“I rule you are out of order, Dr. Rhinehart. Please sit down.” Dr. Cobblestone stood erect at the end of the table and his face was neutral as he spoke these words. As the heads all swung back to me there was a total silence. When I spoke it was almost to myself.
“The great Goddam machine society has made us all into hamsters. We don’t see the worlds within us waiting to be born. Actors only able to play one role: who ever heard of such nonsense? We must create random men, dicepeople. The world needs dicepeople. The world shall have dicepeople.”
Someone had a firm grip on one of my arms and was pulling at me to come away from the table. About half the other doctors seemed to be standing now and jabbering to each other. I resisted the tug and raised my right arm with clenched fist and boomed out to old Cobblestone:
“One more thing!”
A fearful silence followed. All stared at me. I lowered my clenched fist and released the green die onto the doodle pad in front of me: a five.
“All right,” I said. “I’ll leave.” I picked up the die, replaced it in my vest pocket and I left. I learned later that an entirely new sewage disposal system was rejected by unanimous vote and a system of temporary stop-gap repairs initiated to the satisfaction of no one.
34
I had only one session with Eric Cannon to try to introduce him to dice therapy, because he and his father had reached some kind of agreement whereby Eric was to be released three days later. He was naturally keyed up about leaving and didn’t listen carefully as I began a Socratic dialogue to get him into dice theory. Unfortunately, the Socratic method entails a second person at least willing to grunt periodically and since Eric remained absolutely mute I gave up and told him in a twenty-minute lecture what a dicelife was all about. He became quite alert. When I’d finished he shook his head from side to side slowly.
“How do you stay loose, Doc?” he asked. “How do you keep yourself on that side of the desk?”
“What do you mean?”
“How come they don’t lock you up?”
I smiled.
“I am a professional man,” I answered.
“A professional loony. Giving psychotherapy.” He shook his head again. “Poor Dad. He thought I was being cured.”
“The concept of the dicelife doesn’t fascinate you?”
“Of course it does. You’ve turned yourself into a sort of computer like our air force uses in Vietnam. Only instead of trying to kill the maximum number of the enemy, you program yourself to drop your bombs at random.”
“You miss the point. Since there is no real enemy, all of life’s wars are games, and the dicelife permits a variety of war games instead of the continual sluggish trench warfare of the typical life.”
“ ‘There is no enemy,’ ” he quoted quietly, looking at the floor in front of him. “ ‘There is no enemy.’ If there’s one thing that makes me want to puke more than anything else it’s people who think there is no enemy. Your dicelife is a hundred times as sick as my father even. He’s blind, so he’s got an excuse, but you! ‘No enemy!’ ” And Eric writhed in his chair, his face distorted with tension. He twisted his muscular body upward until he was standing, his neck still rolling tensely, his eyes on the ceiling. Clenching his fists he finally held himself reasonably quiet.
“You big fool,” he said. “This world is a madhouse with killers loose, torturers, sick depraved sadists running churches, corporations, countries. It could be different, could be better, and you sit on your lump of fat and toss dice.”
I didn’t say anything since I was not in the mood for a wrestling match and was, as I listened, for some reason feeling guilty.
“You know this hospital is a farce, but tragic, suffering—a tragic farce. You know there are nuts running this place—nuts!—not even counting you!—that make most inmates look like Ozzie and Harriet and David and Ricky. You know what American racism is. You know what the war in Vietnam is. And you toss dice! You toss dice!!”
He banged both fists down on the desk before me two, three, four times, his long hair falling forward at each blow like a black mantilla. Then he stopped.
“I’m leaving, Doc,” he said to me calmly. “I’m going out into the world and try to make it better. You can stay here and drop your random bombs.”
“Just a minute, Eric.” I stood up. “Before you go—”
“I’m leaving. Thanks for the pot, thanks for the silences, thanks even for the games, but don’t say another word about tossing your fucking dice, or I’ll kill you.”
