The Cartoonist (3 page)

Scott glanced at the man in the wheelchair and, for just a second or two, found the scratching of his pencil unnerving.

“He’s amazing,” the girl who’d discovered him said. “Look at how fast he goes. And he hardly even seems to be looking at the page.”

“He is not really senile,” said another student, a soft-spoken East Indian. “Is he?”

Scott opened his mouth to reply when a high, effeminate voice cut in behind him.

“Well, he pretty much fits the bill, Doctors.”

Scott and his entourage turned to face Vince Bateman, who’d been passing by in the hall and overheard the question.

Scott felt a familiar stab of dislike for the man. As a clinical psychiatrist Bateman had few peers. The trouble was that he knew it, and his ego, as huge and ungainly as a grizzly, made him nigh on insufferable to work with. He took over the discussion without so much as a confirming glance at Scott.

“When this gentleman came to us two weeks ago,” he said, “all he had were his tattered clothes and a knapsack containing that clipboard, a bunch of old drawings, and a bundle of lead pencils.” He adjusted his Gucci tie, then flicked an annoying bit of lint from the sleeve of his herringbone jacket. “Before the medical people could come up with a diagnosis, the old fellow regained consciousness and started producing these drawings. One of my residents saw him in consultation, quite properly tagged him as senile, and had him transferred up here. He’ll remain on the chronic ward until he can be placed in a more appropriate center—Saint Vincent’s or someplace like that.”

“But what about his drawings?” the East Indian said. “An artist like this cannot be senile...can he?”

Perplexity crossed Bateman’s face like a swift-moving cloud. He stroked pensively at his mustache before speaking, and when the words came, they seemed to cause him physical pain. It was that hard for Vince Bateman to be indefinite.

“I have to admit being at a loss to explain the artwork,” he said. “It could be an unconscious carry-over from his past, something he was previously capable of doing with little or no thought. Another possibility, since senility is a cyclical condition, is that he draws only when more or less lucid. The fact that he doesn’t communicate during these periods could be due to some separate form of pathology, such as aphasia secondary to stroke...or he might simply be choosing to ignore his external environment.”

The perplexity had left Bateman’s face and now it clouded the faces of the students. Typical of Bateman, he was talking way over their novice heads.

Scott, irked and anxious to leave, decided to elucidate.

“What Dr. Bateman is saying, group, is that we haven’t got a clue what makes this old boy tick. In some ways he fits neatly into a diagnostic slot, and in other, very fundamental ways, he does not.”

Bateman flushed. The only thing he hated more avidly than disorder was being paraphrased. Scott had to turn his head to conceal a self-satisfied smirk.

“There’s a batch of his artwork right here,” Bateman said. “In this satchel.” He indicated a heavy woolen handbag, slung by its strap from the back of the wheelchair. “You might be interested in going through some of it. The majority are quite macabre, with a gruesome sort of horror-comic bent. More than a few appear to relate to events recent in the news. Disasters mostly. More evidence to support the theory of lucid intervals. Presumably he hears about these things on his radio, then creates his own comic book versions.” Bateman edged away. “If you’ll excuse me,” he said.

Then he was gone, gliding down the hall with an animated flourish that made Scott wonder—not for the first time—where the man’s true sexual preference lay.

Still smirking, Scott moved closer to the wheelchair.

“We’ll go through some of these,” he said, “then pack it in, agreed?” Noting the eager nods, he reached into the satchel.

“
Ow
,” Scott cried, jerking his hand back. Blood welled from the pulp of his index finger, droplets of it spattering the armrest of the wheelchair. A few drops landed on the artist’s bare arm, and the old man flinched as if slapped. Other drops speckled the floor at Scott’s feet. No one noticed. All eyes were on his finger.

“
Son
ofa —” Scott said, catching a string of profanities in early stride. His gaze settled accusingly on the dark interior of the satchel. “What the...?”

One of the students, an overweight girl with a runaway case of acne, produced a half-used packet of Kleenex and handed it over to Scott. Then, as if expecting something to spring out at her, she peered into the old man’s satchel. Once satisfied, she poked in a chubby hand. It came back holding a crisp sheet of paper, one edge streaked with fresh blood.

