The Minotaur (55 page)

Seeing the look on Toad’s face, the doctor added, “Amazingly
enough, I think he’s out of danger now. His Hver—weU, usually
these alcoholics have a liver the size and consistency of a football,
but this one doesn’t. Damaged, of course, but not yet fatally so.”

“Amazing.”

“Yep. Anyway, this man is, of course, incoherent most of the
time, but he has lucid moments occasionally. We thought you
might be able to identify him.”

Toad smiled his doubt, “We have our share of party animals in
the navy, but we haven’t misplaced any from our office lately.”

“No fingerprints to match, of course,” the doctor said. “No fin-
gers. No wallet, no ID, no jewelry, but he is somebody. It’s a long
shot, I know.”

“Has he given a name?”

“No. He keeps talking about a woman, probably a wife or
daughter. Judy. Never gives her last name. And this only during
coherent moments. There aren’t all that many of those.”

Toad Tariangton felt hot- He tugged at his tie.
“You must see quite a few of these folks,” he managed.

“Yes. Schizophrenics, most of them. Mental illness complicated
by alcoholism and drug addiction. What say we go look? You’re
busy and I don’t want to keep you. Not a chance in a thousand, I
know.”

Toad lurched to his feet and arranged his coat and hat on his
arm.

“How do you know,” he asked as they walked the corridor,
“that these derelicts aren’t criminals?”

“No doubt some of them are. Petty thieves and whatnot. But the
prosecutors have bigger fish to fry. And even if we found a man
they wanted to prosecute, he’d probably be incompetent to stand
trial.”

“I see.”

“We’d have to send them to St. Elizabeth’s for treatment and
evaluation, hoping they could get well enough to understand the
charges against them and assist in their defense.”

“Very civilized,” Toad said.

“I detect a note of irony there.” The medical man paused at the
fire door of a staircase with his hand on the knob- “Actually all
these derelicts should be in an institution. They are completely
incapable of looking after themselves. The lawyers and judges—
they are such asses.”

“What d’ya mean?”

“Unless someone is being held for trial, we must go to the courts
and seek an involuntary commitment order. We must prove the
person we wish to commit is a danger to himself or others. Assum-
ing the judge agrees, we can hold the man for six months. Then
there is another hearing on precisely the same issue. And a group
of public-interest lawyers have dedicated themselves to represent-
ing these people for nothing. The attorneys, all with the best of
intentions, do their absolute damnedest to get these sick people out
of the institutional setting and right back onto the streets, where
they can drink and starve themselves to death.”

“What a great country,” Toad muttered.

The doctor opened the door and led the way down the stairs. “In
America these days, freedom for those who are functionally dis-
abled, incapable of keeping body and soul together, means the free-
dom to commit suicide with a bottle on a public sidewalk while the
world walks around them. The politicians ignore the problem:
these people don’t vote. There is no problem, the lawyers say.

Vagrancy and alcoholism aren’t crimes, the judges say. Nothing
can be done.”

“This man we’re going to see—is he dangerous?”

“Only to himself. And the lawyers and judges would disagree.”

They were in a corridor now, proceeding past double swinging
doors with little windows that opened onto wards. Toad could see
| the patients in the beds, smell the disinfectant. Nurses hustled by.
He could hear people moaning, and from somewhere a man roar-
ing common obscenities in a mindless chant, the mantra of the
insane.

“What will become of him?”

“When the bandages come off? Oh, we’ll ship him over to St.
Elizabeth’s and they’ll try for an involuntary commitment, and
who knows, they may get lucky. But in six months, or a year, or a
year and a half, the judge will turn him loose. He’ll drink himself
to death in an alley. Or die some winter night when the police are
late coming by.”

The doctor turned left and went through a door.

The patient was staring at a spot on the ceiling over the bed.
Both arms were bandaged to the elbows. Lumps, bandages proba-
bly, under the covers where his feet were.

A chunk of his lower lip was missing. The cavity had stitches at
the bottom of it. Bandages on both ears and nose; a strip of tape
went completely around his head to hold them in place. He was
secured to the bed by a cloth harness.

“You have to get over here, where he will see you. I think the
alcohol has destroyed a lot of his peripheral vision.” The doctor led
the hesitant lieutenant to where he wanted him, then waved his
hand in front of the patient’s eyes.

The eyes moved. They traveled up the hand to the doctor’s face.
Then they moved to Toad, focusing on the dark, navy-blue uni-
form.

The man in the bed tried to speak.

“Take your time,” the doctor said- “Tell us who you are.”

“Uh…uh…”

“What is your name? Please tell us your name.”

“Uh . . .” He stared at the uniform, at the ribbons, at the
wings, at the brass buttons, at the gold rings on the sleeves. “Ju-
dee. Ju-dee.” His gaze was fixated on the gleaming wings.

“There he goes again,” the doctor said to Toad. “Sometimes he
mumbles about A-12. That could be an apartment, of course, but I
remembered seeing all that stuff in the papers about the navy’s new
airplane, so I decided to call you. A long shot.” The doctor sighed.
“I do wish I knew who his Judy is. Maybe a daughter who’d like to
take care of him, or at least know where he is. She’s obviously
someone he cares about.” His voice became brisk, business-like;

“So, do you recognize him?”

Toad Tarkington stared at the man in the bed as he weighed it:
three squares a day in a nice warm cell for thirty or forty years, or
an alcoholic’s death in a frozen alley.

At last he said, “I never saw him before in my life.”