The Alcoholics

by Jim Thompson

  He recognized her. He knew what she’d done. But he would not remember long; and, at any rate, he was virtually as powerless to speak as a newborn baby.

  He was a baby, in fact. A big, old mean helpless baby. Couldn’t even talk, the nasty, lazy thing!

  Terror was crowding into his eyes, stretching the lids, making the whites greater and greater. They rolled in his head, wildly. And his lips moved, his mouth opened and closed—in silence.

  Miss Baker laughed merrily.

  She took a folded hand-towel from her pocket—oh, yes, yes, she had come well-prepared—and placed it over his mouth. He tried to bite into it, but she knew exactly what to do about that. She gripped his nose between her thumb and forefinger and squeezed the nostrils shut. He began to smother.

  “That’ll fixth you, you nathty thing!” Miss Baker whispered. “Thtupid, that’s what you are! Lazy, bad, thtupid man! Don’t even know your own name, do you?”

  She had to force herself to remove the gag, to take away her fingers. The sweet agony in her loins was racing to a climax, and in a few more seconds—oh, thweet heaven, just a few more!—she would…But she did not have those seconds. The mean, stupid thing was strangling.

  She looked down at him, all fairness now, her own pleasure merely a necessary potential of a job to be done.

  “Tell me your name,” she whispered. “If you don’t tell me your name, I’ll have to…” She waited. She lowered the towel. She reached for his nose. “Very well. In that cathe, I have no choice but to…”

  The smothering began, again. Again Miss Baker’s body trembled with a hot orgiastic tide.

  “T-tell me”—she panted: she was breathing for both of them—“Tell—me—your—name…”

  And the billion uncohered images of Van Twyne’s subconscious hurled frenziedly against themselves; they struggled upward, seeking a new exit for the one that was strangely absent. They broke through into nothingness, into a patternless uncharted void: just as the exit had been missing, so now was the pattern. Unguided, unrelated, each struggled and shrieked for command; and yet, gradually, a kind of order—a kind of super-chaos—emerged from the chaos—

  “Name?” He tried, the images coming from way, way back.

  Huh-huh huh-huhwhoooah…

  “Name?” Name, things, words. And his mind sweating.

  Huh-huh-huh-c-a-t, man. C-A-T, Man?

  “Name?” A rush, a void, a meaningful meaninglessness.

  Huh-huh-huh, sugar, honey, darling, dear, mama’s little man nowilayme goddamlilsnob on, daddy DADDY? what you do to me I said so didn’t I well who the hell are you think because you’re assdeep in dough you can.

  “Name?” Everything, everything he ever remembered, mixed up with all the nothing.

  Multiply the diameter times pi which gives us well how would you have it if we are to employ the Socratic method the world according to weighs six sextillion four hundred and fifty quintillion short tons andyoucanhaveit brother and if we are to believe the theory of Malthus you’d better talk fast YOU’D BETTER TALK FAST!

  “Name?” The name didn’t matter, but something else did.

  Humphvan humptydumpty Humphvantwythird. HUMPHREY VAN TWYNE Thir sure, sure you are and I’m Henry the Eighth I’m Mr. God and this is my oldest boy Jesus now let’s be reasonable, sergeant, I’m really if I can make a telephone call.

  “Name?” It was hot and he had to do something.

  Nownownow NOW GET WISE HUMPY BOY. You want to hang on to your machinery, what there is left of it? Well, you’d better start popping off, then, and I’m crapping you negative. You want to leave with

  Balls?

  Still sore aren’t they? That little bitch.

  BALLS?

  Remember them, all right, don’t you? And why not? Ha, ha. How could you forget?

  Miss Baker’s small body was limp. The fever was gone from her eyes, and her breathing was regular. The sheets were bound tight, terribly tight. Tired but happy, she turned away from the table; stooped to remove the doorstop. And then it happened.

  “Balls!” shrieked Humphrey Van Twyne III. “Balls, balls, BALLS!”

  Miss Baker jumped, bumping her head against the edge of the door. She whirled, panic-stricken, and took a few steps toward the table. She ran toward the door again. What—how could he? He was mean, nasty and they’d get her and she hadn’t done a thing, only tried to—

  He shrieked and kept shrieking, that one terrible word. Shrieked, deafeningly, as though he would never stop.

