by Gene Brewer
Not a movement, not a whisper.
“All right, you can go now. I’ll see you again in a few days. Think about what I’ve told you.”
I waited another moment before saying, “Okay, prot, you can come on back now.”
“Ehhh—what’s up, doc?”
“Not a damn thing. Please unhypnotize yourself.”
He complied immediately. Stifling a yawn, he said, “Hiya, gino. Did you find robert?”
“I think so, but I’m not sure.”
“Wouldn’t you recognize him if you saw him?”
“I’m not even sure about that.”
He shook his head. “He looks a little like me. Except—”
“I know what he looks like!”
He jumped up. “Well, if we’re through here, I’ll just be on my way....”
“Not so fast.”
“You call this fast, earthling?”
“Did you hear anything I just said to Rob?”
“You think I would eavesdrop?”
“No. But it might’ve happened accidentally.”
“Well, I never heard a word. You could have been talking to santa claus for all I know. Or any of your other mythical beings.”
“Please sit down.”
Prot plopped back into the vinyl chair.
“All right. I just wanted to tell you what you missed. I presented Rob with a theory about what happened to him when he was six. How his father died and how he reacted to it. Want to hear about it?”
“Why not? We’ve still got eleven minutes and thirty-eight seconds left.”
I started to recap the highlights of my “conversation” with Robert, then had a better idea. I rewound the tape and played it for prot, who seemed fascinated by it. Afterward I forgot to turn the tape recorder back on for a few seconds, but, as I remember it, he said something like, “Your primitive methods never cease to amaze me.”
“Damn it, prot, I’m not interested in your assessment of my technique or of the human race right now. What I’d like to know is whether you think my hypothesis is credible.”
“Anything’s—”
“Yes, I know, but is it likely?”
“I’d say no.”
I remember rubbing my temples hard at this point, but the pain didn’t go away. “Why not?”
“He didn’t die of a heart attack, or any other ‘natural’ cause.”
“He didn’t? How do you know that?”
“I was there, remember?”
“But you didn’t show up until the funeral, did you?”
“When I saw the body, I realized that what happened to rob’s pa could only happen on EARTH. Never on K-PAX.”
“What happened to him?”
“He drowned.”
Suddenly I realized the full implication of what he was telling me. “Are you saying that Rob’s father committed suicide?”
“Did I say that?”
“But how else—”
“Maybe it was an accident. Or maybe somebody done him in. To mention a couple of obvious possibilities.” He stood up, flipped on his dark glasses, which made him look like an aging rock star, and sauntered out.
After he left I sagged down in my chair like a sack of excrement. I thought for a moment that this must be similar to what Robert felt. Then of course I realized he was feeling much worse than I could possibly even imagine. But why was he so utterly devastated by what had happened? Did he—did Harry—come forward when Rob’s father was in the bathtub? My God! It was Harry who killed him, mistaking his intentions! By drowning him, probably. When Rob saw what had happened, he ran away.
But this was only speculation of the worst kind. Maybe his father simply tried to get up, fell, and hit his head on the tub. I had to find out the truth. And the only way to do that was to drag it out of Harry.
I cancelled my regular meeting with Giselle; I didn’t want her to know anything she might inadvertently convey to prot, which might somehow tip off Harry. I looked over my schedule for the next three days. Booked solid. No time even for a quiet cup of coffee. There was nothing I could do but wait until Friday.
Session Forty-three
The Jeopardy game took place in the lounge late Wednesday afternoon. The contestants, as voted on by the other patients, were “Albert Einstein,” “Linus Pauling,” and prot. There were no electronic signaling devices, no flashing scoreboards. Instead, hands were raised and Goldfarb was called upon to judge whose was first. Betty (who had managed to survive phase one of the root-canal procedure) kept the scores, and I was elected to blow the whistle when time was up for each half. The other patients and staff served as the audience.
Everything went very well at first, though Alex nervously brushed his hands through his wavy hair several times—I had never seen the real Alex Trebek do that. He had constructed his own category board and was, of course, quite familiar with the answers and questions. At the end of round one the scores were nearly even, much to the delight of the crowd. Every single answer had been properly questioned by one of the three contestants.
Then things began to fall apart. He got mixed up on an answer involving some arcane scientific term, and forgot where Patagonia was (he had some crib sheets, but couldn’t seem to find what he needed in the rush and jumble). Albert and Linus tried to help, but prot just stood there with a silly grin on his face. Finally Alex stopped altogether and, despite lots of encouragement from the audience, threw down his notes and walked away, mumbling, “I don’t want to be Alex Trebek. It’s a lot harder than I thought.”
“Do you think he’s ready for Ward One?” Goldfarb whispered.
I countered, “Maybe we should wait until we’re sure he doesn’t want to be Mary Hart.”
The new patients from the Big Institute arrived on Thursday, and a special orientation session was set up to acquaint them with their new home. This was done by pairing each of them with one of our long-term residents, who showed them around and introduced them to the rest of the inmates. However, the tours came to a halt in a big circle around prot, and there were the usual high expectations of what he could do for them once they were settled in, despite the limited time frame.
