Disturbing the Peace

by Richard Yates

  “Excuse me,” he said to the orderly – a different one. “Am I still in Hollywood Presbyterian?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “How long’ve I been here?”

  “Since night before last, I believe.”

  “And this is still a medical ward, right? Doesn’t that mean I can sign out whenever I want to?”

  “I believe so, sir; but you’ve been very—”

  “I know I’ve been sick, but the point is I’m well now. How about cranking up the bed.”

  “Certainly.”

  “And you might as well take that tube out of my arm; I don’t need that.”

  “I’ll have to ask the nurse, sir; I can’t—”

  “Okay, let’s get the nurse, then.”

  Soon he was fully dressed and downstairs at the cashier’s office writing out a check, checking out of Hollywood Presbyterian as easily as if it were a hotel.

  “Where can I get a cab?”

  “We’ll call one for you, sir.”

  “Thanks.” And in the taxicab he felt as if he owned Los Angeles; he felt as if he owned the world. For some reason he had a lot of money in his wallet – well over two hundred dollars – and he felt like spending some.

  “Stop at a florist’s,” he told the driver. “Any florist’s.”

  He bought an expensive bouquet of mixed spring flowers, and on second thought he bought two. Then he had the driver take him home, where he pressed the bell on the building manager’s door.

  “Well, Mr. Wilder; you’re looking much better. How’re you feeling?”

  “Feeling fine, thanks, except that I’m sorry for all the trouble the other night.”

  “Wasn’t any trouble. I figured you needed medical attention, that’s all, so I called Dr. Chadwick.”

  “You did the right thing. Here, I brought these for your wife.”

  “Oh, nice. Well, that’s very – thoughtful, Mr. Wilder. Would you like to step inside for a few minutes?”

  “No thanks; some other time. Do you know if the ladies are home? The ladies next door to me? I want to apologize to them too.”

  “Oh; very nice. I think they’re home, yes; why don’t you just ring their bell?”

  He had expected old ladies; instead the older was only about fifty, a pleasant, crafty-looking woman with a henna rinse, and the other, apparently her daughter, was a pretty blonde in her twenties. Maybe they had come to Hollywood to try and get the daughter into the movies.

  “Excuse me,” he said. “I’m John Wilder; I live next door here. I just wanted to say I’m sorry about all the noise and the trouble – here, I’ve brought you these.”

  The older woman’s eyes looked him carefully up and down before she broke into a pleased smile. “Well, that’s very nice. Joy? Come and look. Aren’t they lovely?”

  At last he was alone in his own place, rich with a sense of having paid his debts. There was some broken glass to be cleaned up and a few tumbled chairs to be righted, and something would have to be done later about the tan whiskey stain on the wall, but generally things were in order. He couldn’t remember having felt so well in years. Pouring that bottle down the drain was the smartest thing he had ever done.

  But it was much too fine a morning, or afternoon, to stay indoors; very soon he was outside in his shirtsleeves, strolling up Santa Monica Boulevard, wanting to smile and wave at every passerby. He came to an especially sunny patch of sidewalk and stood slowly turning in place for a long time, holding his face up to the health-giving sun. Then he came to an Orange Julius stand and bought a paper cupful of the stuff. It tasted sweet and cheap, but the orange flavor reminded him of all the good, nourishing things he’d missed in all these years of alcohol. He stopped at a small neighborhood super market – really just a grocery store; not at all the kind of place Pamela had taken him to – and decided to buy whatever looked appealing. When he came out he was carrying a bag of twelve fragrant peaches in one arm and twelve small bottles of club soda in the other: just exactly the right combination of food and drink to get him through the day.

  Back in the apartment he took a ravenous bite out of a peach; he broke out the ice and made himself a plain club-soda highball. “Down the drain,” he said, sitting back in an easy chair with his shoes off. “I’m sorry, Pamela, but everything between you and me is down the drain.”

