At last, with some thirty seconds remaining, Pfeifer took a breath and said quietly, ‘Uh – about the quiz. I’m very pleased to say that some of you did quite well. There were two ninety-eights and even one ninety-nine.’ He then added with a smile, ‘On principle, I never give perfect scores.’
Pfeifer paused, inhaled again, and continued. ‘Of course there were those who – how shall I put it – still haven’t quite caught on. Indeed, the fact that the lowest score was eleven makes it perfectly clear. But suffice it to say, the majority of you seem to be crowded as it were around the fifty-five mark, and show every possibility of ultimately passing the course.’
Agitated murmurs filled the room. Then, as a valedictory, Pfeifer announced, ‘I will affix the grade sheet in the usual place early tomorrow morning. Good day, gentlemen.’
He turned on his heel and exited.
As the students started to follow Pfeifer out, Peter Wyman was heard to mumble audibly, ‘I wonder what I did to lose that point?’
It was Professor Pfeifer’s custom to arrive at the Medical School no later than 6 A.M., so he could get in a few hours of research without the nuisance of having to talk to students. On the days when he had exam results, he would tack them on the bulletin board outside his teaching office – using only the students’ initials to preserve their anonymity – and then retreat off to his lab.
Needless to say, there were numerous early risers the next morning. In fact, while the sun was still a faint semicircle on the eastern horizon, half a dozen visitors had gone to what, in recent years, had come to be known as the ‘Wailing Wall.’
Also part of the tradition was the practice of students – even nonsmokers – after they had seen their grades to cauterize their initials with the tip of a lighted cigarette.
Barney arrived at seven o’clock. Bennett was already waiting.
He was not smiling.
Nor, on the other hand, was he frowning.
‘What’s the score, Landsmann?’
‘Livingston,’ his friend replied somberly, ‘for us it is neither the best of times nor the worst of times. Voilà.’
He pointed to the list and indicated the six names already scorched into oblivion. The recipients of the majestic ninety-nine and the brace of lordly ninety-eights had come and gone. And there were still wisps of smoke emanating from the eleven and the two middle-of-the-roaders who had notched a forty-seven and a fifty-six.
‘When did you get here, Ben?’
‘I arrived at quarter to and these holes were already here. In fact, you and I seem to be following the essence of Greek philosophy, ‘meden agan,’ nothing in excess. I got seventy-four. And you got seventy-five.’
‘How do you know? It occurred to me on the way over that we both had the same initials.’
‘No sweat. I used my full name for the exam – Bennett A. So I’m the seventy-four.’
Barney’s face suddenly lost some of its indoor pallor. ‘Hey, Landsmann, we’re pretty hot stuff. But how are we gonna obliterate our identities?’
‘I’ve got the traditional implement.’
‘But you don’t smoke.’
‘Of course not, but sometimes I take out unenlightened young ladies who do.’ He reached inside his jacket and withdrew a silver cigarette case. Removing a long, thin cigarette, he lit it with a matching silver lighter. Both were monogrammed – or at least bore a seal.
‘Hey, that’s a neat case, Ben. Can I see it?’
He tossed it to Barney. The cover was embossed with a circular crest bearing a silver ‘A’ in a field of bronze.
‘What is this?’
‘Oh, it belonged to my dad. He was an officer in Patton’s Third Army.’
‘Extremely cool,’ Barney admired. ‘My dad served in the Pacific and he didn’t get anything like this. What did your father—’
‘Hey, come on,’ Bennett interrupted, ‘it’s breakfast time – eradicate our names and let’s split.’
He handed him the cigarette.
As Barney went to work on their identities, he quickly scanned the grade sheet for Laura’s initials.
They were not there. Which is to say no longer there. Thus she had either done spectacularly well or bombed out.
He would not know what to say if she turned out to be at the bottom. On the other hand if she were at the top (and, Laura being Laura, this was not impossible), he would not know how he’d feel.
12
‘How did your Biochem test go, Laura?’
‘Not bad.’
‘Does that mean you did well?’
‘No, it simply means what I said – not bad.’
