Chapter 2
Information was a curious commodity in Our House. We called our part of the house ‘Our House’ to distinguish it from the guesthouse, which was joined to our part, separated by a hallway. Inference and idiom were the way we understood the world. A stock set of phrases described the whole spectrum of human behaviour. One man’s meat is another man’s poison. Lie down with dogs and get up with fleas. Better the devil you know than the devil you don’t. As a young child, I had known them all and must have understood their implied meaning, as I could predict with absolute accuracy when and which one would be coming up in any given situation. If I asked an uncomfortable question, there was always a firm colloquialism that cemented the situation. Empty vessels make the most noise. Youth i