  When the phone rang he thought it might be Pamela, or Munchin, and he took his time getting up to answer it; he wanted to be ready for anything.

  “Mr. Wilder? This is Dr. Chadwick.”

  “Oh, hi there. I guess we haven’t formally met, but I want to thank you. I feel like a million dollars.”

  “Very good. I was surprised to find you’d left the hospital.”

  “Didn’t see any point in staying, that’s all. Felt too good to stay.”

  “I see. And what are you up to now?”

  “What am I up to? I’m eating peaches.”

  “Very good.”

  “And I’m drinking enormous amounts of club soda.”

  “You’re drinking what?”

  “Sparkling water.”

  “Ah, very good.” And the doctor chuckled. “I’ll drop by to see you in the morning, all right?”

  “If you want to, okay. And thanks again, doctor.”

  This was the only kind of doctor he needed – the only kind he had ever needed: a thoughtful general practitioner who would pack him off to a medical ward when he was unconscious and chuckle approvingly on the phone when he was well again. The hell with psychiatry! Fundamentally, John Wilder knew how to take care of himself.

  The telephone became faintly oppressive, sitting potent and ready on its little table. It might ring at any second – or, worse still, it might tempt him to make a call, as it had tempted him to call Paul Borg. He might call Carl Munchin; he might call Dr. Rose; and unless he was very careful he might call Janice and Tommy.

  When evening came he found he was tired but not sleepy, and the fine glow of his well-being had begun to fade. The only way he could sleep was to have a drink – just one or two, taken as medication – so he walked down to the liquor store and bought a fifth.

  “Hey, you forgot your change,” a voice called after him from the cash register. “Hey, mister; your change.” But John Wilder couldn’t be bothered with trivialities; he had important things on his mind. He had to figure out not only how to extricate himself from Munchin’s and Pamela’s movie, but how to prevent the movie from being made – and beyond that there were still graver matters, issues that hadn’t yet defined themselves, that would have to be dealt with in the morning.

  He took off all his clothes and brought the whiskey bottle to the bedside; then after a while he got in between the sheets and lay like a corpse until sleep overcame him.

  It seemed only a few minutes later that he woke with a sense that the world was coming apart. Things couldn’t wait until morning. He leaped from bed before he quite knew what it was he had to do; then when the knowledge was clear he found there wasn’t time to get dressed. Still naked, he ran to the kitchen and got a carving knife; then he ran to the telephone and cut the wire. He was just in time: if he’d hesitated a heartbeat longer the phone would have rung, and a voice sounding like Mr. Epstein’s at Marlowe would have told him he was the new Messiah.

  From outside in the night streets he heard a child’s scream and then a police siren, and all at once he realized the enormity of what he had done. Communications had broken down all over the country – all over the world – and he had to act quickly. He pulled on his pants and zipped them up but there wasn’t time for any more clothes; he was out in the dead, deserted street and running barefoot for Santa Monica Boulevard, hearing nothing but the wind in his ears and his own gasping breath. There was a sidewalk phone booth two blocks away; he sprinted for it, clambered inside and grabbed the receiver off the hook.

  “Listen, operator, I’m the one; I cut the phone wire; it’s me; me; me. My name is John C. Wilder and I’m only a man, do
you understand? I’m only a man …”

  And he hardly dared to look, but it did seem that the streets had come to life again; people were moving, and some were even talking and smiling as if nothing had happened.

  “Hey, buddy …” A long-haired young man in a Levi jacket, smiling and frowning at the same time, was hurrying after him as he left the phone booth. “Buddy, I can’t let you be alone after what I just heard.”

  And Wilder backed away from him, gesturing for him to keep his distance. “Yes you can, buddy,” he said. “Yes you can.”

