The Death Gods (A Shell Scott Mystery), page 4
“Arthur Murphy and Wallace Devincent.”
I knew both officers, Art Murphy quite well. “I’ll check it out,” I said. “What more can you tell me about that van—or anything else that might give me a handle on why somebody might want you dead?”
He smiled that bright happy smile again. “This means you will help? I have employed you, Sheldon?”
I grinned back at him, as much in response to that almost childlike smile as the open and unconcealed pleasure in his voice. “Yeah, you have employed me. And, Hank, I hope nobody kills either of us.”
“No problem. You will protect us fiercely. Now, I feel very good. Thank you for assisting, Sheldon. I will tell you what little more I can think of.”
Unfortunately, there wasn’t much more he could give me. He did recall that the green van had only two windows, one on the driver’s and one on the passenger’s side, but behind them only metal, no windows in the back. Also, he was dimly aware that something had been printed in white or light-colored letters on the green metal of the van’s side. That was when he’d lamped the Fu Manchu guy, so it would have been the passenger side. But Hank now had no idea what those printed words might have been. More importantly, when the speeding van passed through the nearby intersection a car entering from the right had braked and skidded, and there had been “a collision sound.”
“Not a crashing,” Hernandez went on, “more like a click-clack. But that car of the assassins did somewhat strike the front of the other vehicle, glancing upon its front bumper or fender, but without serious consequences to either one.” He shrugged. “This other car vanished soon after. And nothing was remaining in the street as clues regarding the near mishap, which officers Murphy and Devincent told me with sympathy.”
“They didn’t appear to believe there was a near accident at the intersection, or even a click-clack?”
“No. They have become convinced all of it was a my imagination. It transpires that, following my first discussion with them on the preceding Wednesday, they looked for me in their computer, and knew already that I had been in their jails.”
“Jails? You’ve been arrested?”
“Si—yes, sure. Twice, both times resulting from malicious charges and lies concocted by my enemies, in hope of ruining me. But they, Murphy and Devincent, also knew of the other unpleasant incidents of notoriety, or some of them.”
“Others?” I was starting to become uneasy. “Incidents of notoriety? Some?”
“It is difficult to explain to a layman. Please, take no offense, many doctors consider this word—layman—a purposeful insult, a knockdown, description of a mere mortal, but with me it is a compliment, mainly. What for my purposes I must gradually acquaint you with are matters fully comprehensible only to other physicians who are not orthodox physicians, not allopathic doctors.”
Maybe because I was already a little uneasy, something in what he’d just said struck me. It was that, “What for my purposes I must gradually acquaint you with....” What purposes? And why “gradually”? But I already had plenty of other questions, so I merely commented, “I hate to get into this, I think. But you’ve said ‘allopathic’ several times now, and I’m not sure I know what it means. It sounds like some kind of disease.”
“It is. It is what everyone automatically thinks of when somebody says ‘doctor,’ or ‘physician,’ or ’medicine,’ or ‘M.D.,’ or ‘health care’ and so forth, because it—allopathy—is the only official medicine we have here in the United States, the so-called legitimate medicine. It is what nearly everyone believes is the only kind of real doctor there is, although there are many, many other kinds of doctors and healers—like me, for example. But they believe this because allopathy is ninety-nine percent of what we are allowed, what is ‘authorized and approved’ for medical treatment in these United States of ours, which also—most importantly—means this official authorized-and-approved stupidness becomes ninety-nine percent of what we hear or read or are told by talking dummies on television.”
Hank leaned forward, placing his clasped hands atop the desk, and fixed his bright almost-burning eyes on me. “Allopathy, or conventional medicine, is a therapeutic system based on the bassackward belief that expressions of so-called disease must be treated by different or unlike expressions—which, incidental but important, is the exact opposite of my homeopathy, which embraces the truism similia similibus curantur, or like cures like. Essentially, aside from the wonderful technical skills of trauma surgeons or surgery to repair or remove malfunctioning or injured body parts or tissues—not so wonderful if those body pieces are okay or repairable without irreversible operations, which most of the time they are—allopathy embraces the continuing use of unnatural chemical compounds alien to the body’s constitution, thousands of synthetic drugs and pills and shots and serums, to treat symptoms of bodily disease or disorder. In practice, it is the upside-down medical philosophy that disease must be attacked by its opposite expression, that disease symptoms must be fought, warred upon, suppressed at all costs.”
“So? What’s wrong with that?”
