Scary Creek (42 page)

Scientists believed the problem had to do with
pigments called rhodopin and iodopsin in the rods and cones, which enabled the
cones to respond to light and produce ‘color’ nerve signals. Others thought it
had to do with fluid in the eyeballs, or in the ability of the optic system to
discriminate codes. In any case, there were no solutions, no cures.

The seeing-eye baboon theory also began to lose some
of its glitter and recede into the dark hole of medical history. How many
Ethiopians would have had the patience to train a wild, ferocious baboon before
finally eating it, or it eating them? I gave the books back to the librarian,
thanked her and returned to the van.

The Grier paper was still on my mind. I called Joanne
Zimmerly’s office from a phone on the street. A secretary said she was
lecturing, but would return soon. She always stopped at the office before
leaving for the day.

“I would like to see her,” I said.

“Do you have an appointment?”

“No, but it is urgent that I see her.”

“Ms. Zimmerly is a very busy woman. She doesn’t
usually see people without an appointment.”

“I want to ask her a few questions about a colleague.”

“Ms. Zimmerly would not be inclined to reveal
confidential information about a colleague.”

“This colleague has been dead for more than 60 years.”

“If you want to take a chance, you can come by, but I
can’t promise you anything; she is very busy.”

I walked to her office slowly. I disliked going where
I was not welcome. Zimmerly sounded as if she had conditioned her secretary to
be as inhuman as possible to discourage personal contact with … common dolts.

When I entered the office, a lovely young woman with a
friendly smile behaved in a charming way and greeted me.

“Yes?” She said pleasantly, as if she didn’t know who
I was even though I knew she knew.

“I called a few minutes ago,” I said. “I would like to
see Ms. Zimmerly.”

“Ms. Zimmerly is out at the moment,” she said,
smiling. “Would you care to make an appointment?”

I told her I was only in town for a few hours and
would wait for Zimmerly’s return. She noticed my discomfort, but did not take
advantage of it. I would not enjoy coming here with a real problem, or greeted
by that therapeutically annihilating smile.

“Please be seated,” she replied.

I found a seat in the corner near a rack filled with
stacks of journals, psychiatric abstracts, the Wilson Quarterly, two copies of
Ladies Home Journal and several back issues of Psychology Today. From my hasty
assessment of journals, I knew why most mental patients were incurable. Psychiatrists
did not want them healthy. There was no future, fun
or fortune
in good
mental health.

Before I could get too deeply into an article, the
phone rang. The secretary listened for a minute, occasionally making brief eye
contact and then said, “There is a gentleman to see you, and his name is
Charles Case.” She listened intently to the voice and then covered the
mouthpiece with her hand.

“Would you care to state the reason for your visit?”

I approached her desk waving the thin sheaf of papers.

“I have a paper written by Dr. Ezekiel Grier, a
psychiatrist. I would like to share it with Ms. Zimmerly and discuss some of
his conclusions.”

She repeated my statement over the phone.

“Is Dr. Grier still practicing in the state?” she
asked.

“Dr. Grier has been dead for sixty years,” I replied.

Again, she repeated my words over the phone.

“You can go in, Mr. Case; Dr. Zimmerly will see you
now.”

I looked at the door, confused.

“I thought she was out?”

“She has a private entrance,” she replied.

Dr. Zimmerly was sitting, no, crouching behind her
desk. It was larger than Connie’s and had more expensive knick-knacks and
plaques. She, however, was not discovering much pleasure in her totems, though
she might have if someone taught her how to laugh.

She was trying to avoid looking forty, but not
succeeding. She had a pore-less creamy white complexion, which made tiny
imperfections leap off her skin. There was a smooth severity to her straight
blonde hair, and her eyes seemed to radiate little warmth or enthusiasm. There
was something about her eyes that tended to ignore those they confronted.

“My name is Charles Case,” I said, offering a hand.

I could see it was a useless gesture. She leaned
forward and gave it a cautious yank, almost as if she were handling something
distasteful.

“I’m sorry about all the formality, Mr. Case, but my
secretary has a tendency to be overprotective. She thinks I am easy prey for
neurotics. If I didn’t know better, I would say she is paranoid schizophrenic.”

I expected a smile, or something, but nothing
happened.

“And you know better?” I asked and wished I hadn’t.

“What is that supposed to mean?” she replied. “Do you
question my credentials?”

I flushed with embarrassment. She saw my confusion and
quietly allowed her dignity to re-center.

“What can I do for you, Mr. Case?”

I could see there was little room in this woman’s life
for small talk, so I made straight for the point.

“Have you ever heard of Dr. Grier?” I asked, boldly
moving a step closer to her desk. “He was the resident psychiatrist at the
state hospital in Vandalia in the 1920s and 30s.”

“The name has a familiar ring to it,” she said,
jotting it down on a pad. “Is there some other reason why I should know about
him?”

“He is notoriously famous for the number of lobotomies
he performed at the state hospital,” I replied.

She nodded confidently. “Yes, I know who you’re
talking about, but I’m not familiar with any of the particulars.”

“I have a paper he wrote in the 1930s,” I said,
offering the script. She took it from my hand and opened it. “I’ve been trying
to find information about a disease he describes in the paper. It is called
“Geonlinger’s Disease.”

Dr. Zimmerly’s eyes registered a blank. She spun in
her chair to the reference library behind her, pulled out a book and ran a
finger down a page. One quarter of the way down, she stopped and frowned. Slammed
the book and pushed it to one side.

