of confusing the real with the unreal. Traditional. Almost classical.
“A real bird on the short-wave set?” he asked gently. “With bloodshot eyes?”
“Yes,” McFarlane replied. “I know it sounds silly. I know it’s hard to believe.”
“Oh, not at all. Not at all. That type of visual aberration is a common enough phenomenon.” The doctor smiled soothingly. “Nothing to…”
McFarlane interrupted him by reaching down and hoisting the carton onto the desk. “You don’t understand, Doctor,” he said. “Go ahead. Open it.”
The doctor looked at McFarlane a moment, then at the brown box, which was punctured with air holes and tied with heavy twine. Disconcertedly, the doctor cut the string and folded back the top flaps. He leaned over and peered in—then sucked in his breath. Pouchy, bloodshot eyes leered up at him. Floppy ears. The upside-down beak. An obscene looking bird.
“His name is Lafayette,” McFarlane said, tossing a few bread crumbs into the carton, which were quickly devoured with a noisy, repulsive gulp. “He rather grows on you after a while, don’t you think?”
* * * *
After McFarlane left with his hallucination, the doctor sat a few moments, meditating. He felt a little dizzy and light-headed, as though he had just emerged from a ride through the Tunnel of Horrors at the beach.
Maybe I am witnessing an entirely new psychosis, he told himself. Funny things are happening in the world today. He saw himself before the American Psychiatric Congress, delivering a monograph: “The Emergence of a New Psychosis.” This new disorder apparently had symptoms opposite from paranoia—he could call it Narapoia. Hopefully, Dr. Departure foresaw the possibility that some of his colleagues would insist on naming it after its discoverer: “Departureomania.” He would be famous; his name linked with Freud. A sickening thought struck him. Supposing this man McFarlane were a malingerer! A fake! By God, he’d find out! Quickly, he buzzed his secretary, Miss Armstrong, and instructed her to cancel all appointments for the rest of the day. Then he reached for his hat and fled from the building.
* * * *
Three days later, the telephone in Dr. Departure’s office rang. Miss Armstrong answered it. It was Mrs. Departure.
“No, he isn’t here,” Miss Armstrong said. “As a matter of fact, he hasn’t been here for three days except to bounce in and out for his mail.”
“I don’t know what’s the matter with that man.” Mrs. Departure’s exasperated voice rattled the receiver. “He’s gone half the night, too. Comes home utterly exhausted. What do you suppose he’s writing in that little notebook?”
“Frankly, I’m worried about him,” Miss Armstrong replied. “He’s so irritable. And in such a frightful rush all the time.”
* * * *
“You’re looking peaked, Doc,” McFarlane said at his next meeting, a week later. It was the first time the doctor had sat behind the desk for many days. His legs ached. Stealthily, beneath the desk, he slipped off both scuffed shoes to relieve the pressure from his blistered feet.
“Never mind about me,” the doctor snapped. “How are you?” The doctor’s fingers twitched. He was much thinner and his face was pale and drawn.
“I think I must be getting better,” McFarlane announced. “I have the feeling lately that someone is following me.”
“Nonsense!” Dr. Departure snapped at him irritably. “It’s just your imagination.”
He squinted his eyes and gazed at McFarlane. If only he could be sure this McFarlane was not faking. So far, there was nothing to indicate he was. After all, his sudden urge on the streets to overtake someone seemed perfectly genuine. McFarlane would raise his head, his pace would quicken and away he would go.
Well, I’ll just have to watch him a little while longer, the doctor told himself.
He closed his eyes a moment, reviewing his activities for the previous week: the long cross-city jaunts in which he had almost lost McFarlane a dozen times; the long, long waits outside restaurants and bars, waiting for McFarlane to emerge.
I’ll just have to keep going until I get all the facts, he thought. But he was a little concerned with the weight he’d lost, and with the strange ringing noises in his head which had recently developed…
At the end of the hour, McFarlane tiptoed out of the office. Dr. Departure was snoring fuzzily.
* * * *
On the day of McFarlane’s next appointment with the doctor, he was met at the door by Miss Armstrong. “Doctor isn’t here,” she informed him. “He’s taken a leave of absence for three months…possibly a year.”
“Oh, I’m sorry to hear it,” McFarlane said. “He was looking done in, though. Where is he? On vacation?”
“As a matter of fact, he’s at Marwood Sanitarium.”
A strange, puzzled look suddenly settled over McFarlane’s face and he gazed into space a moment. Presently, he smiled at the secretary.
“I just had the funniest feeling,” he said. “Suddenly I feel like I’m completely cured. All of a sudden. Just when you told me about Dr. Departure.”
* * * *
The doctors had quite a time with Dr. Departure at the sanitarium.
“Just tell us anything that comes into your mind,” they urged.
Departure’s eyes were glazed and he was very excited. “I’ve got to follow him, I tell you! I can’t let him get out of sight. Not for an instant. He’s got a bird with baggy eyes and floppy ears.”
“Very interesting. All very interesting!” The doctors gloomed among themselves, shaking their heads scientifically. “Something entirely new!”
“It’s rather like a persecution complex…isn’t it? Only the opposite!”
“He seems to have the delusion he is following someone. Amazing, isn’t it?”
“Probably the emergence of a brand new psychosis. I suggest that we observe him very closely.”
And here, one of the doctors went so far as to suggest further that they let Dr. Departure move about the city at will—closely watched, of course, by alternately selecting members of their staff—so that his actions could be carefully noted…
* * * *
THE SHOPDROPPER
“I’m a klepto-kleptomaniac, Doctor.”
Dr. Manly J. Departure, bursting with vitamins and energy after his year’s leave of absence, gazed with professional cordiality at the angular young man across the desk, who was kneading preposterously long fingers and scowling.
“Well, that’s not too serious, Mr. Flint,” Dr. Departure replied, permitting himself an affable chuckle. “There seems to be a lot of kleptomania going around this season. As for the stuttering…”