  She snatched up the doorstop, squeezed through the slowly closing door, and ran madly down the hall. She was barely inside her own room, when Doctor Murphy and Rufus, the former in the lead, came pounding up the stairs. She leaned, fearfully, against her door, listening, listening to the sudden starting and stopping of the shrieks, as the door to Room Four was opened and closed.

  They’d know, she thought, terrified. He’d know. That room was soundproof. He’d know that she’d been in there.

  But maybe…she’d have to try…maybe he wouldn’t think of that. Oh, God, don’t let him think of it!

  Minutes passed. Were they talking about her, deciding what should be done with her? Then, she heard the door of Room Four open, and she opened her own and stepped firmly out into the hallway.

  Rufus bobbed his head as he passed her, carrying a white-enamel hypodermic tray. Doctor Murphy sauntered along behind him, still wearing his bathing trunks.

  He smiled at her engagingly. “Some fun, eh?”

  “I’m awfully thorry to be late, Doctor, but you thee my alarm didn’t go off…”

  “No harm done,” shrugged the doctor. “Wasn’t that some yelling, though? Funny. I’d have sworn he didn’t have so much as a whisper in him.”

  “Yeth,” said Miss Baker. “It ith odd, ithn’t it?”

  “Funny that we could hear him, too. Perhaps the noise leaked out through the ventilating system. Never known it to do it before, but—do you suppose it did, Miss Baker?”

  “Well, I thuppoth it—”

  “Oh, I forgot. You probably looked in on him for a moment. Didn’t you, Miss Baker?”

  “Well, I did feel”—no, no, no!—“Oh, no thir! I—”

  The doctor snapped his fingers. “Of course, not. You were still in bed.”

  “Well, I, uh—I wasn’t in bed, egthackly. I was getting dressed, and—”

  Doctor Murphy picked up her right hand. He opened the finger of his left hand, and placed a small square of cambric in her palm, folding her hand around that.

  “Must have dropped that,” he said, “when you were there—last night.”

  He grinned at her, started down the stairs. “See me right after breakfast, eh, Miss Baker?”

  “Yeth, thir,” said Lucretia Baker, her voice a thin whisper. “R-right—right after breakfast, Doctor Murphy.”

  5

  Doctor Murphy went down the steps to the first landing, turned left down a narrow wrought iron-railed mezzanine, and proceeded to the southernmost wing of the house where his own room was located. He dressed, whistling, feeling unusually pleased with himself.

  All his impulses had inclined him to shove Nurse Baker into her room, shake her until her teeth rattled, paddle her little round butt until she couldn’t sit down, herd her out of the house and hurl her clothes after her. That was what he had wanted to do, and a man less strong-willed—a man lacking the perfect self-control which he had so definitely demonstrated—would have done that. Which, of course, would have been the worst thing he could do.

  She was a sick woman: reason had told him that as it cried down the rage that prompted him to smack her. So for once—oh, hell, not just once; he didn’t blow up very often—he held on to his temper in the face of genuine outrage.

  He had done exactly the right thing.

  She was sick. The sick should be cured, not punished. He had taken the first step toward that cure. He had shown the damned nasty little stinker—this sick woman—that he was wise to her goddam
—that he was aware of her ailment and yet was not angry with her. He had edged the matter out of the shadowed and secret recesses of her mind. Another such nudge or two, and it would be out in the open. If she didn’t fly into a defensive rage.

  Doctor Murphy carelessly knotted a tie around the neck of his short-sleeved sport shirt, raked his fingers through his hair until it assumed some semblance of order and stuffed a couple of clean handkerchiefs into his pockets. He let his grin fade, deliberately, and stared pugnaciously at himself in the mirror.

  Washed up? Who you talking about, bud?

  Well? You got fifteen grand in your keister? Anything to keep the bank from tossing you out of here with a few days’ grace period?

  Now, look. I don’t have time to argue with you. I’ve got work to do, see? I’ve got to be thinking out something on this sick woman—or is she just a degenerate? I’ve got all these alcoholics—

  Oh, sure, sure. And what the hell’s all that going to get you?

  What’ll it—who the hell said it would get me anything?