“Eric … I’m … You’re …”
He left.
35
Dr. Rhinehart should have known when Dr. Mann summoned him to his office at QSH that there was trouble. And seeing old Dr. Cobblestone erect and solemn as he entered made Dr. Rhinehart certain there was trouble. Dr. Cobblestone is tall and thin and gray-haired, and Dr. Mann is short and plump and balding, but their facial expressions were identical: stern, firm, severe. Being called to a director’s office at QSH reminded Rhinehart of being summoned to the principal’s office at age eight for winning money off sixth graders at craps. His problems hadn’t changed much.
“What’s this about dice, young man?” Dr. Cobblestone asked sharply, leaning forward in his chair and banging once noisily on the floor the cane he held upright between his legs. He was the senior director of the hospital.
“Dice?” asked Dr. Rhinehart, a puzzled expression on his face. He was wearing blue jeans, a white T-shirt and sneakers, a dice decision which had made Dr. Mann pale when he had entered the office. Dr. Cobblestone had not seemed to notice.
“I think we ought to take things in the order you suggested earlier,” Dr. Mann said to his codirector.
“Ah yes. Yes, indeed.” Dr. Cobblestone banged his cane again as if it were some accepted signal for the restarting of a game. “What’s this we’ve heard about your using prostitutes and homosexuals in your sex research?”
Dr. Rhinehart didn’t answer immediately but looked intently from one stern face to another. He said quietly:
“The research will be detailed in our report. Is there anything wrong?”
“Dr. Felloni says she has withdrawn entirely from the project,” said Dr. Mann.
“Ahh. She’s back from Zurich?”
“She states she withdrew because subjects were being asked to commit immoral acts,” said Dr. Cobblestone.
“The subject of the experiment was sexual change.”
“Were the subjects asked to commit immoral acts?” Dr. Cobblestone continued.
“The instructions made it clear that they didn’t have to do anything they didn’t want to.”
“Dr. Felloni reports that the project encouraged young people to fornicate,” said Dr. Mann neutrally.
“She should know. She helped me draw up the instructions.”
“Does the project encourage young people to fornicate?” asked Dr. Cobblestone.
“And old people t— Look, I think perhaps you ought to ask to have a copy of my research report when it’s finished.”
The two stern faces had not relaxed, and Dr. Cobblestone went on:
“One of your subjects claims that he was raped.”
“That’s true,” replied Dr. Rhinehart. “But our investigation indicated that he either fantasized or prevaricated the rape to suppress his active unconscious participation in the act of which he complains.”
“What’s that?” said Dr. Cobblestone, irritably cupping an ear at Dr. Rhinehart.
“He enjoyed being laid and is lying about the rape.”
“Oh. Thank you.”
“You realize, Luke,” said Dr. Mann, “that in letting you use some of our patients here at QSH for your research that we are legally and morally responsible for what occurs in that research.”
“I understand.”
“Certain attendants and nurses have reported that a large number of patients were volunteering for your sex research project and have claimed that prostitutes were being suppli
ed to the patients.”
“You can read my report when it’s done.”
Dr. Cobblestone banged his cane a third time.
“A report has reached us that you yourself participated in … as … as … in this experiment.”
“Naturally.”
“Naturally?” asked Dr. Mann.
“I participated in the experiment.”
“But our report stated that …” Dr. Cobblestone’s face grew red with his exasperation at not finding the right words. “… that you interacted with the subjects … sexually.”
“Ahh,” said Dr. Rhinehart.
“Well?” asked Dr. Mann.
“Some neurotic young person I presume is the author of this slander?” said Dr. Rhinehart.
“Yes, yes,” said Dr. Cobblestone quickly.
“Projecting his latent desires onto the dreaded authority figure?” Dr. Rhinehart went on.
“Precisely,” said Dr. Cobblestone, relaxing just a bit.
“Tragic. Is someone trying to help him?”
