The Second Coming

suffered by the poet who mourned dead Shropshire lads and rose-lipt maids and his own lost youth.
    â€œAs I was saying, the odd thing is that the drug is the simplest of all substances, so simple that no one would think of it—in fact, it was discovered by accident. It is nothing other than the hydrogen ion, a single nucleus of one proton, not even an electron. Isn’t that intriguing? that the most complex symptoms, wahnsinnige Sehnsucht, inappropriate longings, depression and such, can be cured by a single proton? Apparently it all comes down to pH. I’ve had a series of six cases, and in each one you have petit-mal seizures plus an unstable pH which fluctuates between a mild alkalosis and acidosis. It is apparently a high sensitivity to pH changes which causes the symptoms. For instance, this morning your pH ran seven point seven. The treatment is simple but pesky. It means checking your pH every couple of hours and calibrating the medication accordingly. Anyone can pass out from alkalosis—I could put Vance out just by having him hyperventilate—but you’re much more sensitive and therefore your pH must be monitored all the time. All my patients are doing well but have to be maintained under the most carefully controlled conditions.”
    â€œWhat does that mean?” asked Will Barrett, taking note of the not unpleasant sensation of being caught up, diagnosed, recognized, planned for, of the prospect of one’s life being ordered henceforward, like joining the army.
    â€œI’ve got this one case of Hausmann’s in the math department here at Duke. Instead of showing up for class he’d be found sitting in the stadium alone. Once he went to Kitty Hawk and lived in the dunes and nearly starved.”
    The dunes? Yes.
    â€œNow, under treatment, he meets his classes and publishes voluminously. Except for living in our convalescent wing, he has a normal life.”
    â€œHere? He lives here in the hospital?”
    â€œWe have to monitor his blood pH every hour. One spoon of vinegar salad dressing and he’s in the depths. One Alka-Seltzer and he’s off for the dunes with two coeds. Heh heh. We don’t know whether it’s your internal governor on the blink or whether your limbic system is abnormally sensitive. Or whether you have a temporal-lobe lesion, though”—he snapped an X-ray—“I see no sign of it. Remarkable, don’t you think, that a few protons, plus or minus, can cause such complicated moods? Lithium, the simplest metal, controls depression. Hydrogen, the simplest atom, controls wahnsinnige Sehnsucht .”
    â€œHow about that?” said Vance.
    The two doctors could have been enlisting him as a colleague. Will Barrett saw that it was his, Dr. Ellis’s, way of telling him good news, and a very good way it was, giving him a new lease on life as offhandedly as making an appointment. What a good fellow Dr. Ellis was!
    Leslie came in, all smiles and melts, Jack Curl dancing behind her.
    â€œLet’s head for the hills, Poppy.”
    He looked at Dr. Ellis.
    â€œVance can monitor your pH as well as I. If he finds any sign of a lesion he can bring you back.”
    â€œAnd here’s the bottom line,” said Jack Curl, coming too close. “Bertie’s got you signed up for the Seniors tournament next month and these two docs say you can make it. If—”
    â€œIf?”
    â€œIf you put up at my place so Vance can check your blood. You can start out on St. Mark’s putting green.”
    He looked at Vance.
    â€œYou heard the man. Now let’s get out of here, old buddy. I got sick people to tend to. I can only add one item to Dr. Ellis’s diagnosis—incidentally, I concur with him now. I’ll make you a press bet that the hydrogen ion will correct your slice—that may be my contribution to medical literature: the correlation of blood pH and the golf slice. Who knows?” He gave him a wink. “The hydrogen ion may even solve the Jewish question. As a matter of fact, why don’t we try it for size—you’re on hydrogen now, your blood pH is exactly seven point four, normal. Is Groucho Marx dead or alive?”
    â€œDead.”
    â€œRight. Now what happened to the Jews in North Carolina?”
    â€œThe Jews?” he said, frowning.
    â€œYes, the Jews.”
    â€œWhy, nothing. They’re going about their business as usual, I suppose.”
    â€œRight.