“Paper cut,” she said. Then she withdrew a sheaf of drawings.

Unmindful of the commotion, the Cartoonist flipped to a fresh page and resumed his penciling.

Scott examined his cut finger. The wound was small but surprisingly deep. A few minutes’ pressure and a bandage would control it—but it stung like hell. Looking down at the grubby old artist, Scott wondered when last he’d had a tetanus shot.

“Are you all right, Doctor?” the East Indian said.

“Not fatal,” Scott said. “Just painful.” He shifted next to the overweight student, who had already begun leafing through the drawings. Despite himself, Scott’s interest had been rekindled by Bateman’s last suggestion: that some of the drawings related to events current in the news. He watched as the girl filed slowly through the sheaf.

Bateman had been right. Many of the sketches were quite macabre. Boneyard scenes with half-rotted ghouls clawing themselves free of the grave. Bloated sea creatures reaching up from weedy depths for the legs of unsuspecting bathers. Some dark, formless thing lurking beneath a sleeping child’s bed.

This last one made Scott think of the night fears Kath had suffered until just recently. Almost every night she would awaken at some ungodly hour, thrashing and screaming, insisting there was something under her bed, something with scaly wet skin that slithered and touched her toes.

“Here’s one,” Scott said, interrupting his own thoughts. He took up a sheet with his uninjured hand and displayed it. “I’m sure you recall the endless news coverage of the recent 747 disaster at Uplands Airport.” Shown was a sleek, mammoth aircraft skidding out of control at the end of the runway, then nosing in jagged, flaming halves into a bordering cornfield. “Looks as if Dr. Bateman was right.”

The students pored over the drawings with interest.

“You folks can scout through the rest of these if you like,” Scott said after a moment. “I have to run.” His mind had turned again to home.

Also anxious to leave, the students thanked Scott for his time, replaced the drawings in the satchel, then marched off down the hallway, chatting cheerily about the strange old man and the August weekend ahead.

Scott started away—but out of the corner of his eye he noticed a flutter of movement and he paused, turning back in time to see a single sheet of drawings glide to the floor from the artist’s withered hand. He bent and retrieved it, curiosity compelling him to study its contents.

There were four frames, again with a horror theme, depicting a lone figure in a decrepit, cobwebbed room. The figure was standing before an elaborate lion’s-head fireplace, and using an ax to rip up the floorboards. In the last frame the figure discovered a mummified corpse underneath. The corpse had a knife in its heart, and something rectangular clutched to its chest.

Great stuff
, Scott thought in amazement.
What a talent.

Replacing the drawings in the satchel, he glanced again at the old man’s work, intrigued by the almost mechanical persistence of his scribbling, by the uncanny ability that seemed to simply flow through him. He found it difficult to accept that the mind responsible for this talent could be entirely empty. From the first moment Scott had seen the old man, he’d been tempted to believe he could be reached, a channel of communication somehow established. His interest in this patient was only partly professional. It was mostly just plain old curiosity. It would be fascinating to learn more about the old man. Some of his comic book styles rang faint bells in Scott’s memory, taking him back across the years to that childhood fascination with comics. Maybe this old guy had been an illustrator for one of the classics:
Tales from the Crypt, The Vault of Horror
, or something like that. It was an interesting possibility—a senile celebrity.

A nurse appeared next to Scott and said,“Dr. Bowman?”

Scott didn’t answer, hadn’t even heard the woman’s voice. He was staring at the drawing the artist was just then creating, a tingly sense of déjà vu coursing through him. He’d had a similar experience on one other occasion, several years back in a village in Bavaria, a place he knew he’d never visited before. At the time he’d been examining some primitive instrument of torture in a dusty medieval museum. Krista had jibed him about that, suggesting that in another life he’d probably suffered public humiliation in a similar device for the unspeakable things he’d done to a clergyman’s daughter.

But what was this? The drawing hadn’t even taken shape yet, just some ribbed, rounded objects, but geometrically arranged—

“Dr. Bowman?” the nurse repeated.

The old artist began sketching more rapidly now, adding texture and dimension, his pencil a hoarse whisper against the page. The rounded objects became cylinders...barrels. Four barrels. But that closely ribbed pattern—as if hoops had been wrapped around them at regular intervals—that was the familiar bit.