“What are you trying to pull, Mr. Case? There is no
such disease.”

I turned a few pages of the paper on the desk in front
of her and pointed to the title. She made a quick evaluation of everything
about the paper from its texture to its date and then re-read the title.

“Alberichs? Where have I heard that name before?” she
asked. Her eyes were glaring and hostile.

I shrugged, unwilling to confide too much at one time.

“I’ve been told that a local psychologist followed up
on Grier’s work with the Alberichs in the mid-seventies; his name may have been
Snowden.”

She made another rapid turn in the chair, removed
another reference book from the shelf and followed her finger through and down
a page.

“There’s nothing here about them, either. They should
be here if it was a legitimate study, unless it was some undergraduate survey,”
she said with a sneer.

“Maybe the paper was published in something other than
a psychiatric or psychological journal,” I suggested.

She slammed the second book and jammed it back into
the vacant slot on the shelf.

“Just exactly what is it that you want from me, Mr.
Case?”

I tried holding myself together, to look and feel more
confident, but it was difficult.

“I would like you to read this paper and comment on
it. I want to know if it is a good paper, or is it just weak, sloppy,
incomplete theorizing, or is it someone’s idea of a joke.”

She shook her head nervously. “What is this, some kind
of a test? Are you trying to make a fool of me?”

Her upper lip was quivering. I felt as if I were in
real danger.

“Not at all, I just need a little help. That paper
makes some very unusual claims.”

“Are you a former student of this university, Mr.
Case?” I shook my head. “Are you a member of the staff or faculty?” I continued
to respond in the negative.

“I’m a taxpayer,” I said, “or soon will be. I’m contributing
to salaries here.”

“Are you aware of the penalty for removing documents
from this university or any other designated office or study center?”

“I didn’t take anything from this university,” I said
growing more hostile than fearful.

“You did remove this document from the state hospital,
didn’t you?”

I couldn’t escape her disabling tongue. I think she
could smell the fear on me and see it in my eyes, and she loved it. Soon, I
feared, it might be necessary to prostrate and prevaricate my way to freedom.

“On the contrary, I was prepared to donate these
papers to the library. I found them in a box in a house I recently purchased in
Vandalia among other personal effects belonging to Dr. Grier.”

She thumbed quickly through the pages of the document,
staring at them, desperately anxious to absorb their curious contents.

“From your reading, what do you think Geonlinger’s
disease is?” she asked.

“It is the exact opposite of progeria,” I replied.

 “Progeria?” she replied, irascibly. “That’s not a
mental illness.”

“I didn’t say it was, but whatever it is, it was
enough of an interest to Dr. Grier to write a paper on it.”

She threw the paper on the desk and toward me.

“He was out of his field. I can’t help you, Mr. Case.
It’s not my field, either, thank God. I wouldn’t have the barest bones of an
idea on how to help you. Go find some internal organ specialist or check the
geriatrics department. I’ve never heard of that damned disease and I don’t ever
want to hear of it again. Now will you please take your paper and get out of my
office?”

I scooped the paper off her desk and headed for the
door, perhaps a little too slowly.

“Get out!” She screamed in a final gesture. I escaped
into the receptionist’s office. There was a smirk on her lips as I walked
swiftly passed her desk. She never unfolded her hands.

“I tried to warn you,” she said.

“Is she always like that? “ I asked.

“Not always,” the receptionist replied. “Sometimes
she’s worse. You got her on a good day.”

Chapter Thirty-Nine

There was another person in Morgantown I was anxious
to find: Michael Snowden, the author of the little historical tract on Vandalia
State Hospital. I walked to the nearest phone booth, checked the listings and
found his number. I figured a call at this time of day would be a waste of
time, but I had more of that than anything else. The phone rang but no one
answered. I decided to call the psychology department and see if he was on the
payroll.

“Psych two,” the laid-back voice replied. I would have
been disappointed had it sounded any other way.

“Is Mike Snowden still on staff?” I asked, not sure
i
f he’d ever
been anything but a student.

“Not anymore.”

“Do you know where he works?”

Questions were asked and I was told to hold for Dr.
Wilson. A few seconds later Wilson answered. After a few preliminary comments, he
suggested I try Snowden’s office and volunteered a number.

I tried the office, a mental health agency. It took
three intermediaries and a few minutes to get him on the phone. When he
answered the music in the background was deafening. I tried to communicate but
was ready to hang up when the noise suddenly abated.

“What was that?” I asked.

“I’m working on an experiment,” he said.

“Why so noisy? I thought experiments were conducted in
quiet, relatively antiseptic laboratories?”

“This experiment is intended to aggravate, to see how
varying decibels of external noise affect one’s ability to perform physically
and mentally.”

“I thought you were a clinical psychologist,” I said.

“No, I handle the technical and financial end of the
operation. I make sure everyone is doing their job as efficient and as cost
effective as possible. I keep track of the mileage, and make sure the crazies
get their money’s worth in care and coddling, and they aren’t being used as dodge
balls.”

“You aren’t a counselor?”

“No, never have been. The real money is in conducting
meaningless experimental projects that affirm what is already known
, but make it sound more decisive
. I hate to listen to people’s problems. Is that why
you called? You want to talk to a counselor?”

“I want to ask you about the book you did on Vandalia
State Hospital a dozen or so years ago.”