Walker Percy - The Thanatos Syndrome

“Very nice.”

“Nice! You try to do it! And, Tom—”

“Yes?”

“Have you driven by the old project in Baton Rouge lately?”

“No.”

“Well, you know what they were like — monuments of bare ugliness, excrement in the stairwells, and God knows what. You know what you’d see now?”

“No.”

“Green! Trees, shrubs, flowers, garden plots — one of the anthropologists on our board noted a striking resemblance to the decorative vegetation of the Masai tribesmen — and guess what they’ve done with the old cinder-block entrances?”

“What?”

“They’re now mosaics, bits of colored glass from Anacin bottles, taillights, whatever, for all the world like — can’t you guess?”

“No.”

“The African bower bird, Tom. Lovely!”

“I see.”

“Do you remember the colorful bottle trees darkies used to make in the old days?”

“Yes,” I say, wondering how Bob Como of Long Island City knows about bottle trees.

“We got some in the Desire project. Yes, Blue Boy’s there.”

“I see.”

“Would you deny that is superior to the old fuck-you graffiti?”

“No.” I look at my watch. “I’ve got to go home. Two questions.”

“Shoot. Make them hard questions.”

“Are you still disposing of infants and old people in your Qualitarian Centers?”

Bob Comeaux looks reproachful. “That’s unfair, Tom.”

“I didn’t say I disapproved. I was just asking.”

“Ah ha. All right! What you’re talking about is pedeuthanasia and gereuthanasia. What we’re doing, as you well know, is following the laws of the Supreme Court, respecting the rights of the family, the consensus of child psychologists, the rights of the unwanted child not to have to suffer a life of suffering and abuse, the right of the unwanted aged to a life with dignity and a death with dignity. Toward this end we — to use your word — dispose of those neonates and euthanates who are entitled to the Right to Death provision in the recent court decisions.”

“Neonate? Euthanate?”

“I think you’re having me on, Tom. We’ve spoken of this before. But I’ll answer you straight, anyhow. A neonate is a human infant who according to the American Psychological Association does not attain its individuality until the acquisition of language and according to the Supreme Court does not acquire its legal rights until the age of eighteen months — an arbitrary age to be sure, but one which, as you well know, is a good ballpark figure. You of all people know this. Consult your fellow shrinks.”

“I see.”

“Next question?”

“How does Van Dorn figure in this?”

He laughs. “Ah, Van. Van the man, the Renaissance man. I’ll tell you the truth. That guy makes me uncomfortable. I’m just an ordinary clinician, Tom. Just a guy out to improve a little bit the quality of life for all Americans. He does too many things well: tournament bridge, Olympic soccer, headmaster, computer hacker — he runs the computer division at Mitsy. In a word, he’s the Mitsy end of the sodium shunt and is a consultant to NRC besides. He’s to NRC what I am to NIH. He’s project manager of the coolant division at Grand Mer — which means it’s up to him to dispose of waste heavy sodium. No problem! Without him there’d be no goodies coming down the pipe. He not only set up the entire computer program for Mitsy but also the follow-up program for the beneficiaries of our little pilot program — some one hundred thousand or so subjects. We know how they’re performing as individuals and as a class. If you want to know the medical status of Joe Blow, a hairdresser in Denham Springs, he’ll hit a key and tell you. If you want to know the incidence of AIDS in all the hairdressers and interior decorators in the treatment area, he’ll hit a key and tell you. As a matter of fact, he mainly credits you with his success. He says you’re going down in history as the father of isotope brain pharmacology.”

“I see.”

“So for better or worse, Doctor, it appears you’re one of us.”

“So it seems.”

“Van Dorn.” He shakes his head. “What a character. I think he’s a bit of a spook myself, but he does think in large terms. This little project is small potatoes to him. He’s got bigger fish to fry.”

“What are they?”

“A little item which he calls the sexual liberation of Western civilization. According to Van, the entire Western world has been hung up on sex since St. Paul.”

“I see.”

“We call him our Dr. Ruth, Dr. Ruth of the bayous.”

“Dr. Ruth?”

“Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the good-sex lady. A little joke.”

“I see. Okay, would you mind taking me to my car?”

We’re sailing through the sunlit pines, “The Beautiful Blue Danube” all around us. Bob is enjoying himself. He puts a soft fist on my knee.

“Tom, we need you. We want you on the team. We need your old sour, sardonic savvy to keep us honest. You understand, don’t you?”

“Yes.”

“Okay, one thing. Tell me honestly. Don’t pull punches. Has anything you’ve heard in the last few minutes about the behavioral effects of the sodium additive struck you as socially undesirable?”

“Not offhand, though it’s hard to say. I’ll have to think it over.”

“There you go!” Again the soft congratulatory fist on my knee. “That’s the answer we’re looking for. Be hard on us! Be our Dutch uncle!”

“What about the cases of gratuitous violence — Mickey LaFaye shooting all her horses — the rogue violence of that postal worker in St. Francisville who shot everybody in the post office?”

Now he socks himself. “You’ve already put your finger on it!” he cries aloud. “That’s why we need you.”

“I have?”

“Rogue. You said it. You know what happens once in a while with elephants, which, as you know, have the largest brain of all land mammals and the best memory scansion?”

“Rogue elephants?”

“Once in a great while. We don’t know why with them and we don’t know why with us. Oh, we got bugs, Tom. Why do you think we’re bothering with you?”

“I understand.” I see my Caprice pulled off the road at the Ratliff gate. After the Mercedes it looks as if it had been junked and abandoned.

We shake hands. “One last thing, Tom,” Bob says in a different voice, not letting go of my hand. “I know that you’ll respect the confidentiality of what we’ve been talking about. But there’s a little legal hook to it too.”

“Legal?”

“It’s a formality, but by virtue of the fact that you know about Project Blue Boy, you are now in the Grade Three section of the National Security Act and are subject to the jurisdiction of the ATFA security guys.”

“It sounds like you’re reading me my rights.”

“I am! That’s what comes from messing with feds.”

“Are those the guys who busted us over there?” I nod toward Lake Mary.”

“Oh no. Those were county mounties. We’ve got a working arrangement with them. The ATFA guys keep a low profile. But I’m afraid they’ll be watching you — just as they watch me. It’s a small price, Tom.”

“What is ATFA?”

“Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms. Tom, those guys make the FBI look like Keystone Kops.”

A final firm handshake. “Tomorrow morning nine o’clock, my office at Fedville. I want you to meet my colleagues in Blue Boy. Tom, they’re good guys. You’ll like them. They’re the best of two worlds.”

“What two worlds?”

“Try to imagine a Harvard and M.I.T. brain who is not an asshole and try to imagine a Texas Humana can-do surgeon who is not an airhead.”

“I’ll try.”

9. ELLEN IS GONE. Margaret and Tommy are gone. Hudeen and Chandra are in an uproar. It is hard to get the story.