“Dr. Bowman.”

Scott did a half-turn toward the nurse, then looked back compulsively at the drawing. With speed that was conjurer slick, the Cartoonist imprinted one of the barrels with a flower that looked like a rose. Then, equally quickly, he etched in a series of parallel slats—like boards but with abnormally wavy edges—joining the barrels from side to side.

Where have I seen this before?
Scott wondered. Had it been recently? Yes, there was a sense of newness to the recognition.

He felt a hand on his forearm and looked around at the nurse, whose face was flushed with exasperation. “Yes, sorry,” he said, “but I...” Then he gazed again at the drawing, trying to place those shapes, their geometric relationship to one another, that big white rose.

“ ...your wife is on extension one-one-three,” the nurse was saying.

“Oh...okay, ” Scott said, feeling oddly transplated, as if awakening from a dream.

“There’s a phone free in the interview room,” the nurse said, shaking her head. Then she continued on her way.

As Scott turned away from the wheelchair to pick up his call, the old man ceased his pencil scratching and shifted his gaze toward the doctor’s receding figure. Down the hall Scott hesitated, sensing those eyes on him. He did not turn. He walked on. But in that instant of hesitation his skin crawled avidly, as if someone had danced across his grave.

He took a bandage from a supply cupboard and put it on his finger, then let himself into the interview room to use the phone. His finger was throbbing like hell. He was thirsty, hungry, and he wanted to go home.

Krista’s voice, cheerful and rich, made him forget the old man and that queer sensation of déjà vu.

For the time being, at least.

* * *

Alone in his wheelchair by the window in the hall, caught in the slanting light and sharpening shadow of late afternoon, the old man touched the congealing droplets of Scott Bowman’s blood on his forearm with tentative, caressing fingertips. His dark eyes rolled. The corners of his seamed mouth twitched.

After a while he began to draw again.

“HI, HON.”

Krista’s voice sounded small and far away. Scott could hear the drone of a powerboat behind her and knew that she was down by the lake, using the cordless phone.

“Hi to you, too,” he said, smiling. He knew she’d be getting ready for his party.

“Glad I caught you—” Her voice angled sharply away, then grew louder: “
Kathleen.
There’s poison ivy down there, pet...sorry, hon. Just wanted to let you know that we’re out of beer. The Swains stopped by this afternoon and drank us all out...and I know you’ve been thinking more about the big Bud this hot afternoon than you have about your little wifey.”

It was true.

“Okay, doll. Thanks. I’ll pick some up and be along soon.”

“Good. See ya.” She hung up.

And suddenly Scott missed her. It was an ache.

He cradled the receiver and left the hospital, heading for the parking lot in long, rapid strides.

* * *

The delay with the students—and stopping off at the Brewer’s Retail to replenish his stock of Budweiser—wound up working in Scott’s favor. By the time he got under way again the rush-hour traffic had thinned, and he was able to reach the city limits in record time. Once or twice during the drive out his thoughts returned to that ancient artist and his bizarre drawing, the curious subject of which Scott felt certain he’d seen before. But the day was clear and his mood was fine, and eventually the car captured his full attention.

The Turbo Volvo was Scott’s baby, the one totally outrageous luxury he’d allowed himself after buying the new house in the Gatineaus, that long range of low green mountains on the Quebec side of the Ottawa river. Quick and responsive, the car gave Scott a wonderfully juvenile feeling. And on this particular August afternoon—his birthday—he was feeling perfectly juvenile.

A tune played over and over in his mind, competing with the music on the tape deck:
Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday, dear Scotty...

Now he was on the home stretch, guiding the car fluidly along the twists and curves of the narrow Gatineau Road. Signaling, he turned left at a dusty road sign reading Sleepy Hollow and slowed to a crawl, protecting the car’s undercarriage from the pits and pocks of the washboard side road. He stopped in front of a bank of green-painted mailboxes, fished out his mail—bills, journals, a few items of personal correspondence—and resumed the drive home. Soon the lake became visible through breaks in the birch trees hemming its banks. The water looked cool and inviting, its blue-green surface dancing with quicksilver.