Of course, he should have known all these years what it was. He should have known that Mr. Eumenes was the worst thing in the world for him. He had known it, but, like a drug addict, he had refused to admit it. He had searched for the man. Yet he had known it would be fatal to find him. The rose-colored spectacles would swing gates that should never be fully open. And he should have guessed what and who Mr. Eumenes was when that encyclopedic fellow in the truck had singsonged those names.
How could he have been so stupid? Stupid? It was easy! He had wanted to be stupid! And how could the Mr. Eumenes-or-otherwise have used such obvious giveaway names? It was a measure of their contempt for the humans around them and of their own grim wit. Look at all the double entendres the salesman had given his father, and his father had never suspected. Even the head of the Bureau of Health and Sanity had been terrifyingly blase about it.
Dr. Vespa. He had thrown his name like a gauntlet to humanity, and humanity had stared idiotically at it and never guessed its meaning. Vespa was an Italian name. Jack didn’t know what it meant, but he supposed that it had the same meaning as the Latin. He remembered it from his high school class.
As for his not encountering the salesman until now, he had been lucky. If he had run across him luring his search, he would have been denied the glasses, as now. And the shock would have made him unable to cry out and betray the man. He would have done what he was so helplessly doing at this moment, and he would have been carted off to an institution.
How many other transies had seen that unforgettable face on the streets, the end of their search, and gone at once into that state that made them legal prey of the Bohas?
That was almost his last rational thought. He could no longer feel his flesh. A thin red curtain was falling between him and his senses. Everywhere it billowed out beneath him and eased his fall. Everywhere it swirled and softened the outlines of things that were streaking by—a large tree that lie remembered seeing in his living room, a naked giant, his father, leaning against it and eating an apple, and a delicate little white creature cropping flowers.
Yet all this while he lived in two worlds. One was the passage downwards towards the Garden of Eden. The other was that hemisphere in which he had dwelt so reluctantly, the one he now perceived through the thickening red veil of his sight and other senses.
They were not yet gone. He could feel the hands of the black-clad officers lifting him up and laying him upon some hard substance that rocked and dumped. Every lurch and thud was only dimly felt. Then he was placed upon something softer and carried into what he vaguely sensed was the interior of one of the barracks.
Some time later—he didn’t know or care when, for he had lost all conception or even definition of time—he looked up the deep everlengthening shaft of himself into the eyes of another Mr. Eumenes or Mr. Sphex or Dr. Vespa or whatever he called himself. He was in white and wore a stethoscope around his neck.
Beside him stood another of his own kind. This one wore lipstick and a nurse’s cap. She carried a tray on which were several containers. One container held a large and sharp scalpel. The other held an egg. It was about the size of a hen’s egg-
Jack saw all this just before the veil took on another shade of red and blurred completely his vision of the outside. But the final thickening did not keep him from seeing that Doctor Eumenes was staring down at him as if he were peering into a dusky burrow. And Jack could make out the eyes. They were large, much larger than they should have been at the speed with which Jack was receding. They were not the pale pink of an albino’s. They were black from comer to comer and built of a dozen or so hexagons whose edges caught the light.
The twinkled.
Like jewels.
Or the eyes of an enormous and evolved wasp.
TOTEM AND TABOO
KATHY PHELAN told her fiancee, “Jay, you can take your choice. Give up drinking or give up me.”
Jay Martin was convinced she meant it. Her triangular face was set in tense lines, and her slanting green eyes burned.
He made one more protest. “But, kitten, I’m not an alcoholic. Just a light-heavy drinker, almost a middleweight, you might say.”
She bared little sharp teeth with extraordinarily long canines.
“Flyweight, shmyweight, what’s the difference? You’re no champ. You never go more than six rounds before you’re flat on your back.”
Pretty as a prize Siamese—and her bite was as sharp. Sadly, Jay Martin said he would, of course, not hesitate a moment about his choice. She smiled and purred and ran her little red-pink tongue out to moisten her lips for his goodby kiss.
Like a wounded crow dragging his broken wing behind him, Jay Martin limped into the Green Lizard Lounge. It was the best place he could think of in which to brood over his decision not to drink anymore. A dry Martini was just the thing in which to mingle sorrow and anger.
Ivan Tursiops entered a moment later, almost literally dived into a huge schooner of beer, rolled and reveled in it, then, after blowing and snorting relief and rhapsody, condescended to listen to Jay’s story. He was properly sympathetic.
“You can’t help your urge towards the battle, you know,” he said. “What you need is a good psychiatrist.”
“The only one I know is an alcoholic.”
“Oh, now, he’s not the only one in the world. The trouble with you, my boy, is you don’t hobnob with enough neurotics. Now I’ve dozens for friends, and every one swears by a different witch doctor. But I’ve heard recently of one fellow who’s so good I’m afraid to see him. I might lose my neurosis, you know, and I couldn’t afford that.”
“You mean your total inability to hear your mother-in-law?”
“Exactly. Look, here’s his address. The new Medical Arts Building.”
