The Thanatos Syndrome

clear. It could mean make yourself at home.
    Home is exactly (I find out) six feet square. He is more than six feet tall. I see a bedroll against the wall. I reckon he sleeps on the floor catercornered.
    The room is furnished with a high table in the center, two chairs like barstools, in one corner a chemical toilet, and nothing more. Mounted on the table is a bronze disk azimuth, larger than a dinner plate, fitted with two sighting posts and divided into 360 degrees. The four sides of the cubicle are glass above the wainscot except for a wall space covered by a map. Hanging from the map are strings weighted by fish sinkers. Next to the map is a wall telephone.
    Outside, the gently rolling terrain stretches away, covered by pines as far as the eye can see. In the slanting afternoon sun the crowns of the pines are bluish and rough as the pile of a shag rug. The countryside seems strangely silent and unpopulated except toward the south, where the condos and high-rises on the lakefront stick up like a broken picket fence.
    â€œIt’s good to see you, Father.” I offer my hand, but he does not seem to notice. Perhaps he regarded his pulling me up through the trapdoor as a handshake. Then I see that something is wrong with him. He is standing indecisively, fists in his pockets, brows knitted in a preoccupied expression. He does not look crazy but excessively sane, like a busy man of the world, with a thousand things on his mind, waiting for an elevator. Then suddenly he snaps his fingers softly as if he had just remembered something, seems on the very point of mentioning it, and as suddenly falls silent.
    We stand so for a while. I wait for him to tell me to sit. But he’s in a brown study, frowning, hands deep in pockets, making and unmaking fists. So, why not, I invite him to have a seat. He does.
    We sit on the high stools opposite each other, the azimuth between us.
    â€œAllow me to state my business, Father. Two pieces of business. Father Placide wanted to know how you were and wanted me to inquire whether you might help him out. Dr. Comeaux wanted to know whether you have decided to recommend his purchase of the buildings and property of St. Margaret’s.”
    Again he gives every sign of understanding, seems on the point of replying, but again falls silent and gazes down at the azimuth with terrific concentration, as if he were studying a chess board.
    â€œFather,” I say presently, “I know you must be upset about the hospice closing.”
    Nodding agreeably, but then frowning, studying the table.
    â€œI know how you feel about the Qualitarian program taking over, the pedeuthanasia, the gereuthanasia, but—”
    â€œNo no,” he says suddenly, but not raising his eyes. “No no.”
    â€œNo no what?”
    â€œIt wasn’t that.”
    â€œWasn’t what?”
    â€œThey have their reasons. Not bad reasons, are they? They make considerable sense, wouldn’t you agree? They’re not bad fellows. They make some sense,” he says, nodding and repeating himself several times in the careless musing voice of a bridge player studying his hand. “Well, don’t they?” he asks, almost slyly, cocking his head and almost meeting my eyes.
    â€œIt could be argued,” I say, studying him. “Then are you going to approve the sale to Dr. Comeaux?”
    â€œHm.” Now he’s drumming his fingers and tucking in his upper lip as if he had almost decided on his next play. “But here’s the question,” he says in a different, livelier voice—and then hangs fire.
    â€œYes?”
    â€œTom,” he says, nodding, almost himself now, but concentrating terrifically on each word, “what would you say was wrong with a person who is otherwise in good health but who has difficulties going about his daily duties, that is—say—when he is supposed to go to a meeting, a parish-council meeting, a school-board meeting, visit the nursing home, say Mass—his feet seem to be in glue. He can hardly set one foot in front of the other, can hardly pick up the telephone, can hardly collect his thoughts, has to struggle to answer the simplest question. What would you say was wrong with such a person?”
    â€œI’d say he was depressed.”
    â€œHm. Yes. Depressed.”
    I wait for him to go on, but he doesn’t.
    â€œWere you, are you, able to say Mass?”
    â€œMass,” he repeats, frowning