The Thanatos Syndrome

quit, do you?” By way of leave-taking he gives me a warm, horse-smelling, shoulder jostle. “Oh, Tom—”
    â€œYes?”
    â€œI know I can count on you to help me see to it that Mrs. LaFaye gets the best care we can give her.”
    â€œYou can.”
    â€œThanks, hoss. What say to the Ein und Zwanzig and a flick?” That’s old P&S talk for let’s go to Twenty-One to eat and then to the movies at Radio City.
    â€œThanks, but I got a junior dog.” I got a date with a student nurse.
    â€œOh shit. Tom?”
    â€œYes?”
    â€œI almost forgot. This is not a favor. This is something I’m sure you’d want to do because it involves an old friend of yours.”
    â€œWho’s that?”
    â€œI spoke to you about Father Smith and Father Placide over at St. Michael’s?”
    â€œYes?”
    â€œWell, it seems the good fathers have a problem. Father Placide called me a couple of weeks ago. Incidentally, he’s a hell of a nice guy—we served on a couple of committees together. He’s got a little problem and frankly I think you’re in a better position to handle it than I.”
    â€œWhat’s the problem?”
    â€œThe problem is Father Smith. It has to do with his behavior. Ha ha, I’m sorry, Tom, but I’m quoting Father Placide. Frankly, Tom, I’m a little out of my element here. I believe you’ve known Father Smith for some time, that you knew him well in, ah, Alabama.”
    â€œYes. What’s wrong with him?”
    â€œI’m not clear on that—something about him flipping out, not coming down from a fire tower. Anyhow, I’d appreciate it if you would talk to Placide. I’d take it as a personal favor.”
    â€œAll right.”
    He looks at his watch, a curved gold wafer. “Could you drop by there this afternoon?”
    â€œWell—”
    â€œTom, just hear what Father Placide has to say. Then I want you to take a look at Father Smith and give me a DX. Okay?”
    â€œAll right,” I say, looking around for Lucy.
    â€œGreat,” says Bob, giving me a strong pronated handshake and a long level-eyed look. “You know something, hoss. If the creek don’t rise, I think we’re going to make it. Right?”
    â€œRight,” I say, wishing he’d let go of my hand and wondering what he wants from Father Placide.

4. LUCY CATCHES ME IN the parking lot. She’s got two sandwiches and two Cokes. We sit in her old pickup, a true farm vehicle spattered to the windows with cream-colored mud. The truck bed is loaded with a tractor tire and a cutter blade from a combine.
    My two-toned Caprice, even older, is alongside. Beyond, in the far corner of the lot, a Cox Cable van is parked facing out. Later I remember wondering what a cable van was doing here. The hospital has a dish antenna.
    â€œYou look underfed. Eat,” says Lucy, eating. She still wears her white coat.
    But I don’t eat. I sit hands on knees. The hot October sun pours through the windshield. The vinyl seat is torn. Stuffing extrudes through the tear.
    Lucy lights up one of her Picayunes, plucks a grain of tobacco from the tip of her tongue, pointing her tongue. I remember her doing this before.
    â€œYou and Bob seem to have patched things up,” says Lucy, watching me. She is sitting in the corner, half facing me, white coat open, bare knee folded on the seat. A splendid knee.
    â€œWhat? Yes.” A déjà vu has overtaken me. It began when she unlocked her door, got in, and I, waiting at the other door, watched her lean almost horizontally, holding the wheel with her left hand and with two fingers of her right, palm up, lift the latch. She’s done this before for me, hasn’t she?
    It is the smell of hot Chevy metal and the molecules of seat stuffing rising in my nostrils and the rustling of her starched coat. I’ve been here before.
    â€œYou were testing her for a cortical deficit, weren’t you?”
    â€œYes. I’m glad you were there.”
    â€œI made it my business to be there. Did you find it?”
    â€œWhat? Oh, the deficit. Yes, I think so.”
    â€œI wanted to tell you why Bob Comeaux was so angry.”
    Lucy is telling me something about Comeaux and his interest in Mickey LaFaye and her ranch. It is difficult to listen.
    The déjà vu has to do with sitting in a car with a girl, woman, with her swiveled around, bare knee cocked on