Doctor Capra pulled on his chin-whiskers and said, “Yes, I’m of a new school of thought. We take the anthropological approach. Have you read the recent authoritative article on our theories in the August Commuter s DigestP”
Jay nodded. Dr. Capra looked pleased and glanced at his watch. His waiting room was full.
“Then you know the essentials. Why waste time repeating them? You must be an intelligent man; you graduated from college. Business administration, I believe?”
“Yes, Doctor. Look, Kathy loves me, but she dominates me. She wants to run every minute of my life. And . . .” “Never mind that, Mr. Martin. Or may I call you Jay? Pay no attention to what your fiancee is doing. I assure you the Freudians and their mother-complexes were way off. It’s not at all necessary that I know your personal difficulties. We-”
“But she’s made me give up almost everything I like. Now, I don’t mind . . .”
“All that’s of no consequence at all, Jay. Hal Hmm!”
The doctor was holding up four photographs of Jay, each made from a different angle. He stroked his chin-whiskers.
“Excellent. No border case here. You’re definitely the avian type.”
Ignoring Jay’s torrential story of his conflicts with Kathy, he said. “Look at the tall thin and gangling body. Stork. Look at the shock of hair. Kingfisher. Big round eyes. Owl. Hooked nose. Falcon. Big and friendly but slightly mocking grin. Laughing jackass.”
“Say!” said Jay. “I resent—”
“No doubt of it, young man. You’re a classical type. There’ll be no trouble at all, at all.”
Dr. Capara rubbed his hands in professional glee and then handed Jay Martin a pillbox. “One every two hours, my boy, until your tutelary totem appears.”
“What?”
“You read the article, didn’t you? You know that primitive societies were quite correct in dividing their people into clans, each of which had a guiding and protecting spirit of totem modeled after a particular animal, don’t you? We psychiatrists of the anthropological school have found that the primitives unconsciously stumbled over a great truth. Every man is, in his subconscious, a bear or fox or weasel or mapgie or pig, or what have you. Watch your friends. Observe their
types of bodies, their faces, their actions, their characters. All modeled upon some zoological prototype.
“This pill is the result of our collaborations with the neurologists and biochemists. It organizes your subconscious so that your subjective totem seems to be projected objectively. In fact, it may be, for all we know, for we’ve never succeeded in catching one. However . . .”
“But, Doctor, don’t you want to hear what my trouble is? Kathy says . . .”
Capra glanced at his wrist watch, stood up, smiling, and gently butted Jay out of the office with his hands.
“Come back at this time next week. I can give you five minutes.”
“But, Doc, Kathy says I drink too much!”
Capra stopped, frowned, and pulled on his yellow-brown goatee.
“I knew there was something. Ah, yes, don’t drink any liquor while you’re taking these pills, my boy. Might disorganize the subconscious, you know.”
“But, but... I”
“Not now, Mister Martin.”
Ivan Tursiops looked up from the depths of his beer. “How’d it go?”
“I just told Kathy. Her fur really bristled; I was lucky to get away with only a verbal mauling. She says I should ignore - Capra’s com. All I need is a strong will power. If I loved her enough, I’d . . .”
Ivan beckoned to the waitress.
“Dry martini.”
“No, thanks,” said Jay. “Doctor’s orders. And Kathy threatened to scratch my eyes out if I ever came around with liquor on my breath again. Everybody’s against me. . . .”
The waitress set down the martini. Absently, broodingly, Jay sipped. Ivan said, “Pay no attention to either, my boy. I was just talking to Bob White, and he said he knows a hell of a good psychiatrist who uses the over-do-it approach. Just what you need. If your neurosis is alcohol, you don’t try to quit hitting the bottle. You try to drink too much.”
Jay downed his martini. His eyes were bright. “Yeah? Tell me more.”
“Waitress!”
Jay Martin awoke at noon the following day. Because it was Saturday and he didn’t have to work, he didn’t care that it was so late. But he did mind that he had to wake up at all. Seven martinis before he lost count. That meant a head the size of the Hindenburg and one just as ready to burst into flames. He’d be riding a seismograph of nausea and . . .
But he wasn’t. His head was clear as a freshly wiped cocktail glass, and his nerves firm as a bartender’s hand scooping up a tip.
It was then that he saw, perched on the foot of his bed, the bird.
The jagbird.
It was big as a bald eagle. It was bald, and the bags under its squinting bloodshot eyes were packed with dissipation. Its long bulbous red beak hung open to expose a swollen tongue with purple hair. Its frizzled black plumage reeked of stale beer; its breath was the morning-after’s.
If Jay had not felt so healthy, he would have sworn that this was the first hallucination of an attack of D.T.’s.
“Go away!” he said.
“Nevermore!” croaked the jagbird.
It was some time before Jay understood that the phrase was not a reply to his request that it leave. It was, literally, Jay’s usual vow on awakening after a hard night.
Jay got up and made some coffee. While he was drinking it, the bird flew in and perched on the chair across the table.
“Nevermore!”
If it hadn’t been for the creature, Jay would have been able to eat a hearty breakfast, something he hadn’t done for several years.