“Yes,” replied Dr. Cobblestone. “Yes. Dr. Vener has … How did you know it was a young man?”
“George Lovelace Ray O’Reilly. Projection, compensation, displacement, anal-cathexis.”
“Ah, yes.”
“Is there anything else?” said Dr. Rhinehart, making motions of rising to leave.
“I’m afraid there is, Luke,” said Dr. Mann.
“I see.”
Dr. Cobblestone gripped his cane carefully in both hands and, aiming, banged it a fourth time on the floor between his legs.
“What’s this about dice, young man?” he asked.
“Dice?”
“One of your patients has complained that you’re making him play some strange game with dice.”
“The new one, Mr. Spezio?”
“Yes.”
“We have patients working with clay, cloth, paper, wood, leather, beads, cardboard, lathes, wire … I saw no reason not to let a few select patients begin playing with dice.”
“I see,” said Dr. Cobblestone.
“Why?” asked Dr. Mann blandly.
“You can read my report when it’s done.”
No one spoke for a while.
“Anything else?” Dr. Rhinehart asked at last.
The two older men glanced uneasily at each other and Dr. Cobblestone cleared his throat.
“Your general behavior lately, Luke,” said Dr. Mann.
“Ahhh.”
“Your impolite and … unusual behavior in our last board meeting,” said Dr. Cobblestone.
“Yes.”
“Your erratic, socially upsetting eccentricities,” said Dr. Mann.
“Your interruption of Dr. Wink,” added Dr. Cobblestone.
“We’ve received complaints from a few nurses here at QSH, several board members naturally, from Mr. Spezio, and …”
“And?” suggested Dr. Rhinehart.
“And I myself am not blind.”
“Ahh.”
“Batman over the telephone is not my idea of a joke.”
There was a silence.
“Your behavior has been undignified and unprofessional,” said Dr. Cobblestone.
Silence.
“You can read my report when it’s done,” said Dr. Rhinehart finally.
Silence.
“Your report?” asked Dr. Cobblestone.
“I’m writing an article on the variety of human response to socially eccentric behavior.”
“Yes, yes, I see,” said Dr. Cobblestone.
“My hypothesis is—”
“No more, Luke,” said Dr. Mann.
“Pardon?”
“No more. You’ve just about convinced everyone but Jake that you’re splitting apart. He alone has faith—”
“My hypothesis is—”
“No more. Your friends have protected you all they’re going to. Either settle back into the old Luke Rhinehart or you’re finished as a psychiatrist.”
Dr. Cobblestone arose solemnly.
“And if you wish to bring up your idea for some sort of new center to help our patients you must have it placed on the agenda before our meeting.”
“I understand,” said Dr. Rhinehart, also standing.
“No more, Luke,” said Dr. Mann.
Dr. Rhinehart understood.
36
Dr. Rhinehart should have known when Lil sat him down in the armchair opposite her without accepting the joint he was smoking that there was trouble. As part of Be Kind to Everyone Month (June) and a one-in-six die decision, he had been courting her anew with all the unselfish and romantic love he could summon, and they’d been having a marvelous week. Four days of traditional courting (a play, a concert, an afternoon stroll in the park, an evening of love on hashish) had been climaxed with a three-day weekend swimming and sunning and sailing while living without the children at their Big Old Farmhouse on Eastern Long Island. He’d picked some flowers for her and bought champagne and they’d sailed over to Fire Island and smoked some pot and made a long slow giggly love on top of a blanket against a sand dune—only sporadically interrupted by the sense experience of horseflies—and swam and frolicked in the surf, she pretty and brighteyed and girlishly athletic and he handsome and affectionate and boyishly uncoordinated.
They returned to build a roaring fire against the chill of the early June evening and then made a second sweet love in the creaky old double bed and slept the sleep of the just.