  Because it was very important to remain alone as long as possible. If it wasn’t true, let them leave him alone. If it was, let them find him. Let them all hear whatever the young man had heard; then let them find him. He walked steadily away from home, going west along Santa Monica with his head down, watching his naked feet tread the pavement. Once he stumbled and went down on one hand, and his thumb picked up a trace of dogshit. He wiped it on his pants but the smell remained, and the smell soon became his sole proof that he was mortal and earthbound – only a man. No second coming of Christ would have dogshit on his thumb.

  “… The man is said to be in Los Angeles,” Walter Cronkite was saying on television screens all over America, “and is said to be walking the streets alone. Los Angeles police have been cautioned not to be misled by impostors …”

  The only way to silence that voice was to smell his thumb. An adolescent boy sat in a doorway playing a guitar, and Wilder sat down beside him. The boy was barefoot too, and he was playing mortal, earthbound music.

  “Don’t let me interrupt you,” Wilder said; “that sounds nice. You just go on doing what you’re doing, and I’ll do what I’m doing.”

  “What’re you doing?”

  “Smelling my thumb.”

  And the boy got up and walked away.

  If it wasn’t true, he was making a fool of himself. But what if it was? He was heading toward the Strip now, walking up a long shallow hill. A cop in a crash helmet stood tensely astride a motorcycle at the curb, his radio crackling, and Wilder approached him – first smiling and waving both hands to show he meant no harm, then pointing to his own naked chest. “It’s me, officer,” he said.

  “Don’t touch me, mister; don’t come any closer.” The cop’s hand rested on his loaded belt.

  “No, no; you don’t understand. It’s me. I’m the one.”

  “Move along, mister…. I said move along.”

  So he walked on, climbing toward the lights of the Strip. If the police were all afraid of being misled by impostors, how could he ever establish his identity? He dropped his ring of keys on the sidewalk; then he pulled out his wallet and began dropping means of identification as he walked: his driver’s license, his credit cards, his Social Security card. When they were all gone he resorted to dollar bills, which he dropped at measured intervals – singles, then fives, tens, twenties. He was up on Sunset, walking east toward home. People were clustered at the sidewalk tables of late cafés or strolling both ways under the bright streetlights, and nobody seemed to notice what he was doing.

  “There is still no word from Los Angeles,” Walter Cronkite’s voice said. “The man is still at large …”

  All his money was gone by the time he turned down his own street, which he found more by instinct than design. The door of the apartment was standing open and he padded inside, shutting and locking it behind him. He had given them every chance; let them come and find him here.

  “… either one of the greatest events of all time,” Walter Cronkite was saying, “or one of the crudest deceptions. Only time will tell….”

  He paced the apartment with both hands over his ears, but when he closed his eyes he saw a tabloid newspaper headline:

  SAVIOUR

  OR

  FRAUD?

  There was nothing to do but walk around the apartment and wait. “Come on,” he said as he walked. “Come on; come on.”

  Toward dawn he heard a police helicopter hovering over the building and he had to smell his thumb for a long time before the sound went away, but it wasn’t until the first light of morning that he separated two slats of the Venetian blind and peeked outside to see if a crowd had formed. It hadn’t – at least not yet – and he went back to pacing the floor while the windows slowly changed from blue to yellow.

  “… The search has narrowed to a single residential block in Los Angeles,” Walter Cronkite said, “but police have not yet revealed the location for fear of drawing a crowd that might well be unmanageable. CBS camera crews are standing by for what may be the greatest moment in …”

  WILL HE

  SHOW

  HIMSELF?

  “No, wait,” Wilder said. “Listen: I’m only a man.” And he would have gone out and walked the streets again to prove it if he hadn’t been afraid of opening his door.

  Soon he could hear the crowd – a dense, heavy sound like the sea – and he parted the slats just enough to see that the police had erected barricades across the street. He went to the door, opened it and looked out blinking for a split second before he slammed it shut and went back to walking the floor.

  A GLIMPSE!