He got up and walked out. The bird flew through the door just as he opened it. And it insisted on perching upon his shoulder and croaking every sixty seconds, regular and monotonous as a metronome, “Nevermore!”
When he brushed it away, it flapped heavily above him so its shadow always fell on Jay’s head.
Jay was afraid to visit Kathy, so he went to a movie. The bird flew in with him, nor was it asked for a ticket. When Jay sat down, it perched upon his shoulder. The woman behind Jay did not seem to be bothered by it, so he decided that it must be a hallucination. It was a visual, auditory, tactile, and olfactory triumph for Dr. Capra’s little pills. Jay wanted to read the riot act to the psychiatrist, but he was afraid that he would be asked if he’d been . drinking liquor while taking the pills. Not only had he done so, he had swallowed all of them at once during a fit of bravado when Ivan Tursiops had said that they were probably nothing but sugar.
At exactly 5 o’clock, the jagbird disappeared. Puzzled but elated, Jay left the movie a few minutes later. It was not until he was just about to step into the Green Lizard that he remembered his hangovers always left him at that time.
He raised his eyebrows and went on in. His eyebrows soared even higher when he saw the bird sitting on the bar, waiting for him. Jay ignored it and ordered a martini. He lifted it to his lips.
uHic!” belched the bird.
At the same time it breathed in his face.
“Aagh!”
“What’s the matter?” said the bartender. “You chokin’ or somepin?”
“Can’t you smell it?” wheezed Jay.
“Smell what?”
“Nothing.”
The jagbird had put one heavy foot on the edge of the glass. Its talon, like a waiter’s dirty thumb, dipped into the drink. It’s red eyes, purple in the lounge’s dim light, squinted reproachfully.
“Hie/” it said.
“Haec!” sneered Jay.
“Hoc/” trumped the bird.
“Heck!” groaned Jay.
He left the martini untouched. He couldn’t argue with a bird who could decline Latin.
Kathy was so pleased to see Jay sober and with not even the hint of liquor on his breath that she almost purred. Her suspicion-slanted eyes widened into a soft golden-green.
“Oh, Jay, you’ve really sworn off. You love me!”
Her kiss was more than warm. He didn’t enjoy it as much as he should, and she felt it. She stiffened, narrowed her eyes, and put her sharp nails on his arm.
“What’s the matter? Aren’t you happy? Do you regret doing this for me?”
“Bring me a drink.”
“What? I will not!”
“Oh, I won’t touch it ... I think.”
Kathy sensed urgency. She went to the liquor cabinet and poured a scotch. He watched her and wondered again why he had to give up drinking when she wouldn’t. She had explained that she did not have to drink, but he did. Would he be a dog-in-the-manger and ask her to give up her harmless enjoyment because it was for him a vicious habit? Feeling like a selfish brute, he had said no. But he couldn’t help a little bitterness.
She handed him the scotch. Instantly, the jagbird stuck its big bulbous beak between cup and lip.
“Hid”
Jay handed the glass back to Kathy.
“See?”
She didn’t. He explained. Instead of relaxing, her eyes slitted even more, and her nails scratched his arm.
“Do you mean this bird will always be with us? Even after we’re married? We’ll never be alone?”
There was no soft plaintive note in her voice. Only a hiss of anger and determination.
He patted her arm. “It’s not a real bird, kitten. You can’t see it.”
“No, but I’ll know it’s therel I won’t be able to forget it. It’ll make me nervous as a catl Not only that, but I don’t like your giving up liquor because of some crazy bird. I want you to do it on your own will power, to stand on your own two feet.”
“If it weren’t for my totem,” he said, “I’d not be standing on my feet now. I’d be under the table at the Green Lizard.”
“That’s what I thoughtl” she spat. “Where is the jagbird now?”
He jerked his thumb at the end table, where it perched, sleepy-eyed, upon the ceramic bust of a Silenus. She stared vainly, burst into tears, and said, “Oh, if only I could see it! If only ...”
She stopped and dried her eyes. She became soft and furry-voiced.
It was a moment before he could see what she intended doing. She looked unconcernedly at him and even yawned, as if the whole matter had all at once become of no importance.
He blinked rapidly, like a startled owl. The outlines of her body had wavered and then congealed. They had remained fixed for only the space of a wink, but long enough. There was no mistaking the long bristling whiskers, the fangs revealed by the yawn, and the narrow-pupiled eyes. Nor the I’m-about-to-swallow-the-canary expression.
He strode past her, scooped up the jagbird, and lunged through the door.
Kathy screamed, “Jay, come back!”
“Nevermore!” croaked the bird, its head sticking out from under its owner’s arm.
Jay Martin is now married to a little woman with a spaniel’s big brown eyes. Her devotion to him has been described by their friends as dog-like. They act like two lovebirds. He no longer drinks like a fish, and he has become a whale of a success in the business world. He seems to be gifted with some uncanny instinct which enables him to judge a person’s character at a glance. Last year he joined the bulls, cornered the bears, and made a big killing among the wolves of Wall Street.
The Celestial Blueprint and Others Stories Page 11