I had, apparently, not asked a wonderful question. He scowled hugely, pulling his lips sideways, and appearing to clamp his teeth tightly together. But then he smoothed his features, forcibly it seemed to me, and said slowly, much more slowly than before, as though to be sure I didn’t miss anything, “Perhaps you were not listening cleverly. I am explaining that allopathy is a crazy upside-down as I mentioned—bassackward system of medicine based on the unproven and unprovable assumption that diseases are foreign invaders”—his voice rose half an octave—“like killer bacteria and viruses and various evil malevolences from outer space, which must be attacked and destroyed with fire and sword and fierceness, with lightning bolts, lasers, poisons, giant hammers and maybe even H-bombs, whatever might kill the disease!”
Again, though somewhat tentatively this time, I said, “Uh, that’s wrong? There’s a better way?”
“Almost anything except suicide would be better. But there is an infinity of better, including everything else, everything not allopathic.” Hernandez nodded briskly, that sharp nose and the pointed ends of his gray mustache appearing to slice through the air. “But there is not time for me to inform you of all the gazillion better ways. Perhaps there never will be time.” He paused, gazing across the room for several seconds, then nodded briskly again and looked directly at me.
“There is not sufficient time, not now. So I will say only this.” Those dark glowing eyes of his seemed to become even brighter, as though some inner rheostat had turned up their power, and I remembered thinking, earlier, that his piercing gaze was almost that of a far-out visionary, or a madman.
“There is a wonderful, unmeasurable, almost unimaginable power within each of us, which is part of us. Of you, Sheldon, me, each, all. It is the power that formed, from the union of a tiny egg and a single microscopic spermatozoon, the incredible growing universe of being each has become—the universe, if you will, that is you, me, the patient in my outer office, the sick one. This power, which began each of the miracles of us with those two tiny cells and formed or helped to form the universe of us now does not, when this job is part done, disappear, vanish. It does not die. It is still there, alive and burning within us. And if we—or allopathic stupids—do not violently oppose it, it is ready to heal us of everything except death, and perhaps even of that also.”
He picked up a pen, twirled the cylinder in his fingers. “No doctor can cure these sick or suffering patient-universes. I cannot. But the true physician, who I say must cooperate with nature, with God, or with that force within instead of opposing it with his puny lightnings and thunders, can sometimes help the patient to cure himself. That is all we can do. But we should not do anything else.”
Hernandez paused, curled his lips as if to continue speaking, but then closed his mouth, nodding several times, slicing the air again vigorously with his nose, and at length said to me, “Those of us who believe this, or something of a friendly similarity, and thus practice unorthodox, unapproved, un-allopathic methods for hopefully restoring ease to the dis-eased are, by that ninety-nine percent of our medical colleagues, described or defamed as salesmen of snake oils, or fools misguided. Or, usually, as quacks.”
I blinked, took a deep breath, remembering again that conversation with Paul Anson. I was now sure my medical friend, Dr. Anson, had indeed spoken of a Henry Hernandez—and had also used the word “quack”.
“I see,” I said, not really seeing at all. But I continued, “If I’m not mistaken, a quack is either a maverick medical doctor who screws up almost beyond human comprehension, or, more often, somebody not a licensed M.D., who greedily profits from human misery by fleecing the sick and dying of their money and pretending to have miracle cures for everything.”
“Boy, are you mistaken, Sheldon. A quack—which is a word for horribleness spoken of others almost entirely by orthodox allopathic physicians—is a doctor who cures, a healer who heals, or could even be a layman who through herbs or natural medicines or magnetism or laying on of hands makes sick people well. One would think this healing a good thing, right? However, if anyone restores strength to the weak or life to the dying in ways disapproved by the monopoly, which in practice means anything that actually works, this is defined—by the monopolists themselves, of course—as dangerous quackery. Is it not fascinating, Sheldon? We have been led to believe that saving a man from death is dangerous to his health. So, a quack is me. I am almost the perfection of quackissimo.”
“You lost me, somewhere in the middle there.”
“Probably I lost you before then. It is difficult to make sense of any concept which is examined upside-down. First we must turn it right-side up in order to begin seeing what it is.” He inhaled deeply, let out a long sigh. “I would like to take time and explain fully, inform you well of this particular upside-downness, but soon I have a patient. I was able to see you easily at this time only because the Vungers, two of my dear patients, have not appeared at ten o’clock for their hour appointment. Again—twice now this has happened. It is strange.”
