"And yet there was something a bit odd. He faced me as he spoke, was oriented towards me, and yet there was something the matter -- it was difficult to formulate. He faced me with his ears, I came to think, but not with his eyes. These, instead of looking, gazing, at me, "taking me in', in the normal way, made sudden strange fixations -- on my nose, on my right ear, down to my chin, up to my right eye -- as if noting (even studying) these individual features, but not seeing my whole face, its changing expressions, "me', as a whole. -- p. 9
Can I help?' I asked.
"Help what? Help whom?'
"Help you put on your shoe.'
"Ach,' he said, "I had forgotten the shoe,' adding, sotto voce, "The shoe? The shoe?' He seemed baffled.
"Your shoe,' I repeated. "Perhaps you'd put it on.'
He continued to look downwards, thought not at the shoe, with an intense but misplaced concentration. Finally his gaze settled on his foot: "That is my shoe, yes?'
"Did I mishear? Did he mis-see?
"My eyes,' he explained, and put a hand to his foot. "This is my shoe, no?'
"No, it is not. That is your foot. There is your shoe.'
"Ah! I thought that was my foot.'
Was he joking? Was he mad? Was he blind?"
