The Thanatos Syndrome

by Walker Percy

  “Who, Dr. Van Dorn? Why not?”

  “He’s manipulative. I don’t trust him,” says Chandra.

  “He biggety too,” says Hudeen.

  “How do you mean?”

  “Telling me to call Carrie Bon and tell her Claude he staying out there too. Didn’t ax, told, like I’m working for him.”

  “Wait. You’re telling me that Dr. Van Dorn asked you to call Carrie Bon, Vergil and Claude’s mother, at Pantherburn and tell her that Claude was going to be staying at Belle Ame too?”

  “That what I’m telling you.”

  I look at Chandra. She shrugs. “That was after I left. I had got my call.”

  “What did you do, Hudeen?” Hudeen doesn’t turn around but holds up both hands, pale salmon-colored palms turned up. “What I’m going to do, he standing right there holding out the phone. So I told her he be staying on with Tommy and Margaret and she say all right.”

  “I see.”

  “I sent him some clothes too, but he big.”

  “I know.”

  “I sent him your sweater and pajamas.”

  “Good.”

  “Dr. Tom—” For the first time Hudeen turns to face me, drying her hands with her apron, eyes almost meeting mine, then falling away. “I sho wish you’d—Ain’t no way I can—” She turns back to the sink.

  I look at Chandra. She too opens her hands. “She means that Tommy and Margaret need more parenting and that Mrs. More is preoccupied with her bridge or with—” She too falls silent.

  Parenting. True, I could use more parenting skills.

  We all fall silent.

  I’m thinking about the argument and the Godiva chocolates. Then I think of nothing. Then something occurs to me.

  “Chandra, I want you to do me a favor.”

  “Ask it.” There is something alarming about her new gravity, her attentiveness to me. I think I liked her smart-aleckness better. “I got a few minutes before I have to do this remote. I’m meeting the camera crew and the remote unit.”

  “This won’t take long. I want you to make a phone call for me.”

  “No problem.” She picks up the wall phone.

  “No. Don’t you have a cellular phone in your car?”

  “I surely do.” She looks both pleased and puzzled.

  “Okay, but first hand me that phone and I’ll make a call.”

  Hudeen and Chandra make an effort to appear not to listen as I make my call. But they don’t talk. Hudeen turns off the sink tap.

  I call Belle Ame. A woman’s voice answers. I ask for Van Dorn. He’s not there.

  “This is Dr. Thomas More. With whom am I speaking?”

  “Oh, Dr. More! This is Mrs. Cheney from homeroom. You remember me!”

  “I sure do.”

  “Dr. Van Dorn will be back in a few minutes. He’s down at the soccer field.”

  “Very good, Mrs. Cheney.” She has the sweet-lady voice of a sorority housemother. “I am calling to tell you I am picking up Tommy and Margaret and Claude Bon in about an hour. You can tell Dr. Van Dorn when he gets back.”

  “Well surely, Doctor, but I thought—”

  “Plans have been changed. I’m picking them up. Please have them ready, Mrs. Cheney.”

  “I surely will, Doctor. But—”

  But I’ve hung up. I pass the phone to Chandra. She looks at me.

  “Chandra, I can’t explain now—we have to move fast—but will you make a call for me from your cellular phone in your car?”

  “Of course.”

  “You were leaving anyway.”

  “Yes, I—”

  “Can you leave this instant?”

  “Sure.” She gets up. She hears something in my voice. “What’s the call?” She’s good. She doesn’t ask why.

  “Do this please. Go to your car, but don’t make the call until you’ve driven ten blocks past those Cox Cable linemen. Then park and make this call. Call Belle Ame, here’s the number. Ask for a Mr. or Mrs. Brunette. All I want to find out is if they’re at the school. You don’t need to talk to them. Mrs. Cheney will probably answer the phone. You will learn right away either that they’re with the school or that she never heard of them. Hang up. You understand?”

  “I understand,” she says, watching me like a hawk.

  “Then call me. If Mr. and Mrs. Brunette are with the school, say this: Dr. More, I just called to say I can make it tonight. If Mrs. Cheney never heard of them, say: Dr. More, I’m sorry, but I’m going to be tied up at work. Do you understand?”