‘Come on, we shouldn’t have secrets between us. I’m your future husband, after all.’
‘Just for the record, Palmer, I haven’t given an official answer to that one either.’
‘Okay, Doctor, okay, I capitulate. Now, what are you doing for Thanksgiving?’
‘Studying, what else?’
‘That goes without saying. But you’ve got to take some sort of a break. I mean, even prisoners on Death Row eat turkey on Thanksgiving.’
‘Oh, I’m sure the dining room will come up with a reasonable facsimile – even if it’s cellophane with plastic stuffing.’
‘Then I’ll come and eat ersatz turkey with you.’
‘But what about your parents? Won’t they be disappointed not to see you?’
‘Not as disappointed as I’ll be at not seeing you.’
Palmer then had a sudden disquieting thought.
‘Or did you make other plans?’
‘Well, actually, I just assumed that Barney and I—’
‘Ah, the good Dr Livingston—’ he interrupted.
Laura frowned. ‘As I was saying,’ she continued pointedly. ‘Barney and I and a few of the first-year chain gang were gonna set up a big table in the cafeteria and pretend we were a family. But there’ve been a few last-minute defections.’
‘Namely?’
‘Well, Bennett’s flying home to Cleveland for the day to be with his folks—’
‘That’s rather extravagant. He must be well off.’
Laura nodded. ‘I guess so. From the looks of his wardrobe, I’d say he singlehandedly keeps Brooks Brothers solvent. And then Livingston’s finked out as well.’
‘Returning to the family seat in Brooklyn?’
‘He didn’t say. In fact, he’s been acting kind of strangely for the last week or so.’
‘Why – is he angry with you for some reason?’
She shrugged. ‘I don’t think so, unless he’s pissed off because I wouldn’t tell him how I did on the Biochem exam.’
‘How did you do, by the way?’ thrusted Palmer, trying to catch her off-guard.
‘I told you, Palmer,’ she riposted, ‘not bad.’
We gather together to ask the Lord’s blessing
He chastens and hastens His will to make known.
The wicked oppressing now cease from distressing.
Sing praises to his name; He forgets not His own.
Barney kept the car radio turned to WCRB as long as their signal held out. They seemed to be the only station in all of New England that had not already begun to sing Christmas carols on Thanksgiving Day. Since he was all alone in one of Lance’s Corvettes, he could sing aloud the ‘Hymn of Thanks-giving,’ which he remembered with fondness from his high school days.
Interstate 86 South was virtually empty. Most travelers had reached their destinations and were already sitting at festive tables. To spend Thanks-giving alone was a fate even worse than a solitary Christmas, he decided. Because outside of Macy’s parade on television, there was nothing to do except join your near and dear ones and stuff your face.
Barney’s would be one of the few unstuffed faces. He’d had to disappoint his mother, who had naturally expected him to return to Brooklyn. Moreover, all he had offered by way of explanation was that he had to visit a ‘friend in trouble.’
(Curiosity had forced Estelle to as
k, ‘Is it a girl?’ Barney had merely replied that it was ‘nothing to worry about.’)
On the northern outskirts of Hartford, he turned off the highway and headed down a series of roads that grew progressively narrower and more primitive. Finally, he squeezed through a narrow dirt path, framed by leafless trees, and suddenly emerged into a vast open space. About a hundred yards away was an opulent house in the French style. A small brass plaque at the large wrought-iron gates read:
THE STRATFORD INSTITUTE
Barney thought for a moment of its colloquial sobriquet: ‘Château Loco.’ For here dwelt the aristocracy of the mad. Or at least the plutocracy. Rumor had it that the residents paid nearly a thousand bucks a week.
Christ, he thought to himself, for that money their straitjackets ought to be cashmere. He understood why he was telling himself such feeble jokes. For he had always been told of the paranoia people feel when visiting someone in a mental institution. Even the most confident feel an irrational anxiety that they will be unmasked – and therefore not allowed out.
When he pulled up at the booth to identify himself, he saw that the guard was munching on a turkey leg and looking perfunctorily at a flickering TV screen. He thumbed his clipboard, adding a spot of grease on every page.