They sailed and swam again the next day and the next and on the last evening, a little high on champagne and marijuana, they spent ten minutes holding hands in front of the fire and another ten minutes sitting on their bed with the lights off staring out the window at the moonlight reflecting in pale blue off the waters of the bay a hundred yards from their house. Dr. Rhinehart lighted up another joint and felt warm and complete and serene. The touch of Lil’s hand seemed to him holy. But then Lil asked him to sit opposite her in the armchair and shook her head when he tried to hand her the joint and Dr. Rhinehart knew there was trouble.
After turning on the bedside lamp, he looked up at her and was surprised to see tears in her eyes. She reached forward and took one of his hands and drew it to her face. Her lips touched his fingers delicately and she looked into the black pools of his eyes. She tried to smile, but with a tear running down one side of her face.
“Luke,” she said, and she paused for several seconds searching his eyes. “Why have you been acting so strangely … for so long now?”
“Ah Lil,” Dr. Rhinehart began to answer. “I’d like to tell you …” and he stopped. The affections he’d been feeling froze, the lover solidified to stone. Sitting mute, hand being held, was a wary dice man.
“Please tell me,” she said.
She was wetting her lips and squeezing his hand.
“We’re together again, Luke,” she went on. “I feel so whole, so full of love for you, yet … I know that tomorrow, the next day, you may change again. Everything that’s made these last few days sweet will disappear. And I don’t know why.”
Perhaps, he thought, Lil could become the Dice Woman. It sounded like the name of a villainess on the Batman show but it offered at the moment the only rationalization he could find for betraying the secret of his life. He wavered.
“I …” he started. The dice man still fought.
“Tell me,” she said.
“Experimenting, Lil,” he began for a third time. He paused: wide-eyed she waited for what he was going to say. Narrow-eyed, so did he. He reached to his side and turned off the light again. Their faces, separated by only three feet, were still quite visible in the moonlight.
“I didn’t want to tell you until … I’d learned whether the experiment had value; you might have fought the experiment, rejected me.”
“Oh no I wouldn’t.” Her grip on his hand was frightening. “I would have gone along,” she said. “I would have. Those asses think you’re losing your mind. I would have laughed at them if I knew
. [Pause] But why? You should have told me.”
“I know that now. I knew that as soon as I freed myself from the experiment: I should have done it all with you.”
“But …” Still staring, her eyes glittering, she seemed nervous, uncertain, curious. “What were the kind … kinds of experiments?”
Dr. Rhinehart was so pale and stonelike in the moonlight he looked like an abandoned statue.
“Oh, going to places I’d never been before, pretending to be someone different from myself to see people’s reactions. Experimenting with food, fasting, drugs, even getting drunk that time was a conscious experiment.”
“Really?” And she smiled, tears wetting her cheeks and chin, like a child in the rain.
“It proved that when I’m drunk I act drunk.”
“But why didn’t you tell me?”
“The mad scientist in me insisted that if I told you I was experimenting, your reaction would be experimentally useless and a wealth of evidence would be missing.”
“And … and the experiment is … over?”
Dr. Rhinehart stared at her, trying to smile. “Of course,” he said.
She stared back at him, her face altering moment to moment from cold fury to helpless entreaty.
“This week,” she finally said softly. “This last week,” she whispered again looking away from out the window. Then, abruptly, she came forward heavily into his arms sobbing.
“I want things to last, I want things to last,” she said, gasping and shuddering in his arms.
Dr. Rhinehart stroked her, kissed her, mumbled sweet nothings, but felt, if the truth be known, utterly abandoned.
37
Dr. Rhinehart should have known when Mrs. Ecstein summoned him to her living room couch that Wednesday that there was trouble. They hadn’t met in her apartment since she had begun therapy with him. After letting him in she seated herself sedately on the couch, folded her hands and looked at the floor. Her mannish gray suit, her glasses, and her hair tied back severely in a bun made her look strikingly like a door-to-door purveyor of Baptist religious tracts.
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