There were seven in all. One, a man suffering from DeClerambault’s syndrome, was certain that Meg Ryan was in love with him. Another was constitutionally unable to tell the truth. (I was pretty sure what prot would do with him: suggest he run for public office.) Yet another thought himself the ugliest man in the world, a “toad,” in his opinion.
The women in the group weren’t much better off. There was a variant case of Cotan’s syndrome (nothing exists), but in her case everything existed except her. To put it another way, she thought herself invisible to all of us and, consequently, felt no compulsion to dress after a shower, stole food from others’ plates, etc. Another (my new responsibility) thought that real people were speaking to her from the television set. And there was a woman who simply could not get enough love (love, not sex). First thing she told her new doctor (Beamish) was that “No one ever called me ‘J’aime.’” And finally, we had a new “Jesus Christ,” but with a twist—she, too, was a woman, the first female Messiah to grace the institute in our long history. She had, of course, been a carpenter.
The “Magnificent Seven,” Menninger called them. But all I could see was an enormous amount of frustrating work ahead. Like one of my previous charges, a postal carrier who went berserk because he could never finish the job (“No matter how many pieces I deliver they just keep coming!”), I could see a future with endless patients waiting to get in, like the people crowding around the front gate.
I had asked Jasmine Chakraborty to stand by in my office, which is adjacent to my examining room. (How he got his first name is a long story, and one of the reasons he left India.) Chak, too, had been making retirement noises lately, though he is only forty-eight. Or hinted, at least, that it was time “to make a new change,” as he put it. I hoped he wasn’t thinking of a move to the planet K-PAX.
Prot bange
d in and grabbed a huge handful of raisins, which he crammed into his mouth.
There was no more time to waste. “All right. I’d like to speak to Harry now. Harry?”
Prot seemed surprised, but stopped chewing and his feet began to shuffle around.
“Harry, this is Doctor Brewer. I’d like to speak with you for a minute.”
Like Robert, Harry appeared to be hiding. But in his case, I could see him.
“Harry, c’mon out. If you don’t, I’m coming in to get you.”
Harry scowled, annoyed that he’d been found so easily. Apparently he didn’t like raisins—he spat them back into his hand and dumped them onto the table next to the bowl.
“Harry, I’m mad as hell at you.”
His feet stopped moving and his eyes opened wide. “I didn’t do nothin’.”
“Harry, what happened to Robin’s father?”
“I didn’t do it.”
“Do what, Harry? What happened to Robin’s dad?”
“He died.”
“I know that. But how did he die? What happened to him?”
“I don’t know. We ran out of the bathroom.”
“Why? Why did you run out of the bathroom?”
“Rob was afraid.”
“Of what? What was Robin afraid of, Harry?”
“He was afraid of his daddy.”
“What was his daddy trying to do to him?”
“He swung at Robin.”
“He tried to hit him?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He seemed to shrink away from me. “I don’t know!” It occurred to me that perhaps he was lying about this to protect his alter ego. Or perhaps himself.
“Where did you run to?”
“We ran out into the woods. We was running as fast as we could. I tried to get Robin to slow down. He ran right straight into a tree. I tried to tell him to stop, but it was too late.”
“What happened after that?”
Harry settled down a bit and started to chew on a fingernail. “I don’t—I don’t remember.”
“What’s the next thing you remember?”
“We were in bed and there were some people around.”
“Who were they?”
“I don’t know. They were strangers.”
“Okay, Harry. I just want to ask you one more thing. Did you push Robin’s father before you ran out? Or hit him with something? Anything like that?”
“No!”
“All right, Harry, just a couple more questions. Have you seen Robin lately?”
“Not for a long time.”
“Do you know where he is?”
He shook his head.
“Okay, Harry, thank you. You’ve been very helpful. Now I’m going to ask you a big favor.”
He looked puzzled.
“We need to take a little blood sample from you. It won’t hurt much. You’ll hardly feel it. Dr. Chakraborty works with me. He’ll come in and do it, okay?”
He shifted around nervously. “What for?”
“We need to make sure it’s all right. It’s like a little checkup. You’ve been to the doctor before, haven’t you?”
“No.”
“Well, it’ll only take a minute.” I called Chak in.
Harry’s mouth puckered up. “I don’t want to....”
The door opened. “Hi, Harry, how are you doing? I am Doctor Chakraborty. You may call me Doctor Jackrabbity if you want. I would like to take only a teensy-weensy bit of blood from your arm if you won’t mind.”
Harry started to squall. I thought: Here’s a kid who may well have killed a grown man and he’s afraid of a little needle. What a very strange thing is the human mind!
Chak tried to calm him by talking about his own five-year-old boy, who also hates to have blood taken. “Jag wants to be an astronaut, Harry. What do you want to be?”
Harry wasn’t interested in discussing it. He was crying his eyes out.
“Okay, Gene, I’m finished.”
