The Deadly Percheron Read online

  But what was I doing in a mental ward? I was not insane. I was a psychiatrist. Who had committed me?

  The fat face again. This time it was easier to talk.

  “Where am I?”

  “You’re sick. Don’t talk.”

  “But what’s the name of the hospital? Where am I?”

  “Be quiet. Be a good boy…”

  The last word held as if the sentence might not be finished.

  “But where am I? What am I doing here?”

  The fat face was gone.

  This time I was determined to find out where I was and why. They could not keep me, a doctor – a psychiatrist – in ignorance like this. It was unethical. I would demand to see the doctor in residence.

  After a long wait another face appeared. A competent face with glasses, a professional face, a man’s face – the doctor?

  “Where am I?”

  “The City Hospital.”

  “The psychopathic ward?”

  “Yes.”

  “But, doctor, you can’t keep me here!”

  “I’m afraid we have to, old man.”

  “My name’s Matthews, George Matthews. I’m a doctor with offices on Lexington Avenue. I’m a psychiatrist.”

  He hesitated before he spoke. “Your name is John Brown. Homeless. Picked up wandering.”

  “It’s not true! It’s as I told you! I’m a physician, a psychiatrist. You can’t treat me like this!”

  “I’m afraid you’re mistaken, old boy. But I’ll look into it. ‘George Matthews,’ did you say?”

  “Doctor, I tell you – ”

  But he was gone.

  He came back.

  “Who did you say you were?”

  “Dr George Matthews of 445 Lexington Avenue and Hackensack, New Jersey.”

  “There is such a doctor. How did you know his name? Has he treated you at some time?”

  It did not look like a stupid face–how could it be so obtuse? I wanted to shout at it, but I knew I must keep calm, a model of sanity.

  “I am that man, doctor. Look, you can call a number, can’t you? You can call Butterfield 2-6888, can’t you? That won’t do any harm.”

  “But that’s Dr Matthews’ number.”

  “That’s what I’m telling you! I am Dr Matthews! There’s been a mistake. Call that number and describe me to my nurse. If the description tallies, you will know I’m telling the truth!”

  The face was gone. To telephone I hoped.

  This time he was back quickly. The first I knew of his presence was when I felt the straps loosen. I sat up. A young, embarrassed intern stood at the foot of my bed. He was not smiling.

  “Well,” I said, “I was right, wasn’t I?”

  Only then did it occur to me that I might not be right. An irrational fear, I told myself. I knew who I was, didn’t I?

  “I was mistaken – ” he began.

  “That’s what I was trying to tell you…”

  He spoke quickly. “I was mistaken in saying there is a Dr George Matthews,” he said. “There was a Dr George Matthews. But he died recently.”

  He spoke clearly and distinctly. Underlining each simple sentence as if he were speaking to a child. Or a madman.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I looked first in an old directory. There I found a Dr George Matthews at the address you gave me. But when I called the number, exchange cut in and said there was no such number. I checked with a later directory and I found that Dr George Matthews had died.”

  “When?”

  “I don’t know when. Between this year and last, I suppose.”

  “But I am Dr George Matthews. I’m not dead. I live in Hackensack, New Jersey. I have a wife named Sara…” The intern was very embarrassed. He gripped the foot of my bed with both his hands, clenched the rail tightly as if he were fighting pain. “I’m afraid you’re mistaken. I know it seems that way to you, but that is not your name. Our records are quite accurate – I checked them again before I came back. The name on your Social Security Card, which we found in your pocket, is that of John Brown.”

  Then he went away. What was the use of telling him I had never had a Social Security Card? He knew that they had never been issued to doctors just as well as I did.

  They let me up and around but would not let me shave myself. They gave me an old pair of corduroy trousers, the ones I had been wearing – I was told – when they found me. I held them up with my hands. I could not have a belt because I might hang myself with it. There was no mirror, and I was not allowed to leave the ward. I could not see what I looked like now.