  “I understand.” What she hears in my voice is the urgency. She’s halfway to the door.

  “I appreciate this, Chandra. We have to be careful, even with a cellular phone. I’ll explain later.”

  “No problem.” She’s gone.

  After Chandra leaves, Hudeen and I are silent. Finally Hudeen says “Shew!” and then after a while she says, I think, “Humbug.”

  I move to Chandra’s chair next to the wall phone. The seat is still warm from Chandra.

  Before I know it, Hudeen has given me a plate of Tennessee ham, collard greens, black-eyed peas, two corn sticks which she makes in an iron mold, and a slab of sweet butter. “You ain’t going nowhere till you eat this. You looking poor. You been looking poor.” By poor Hudeen means I’m not fat. “You want some buttermilk?”

  “Yes.”

  I eat fast, watching the stove clock. It takes four minutes for the phone to ring. Hudeen jumps and says “Lawd.” I let the phone ring twice. I pick it up.

  “Hello”—with a mouth full of collards.

  “Dr. More?”

  “Yes?”

  “Chandra Wilson.”

  “Yes, Chandra?”

  “I just called in to the station and I can make it tonight.”

  “Thank you for calling, Chandra. I hope you’ll feel better.” I hang up.

  I eat it all. The ham is strong and salty. The collards are even stronger than Carrie’s mustards, stronger than the meat. Hudeen nods. She is pleased. She wants me fat.

  I look at my watch and call Lucy at Pantherburn.

  “Lucy—” I begin.

  “Oh, my Lord, I’ve been worried to death. There’s something I’ve got to—”

  I cut her off. “Lucy, I appreciate your concern for your uncle and I’m on my way.”

  “What?”she says. “What?”

  “I most deeply appreciate your concern for your uncle. I’m leaving now, okay?”

  “Okay, but—” She understands that something is up and I can’t talk.

  “I need you to help me make a professional call, okay?”

  “Okay”—baffled, but she’ll go along.

  “I’ll see you in half an hour, okay?”

  “Half an hour,” she repeats in a neutral voice; then collecting herself: “Fine, I appreciate it!”

  I finish the last of the buttermilk. “Thanks, Hudeen. They’ll be back tonight.”

  “Bless God! I sho be glad.”

  “Hudeen, don’t call Carrie Bon about Claude. Don’t call anybody.”

  “Bless God, I’m not calling a soul.”

  10. THE COX CABLE VAN is still in place, the lineman still in his bucket, the driver still behind the wheel. Neither man looks at me.

  A pickup follows me through town, but it passes me on the boulevard, a new four-door Ranger. The passenger on the right wears a new denim jacket, a long-billed, mesh Texaco cap. He does not look at me. There is a nodding toy dog on top of the dash and a gun rack in the rear window. There is only one gun in the rack, an under-and-over rifle-shotgun. For a mile or so the Ranger stays a couple of blocks ahead. But when I pull into a service station it keeps going.

  I call Lucy at the pay phone. Her “hello” is guarded.

  “I’m at a service station in town. I can talk. I’m on my way to pick up Margaret and Tommy and Claude at Belle Ame. I’ll explain. Since you are making a professional call there, why don’t I pick you up? That way I could drop you and Claude off. To save time,
meet me at Popeyes. Okay?”

  “Sure.” She is still cautious, knowing only that something is up.

  No sign of the van or the Ranger on I-12 or the River Road.

  Lucy’s truck is parked at the rear of Popeyes, backed in under a magnolia heading out. It is two-forty-five. I park close, heading in, make a motion for her to stay put, and open the driver’s door. She slides over. She wears her white clinician’s coat—good, she picked up on the “professional call”—and has her doctor’s bag. She places the bag precisely on her lap, her hands precisely on top of the bag. She gives me a single ironic look under her heavy eyebrows but says nothing.

  “We don’t have much time,” I say. We are spinning up River Road. I feel her eyes on me as I drive. “I have something to tell you. I think you have something to tell me. I’ll go first.” “You go first,” Lucy says.

