““That's pretty amazing, the countries thing," I said. "Yeah, everybody's got a talent. I can memorize things. And you can...?" "Urn, I know a lot of people's last words." It was an indulgence, learning last words. Other people had chocolate; I had dying declarations. "Example?" "I like Henrik Ibsen's. He was a playwright." I knew a lot about Ibsen, but I'd never read any of his plays. I didn't like reading plays. I liked reading biographies. "Yeah, I know who he was," said Chip. "Right, well, he'd been sick for a while and his nurse said to him, 'You seem to be feeling better this morning/ and Ibsen looked at her and said, `On the contrary,' and then he died." Chip laughed. "That's morbid. But I like it.””
