Luke Rheinhart - The Diceman

lacking since you rejected your father in the form of Freud and Dr. Mann and began this random rebellion.'

`But a good dice therapist must lead a random life.'

`But he's got to meet the patient regularly. He's got to show up ' `Mmmmm.'

`He's got to listen. He's got to teach.'

`Hmmm.'

`Moreover, you've got Lil trying dice therapy, your kids. Your new self is being accepted. You don't have to play the

fool anymore.'

`I see.'

`I even accept the new Luke. Arlene has introduced me to several, Ah, positions of dice therapy. I spoke to Boggles.

Dice therapy makes sense.'

`1t does?'

`Of course it does.'

`But it will tend to break down the sense of a stable self so necessary for a human to feel secure.'

`Only superficially. Actually, it builds a dice-student's - Jesus, I'm using your terms already - a patient's strength by

forcing him into continual conflict with others.'

`Builds ego strength?'

'Sure. You're not afraid of anything now, are you?'

`Well, I don't know.'

`You've made an ass of yourself so many times that you can't be hurt.'

'Ahh, very acute.'

'That's ego strength.'

`Without any ego.'

`Semantics, but it's what we're after. I can't be hurt because I analyze everything. A scientist examines his wound, his

wounder and his healer with equal neutrality.'

`And the dice-student obeys the dice decision, good and bad, with equal passion.'

`Right,' he said.

`But what kind of a society will it be if people begin consulting the Die to make their decisions?'

`No problem. People are only as eccentric as their options and most of the people who will go through dice therapy are

going to develop just like you; that's what makes your case so important. They're all going to go through a period of

chaotic rebellion and then move into a lifetime of moderate, rational use of the dice consistent with some overall

purpose.'

'That's very nice, Jake,' I said and leaned back on the couch from the alert sitting position I had been in.

`I'm depressed,' I added.

`Moderate, rational use of the dice is rational and moderate and every man should try it.'

`But the dicelife should be unpredictable and irrational and immoderate. If it isn't, it isn't dicelife.'

`Nonsense. You're following the dice these days, right?'

`Yes.'

`You're seeing your patients, living with your wife, seeing me regularly, paying your bills, talking to your friends,

obeying the laws: you're leading a healthy, normal life. You're cured.'

`A healthy, normal life -'

`And you're not bored anymore.'

`A healthy, normal life unbored -'

`Right. You're cured.'

`It's hard to believe.'

`You were a tough nut to crack.'

`I don't feel any different than I did three months ago.'

`Dice therapy, purpose, regularity, moderation, sense of limits: you're cured.'

`So this is the end of my booster analysis?'

`It's all over but the shouting.'

'How much do I owe you?'

`Miss R'll have the bill for you when you leave.'

`Well, thank you, Jake.'

`Luke, baby, I'm finishing up "The Case of the Six-Sided Man" this afternoon and after poker tonight. I thank you.'

`It's a good article?'

`Tougher the case, better the article. By the way I've asked old Arnie Weissman to try to get you invited to speak at

this fall's annual AAPP convention - on Dice Therapy. Pretty good, huh?'

`Well, thank you, Jake.'

`Thought I'd present "The Case of the Six-Sided Man" on the same day.'

'The dynamic duo,' I said.

`I thought of titling the article "The Case of the Mad Scientist," but settled on "The Six-Sided Man."

What do you think?'

`The "Case of the Six-Sided Man."

'It's beautiful.'

Jake came around from behind his neat desk and put his arm way up on my shoulder and grinned up into my face.

`You're a genius, Luke, and so am I, but moderation.'

'So long,' I said, shaking his hand.

`See you tonight for poker,' he said as I was leaving.

`Oh that's right. I'd forgotten. I may be a bit late. But I'll see you.'

As I was softly closing the door behind me, he caught my eye one last time and grinned.

`You're cured,' he said.

`I doubt it, Jake, but you never can tell. Die be with you.'

`You too, baby.'

Chapter Fifty-four

[From The New York Times, Wednesday, August 13, 1969, late edition.] In the largest mass escape in the history of

New York State Mental Institutions, thirty-three patients of Queensborough State Hospital of Queens escaped last

night during a performance of Hair at the Blovill Theater in midtown Manhattan.

By 2 A.M. this morning ten of these had been recaptured by city police and hospital officials, but twenty-three

remained at large.

At the Blovill Theater the patients sat through the first act of the hit musical Hair, but as the second act was beginning they made their escape. Most of the patients began to snake-dance their way onto the stage to the music of the first number of Act 2 `Where Do I Go?', mingled with the cast, and then fled backstage and hence to the street. The Blovill

audience apparently assumed the performance of the patients was part of the show.

Hospital officials claim that someone apparently forged the signature of Hospital Director Timothy L. Mann, M.D., on documents ordering staff members to make arrangements to transport thirty-eight patients from the admissions ward to see the musical by chartered bus.

Dr. Lucius M. Rhinehart, whom the forged documents had ordered to organize and guide the expedition, stated that he and his attendants had concentrated on holding the three or four potentially dangerous patients and could not make an effort to pursue the majority when they fled backstage. In all, five patients were restrained within the theater.

`The excursion was ill-tuned and ill-planned - ridiculous in fact and I knew it,' he said. `But I attempted on four separate occasions to get in touch with Dr. Mann to question him about the request, and, failing, had no choice but to carry it out.'

Police indicated that the size of the mass escape, the character of some of the patients involved, and the complicated series of forgeries needed to fool responsible staff members indicate a plot of major proportions.

Among those who escaped were Arturo Toscanini Jones, a Black Party member who recently made news when he spat in Mayor Lindsay's face during one of the mayor's walking tours of Harlem, and hippie figure Eric Cannon, whose followers recently caused a disturbance at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine during the Easter Mass.

A complete list of the names of those who have escaped was being withheld pending communication by hospital officials with the relatives of those who fled.

The patients who escaped were dressed for the most part in khakis and tee-shirts and informal footwear such as sneakers, sandals, and slippers. A few patients, it was reliably reported, had been wearing pajama tops or bathrobes.

Police warned that some of the patients might be dangerous if cornered and urged citizens to approach all known escapees with caution. They noted that among them were two of Mr. Jones's Black Party followers.

A full investigation of the breakout was under way.

Officials of the Blovill Theater and Hair Productions, Inc., denied that they had managed the mass escape as a publicity stunt.

How simple it all seems now reading about it again in the Times. Forge documents, charter bus, drive to theater, flee during performance.

Do you have any idea how many documents have to be forged to get one single patient released for one single hour from a mental hospital? From the time I left Eric at 11.30 A.M. that morning until my analytic hour with Jake at 3