sauna had bridged some gap between them, and for the first time since he had joined the club, Cooper took a seat next to Parrish.
    It turned out to be a mistake. Parrish ignored him. Cooper didn’t want to pester Parrish in front of the counter lady, and was too embarrassed to move to his old seat at the other end of the counter. Instead, he left the health club before he had finished his sandwich. It was the first break in his regular routine in more than six months, and it shattered his poise.
    That evening, putting aside The Magic Mountain and the peregrinations of Hans Castorp, Cooper tortured himself with hypothetical conversations with Parrish, most of which were confrontational.
    He was less than alert when he got to the club the next day. Parrish, as always, showed no remorse for any rudeness he might have