  Listen, you stupid jerk! Face the facts. Do you want to keep this place going or not? Damned if I know why you would, but do—

  You know the answer to that.

  Then there’s just one thing for you to do. Start thinking about a nice round sum from the Van Twyne farm—

  You think I’d do that, just because the family’s fed up—afraid to give him the thirty-seventy chance the operation entitles him to? You think I’d keep a man buried here alive, a hopeless imbecile, just because his family is willing to pay for it?

  I said I wasn’t going to think about it, now, and by God I’m not!

  Doctor Murphy gave his image a stern conclusive nod. He turned toward the door. A young man stood there, leaning against the casing, grinning at him.

  “Sorry to walk in on you, Doc,” he said. “Guess you didn’t hear me knock.”

  “I see,” said Doctor Murphy. “And did it occur to you to wait until I did hear you?”

  He was, appearances to the contrary, something of a stickler for formality. He liked good manners; except when they were sodden, he usually found those good manners practiced by alcoholics. And this man was very far from sodden. It was unlikely that his system still retained any of the alcohol which had been in it upon his arrival the day before.

  The young man chuckled, brushing aside the rebuke. “You’ve got to fix me up, Doc. Boy, if I don’t get a drink fast I’m going to fall apart.”

  The doctor nodded slowly. He suddenly appeared to be charmed and intrigued by his visitor. “Had quite a bender, eh? Well, I guess when you advertising men hang one on, you really hang it on.”

  The young man said they did. And how!

  “Don’t have to worry about your job, eh? If they don’t like it at that place, there’s plenty of other places that will?”

  “Well, I don’t want to brag, Doc, but I can tell you this. Drunk or sober, I can still do a hell of a lot better than…”

  He proceeded to brag, while the doctor casually pushed up the sleeve of his hospital bathrobe and took his pulse. He had no doubt that the young man’s boasts were true, or almost true. Alcoholics had to be good. They lost time from their jobs. They were guilty of disgusting and atrocious acts. Thus, if they were to survive in their professions or jobs, to be tolerated by the world they so frequently outraged, they had to work and think harder than normal people.

  So this man probably was very good at his work now. He probably was very much in demand. Five or ten years from now…well, that would be another matter. A man’s ability availed him nothing if he could not stop drinking long enough to use it. All his talents were worthless if people were afraid to hire him.

  “First trip to a sanitarium, Mr.—uh—Sloan?”

  “Make it Jeff, Doc…Yep, first trip. Usually, you know, I don’t want any more after the second or third day. I’m not sick at my stomach exactly; just feel like I’ve had enough. But this time, I—”

  “Uh-huh. I think I understand, Jeff. So I’ll tell you what you’ll have to do. Get sobered up completely; rest for a couple days until your nerves are straightened out. Then get back to your job, and never take another drink as long as you live.”

  Jeff Sloan laughed. “You’re kidding, Doc. I can handle it. Didn’t I tell you this was the first time I—”

  “You’ll never be able to handle it again. And this won’t be the last time.”

  “But I’ve got to drink. It’s part of my job. I have to meet a lot of people and—”

  Doc Murphy couldn’t decide whether he was angry or sad. A little of both, he guessed. His nose wrinkled, sniffing the air suspiciously.

  “Well, I suppose if you must have a drink…”

  “A big one, Doc!”

  “I’ll give you an ounce, now. If you want more later, you can have it.”

  Followed by the young man, he walked down the mezzanine until he came to the padlocked door of a one-time linen closet. He unlocked it and stepped inside. He emerged with a shot-glass full of one hundred-proof bourbon. Jeff Sloan gulped it eagerly. Doc handed him a small ivory-colored pill.

  “No,” he said, answering the suspicious question in the other’s eyes. “It won’t make you sick at your stomach. It won’t put you to sleep.”

  Sloan tossed the pill into his mouth. He expressed effusive thanks for the drink, and headed down the hall toward his room. A few steps away, he turned grinning and brushed his hand across his forehead in a gesture of exaggerated dismay.

  “Say, that’s the real stuff, Doc! What brand is it? Think I’ll lay in a few bottles when I get home.”

  “I’ll write it down for you,” said Doctor Murphy smoothly.