  By running my hand over my head I could tell that my hair was more closely cropped than it used to be. It felt short and bristly like an undergraduate’s. I began to feel like a different man, a poor man, a sick man.

  I grew friendly with the young intern. His name was Harvey Peters. We talked together whenever he could spare the time. I argued with him again and again. But it never did any good.

  On the second day –

  “Doctor, I tell you my name is Matthews! I am married and I live in Hackensack, New Jersey. I want you to get in touch with my wife.”

  “I’ll try if you want me to.”

  “There must have been some mistake about the other. The telephone company’s error. But reach my wife, please! She’ll be worrying about me.”

  “I’ll try – ”

  The third day –

  “My wife’s coming to see me today? You got in touch with her, didn’t you? She’ll be coming to take me home today?”

  He shook his head. “I’m sorry, fellow. I tried. But I could not reach your wife.”

  “She wasn’t in? She was out shopping most likely. Sara likes to shop. But you’ll try again? She’ll be in the next time you call.”

  “There is no Mrs George Matthews in the Hackensack telephone book.”

  “But, doctor, we have a phone. I know we have a phone.”

  He kept shaking his head. I could see he pitied me now. “There is no Mrs George Matthews in Hackensack, New Jersey, who is a doctor’s wife. That Mrs George Matthews moved away. She left no forwarding address. I know because I’ve checked with the post office.”

  “Doctor, there must be some mistake! She wouldn’t leave like that – without a word!”

  “I’m sorry, old man. You’re mistaken.”

  “I’m not mistaken. I am George Matthews.”

  “You must not get so excited. You must rest.”

  Another day –

  “Doctor, how long have I been here?”

  “About two weeks.”

  “What is the diagnosis?”

  “Amnesia, with possible paranoid tendencies.”

  “But I know who I am! It’s just that I can’t prove it!”

  “I know. I know that’s the way it seems.” He was humoring me. A mild-mannered, kind, young man who was almost a doctor was humoring me. He pitied me. He had not as yet developed the necessary callousness and the aberrations of his more intelligent patients still dismayed him. He wanted to let me down gently. I knew he would comply with all my requests (or pretend to comply), because he felt that my interest in my former life – in any former life, even a mythical one – was an encouraging symptom, a sign of possible improvement.

  I continued to batter my hopes against this blind construction of theory and tradition, this man for whom I was mad because my history sheet said I was – and if I were not psychotic, why then was I in the psychopathic ward of the hospital?

  “But, doctor,” I said, “I know who I am. A man suffering from amnesia does not know who he is. All, or a part, of his past life is lost – he has misplaced his identity, his personal history, even his habits. That isn’t a description of me!”

  He answered me patiently. He talked while his eyes looked past me, remembering the definitions and practices learned by rote, mechanically interposing the logical objections, the proper refutations to all my proposals. A neurotic catechism – a litany for the irr
ational!

  “You do not recognize your identity. You do not recognize your name – worse! – you refuse to accept it as yours. You put forward instead another man’s name, a dead man’s name, and claim it as your own. You claim his wife, his profession. And, building on this delusion, you begin to think that all of us are persecuting you, holding back what is rightfully yours. That is paranoia.”

  “Doctor, do me a favor?”

  “What is it?”

  “Call the police. Headquarters. Ask to speak to Lieutenant Anderson of the Homicide Division. Tell him I am here. Describe me to him. Tell him that there has been a mistake – that something has gone badly wrong.”

  “But the police brought you here. You were charged with vagrancy. The police know all about you.”

  “Just this one last favor, doctor. Please, call Lieutenant Anderson!”

  He went away. This time I did not pretend to myself. This time I knew that it would do no good. Although I might still have him call my club and some of the medical societies I belonged to, I suspected that the response would always be the same. This was the last time I would try. After this I could do nothing but wait.

