VanitasTHE ROBBERS had left a circle of turds at Ruel’s place at the dining room table: moistly gleaming, brown globules that the youngest child Roy mistook for candy. He raced to grab some, but was mercifully overtaken by Yahyey, his yaya, who had shrieked “Dirty! Dirty! Dirty!” as she whisked him away. Ruel mused that this much used word must be the Filipino yaya’s mantra. His wife Cora was talking to the police investigators. It was only now that Ruel noticed how much the decorative curllicued columns with their rounded capitals, marking the partition between the slightly elevated dining room and the living room, resembled twisted turds. Had some perverse form of mimetic magic worked itself on the criminals’ minds to make them leave such a vile memento of their depredations? Or was it n
