Quicksand (18 page)

 

 

He reached for a notepad and began to map out what he was already thinking
of under the somewhat grandiose title of "Project Urchin." Instantly
the telephone rang.

 

 

With a mutter of annoyance he picked it up.

 

 

"Barrie Tumbelow here," said the distant voice. "I gather you've been
trying to reach me. I did call up on Saturday morning, but apparently
you'd just gone out."

 

 

-- Of course. When I dashed off to Blickham I completely forgot about
the message I left asking him to contact me.

 

 

"I need some advice," Paul said. "We have a patient here who speaks
absolutely no English, and I want to measure her IQ."

 

 

There was a moment of silence. "You do realise," Tumbelow said at last,
"that this isn't my speciality? I can claim to know a good deal about
measuring infantile intelligence because that's part of my . . . ah
. . . basic armoury, but . . . You do mean an adult patient?"

 

 

"Yes."

 

 

Tumbelow click-clicked his tongue against his teeth. "Well . . . Ah-hah!
I think you may have come to the right shop after all. I picked up a
preprint at a congress I went to recently about IQ testing of deaf-and-dumb
adults. That ought to include some suitable non-verbal material for you.
Hang on. . . . Yes, here we are. This was a project to correlate the g
coefficient of several different testing methods wholly exclusive of
any verbal content. Does that sound like what you're after?"

 

 

"Absolutely ideal," Paul agreed.

 

 

"I'll let you have the loan of it, then," Tumbelow promised, and rang off.

 

 

Pleased, Paul reverted to what he had been doing when he was interrupted.

 

 

Obviously, the first step was to list everything he knew about Urchin in
the order in which the facts occurred to him, like an amateur detective
in a mystery novel collecting clues. Ultimately, perhaps, a pattern
would emerge, but at this stage he felt baffled.

 

 

-- She took the tape-recorder in her stride, but she was scared of the
photographer's cameras. And what in the world frightened her so badly
about the X-ray machine?

 

 

He ploughed on until be had filled three sheets of the notepad, then went
back to the beginning and entered against each item action he might take
to answer the implied questions. The phone rang a second time while he
was busy with this, and he picked it up, sighing.

 

 

"Dr Fidler? Oh, my name's Shoemaker. You sent us a tape and a sample of
writing by one of your patients."

 

 

"Oh, yes!" Paul sat up straight. "Have you identified the language for me?"

 

 

"I . . . uh . . . I'm afraid not. But I judged from the tone of your
covering letter that you were in a hurry for the information, so I
thought I'd better let you have a progress report. The matter sort of
fell into my lap, you see, because I happened to be here on Saturday
morning when it arrived. I took the sample of writing home with me --
easier to deal with than the tape, naturally, because there are so many
thousands of different spoken languages -- and I went all the way through
Diringer's book
The Alphabet
, which is pretty much the standard work,
and I drew a complete blank."

 

 

"Are you certain?"

 

 

"Well, I suppose it might be something that Diringer missed, but that
seems most unlikely to me. There's a slight resemblance to runic in the
form of the letters, but the vowel-determinants given alongside certainly
don't belong to a runic system."

 

 

"How extraordinary!" Paul said.

 

 

"Yes -- yes, it is." Shoemaker hesitated. "Don't take my word for gospel,
though. There are still a lot of other lines I can try: I'll play the tape
over to everyone I can corner during the next few days, and I'm making a
transcription of it in Bell Phonetic which I'll send down to London. But
while I was doing that it suddenly struck me: if this is material from
a mental patient, could it possibly be an invented language?"

 

 

"That occurred to me too," Paul said. Out of the corner of his eye he
saw the door open, and waved impatiently at the intruder to wait. "But
I thought it was next to impossible to devise an imaginary language."

 

 

"Quite right. It's almost bound to bear traces of the inventor's . . . uh
. . . linguistic preconceptions. There was the case of a girl in France
at the end of last century who claimed to be in telepathic communication
with Martians, and hoaxed people right and left until a philologist showed
that she was talking not 'Martian' but a crude variant of her native
French. Nonetheless, I'd be grateful if you could make absolutely certain
we're not wasting time on something she's made up from whole cloth."

 

 

Paul promised to do his best and cradled the phone. Turning, he saw that
the visitor he had so casually made to wait was Dr Alsop.

 

 

"I'm dreadfully sorry!" he exclaimed.

 

 

Alsop waved the apology aside. "It sounded important -- but what was it
all about, anyway?"

 

 

Paul explained his plan for "Project Urchin" and handed Alsop the notepad
on which he had made his preliminary list.

 

 

"Very thorough," the consultant approved in a cordial tone. "There are
some things here, of course, which puzzle me, but I assume that's because
I haven't been told about them yet. What have X-ray machines got to do
with the case?"

 

 

"Thanks for reminding me. I missed one thing." Paul reclaimed the notepad
and wrote in:
Knowledge of anatomy, karate or other unarmed combat.
Meantime, he described the near-disaster at Blickham General and the
events of Saturday night.

 

 

"Sounds like a useful person to have on your side," Alsop murmured.
"Question is, how do you persuade her to stay there without being able
to talk to her?"

 

 

"She seems to be trying to learn English."

 

 

"Seriously, or as a way of gaining attention for herself?"

 

 

"Seriously, as far as I can tell."

 

 

"Now that is interesting. . . . May I just see that list again? Thanks."
Alsop ran his eye down all three pages of it. "You've certainly gone into
great detail. What do you expect to get out of it -- a paper, a series?"

 

 

-- A healed girl.

 

 

But Paul didn't voice that. He said merely, "It's too early to guess,
isn't it?"

 

 

"Very wise. Well, you can rely on me for any advice I can give. I've been
hoping you'd settle to something ambitious instead of loafing along with
your routine work, and I'm very pleased."

