XIII

A letter...

Sir Philip's Bughouse O-R

Praecox, Cal. May 8

Dear Al:

I enclose the enclosed, a monumental missive from your Lucy Quigley, who is, as you in one way or another said, some chick. What does she look like?

I send it because I think you will enjoy it, although it contains reportorial information which I know you have in her formal report and therefore don't need, and some heady compliments addressed to me which you will feel I should have modestly kept to myself.

And in all seriousness, I want you to think over her hypothesis about the non-sexual, or should I say presexual, nature of George's disorder. I'm in a neither-confirm-nor-deny mood about it at the moment, but it excites me and I'd like to echo when it bounces off you.

You'll be happy to know that I obeyed your orders of about five months back and got some sleep, about fourteen consecutive hours' worth, and that since then I have worked for forty consecutive hours cleaning up all the work which the sleep and my preoccupation with George caused to pile up. So everything is normal again. I've only seen George once in that time--I happened to be candling the head of a strait-jacketed neighbor on his corridor--and all I did was chat. One interchange you'll be interested in: I told him that I would respect his wish not to discuss his specific conduct with Anna, and the contents of the airmail letter which fused this bomb; I assured him further that I was about to ask him a question which he need not answer. I then asked him why he did not want to discuss these things.

Well, our George sat on the edge of his cot and scratched his handsome yellow head, and at length gave me a diffident smile and said, "I just wouldn't want you to think I was queer."

What's new with you?

Phil

Palace of Pathology O-R

New Rosis, Ore. May 10

Dear Phil:

Have read and reread Lucy's letter and return it herewith. You're quite right: she's some chick. Or was I the one said that? All right; I'm right: she's some chick. As to what she looks like, you can see for yourself. She's arriving here tomorrow and we'll grab a chopper and buzz down your way for dinner. Okay?

As to an opinion on her hypothesis, you will please excuse me, dear friend, but I have none, and if I had I wouldn't tell you. Please always regard me as being something like an airline ticket agent. I know how they come and go and I fix it for people to ride; but don't ask me how the new-fangled things work. So no opinion. As to clause 2 above, wherein I depose and say I wouldn't give you an opinion if I had one, leave me state here and now that I think you're a great man.

A clever man. A good man in several senses. But from time to time I get these uneasy feelings. Every time I express opinions to you it turns out three months from now that I have ordered you to do this or permitted you to do that, and what's more you can prove it.

I have two pieces of news for you. One is that when I arrive I shall give you a little box with some costume jewelry in it, like silver bars, and a paper with a message suitable for framing, like a commission, and a paymaster's voucher retroactive to your 25th birthday. You can, if you are able, square it with your own conscience that under false colors you have been endearing yourself to George as a sergeant while actually an officer the whole time.

My other piece of news has to do with the late Major Manson, may his shade be reading over your shoulder to catch this my heart-felt apology. (Remember when I called him moo-headed and concluded that he had slapped a "psychosis unclassified: violent" on George solely because George had punched him in the nose?) Well, after his honorable deceasement, our efficient Army separated his personal effects from government issue and sent the former to his survivor, a daughter. She quite understandably let some time go by before she tackled the job of sorting his things. Among his papers was an unmailed air-letter form. I enclose it, and I think no one need wonder why that mail censor was intrigued enough to bring it to the major, nor why the major sent for George.

Skip lunch. That's an order. You and Lucy and I are going to eat up a storm.

'la. vista, Al

Enclosure: An unmailed air letter form. It bears the soldier's serial number, an APO post office address, and the designation of a combat unit. It is signed. The body of the letter, in toto, follows:

Dear Anna:

I miss you very much.

I wish I had some of your blood.

Close the file. You've read it all.

You are sitting in the lake of light from Dr. Outerbridge's desk lamp. It has grown late. But sit a while; you will not be interrupted by the fictional psychiatrist, who after all exists only for you, The Reader.

So place your hands on the bland smooth face of the closed file folders, and close your eyes, and quietly think.

Since this is and must be fiction, what would please you?

Dr. Outerbridge found Lucy Quigley absolutely charming, and in due course she became Mrs. Dr. Outerbridge. They worked famously together and achieved togetherness and fame. Does that make you happy?

George was turned over to a Veteran's Administration facility and his arrested emotional persona was attacked with narcoynthesis, reserpine, electric shock and an understanding analyst, and in three years and five months he was discharged as cured. He married Anna, inherited his aunt's farm, and they live quietly near the woods and each other. He has learned to love children. Okay?

Or if the idea of such as George still offends you, why it's the easiest thing in the world to have therapy fail and we'll wall him up forever. Or he could get killed in a prison riot, or escape and be brought down by police bullets. Would you like him shot in the chest? Or in the belly? You would? Why that: what is he to you?

But you'd better put the folder back and clear out. If Dr. Outerbridge suddenly returns you'll have to admit he's real, and then all of this is. And that wouldn't do, would it?