Would you pass the butter, please? How much have our stocks risen today?
What is the price of tomatoes? Have you heard that Princess Di is expecting
again?
When Sophie’s mother got home later that afternoon, Sophie was practically in
shock. The tin containing the letters from the mysterious philosopher was safely hid-
den in the den. Sophie had tried to start her homework but could only sit thinking
about what she had read.
She had never thought so hard before! She was no longer a child—but she
wasn’t really grown up either. Sophie realized that she had already begun to crawl
down into the cozy rabbit’s fur, the very same rabbit that had been pulled from the top
hat of the universe. But the philosopher had stopped her. He—or was it a she?—had
grabbed her by the back of the neck and pulled her up again to the tip of the fur where
she had played as a child. And there, on the outermost tips of the fine hairs, she was
once again seeing the world as if for the very first time.
The philosopher had rescued her. No doubt about it. The unknown letter writer
had saved her from the triviality of everyday existence.
When Mom got home at five o’clock, Sophie dragged her into the living room
and pushed her into an armchair.
“Mom—don’t you think it’s astonishing to be alive?” she began.
Her mother was so surprised that she didn’t answer at first. Sophie was usually
doing her homework when she got home.
“I suppose I do—sometimes,” she said.
“Sometimes? Yes, but—don’t you think it’s astonishing that the world exists at
all?”
“Now look, Sophie. Stop talking like that.”
“Why? Perhaps you think the world is quite normal?”
“Well, isn’t it? More or less, anyway.”
Sophie saw that the philosopher was right. Grownups took the world for
granted. They had let themselves be lulled into the enchanted sleep of their humdrum
existence once and for all.
“You’ve just grown so used to the world that nothing surprises you any more.”
“What on earth are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about you getting so used to everything. Totally dim, in other
words.”
“I will not be spoken to like that, Sophie!”
“All right, I’ll put it another way. You’ve made yourself comfortable deep down
in the fur of a white rabbit that is being pulled out of the universe’s top hat right now.
And in a minute you’ll put the potatoes on. Then you’ll read the paper and after half
an hour’s nap you’ll watch the news on TV!”
An anxious expression came over her mother’s face. She did indeed go into the
kitchen and put the potatoes on. After a while she came back into the living room, and
this time it was she who pushed Sophie into an armchair.
“There’s something I must talk to you about,” she began. Sophie could tell by
her voice that it was something serious.
“You haven’t gotten yourself mixed up with drugs, have you, dear?”
Sophie was just about to laugh, but she understood why the question was being
brought up now.
“Are you nuts?” she said. “That only makes you duller’.”
No more was said that evening about either drugs or white rabbits.