‘Uh hunh.’ He nodded. ‘Dr Livingston to see Mr Eastman. Go right in.’ (Barney had merely said on the phone that he was ‘calling from Harvard Medical School,’ but it clearly enhanced his acceptability.)
At the heavy wooden front door he was met by a cherubic matron who politely offered holiday greetings and, somehow assuming Barney was familiar with the institute, indicated that ‘the Eastman boy’ was taking some air on the back lawn, and ‘Dr Livingston’ was welcome to seek him there.
Barney nodded and started down the long, high corridor.
Unfortunately, he took a wrong turn and found himself standing before a white metal door that was firmly locked. He peered through the rectangular window of wired glass and saw a phantasmagoric collection of patients shuffling, stretching, groaning, each evidently in his own private world, apparently unwilling or unable to acknowledge the presence of anyone else. It reminded him of a Fellini film. Only this unreality was real. Jesus, he thought, is Maury in there?
‘May I help you?’ called a stern female voice. He turned to find a Valkyrie in nurses’ garb.
‘May I help you?’ she repeated an octave lower.
‘I’m … from Harvard Medical School to see the Eastman boy.’
‘Well, he’s certainly not in there,’ she protested.
Thank God, Barney thought. ‘I was told he was on the back lawn. Would you direct me, please?’
She pointed in the proper direction. Barney nodded and hurried off, hoping the fright he felt didn’t show on his face.
He found Maury sitting alone on a large, empty stone terrace overlooking a vast, manicured garden. He seemed to be watching the sun descend behind the rim of the Taconic Mountains.
‘Hi, Maury,’ Barney said quietly.
‘Hello, Barney,’ his friend replied tonelessly, without turning his head. ‘Thanks for coming. Amazing sun, isn’t it? Sort of like God putting a shiny copper penny into a slot to buy us a skyful of stars.’ He still did not turn his head.
‘That’s a lovely metaphor, you should write it down.’
‘I don’t write anymore,’ he muttered.
Since Maury would not face him, Barney walked around his chair and leaned against the railing of the porch. Now he could see why his friend was so fascinated by celestial light; his own eyes were like burnt-out electric sockets. The sight made Barney shudder.
‘How’s Medical School – am I sorely missed?’
‘It’s kind of a drag, actually. And I miss you, Maur. The guy that’s in your room now is a real asshole.’
‘There’s someone in my room? I thought they’d board it up or quarantine it or something so nobody would catch—’
‘Stop knocking yourself,’ Barney interrupted, putting his hand lightly on Maury’s shoulder. ‘I bet you’ll be back with us by spring.’
‘Don’t futz me around. I’m gonna be here forever.’
Barney gazed into those chillingly empty eyes and thought to himself, This poor bastard was better off when he was manic. At least he was alive.
‘Hey, come on, trust me, willya? I’m practically one-eighth a doctor. You’re gonna be okay, Maur. You’re gonna come out of this and be another John Keats, just like you said.’
‘Keats died at twenty-six.’
‘Yeah, right,’ Barney responded, ill at ease. ‘That was a lousy example, I guess. But you know what I mean.’
Then there was silence. Why? Barney wondered. He knows goddamn well what I’m trying to say. Why won’t he let me cheer him up? Why’s he so intent on pulling me down into the abyss with him? And why did he ask me to come out here in the first place?
They sat for a few minutes without talking. Then, out of nowhere, Maury whispered, ‘They’re zapping me.’
‘What?’ Barney knew what he meant but didn’t want to believe it.
‘The doctors call it ECT – Electro-Convulsive Therapy,’ Maury explained, in the same gray tone of voice. ‘My fellow inmates call it “zapping”. You must know about the machines they have to fry your brains …’
‘Shock treatment – you mean you’re getting shock treatment?’
His friend nodded.
Barney was overwhelmed with disgust. He had always associated electricity with punishment. Shocks for antisocial aggressive types; and for the homicidal, the supreme chastisement – the electric chair. But why this poor harmless guy? …
‘It’s supposed to cure depression.’ He shrugged and added, ‘Anyway, my father thinks I’m better.’