  Walking, he insisted to himself that it wasn’t true. If it was true the tumbled apartment wouldn’t look this way: these ashtrays wouldn’t be overflowing with butts and there wouldn’t be this tan stain of whiskey on the wall. The clothes in this closet were John C. Wilder’s clothes – anyone could see that – and the dirty feet that padded this carpet were John C. Wilder’s feet. John C. Wilder was short. He was thirty-nine years old and he came from New York, where he sold space for The American Scientist, and he had a faint scent of dogshit on his thumb.

  But what had driven him out of here last night? What had made him walk all that distance and drop all that money? What was the phone call he had stopped by cutting the wire?

  The attraction of the front door was powerful. He let himself go to it again and open it, and this time he let his shy, blinking face be seen for a whole second or more.

  The crowd gasped – a sound like a great wave – and he could hear the whirring and clicking of many cameras before he shut the door.

  IS HE

  OR

  ISN’T HE?

  And he was walking the carpet again with his head in his hands. “… We have now had two very brief glimpses of the man, enough to convince many skeptics that the whole incredible story is a hoax….”

  “No!” Wilder said. “I mean yes! I mean wait; just wait.” He stood with his hand on the doorknob, breathing hard; then he opened it and looked out and ducked quickly back out of sight for the third time.

  THIS IS

  GETTING

  SILLY

  He was hopping and bounding around the room now, whimpering, and he had left the door slightly ajar. For what seemed a very long time he stood pressed against the far wall where the whiskey stain was, trying to gather courage, until at least a serene inner voice said Go ahead, John.

  WAIT …

  And there was more than dignity in the way he walked across the carpet; there was a kind of grandeur. He opened the door all the way and stepped out in the sunshine, letting the crowd and the cameras feast on him. He stood with his hands at his sides for a while; then he raised two fingers in benediction, and then to leave no shadow of a doubt he raised both naked arms as if he were hung from a cross and let his head fall to one side.

  THE

  MILLENNIUM!

  He held the pose of crucifixion for a while; then he dropped his arms again and turned his head slowly to the left and to the right. There was no cheering; there was only a vast, solemn hush and the sound of many cameras.

  A middle-aged Negro carrying a small black satchel emerged from the foreground and approached him, followed by a heavy Negro woman in a maid’s uniform who held one hand pressed to her mouth. “Mr. Wilder?” the man said. “I’m Dr. Chadwick. Can we go back inside now?”

  It was only natural that they would wan
t to authenticate the miracle: the doctor would probably check his heartbeat and other vital signs, and the maid was there as a witness. When they came in they flooded the place with sunlight.

  “You’ve been through a great deal, Mr. Wilder,” Dr. Chadwick was saying, “and you’re very tired. Now you need a good rest.” He set his black bag on the coffee table, opened it and took out a hypodermic syringe.

  “You gonna shoot me out?”

  “I’m just going to make you more comfortable.” He squinted at the needle and sank it into Wilder’s upper arm. “He’ll be all right,” he told the maid, who was still clasping her mouth. Then he picked up the phone and said “Oh” when he saw the wire was cut. “I’ll have to call from the office.” The maid said something Wilder couldn’t hear, and the doctor said “Oh; all right, we’ll take care of that now. Mr. Wilder? Will you step over here, please?” They were escorting him to the telephone table, and he collided with it so heavily that the dead phone clattered to the sunlit floor. “If you’ll just sign this,” the doctor said, “we’ll fill out the rest.” At first Wilder thought he was handing him the hypodermic needle to write with; then he saw it was a ballpoint pen.

  “I get it,” he said. “This is to establish that I’m alive, right?”

  “It’s to establish that you’re alive and well and fully aware of your responsibilities.”

  The first time he tried to sign his name it came out in shaky capital letters like the writing of a child. “That’s no good,” he said. “Let me try again.” The second effort looked more like a real signature, and the third was better. While writing, it struck him that maybe he wasn’t certifying the identity of the new Messiah; maybe he was certifying himself as the first man in history to make a full recovery from madness without psychiatry. And maybe the two were the same.