David applied more tape diagonally around Rachel's foot, winding from the arch, over the top, around the heel and back to the arch to further stabilise the ankle and add pressure. As he was doing this, Maria took the towels to the stream to re-wet.

"I can't keep my eyes off your equipment, David. You're an impressively built lad. Maria doesn't know how well endowed you are. She has no comparison, but I do. I explored a fair bit before I met Edom, and I knew a lot of men — I know."

"I didn't realise until I arrived at Army camp last year and saw the other fellows in the gang showers. Didn't realise until they were pointing and staring. Until I saw they were all smaller, most of them much smaller. I had always considered this as normal. This is still normal for —"

"What's still normal for what?" Maria interrupted as she came back in with the cold towels. "Let me put these on again, Mama, then you can tell me what's normal."

She reapplied the cold compresses and looked up. "David? Mama? Who's going to tell me what's normal?"

"You go ahead, Mama," he said. "You're more experienced with this than I am."

"But you're closer to the subject than I am," Rachel said, giggling.

"Closer, maybe, but until last August in Quebec, I was completely unaware of anything of it. It had never entered my mind."

"I'm no further ahead here," Maria said. "What's this normal thing you were talking about?"

"Abnormal, Sweetheart," Rachel replied. "Abnormal is more the theme of the discussion we were having."

"Yes, but to me, entirely normal," he countered.

"But you had no basis for comparison. No norm to relate to."

"That's the thing, though. My range of comparison had been my father, my brother and me. I seemed normal."

"You come from a very big family."

"No, only one brother and one sister."

"I'm completely confused here," Maria said. "What's this about?"

Rachel reached out her hand and gave his dangle a gentle shake. "This, Maria, we're talking about this."

"That's such a delightful topic, one I'm very interested in," Maria said, "but I haven't been able to follow. What have I missed?"

"Mama, you tell her, you know more about it than I."

Maria shook her head. "Weren't we just here a minute ago?"

"Size, Maria, size. These are normally smaller. Much smaller. I didn't realise they came this big until I spied on you that first day. David's is bigger dangling than most men are when they're hard."

"How big are they normally, then?"

"This size," he said. "This is normal for me. This is what I grew up with, what grew up with me.."

"So that's where I came in, then," Maria laughed. "He thinks it's normal, you think it's not."

"I know it's not, and he now also knows. Tell her about your discoveries in the showers. I'd like to hear the rest of it too."

He looked at them and shrugged "My first day in Valcartier when I arrived to sign-up for the Army last August, after being assigned a bunk in the barrack tents, I went to find a bath. It was hot and humid, and after the four-day train trip, I was sticky and stinky.

"There were no baths, only large rooms with shower nozzles. The room was crowded when I arrived so I undressed, joined in and stood under a shower stream enjoying the cooling water for a while before starting to soap. I looked up and saw nearly everyone staring at me, so to find out what the problem was, I asked the fellow next to me to explain.

"He pointed down at me, told me I was so big. I looked down at his and could barely see it buried in his hair, so I looked at the others in the shower. Most were not much larger than my thumb, smaller than I had been as a child. Thinking some might be slow growing, I looked further and realised I'm thicker than some were long.

"I became increasingly curious during the following weeks when I had seen only one approaching my size. Most were half as long, weren't half as thick. I felt like a freak." David shook his head and offered a twisted smile.

"When I was in Bath and Bristol on my leave in January, I spent a lot of time in the libraries, reading, trying to learn more. There is so little written about such things. Almost like it's a secret."

"I guess it's because they're kept hidden, not wagged around in public," Maria said. "So, Mama, what's your experience with this?"

"Your father was also big when hard, wonderfully thick. But when soft, he was only about half as big; he doubled when excited, he grew to about the size David's is when dangling. Edom had the thickest and among the longest I had seen... Until David."

"This looks and feels perfectly normal to me." Maria hefted it and giggled. "But what is the normal size? I'm curious again."

"I read a study report in a medical journal in the university library in Bristol, which analysed several researchers' findings. Normal length ranges from two and a half to four inches and the normal erect range is from four and a half to six inches."

