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Show 777L this world's in, I don't know... And that's only one. One child. Forty-eight!" She shook her head. I shrugged. "I think he enjoys the consequences. It's called faith." Then, trying to speak her language, I added, "I don't think he ever feared the consequences. He's a good man- he presumed that the consequences would also be good." "Was he... is he right?" I thought for a moment, weighing my life. Of my father's children, I suspected' that I hadbeen closer to losing any sense of meaning and all contact with goodness. But I had survived - and I wasn't a bad person I thought of the pain life had brought and remembered Brian's words about how everyone suffers. I thought of my mother's breakdowns, her nerves and organs rebelling at neglect, twisting and writhing for attention. Then I thought of her sweet face, her tender heart, her capacity for intimacy and love. "Yes." I said at last. "Yes, I think he was right." I thought of my brothers and sisters -'most of them bright and handsome, well-groomed and responsible, and all devoted to their families. It was a fair statement. My father's forty-eight children were extraordinary. Even in a typical nuclear family, parents would have reason to feel proud of such children. As we passed my father's red brick office, I pointed. "There's where my father works," }said. Two people were entering and I felt a sudden, unreasonable flash of apprehension. Stop being paranoid, I thought. Aunt Elsagreeted us at 4t-hv,e Kbaiog- ddoouuboliee ud oor of the house, embracing me first with restraint, then wholeheartedly once I had explained Clare's presence and that 'Daddy gave his |