  “Ellen has gone to a bridge tournament in Fresno for the rest of the week. Without Van Dorn. I have reason to believe she is not well. I also have reason to believe there is something going on at Belle Ame, possibly involving the sexual abuse of children. For some reason Van Dorn has arranged for Tom and Margaret and Claude Bon to stay there with the boarders. I am going to pick them up after school. I don’t think there is anything to worry about—with them. What I would like to do is have a word with Van Dorn, and while I’m talking to him, I’d like for you to look around, preferably in a professional capacity, maybe some sort of routine epidemiological check, talk to children and staff, whoever, see what you can see.”

  She hangs fire, eyes still on me, not altogether gravely. “Is that it?”

  “For the present.”

  “As it happens, I can do better than that. I was over there last week checking on a little salmonella outbreak. Nothing serious, but it would make sense for me to make a follow-up call, collect a couple of smears. In fact, I ought to.”

  “Good.”

  “May I say something now?”

  “Sure. Till we get there. Which is right up the road.”

  River Road is sunny and quiet. The traffic is light: two tourist buses, three cars with Midwest plates, half a dozen standard Louisiana pickups, three hauling boats. No new Ranger or van.

  She speaks rapidly and clearly. “Comeaux is on to you. Their mainframe flagged down all our inquiries last night. They know what we know and that we know, even the individual cases. I’ve been at my terminal and telephone for the last two hours.”

  “That’s okay. I’ve already spoken to Comeaux.”

  “Here’s something that’s not okay.” Her voice slows. “Neither NIH nor NRS nor ACMUI ever heard of a sodium pilot by the name of Blue Boy or any other name. What do you think of that?”

  “Maybe they don’t want to tell you.”

  “Tom, I’ve got Grade Four clearance. I can access all three of them. Furthermore, I talked to Jesse Land himself.”

  “Who’s he?”

  “The director of ACMUI, and a friend and classmate at Vanderbilt. He would know and he would tell me.”

  “That is strange, but right now all I want to do is—”

  “Tom.”

  “Yes?”

  “Listen, please. This is stranger than you think. This means that Blue Boy is unauthorized officially and must have been put together by some sort of dissident coalition from NRC and NIH with some foundation money, probably Ford—I think I picked up something from them—plus an interesting local political connection.”

  “Very interesting, but what are you worried about? Evidently you’ve already blown the whistle, told Jesse whoever.”

  “It don’t work that way, Tom.”

  “It don’t?”

  “You don’t keep up with politics, do you?”

  “No.”

  “The way it is in politics, Tom, is that if you’re head of an agency you generally like to keep your job.”

  “I see.”

  “Tom, may I give you a couple of elementary political facts?”

  “Sure. You’ve got a couple of minutes.”

  She speaks patiently, patting my thigh to make her points. “Number one: Tom, you are aware that the presidential election will occur next month?”

  “I was aware of that.”

  “You’re aware that the incumbent ticket is a shoo-in, almost certain winners?”

  “I suppose.” I am thinking of all the political arguments at Fort Pelham, which were endless and boring and often inflamed to the point of fights.

  “Tom, if this Blue Boy outfit can make it until November 7, they’ve got it made for good. Blue Boy can be presented as a fait accompli. They’ve got the clinical results, Tom, the numbers. And the numbers are going to be irresistible. And, Tom, they’re not only going to be authorized if they can make it by then, they’re going to be heavily funded. NIH can’t turn them down. You know that, don’t you?”

  “Well—” I look at my watch. School is out.

  This time Lucy’s hand stays on my thigh. “But there’s one fly in the ointment, Tom.”

  “Is that so?”

  “That’s so. Guess who?”

  “Who?”

  “You.”

  “Me.”

  “Tom, you’re the one thing they’re worried about. You’re the danger. They even have a name for you—or what they’re afraid you might become.”

  “What’s that?”

  “An intervener. Which is to say, the deadliest sort of whistle- blower. Tom, they have to do something about you.”

  “I know. They offered me a job. On the team.”

  “Are you taking it?”

  “I haven’t decided.”

