The Last Gentleman

‘beating.’”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI couldn’t help but wonder who the beating was intended for. Was it you who got the beating from me yesterday? Or am I getting a beating from you today?”
    â€œYou could be right,” said the other, trying to straighten the ambiguous chair and face the doctor. He meant to signify that he wished to say something that should be listened to and not gotten at. “Nevertheless I have decided on a course of action and I think I’d better see it through.” For some reason he laughed heartily. “Oh me,” he said with a sigh.
    â€œHnhnhn,” said Dr. Gamow. It was an ancient and familiar sound, so used between them, so close in the ear, as hardly to be a sound at all.
    The Southerner leaned back and looked at the print of hummingbirds. They symbolized ideas, Dr. Gamow had explained jokingly, happy ideas which he hoped would fly into the heads of his patients. One bird’s gorget did not quite fit; the print had been jogged in the making and the gorget had slipped and stuck out like a bib. For years the patient had gazed at this little patch of red, making a slight mental effort each time to put itback in place.
    â€œI notice now that you use the phrase ‘run out’—‘Ihave run out of money’,” said Dr. Gamow. Lining up his feet again, he sighted along his knee like an astronaut. “The idea suggests itself that you literally ran out of your own money—”
    â€œFiguratively,” murmured the other.
    â€œLeaving it behind? I could not help but notice you seem to have acquired what seems to be a very expensive possession.”
    â€œWhat is that?”
    â€œThe handsome leather case.” Dr. Gamow nodded toward the reception room. “Camera? Microscope?”
    â€œTelescope,” he said. He had forgotten his recent purchase! He was, moreover, obscurely scandalized that the doctor should take account of something out in the waiting room.
    â€œA telescope,” mused the analyst, sighting into the farthest depths of the desk. “Do you intend to become a seer?”
    â€œA seer?”
    â€œA see-er. After all a seer is a see-er, one who can see. Could it be that you believe that there is some ultimate hidden truth and that you have the magical means for obtaining it?”
    â€œHa-ha, there might be something in that. A see-er. Yes.”
    â€œSo now it seems you have spent your money on an instrument which will enable you to see the truth once and for all?”
    The patient shrugged affably.
    â€œIt would be pr?tty nice if we could find a short cut and get around all this hard work. Do you remember, the last time you left you stood up and said: ‘Look here now, this analysis is all very well but how about telling me the truth just between ourselves, off the record, that is, what am I really supposed to do?’ Do you remember that?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œAnd do you still think that I am spoofing you?” Dr. Gamow, who liked to be all things to all men, had somewhere got the notion that in the South you said “spoofing” a great deal.
    The patient nodded.
    â€œYou also recall that this great thirst for the ‘answer,’ the key which will unlock everything, always overtakes you just before the onset of one of your fugue states?”
    â€œNot always.”
    â€œAlways in the past”
    â€œNot this time.”
    â€œHow much did it cost you?”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œThe telescope.”
    â€œNineteen hundred dollars.”
    â€œNineteen hundred dollars,” repeated the analyst softly.
    â€œWhich leaves me with the sum of fifty-eight dollars and thirty cents,” said the patient. “According to my calculations, I owe you for eight sessions this month, including this one.” And arising from the ambiguous chair, he placed two twenties and a ten on the desk. “Now I owe you one fifty. I’ll pay you at the end of the month.”
    Dr. Gamow gazed at the money. “May I review for you one or two facts. Number one, you have had previous fugue states. Number two, you give every indication of having another. You always quit the analysis and you always buy something expensive before taking off. The last time it was a Corvette. You still have a defective ego structure, number three. Number four, you develop ideas of reference. This time it is hollow men, noxious particles, and ultimate