  He re-locked the door of the closet, carefully testing the lock afterwards. He went down the stairs, started to enter the dining room, then turned abruptly in the opposite direction. He had almost forgotten about the General. The old boy had, or had had, a constitution like iron but it was being seriously strained.

  The General was lying on a table in a small examination room. Doc took his blood pressure, then, since he had no stethoscope with him, he laid his ear against the old soldier’s chest and listened to his heart.

  He straightened again, frowning indecisively.

  “Well, Doctor. Would you say I was alive?”

  “Oh, nothing as bad as that,” said the doctor. “I was just wondering what to embalm you with.”

  “Mmm.” The General pursed his lips thoughtfully. “If I might make a suggestion, I believe that one of the time-tested fluids is—”

  Doc laughed, tapered the laugh into a severe frown. He was going to have to stop clowning with the patients, dammit. What the hell was he running, a circus or a sanitarium? It was all right to joke a little, but this incessant gabbing and horsing around was going out the window. As of right now!

  He rang the bell for Rufus, stepping out into the hall when he heard the attendant approach.

  “The General is pretty run-down,” he said, dropping his voice. “How’s our plasma holding up?”

  “Well—uh—uh—” Rufus started to scratch his head, then quickly dropped his hand as doc’s eye caught his. “Why’n’t we sock him with insoolim, Doctuh? ’At start ’im to eatin’ good.”

  “Don’t think he can take an insulin shock,” said the doctor, nodding appreciation for the suggestion. Rufus had plenty on the ball, if he’d only use it. All that had got him sore with Rufus was the latter’s bollixing around with that correspondence school crap instead of using his very good common sense. “Guess we’d better make it plasma.”

  “How about goo-clothes? We ’travenize him, huh, Doctuh? Give him nice goo-clothes brek’fuss—”

  “Glucose!” snapped Doctor Murphy. “Can’t you remember anything at all? Not goo-clothes, for Christ’s sake! Glucose! G-l-u-c-o—”

  “Yes, suh,” said Rufus, quickly. “I go get it right away.”

  “You will not! And stop telling me what to do, dammit! His system won�
��t burn up a good load of glucose, so…Oh,” he said tiredly. “No plasma? They didn’t—wouldn’t fill our order?”

  “Yes, suh. Sure would stop tradin’ with that outfit, if I was you, Doctuh. Ain’t a bit dependable no more.”

  “Yeah. Well…”

  “Doctuh…Maybe—well, me’n General’s same type, an’—an’ if he wouldn’t mind takin’ blood from—”

  Doc Murphy let out a happy roar. “Mind? Why in hell should he? Why—”

  “Why, indeed?” called a reedy voice from the examination chamber. “He would, on the contrary, be delighted, grateful and—uh—flattered.”

  Rufus beamed. Doctor Murphy clapped him on the back. “Go on and get breakfast over with—General, you lie there and rest; we’ll see you in thirty minutes or so—and…Miss Baker down yet?”

  “No, suh. She havin’ some coffee in her room.”

  “Good! I mean—uh—well, good.”

  They walked down the hall together, the doctor apologizing—very handsomely, he felt—for his tirade of the day before. The trouble with Rufus, he declared, was that Rufus couldn’t take a joke. Not that Rufus hadn’t deserved an A-1 ass-eating, understand, but—but hell!

  “Murph!”

  “Oh, oh.” Doc paused in front of a partly opened door. “Put my breakfast on the table, Rufus. I’ll—”

  “Murph! Come in here at once, you hideous beast!”

  Rufus went on.

  Doctor Murphy went in.

  He sat down on the edge of the woman’s bed, listened to a throaty, tearful and seemingly interminable denunciation of himself, his employees, his hospital, the motion picture industry, the income-tax bureau, the Republicans, the Democrats, the—everything that manic depressive, alcoholic Susan Kenfield could think of—all delivered with beautiful if occasionally inappropriate gestures.

  Her hair was snow-white, but her great brown eyes, her face and her body (a considerable area of which was exposed) were those of a woman in her early thirties. At least, one would have to look at her long and closely to suspect that they were not. Just how old she was, Doc could only guess. Probably around forty, he believed, since she had been playing character parts for more than twenty years.