The Thanatos Syndrome

me.
    â€œMax, Blue Boy was not a pilot involving Angola. It covered the entire parish, in fact, all of Feliciana. Moreover, I’m afraid what we’ve got here are some side effects which in fact you are aware of and which I can show are related to the additive—”
    â€œSuch as? What do you mean, the whole parish?”
    â€œSuch as regression of some subjects, especially children, to pre-linguistic pongid levels of behavior, regression of some women from menses to estrus, the sexual abuse of children—”
    Bob Comeaux has taken off his hat, placed his hand on his forehead, closed his eyes. “Dear God, do you hear?” He speaks softly. “Where have we heard this before? Do I hear echoes? Of men descended from apes? Who was accused of this? Of corrupting the youth of Athens? You know who was accused of that. But I will confess that tampering with the sexuality of women is a new one.” He’s shaking his head sorrowfully at me. “From the local yahoos I would have expected it. But from you? Et tu —” He turns to Max. “Well, I suppose it always happens in a scientific breakthrough—”
    â€œI wasn’t speaking of science, Bob. I was speaking of you and Dr. Van Dorn. It was you who made the decision to enlarge the pilot to the entire Ratliff water district—exempting Fedville. And it was your colleague Van Dorn who used the additive on the students at Belle Ame for purposes of the sexual gratification of himself and his senior staff—”
    â€œHold it, Doctor!” Bob Comeaux now stands against the door, hands behind him on the knob. He has entirely recovered, not only himself and his old assurance, but his old anger. “Hear this, Doctor. In the first place, I put my money where my mouth was. I sanctioned a dosage of additive for my own son—and hear this: he is doing brilliantly. And finally, Doctor, you know damn well I’m not responsible for Van Dorn’s behavior. But apparently this is the way you want it.” From his pocket he takes a paper, slowly tears it once, and again, drops it into my student waste- basket. “That was your release. After what you pulled at Belle Ame this morning, what is going to happen is that we’re packing your ass right back to Alabama. I’m sorry, Doctor. I came up here to get you out of here. I had the door open. I did everything but pull you out bodily. Max,” he says.
    I look at Max.
    Max is standing over me, hands deep in his pockets, staring down at the curled-up toes of his Thorn McAns. “He can do it,” says Max softly. “Look, Tom. Here’s what’s let’s do. Why don’t you—and I’m sure Bob here would accept this—why don’t you and Ellen— Look, there’s no reason to, ah, go to Alabama—instead, why don’t you and Ellen do what I’ve been trying to get you to do, move down to Mandeville, into Beau Rivage with us—there’s a condo on 12 just below us available—and I need a partner—I’m tired of clinical work, want some time for writing. You know we always did well together, especially in group. I know you’ve had some problems, ah, at home, that is, adjusting. Tom, we could do well together, and economically too—” He breaks off suddenly, eyes widening.
    While Max is talking I’m spreading the Belle Ame photos on the floor, plus Lucy’s printouts and graphics from the NIH and Public Health mainframe in Baton Rouge and the local Fedvile data bank showing not only the distribution of Louisianians dosed up on Na-24—the starry galaxy over Feliciana—but the procurement order from Fedville, signed by Dr. Comeaux, exempting Fedville from the Ratliff water district and ordering a second intake upstream from Ratliff. The photographs, I can’t help but notice again, exhibit the same Victorian propriety, the decorous expressions, every hair in place, bobbed in the women, old-fashioned 1930s high haircuts in the men, a British sort of nakedness, white-as-white skins and vulnerable backs, unlike tan-all-over U.S. California nakedness, and the children above all: simpering, prudish, but, most of all, pleased. It is the proper pleased children—
    For a while both Max and Bob gaze, at first politely, heads aslant, as people will attend to other people’s photos. Max’s cheek is even propped reflectively on three fingers.
    In my clinical