“Harry? It’s all over. Thank you for coming in. You may go now.”
The crying ceased immediately. Harry was out of here.
Before prot could return I called out, “Paul? This is Dr. Brewer. May I speak to you for a moment?”
Paul yawned. “That was a pretty dirty trick you pulled on old Harry, there. You didn’t tell him you were going to suck blood out of him.” He grabbed the pile of chewed-up raisins and popped them back into his mouth. “If you had, he never would have showed up.”
“Paul, this is Dr. Chakraborty. He’d like to take a little from you, too.”
“Sure. Why not?” He held out his arm.
“Other arm, please,” Chak said.
While “Dr. Jackrabbity” was preparing a fresh needle and syringe, I asked Paul if he knew anything about the death of Rob’s father. “Not a thing,” he said. “I wasn’t around then.”
“I know. But I thought you might have heard something. From Rob or Harry—someone.”
“Nope.”
“Finished.”
“Thanks, Chak.”
“There is no problem,” he said as he hurried out with the precious blood samples.
“Seen Rob anywhere around today?” I asked Paul.
He began to tap a foot nervously. “Nope.”
“Do you know where he is? How we might find him?”
“No idea.”
“Well, where did he go in the past when prot up?”
He shrugged. “I never paid much attention. When prot came, my chances of gettin’ laid were nil or less.”
“Speaking of that, I need to ask you a very important question, and I would appreciate a truthful answer.”
He looked pained, but didn’t protest his honesty.
“Paul, I know you come out whenever Rob has a sexual encounter. What I want to know is whether you ever pretended to be Robert at other times. Specifically, in this room.”
His face actually turned red, and he said, sheepishly, “Once in a while.”
“When, for example?”
“When you talked about his sex life. He doesn’t even like to think about it, you know.”
“No other times?”
“Hardly ever.”
“And Rob was really Rob in his other dealings with Giselle?”
“I really don’t care about the rest of his life, doc.”
“Okay, Paul. You may go.”
“What—already?”
“Just wanted to take a blood sample. Thanks. Bye-bye.”
“You got some damn good-looking nurses around here, you know that? I’d sure like to—”
“Good-bye, Paul. Thanks for stopping by. I’ll call you again if I need you.”
He stared at me glumly, but finally went back to wherever he hung out when he wasn’t needed.
Prot reappeared and went again for the bowl of raisins. “Any luck, doctor b?”
“Another strikeout.”
“Ah, those handy sports terms.” Bits of the dried fruit flew from his mouth. “Y’all seem to think life is just one big ball game.”
“Is that so bad?”
“Even your so-called scientists spend most of their time playing games when the answers are right there staring them in the face.”
I brushed a bit of raisin off my knee. “What answers?”
“Well, for example, whether the UNIVERSE is going to collapse again or expand forever.”
“According to my son-in-law, some astronomers think it’s going to be an endless expansion.”
“So what? You haven’t got all the evidence yet. Why do you humans tend to jump to conclusions before all the facts are in?”
“I think everyone realizes this is mostly speculation,” I replied weakly. “Anyway, why don’t you give us some hints if you already have all the answers?”
“Okay, since you can’t destroy anyone with it, though you’d probably like to, I’ll give you a hint. The ‘missing mass’ is right there in Einstein’s equations. You just ha
ven’t put two and two together yet.”
“Thanks. I’ll pass that on.”
He tipped up the bowl and took in the last raisin. “Well, if there’s nothing else...”
“There is one thing. Have you had a chance to talk with any of the new patients?”
“Sure.”
“What do you think?”
“About what?”
“Dammit, prot, about the patients!”
“Sorry, doctor. I’ve decided to retire from psychoanalysis. They’re your responsibility from now on.”
“Wonderful.”
“Don’t underestimate yourselves. You can do it. You’ve just got to get rid of a lot of the false assumptions you seem to cherish. Believe me, it’s as simple as that.” He stood and stretched. “Well, I’ve got things to do. Au revoir.”
“But our time isn’t—”
After the door slammed I thought: Another session wasted. I didn’t even press him on the question of how Rob’s (or his own) father died. On second thought, it wasn’t a total bust. I was convinced that Rob, in the guise of Harry, at least, didn’t kill his father. But if he had drowned accidentally, how did it happen? Maybe I was trying to make too much of the situation. Perhaps prot was wrong and he did die of natural causes. In either case, why would Rob feel so incredibly guilty about it? What the hell was it he wanted and very much needed to “get off his chest,” but could not?
It was time to play the trump card. To get his “dad” in here to confront Rob, to get the truth out of him before it was too late.
That evening I called Steve and told him about prot’s advice to the world’s astronomers. To my surprise, he seemed quite excited about this. “Einstein’s equations? You mean general relativity?” There was a long pause and I thought for a minute he had gone. “Only problem,” he went on, “is how does that help us to find the missin’ mass?” Another pause. “Unless he’s sayin’ it has somethin’ to do with acceleration and gravity....” I heard panting. “Mah God!” he shrieked. “That’s it!”