 

 

Paul chose his next words carefully. "What I really would appreciate
is some backing. If there's any difficulty about my asking for special
facilities, for instance. Dr Holinshed and I -- "

 

 

"Don't say another word," Alsop smiled. "It wouldn't be good for
inter-staff relations. But you can count on me."

 

 

He slapped both thighs with his open palms. "Well, we'd better get on,
hadn't we? There's a full roster of patients at the clinic today, and I
daren't be late. Which reminds me: I have to go up to London next weekend,
and I'd rather like to stop over on Monday and see my publisher about
this book I'm doing. Would you mind taking next week's clinic for me?"

 

 

-- Breakthrough!

 

 

Throughout the morning's series of interviews with patients Alsop
continued to eye Paul with curiosity. However, it was not until the door
had closed behind the last of those on the stand-up-and-yell list that
he leaned over confidentially and spoke what was on his mind.

 

 

"You haven't said anything about it, young fellow, but I've reached a
conclusion. Your wife's back. Am I right?"

 

 

For a moment Paul was taken aback. Then he managed a sickly grin, while
Alsop chortled appreciation of his own insight.

 

 

Alsop had another appointment before proceeding to the clinic, and asked
Paul to drive into Blickham and join him later. Pleased with the good
impression he'd made today, Paul returned to his office and continued
with his routine tasks, free from thoughts of the disasters that might
have been.

 

 

Until the phone rang, and Holinshed's voice ground in his ear like
icebergs crashing in a stormy sea.

 

 

"Fidler? Come down to my office right away!"

 

 

 

 

 

 

*22*

 

 

Paul closed the door briskly behind him and sat down without being
asked. Holinshed scowled disapproval of the act and adopted his familiar
headmasterly pose with elbows on chair-arms, fingertips together.

 

 

"I am informed, Fidler, that you have been guilty of what one can only
term a number of gross errors of professional judgment during the past
few days. It's very seldom that I have cause twice within a week to
rebuke a member of my staff, particularly one who holds a position of
responsibility. One is prepared or this kind of mistake among the very
junior staff who are as yet lacking in experience, but in people such
as yourself one looks for a degree of caution and foresight."

 

 

Paul stared at him incredulously.

 

 

-- Maybe Iris was right after all. Maybe I don't belong in this line
of business. Not when the psychiatrists sometimes seem madder than
their patients!

 

 

He said, completely forgetting the technique for dealing with Holinshed
which he had been so pleased to master at their last interview, "What
are
you talking about?"

 

 

"I don't like your manner, Fidler," Holinshed snapped.

 

 

"And I don't like your accusations. Substantiate them or apologise."

 

 

The words hung in the air like smoke. Paul felt anger turn slowly sour
in his belly until it was transmuted into alarm at his own outburst.

 

 

"Are you denying" -- Holinshed was practically whispering -- "that you
gave instructions for the transfer of Riley from the Disturbed wing,
thus directly setting in motion the train of events that climaxed in
one of my nurses nearly being killed?"

 

 

-- Oh my God. How am I going to get out of this one? Hang on: "Your wife's
back." Therapeutic value of orgasm. Mostly double-talk but it'll sound
convincing.

 

 

"Are you familiar with the background of Riley's case?"

 

 

"What? Fidler, I make it my business to acquaint myself with the history
of every patient committed to Chent!"

 

 

"Then you can't have overlooked the element of extreme homosexual tension
which contributes so much to his condition. He's making valiant efforts
to achieve normality, but at his age he's still a virgin, simply because
his inability to establish a stable relationship with a girl is resulting
in impotence. Keeping him under maximum security is going to compound
his problems by preventing even casual contact with women. I stand by my
decision to transfer him, I'd do it again tomorrow if the occasion arose,
and what is more I risked my own life on Saturday night in support of
this belief. Were you not told about that?"

 

 

"What would you have had the nurse do -- stand necking with him in the
middle of the dance-floor?"

 

 

"Do you think I want to make things worse for him by encouraging him to
imagine that one of the nurses finds him irresistible? But she rebuffed
him as fiercely as if he was liable to rape her. He's incapable of that,
as far as we can tell. What he needs is acknowledgment of his masculinity
from other people to reassure him that he's not queer. Dr Alsop has brought
to my attention some work by a man in Sweden on the relationship between
sexuality and delinquency, and there appears to be some relevant material
there."

 

 

Gradually Paul had been working back towards self-control. He wound
up the last statement in exactly the stuffy tone calculated to impress
Holinshed, and knew he had recouped most of the lost ground. Everything
now depended on what the other "professional errors" might be.

 

 

-- He's never going to like me. But by God I think I might make him
scared of me before I leave this disgusting hole!

 

 

"The fact remains," Holinshed said, with marginally less conviction
than before, "a patients' dance is hardly a proper proving ground for
your theories about Riley, and more than Blickham General is for your
theories about the girl you've decided to call Urchin. A nurse there
was actually injured!"

 

 

"It was on Dr Alsop's recommendation that I took her for the X-ray.
I took every precaution I could think of, including having the photographs
made which Inspector Hofford asked for, since it occurred to me that
to undergo a strange but innocuous experience would predispose her to
submit quietly to the X-ray."

 

 

"Instead of which she proved not merely uncooperative but downright
dangerous!"

 

 

"On the other hand, on Saturday evening she was both cooperative
and courageous." Paul glanced at his watch, but kept talking to stop
Holinshed breaking in. "I have to join Dr Alsop at his clinic this
afternoon, but I can spare a few minutes to outline the project which
we've been mapping out this morning. We propose to conduct an exhaustive
analysis of Urchin's behaviour, with a view to reconciling the obvious
inconsistencies into . . ."