  “Tom, for Christ’s sake, they can send you back to Alabama, or—”

  “Or?”

  “Nothing.”

  “How could they send me back to Alabama?”

  “Tom, you busted your parole when you crashed into the shunt site on Tunica Island. They have you.”

  “I see. So?”

  “He thinks you’ve already blown the whistle on them.”

  “How’s that?”

  “It seems the deal between your pal Bob and your Father Smith has fallen through. Father Smith is not only not going to sell his hospice to them, he called the wrath of God down on him. Bob thinks you told him about the pilot and that you’re going to turn loose the Catholics and fundamentalists on him. That would blow it.”

  “I suppose.”

  “Fortunately, you’ve got one thing going for you. No, two things.”

  “Yes?”

  “One, Father Smith is crazy as a jaybird and everyone knows it. He spoke to Bob through a bullhorn.”

  “What’s the other?”

  “The other is, you’re not exactly the type to get involved in religious crusades, and everybody knows that.”

  “So?”

  “Tom.” She has come close. There’s half the seat left beyond her. We’re spinning down River Road in the pickup like Louisiana lovers.

  “Yes?”

  “Bob Comeaux laid it out for me one, two, three. He was perfectly open and aboveboard and, Tom—”

  “Yes?”

  “He’s got a good case.”

  “He has?”

  “May I tell you?”

  “Tell me later.” I can see the widow’s walk of Belle Ame over a cypress break.

  “We’re here. Let’s get the kids.” We’re through the great iron gates of Belle Ame and into an English park.

  Nothing could look less sinister than the gentle golden light of Louisiana autumn, which is both sociable and sad, casting shadows from humpy oaks across a peopled park, boys and girls in running suits gold and green, a bus loading up with day students, and the playing fields beyond, youth in all the rinsing sadness of its happiness, bare-legged pep-squad girls flourishing in sync banners as big as Camelot, boys in a pickup game of touch coming close to the girls both heedless and mindful.

  Lucy speaks quickly, one hand creasing the flesh of my thigh to fold the words in.


  “Take the job with Comeaux. You have no choice.”

  “I probably will. Look out for a couple named Brunette, a Mr. and Mrs. Brunette.”

  “Okay. You and the kids better spend the night at Pantherburn.”

  “Why?”

  “Your phone’s bugged, for one thing. Hal told me.”

  “So is yours, probably.”

  “Not now.”

  “Why not?”

  “I fixed a device on my modem.”

  “You have a lovely one.”

  “What?”

  “I said you have a lovely modem.”

  “You’re crazy.”

  “Come back in half an hour. Head for the rec room over there.”

  I’m not looking at her now but at Van Dorn. He’s coming down the outside staircase of Belle Ame, which hangs like a necklace from this lovely old lady of a house. Belle Ame, lovely lady. He’s smiling, his arms outstretched. He’s expecting us.

  11. BELLE AME IS nestled under the levee in a magnolia grove, which hides most of the tank farm which surrounds it on three sides and the towers and pipery of the refinery which used to hum night and day like twenty dynamos before the oil wells dried up.

  This is no hard-used, working plantation house like Pantherburn. There are no Sears freezers on the gallery, no bird dogs scrabbling in the hall. Belle Ame has been restored to its 1857 splendor, a slightly vulgar splendor, showy and ritzy even then, with its florid Corinthian columns from late rich Rome and the late rich South. It is even more showy and ritzy now, as much now the creature of Texaco and Hollywood as of King Cotton then. Texaco, which owned it, wanted to do something “cultural” to show they were not despoiling the state. Hollywood wanted its own dream palace of the South. More movies have been made here than on Paramount’s back lot. Susan Hayward and John Carroll are its proper tenants. Clint Eastwood, a Yankee deserter, unshaven but not ungallant, was hidden out here by Southern belles, a bevy of hoopskirted starlets from Sunset Boulevard …

  Outside, between its far-flung wings, its famous twin staircases rise and curve as delicately as filigree between the columns of its slightly vulgar, thrusting Roman portico. The grounds are scattered with no less pretentious structures, garçonnières, pigeonnières, slave quarters, and even a columned Greek-revival privy.