  He returned, stood at the foot of my bed, hesitant, sorry for me. “Lieutenant Anderson knew Doctor Matthews well,” he said. “He committed suicide last year. His body was found in the North River. The Lieutenant said that you must be an impostor.”

  After that I began to believe it myself.

  It was terrifyingly easy for me to believe that the past that I remembered was unreal. I had been lifted out of my life as totally as a goldfish is dipped out of an aquarium; more so, for when a storekeeper scoops a fish he soon places it again in a paper bucket of water – the fish remains in its element. I was not so fortunate. I lived and breathed, but in an entirely different fashion, horribly unfamiliar.

  They wake you early in a mental hospital, at about six o’clock. They feed you prunes, oatmeal, whole wheat bread, butter, coffee. Then you help clean up the ward until nine o’clock. You make your bed, you push a mop, you scrub toilets. There is enough for an hour’s work, but you have until nine o’clock to do it. But that is not too long. After a while, it takes you until nine o’clock because from nine until twelve is the rest period. That means you have nothing to do between nine and twelve but rest. You sit. You listen to the radio. Sermons, recipes, the news every hour on the hour. If there is an old magazine or newspaper around, you read it even if you have read it from cover to cover ten times before. What is left of it, that is. All items that might have an exciting or depressing effect on the patients have been removed.

  The big room is clean. It is warm. There are comfortable wicker chairs (made by the patients – occupational therapy), and outside the sun is shining.

  This is all necessary. I knew it to be necessary, knew for a fact that I was in a model institution, but knowing it did not help me to accept. After a week, two weeks, more weeks of sitting and listening, you get so you listen, wait to hear a sound different from the rest. The sense of hearing is the last to give up hope. But you know that time will never end, and you begin to scheme against this fact, to plan lovely lies of escape and the return to a life that probably never existed. For after twelve comes lunch, a stew of meat and potatoes, whole wheat bread, butter, jello. And after-lunch you clean the toilets again, push the mop (if you have mechanical aptitude you can go to the shop) until three – and after three there is a rest period until five. Then you have supper, a piece of beef or a bowl of soup, whole wheat bread, butter, rice pudding. And after supper you go to bed and tell lies to yourself until you go to sleep.

  On Thursdays I saw the psychiatrist – a pleasant woman, Dr Littlefield, a behaviorist. She gave me tests. Fit the little pegs into the little holes, the big pegs into the big holes. Turn the discs over and put them back in place – one side red, one side white – see how quickly you can do it! Answer the questions, as many as you can. A king is a monarch, serf, slave, hedonist, a lucky man. Underline the one you think is more nearly right: 2 × 2 + 48 = 54,62,57,52.

  She was a small woman with a bun of neat brown hair. Her eyes were blue and she had a tidy smile. I guessed she was about my age. The first time I did the tests, she studied my paper carefully, biting her lip as she evaluated it. I waited eagerly to hear her say: Why there must be some mistake! Why nobody in a mental hospital should do this well!

  I should have known better. She looked up at me and smiled politely. “You show ready understanding. I think you have no trouble learning. But there is a certain instability indicated – a compulsion?”

  A sane man could have taken the same tests and made the same answers. A sane man? I was a sane man. But did I think so? Could I really be deluding myself?

  I wanted to tell her what I knew, prove to her that I, too, could give Stamford-Binet tests, make a prognosis, indicate treatment. I wanted to be a bright student. I wanted to outwit the teacher. But I knew I did not dare.

  There was only one way I could get out. I must show “improvement.” It did not matter what the truth was. I could never prove to them that my name was George Matthews, that I was a doctor, a psychiatrist, a married man with a bank account. Or if I could it would take a very long time. I knew that what I would have to do would be to break down all the individual, carefully constructed ramparts of science and knowledge – I would have to prove to Dr Littlefield, Dr Peters, Nurse Aggie Murphy, that I was a man and not a case history, a human and not a syndrome. And I could not allow myself a short time. I had to get out tomorrow, or the day after, or the day after that!