‘Has he been here to see you?’
‘No. I mean he’s a very busy man and San Francisco isn’t what you’d call around the corner.’ He sighed deeply and continued, ‘But he calls. He calls Doctor Cunningham, the chief shrink, and makes sure the guy is taking care of me … Hey – I made you come all the way from … wherever … and I haven’t asked about you. Or your wife.’
‘I’m not married,’ Barney whispered, growing steadily sicker at heart.
‘Oh,’ Maury answered in a childlike tone. ‘Didn’t you have something to do with that tall blond girl? …’
‘Laura,’ Barney said, nodding. ‘Laura Castellano. She’s just my friend.’
‘She was good-looking, I remember that.’
‘Good,’ Barney said, forcing a smile. ‘If you can talk about pretty girls, then you must be on the way to getting well.’
‘There’s no such thing as “well” in psychiatry,’ Maury said with an air of plaintive resignation. ‘You just progress from one kind of sick to another. You’ll be learning that soon, I’m sure.’
‘What idiot doctor told you a stupid thing like that?’ Barney snapped.
‘My father,’ Maury mumbled. ‘As far back as I can remember, he always said that.’
Things look swell, things look great,
Gonna have the whole world on a plate.
Starting here, starting now
Honey, everything’s coming up roses …
As he drove back up Interstate 86 Barney spun the dials of his car radio, hoping to find something to mollify the dull ache in his gut. But all he could get with any clarity was Hartford’s WFDR, a station exclusively devoted to show tunes. And the trumpetlike voice of Ethel Merman blasting out the brand of frantic, mindless optimism so typical of Broadway seemed an ironic mockery of Maury’s plight.
He pulled into the first Howard Johnson’s on the turnpike, ordered a 3-D burger (which tonight seemed to represent Disillusion, Depression, and Despair), and tried to force himself to eat.
‘Gosh, you look down, honey,’ said the sympathetic, frizzy-haired waitress. ‘Did you lose your girl or your job?’
‘Neither,’ Barney replied, ‘but I think I’m about to lose my temper.’
He got
five bucks worth of change from the cashier, went to the phone booth, pulled a crumpled envelope from his pocket, and dialed San Francisco. After three rings there was a reply.
‘Doctor Eastman’s office.’
It was his answering service.
‘Uh – could you tell me how to reach the doctor? It’s fairly urgent.’
‘Are you a patient?’
‘No, no. I’m – I’m a doctor, actually. Name’s Livingston.’
There was a brief silence and a clicking sound, which suggested that wires were being spliced and reconnected.
And then a man’s calm baritone voice: ‘Yes, this is Doctor Eastman.’
‘Uh – it’s Barney Livingston, doctor. I’m a friend of Maury’s. I was the last guy to speak to him before he – you know – jumped.’
‘Oh, of course. Did you get my little note?’
‘Yes, thank you, doctor,’ Barney replied, thinking once again of the brevity and lack of emotion in Eastman’s letter of thanks. ‘Actually, that’s how I got your number …’ Eastman was not exactly helping to keep the conversation alive, so Barney had to keep taking the initiative. ‘Uh – I’ve just been to visit Maury, sir—’
‘That seems beyond the call of duty,’ the doctor remarked.
‘He’s a nice guy, sir. I like him.’
‘I’m pleased to know that. He generally has difficulties interacting with his peers. Now how can I help you, Mr Livingston?’
‘It’s Maury who needs the help, sir.’
‘I don’t follow.’ There was now a hint of annoyance in the psychiatrist’s voice.
‘Doctor Eastman,’ Barney continued, trying to maintain his composure, ‘do you know they’re giving your son shock treatments?’
‘Of course.’
‘Well, if you’ll forgive my bluntness, sir, I’ve just visited your son. And from what I saw, he’s a lot worse than he ever was.’
‘That’s not what I hear from Doctor Cunningham,’ Eastman retorted. ‘Besides, what makes a first-year medical student qualified to pass judgment on his superiors?’
‘Doctor,’ Barney said earnestly, ‘all I ask is that you take the time to come and see how these treatments are incinerating your son’s brain—’