"How big is an inch?" Maria asked.

"It's a little over two and a half centimetres. I have an inch scale here. Two inches is the length of my little finger in a fist like this. Three inches is the length of my thumb, four is the width of my palm here below my thumb, five is from the crook of my thumb to the end of my forefinger, six is from the crook of my thumb across here to the end of my middle finger, seven is..."

"This," she said, giggling and spreading her fingers along his dangling length.

"Not quite. It's a bit down toward six." Then he added with a big grin. "It's more toward normal size."

"What's seven then?"

"Tip of my thumb to my forefinger in its widest spread."

"And eight?"

"Tip of thumb to tip of middle finger spread wide."

"And nine?" she asked, looking down and giggling.

"Only when you get me excited."

"That's an interesting thing, Maria," Rachel said, "Some grow a lot, double or more in length when they erect. Others, like David's, don't lengthen so much as thicken, they lengthen half or less. It would be rather uncomfortable and awkward for you, for the both of you if his doubled in length."

"But the size doesn't matter," David replied. "That's the theme which I heard the guys all talking. The important thing, they all said, is how well it's used. Strange, though, as word of my size spread around the company and the regiment, it became increasingly difficult for me to have a normal conversation."

Maria looked at him with a puzzled expression. "How so?"

"Few took me seriously, most of them were distracted and the talk almost always turned rather crude. It would be easier if I were a fair amount smaller, more like of the rest of the fellows. If size doesn't matter, then why were they paying all the strange attention to it? Confusing to me."

He looked at his watch. "It's now 1820. It'll be growing dark in less than an hour. I need to cut saplings and make a pair of crutches. Where do you pack the bone saw, Mama?"

"It's tied between plies in the same pocket as the biscuit box."

"I remember seeing that. How's the ankle feeling?"

"Still throbbing, but much more gently. I've had excellent care. I've thoroughly enjoyed your nursing uniform."

He looked down, shook his head and let out a deep sigh, then got up to pull on his trousers. "Let me change from nursing to woodsman's clothes, I have to go cut some timber. We should get dinner going, we don't want the stove still on too far into twilight. There's no moon tonight until well after midnight."

"I'm thinking of a thick stew of venison and barley with diced onions, carrots, turnip and wild mushrooms," Rachel said.

"The barley will take the longest." Maria added with a giggle, "I'll slip into my chef's garb and get that going."

"And what can I do?" Rachel asked.

"You can concentrate seriously on being a convalescent. Relax and rest," David said as he headed out. "You need to mend."

"So that's not normal?" Maria asked after she had heard David find the bone saw and walk across the slope.

"No dear, not anywhere near it. I met a lot of thumb-sized men and one who barely grew to thumb-size when hard."

Maria looked at her thumb. "And what was it like with them?"

"It depends on the person attached to it. I would be thrilled to have someone like David attached to a thumb-sized one. It depends so much on how it's used, so much on the passion of the person using it. Most importantly, it depends on the person. Actually, entirely on the person. Remember, it's simply a tool. Tools don't do the work. It's the craftsman's talent and passion that create the fine work."

Rachel smiled. "A thumb-sized man was how I discovered a magical spot inside... I must tell you about it. I was amazed at the magic he could do with his small tool. He wasn't Jewish, not circumcised, the only non-mutilated one I had seen until David's. God, was he long-lasting. The length of his endurance far outdid his short size."

She trembled lightly as she grinned sheepishly at Maria. "Give David a small one and I'd be no less attracted to him; he's a magnificent person. Give David's to many other men, I wouldn't be interested except in looking at the tool." Rachel trembled again. "I do love looking at it."

"So size isn't important, then," Maria said. "I had no idea of this size thing, no reason to think David's size is anything but normal. To me, he is the normal size, normal in my experience. He's the both the smallest and the largest..." She shook her head. "I don't know what to think."

She looked down again at her thumb, laid it on her wrist and remained quiet for a long while as she stared. Then shuddering lightly, she shook her head again, looked up at her mother and said, "I'll go get the barley started."