Summary

In Part IV: Millions, Chapter 30, the eight-year-old boy stopped talking the summer of the plague after his father died and when his mother was sick with the plague. His three-year-old brother became his responsibility, but his mother forbade him to leave to scavenge food. Once they ran out of food, the boy left to find food, locating only a piece of pound cake which he keeps in his pocket, and he returned home to find his brother missing. Lost in her illness, his mother cursed him, and when she died, he burned her in the backyard. For months, he lived at home, searching for his brother, and when he finally wandered away, soldiers found him, naming him Poundcake because of the treat in his pocket. The sergeant likes the born shooter, especially since he is mute, but though he claimed...