  I realized this when Peters reported my own suicide to me. He told me that Anderson had said I died last year – last year. I took that piece of information, so casually dropped, and with equal calm stored it in a cranny of my mind. I must have lost months! When I looked outside I saw that it was summertime. I must actually have had a loss of memory (that rushing blackness in the subway seemed yesterday or last week, not last year –but I knew it had happened on a rainy fall day, the 12th of October). The problem was: had I forgotten the same period they thought I had? Amnesia cuts two ways. You can forget your remote past, your early years, childhood, youth, young manhood, or you can forget a piece of your maturity.

  I knew now that I had forgotten some things – I did not realize how much.

  But I could lie. I could build a past that was not true, but which fitted the role I had been given. I could report the fictional history of a destitute man, and I could do it well because I had studied and put to heart many such case histories.

  They expected me gradually to recover my memory. Harvey Peters said that I showed improvement. Dr Littlefield gave me tests each Thursday and told me that I showed less fear, less anxiety. But they would never, or only after too long a time, know me for the man I was. Or had been.

  Why should I be Dr George Matthews any longer? What was wrong with being john Brown? Someone wanted me to be John Brown. Why should I fight him?

  Was identity worth slow decay?

  No. I would lie.

  I had made up my mind.

  A year contains 365 days. I died last year. Dr George Matthews died this minute. John Brown is born. John Brown will escape. John Brown will find the one who wanted to obliterate Dr George Matthews – and who played with him first, twitting him with comedy! – and John Brown will destroy him.

  “I was born in Erie, Pennsylvania. My father worked in the mills. I had seven brothers. My mother died. My sister ran away. I joined the Army under another name.”

  “You remember now?”

  “It comes back slowly. I was hurt – somewhere in France. I came home. There were no jobs. I was on relief. I went from town to town. I worked on farms up and down both coasts. Then I was away for awhile.”

  “Away? Just away?”

  Slick, glib lies. I had to hide something. I had to make my story fit the pattern she expected, and she expected me to try to hold back some part of the whole.

  “I got marrie
d. Down South. I worked for a real estate office. Then times got hard again. She was having a child. She should have had an operation. We waited too long. We didn’t have the money for the operation. She died.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  A facile lie told slowly – a typical syndrome of self-pity. This was what was expected. This was what she was going to get.

  For a few moments I said nothing. Dr Littlefield was respectfully silent. I wanted to laugh deeply. Life was bitter and good and I hated all of them. I was glad I knew how to lie.

  “Then what happened?” Tentatively. Ready to take it back with silence if her timing was off. She did not want to precipitate an emotional block. This bland little trained priestess of scientific black magic thought she could steal my story from my unwilling mind. And it was I who was doing the embezzling!

  “I left town. I went the rounds again. Things got worse. You know how it was during the Depression? In season I became a harvest hand. In the winter I stayed in cities – the relief is better there. I worked on the PWA, the WPA. I bummed around…”

  Looking down, as if I were ashamed. I was not ashamed. Even if this had been my life, I would not have been ashamed.

  “Yes?”

  “I drank.”

  “Much?”

  “A lot.”

  She did not say anything. Had I overplayed my hand? “It’s funny but I never want a drink anymore.”

  That ought to do it!

  “No?”

  “No, not since the bust on the head…”

  I hoped the location was right. It was usually the head. “When did you hurt your head?” She thought she was helping me remember! It was working!

  “Before I came here. I had a fight. Over a woman. He came at me with a bottle. That’s all I remember.”

  A classic tale. Cribbed from a million sordid lives. But it would do.

  Of course, they did not let me go right away. I had to run the gauntlet every day for a week. Dr Littlefield saw me again, then Dr Smithers and Dr Goldman. Harvey asked me sly questions. I fed them all the same pap. A detail here, a detail there. Careful parallels drawn from selected casework. Never too close, but always the pattern they had been taught to expect.