Росс Макдональд - The Three Roads

But it was possible that the motives behind Wright’s muscular attitude were not entirely moral. Klifter had noticed during their conversation on the road that Wright was deeply interested in Paula West. This sexual interest in his patient’s lover might have influenced him to take the longest way in his treatment of the case, avoiding the drastic shortcut on which Klifter had decided. There was also the fact that Paula was opposed to Bret’s being told the truth, and Wright took her opinions very seriously.

Wearily he dismissed the elaborate train of conjecture. The case must be judged on its merits rather than on the basis of hypothetical motives of the other people involved. The only question to be decided was Taylor’s relation to the blurred and wavering line that separated the sheep from the goats, and his mind was already made up.

His hand was in his pocket palpating the wad of clippings when he was overcome by caution. What if he made his potent gift of truth and Taylor then refused to become his patient? The results could be embarrassing, not to say disastrous. He must be certain before he prescribed this medicine that the case was his.

“Do you wish to see me again?” he said. “Do you think I can help you?”

“I’d like to think so. I’d grab at anything that promised to pull me out of this backwater. If I don’t get back to work soon I’ll lose the habit permanently.”

“What work are you planning? It is good for you to be thinking of going back to work.”

“It’s a book I’ve had in mind for a long time. I call it The Political Fallacy . It’s nothing startlingly original, the idea goes back away before Thoreau, but I want to make some modern applications of it. The leading fallacy of our times, underlying fascism and communism and even most of the liberalisms, is the belief that political man is man in his highest function, that political forms are the salvation of the individual soul – but don’t let me bore you,” he concluded miserably.

“On the contrary. Please go on. I take it you are no anarchist?”

“Call me a political protestant. Your true anarchist is the enemy of political forms of any kind. I simply want government to know its place. A state, or a political party, is a means to an end. The end has got to be determined by non-political values, or politics becomes a snake gagging on its own tail. You have an analogous problem in psychiatry, don’t you? Whether to prepare your patients for the absolutely good life or for the life of society. That’s a crude antithesis, but you know what I mean.”

“I do indeed. That is one of our basic problems. Especially in a period when the good life and the life of society may be at opposite poles. In an insane society it is the sane man who seems insane.”

“I can’t take that comfort to myself,” Taylor said with his bitter smile.

“You have no reason to despair. The final test is ability to work, and your mind displays great energy.”

“And produces nothing. You can hardly imagine how unsettling it is not to remember certain things. It’s as if my own back yard were full of hidden land mines. I know I planted them myself, but I can’t remember where.”

“You know as well as I that every man has within him, in his back yard as you say, the total range of good and evil. But nothing there is less than human. You will find that nothing there can blow you to pieces.”

“Then what happened to my wife?” Taylor’s voice had suddenly become violent and high. “Why has nobody told me?”

“Consider that you did not know you had a wife until today. Commander Wright has allowed your process of recall to follow a natural course.”

Taylor twisted in his chair in order to look up into Klifter’s face. “I can’t live in a cage for the rest of my life. I feel as if they’ve shut me away in a drawer in a mausoleum.”

“I understand your feeling,” Klifter said quietly. “Shall we meet again then?”

“If you think it will do any good. Commander Wright said something about a leave.”

“Yes. If you come to stay with Miss West in Los Angeles you will be accessible to me. She has already taken it up with Commander Wright’s superiors. You will come to see me this week in Los Angeles then?”

“I have no choice, have I?”

“Your choices are voluntary. You are legally a free man–”

“I didn’t mean to be ungrateful,” Taylor said. “If I had a choice, or since I have, I’ll come.”

“Good. In the meantime it will be well for you to read these.” He brought the wad of clippings out of his pocket and handed them to Taylor. “We will talk of them at our next meeting.”

The young man stared at them. “What are they?”

“The newspaper accounts of your wife’s death. She was murdered nine months ago. Your illness had its inception at that time.”

Bret had sprung to his feet and was standing over the doctor, his irises shining grayly like small spinning wheels. “Who killed her?”

“The murderer is unidentified and still at large. When you have read those articles you will know all that I know.”

“I see now what the mystery was,” Taylor said slowly. “The bloody fools!”

“You must excuse me now,” Klifter said. “Good-bye. I should say au revoir.” The German phrase had risen to his lips, but he suppressed it, as he tried to suppress all German things to himself.

Bret was so absorbed in the newsprint in his hands that he failed to answer. With a last look at his tormented face Klifter went to the door. Superficially, he reflected as he closed it behind him, these Americans were an optimistic and secular brood. Incessant radios routed their loneliness, five-color advertisements and chromium bathrooms exorcised their diseases, mortuaries like the mansions of heaven disguised their funerals. But the tragic inner life went on, strong in proportion to its denial and violent in proportion to its stealth. The handsome barbered heads and sun-tanned faces were shadowed by death. Even more than the others, it seemed to him, Taylor had been engaged in a lifelong struggle with death. Let him meet his adversary face to face.

The afternoon was warm for February, and they drove with the top down. It was good to be on the road again after the last dragging hour at the hospital, packing Bret’s luggage in the rear compartment of the roadster, listening to Commander Wright’s last-minute instructions: “There’s no reason why he shouldn’t enjoy himself in moderation. Sports like swimming and golf are just what he needs to build up his self-assurance. Maybe even the occasional night club, but he shouldn’t do any drinking.…”

When they got away from San Diego’s dreary suburbs and onto the coast highway, Paula drove fast. Their physical speed, their tangible advance through the whipping air, gave her the illusion of progress and the promise of fulfillment. But she was disappointed by Bret’s attitude. After months in what amounted to custody he’d naturally feel awkward and shy on his first day in the outside world. Commander Wright had warned her to expect this. Still his continued silence worried her, nagging at the edges of her hope and threatening to spoil this sunny, blowing birthday of his freedom.

Snatching at any straw to make him speak, she pointed to a landmark she had often noticed before, the tall, leaning chimney of a brick kiln on the inland side of the highway. “I bet an immigrant from Pisa built that.”

“I beg your pardon.” His voice was heavy and dull. He hadn’t noticed the leaning chimney. He hadn’t even heard what she said, and she had to admit the warmed-over crack hardly deserved an audience.