I said, “Well, I’ve got enough to start with, Doc—Hank. But before I leave, did you really lose a dog, or was that just—”
“Ai, Chihuahua, yes, my Rusty! You read the mind, this was the final thing of which I intended speaking to you, before the next patient. Rusty, this dog I love with all my heart and bones and everything. He is three years old, part of German Shepherd and part of maybe Saint Bernard, and part of just dogs I think. He is gone now nine days, and I am desolate.”
“Nine days? Isn’t that—”
“Yes. When I leaped back avoiding the green van, Rusty was coming forth from the back yard—we do not tie him, and with great enthusiasm he can jump over the fence—and racing to greet me by licking and jumping, you know. With quickness, he understood the wrongness of that green vehicle, and chased it down the street, barking as though to devour it. They went forward on Mulberry one block after this intersection here, then turned right on the street called Lemon. I was still watching, not yet fully comprehending everything. Rusty disappeared there also, a little more than one block away, still chasing, and he has not returned. I have not seen him since that moment.”
Hank paused, frowning, the usual brightness gone from his features. “Sheldon, we are now associated, you are helping. More than anything else, more even than those men of evil intentions, you will help me best if you can find Rusty. Or what has come about for him. I fear he is not alive or would have long ago returned.”
He looked so somber, his gaze fixed on but not seeing me, that I didn’t speak immediately. And before I responded, Hernandez blinked, shrugged, leaned toward an intercom box on his desk and pushed a lever down, then said something in rapid Spanish.
I caught a word or two—some time ago I’d spent a few months, part investigation and part vacation, in Mexico City—but all I could be sure of was the name Vunger, and telefono and casa or telephone and house. Equally rapid Spanish came back through the intercom speaker, and though I could tell it was Eleonora’s voice I couldn’t decipher much else, since both the doctor and his wife were speaking at approximately several thousand words a minute.
I did hear “Vungers” again, and something about salud or health and what sounded like “eye-fie,” followed by “mejor, mucho mejor” or “better, much better.”
Odd. That curious word had sounded a lot like the currently much-ballyhooed disease, IFAI, pronounced eye-fie, but I had probably screwed something up between Eleonora’s voice and my ears. Because, of the thousands of people who “caught” IFAI, nobody got better, they all died. The name now in common use made that clear enough: IFAI was an acronym for “Invariably Fatal Acquired Illness.” So, no two ways about it: catch IFAI and it followed with incontrovertible logic that, since IFAI was invariably fatal, invariably you were a goner.
Hernandez rattled off a few more comments in Spanish, then flipped up the intercom switch, leaned back in his chair and said, “Sheldon, I am concerned about so many things that I am becoming unstrung somewhat. These good people I spoke of to you, Mr. and Mrs. Vunger, my patients who failed to appear this morning, they also did not appear this past Monday, appointments for both times having been made. It is most unlike them not to phone for cancellation, or to explain. My wife has several times phoned their home, without success, but this morning she was able to speak with a neighbor, a Mrs. Brewster next door to them. The Vungers—he is Guenther, she Helga—are not at home, they have not been seen, newspapers have been left outside for several days, near the front door.”
He paused. “I am concerned, gravely, about Rusty. And I of course wish the two men, those bastardos, found and done something crucial with. But....”
He was taking a while to get there, but I knew where he was going. So I said, “Give me their address and I’ll do a quick check on the Vungers some time today. If they don’t live clear out in the boondocks.”
He smiled, face brightening, large teeth coming into view again. “It would be a service. Probably it is nothing of import, but—I will appreciate knowing something. They live not far. Thank you.”
“No problem. Hank, I assume you’ve told me all you can about that green van and the two bastardos.” He nodded quickly and I went on, “So, about Rusty, have you done some checking yourself, called the animal shelters, Humane Society, that sort of thing?”
“Oh, yes. Immediately when Rusty did not return, that very afternoon” He described actions he’d taken since then, and it seemed to me he’d covered most of the likely areas already. Hernandez finished by saying, “I have running advertisements in the newspapers’ lost-and-found sections, with a thousand-dollar reward offered. The police I also notified, but they were not greatly excited, being already familiar with my numerous psychoses.”
“Did you happen to check with any of the people around that next intersection? Along Lemon Street, where the van turned, with Rusty chasing them?”
His eyes widened. After a long silence he said, “Estupido! That is so obvious. Now. Estupido! I failed to even consider this obvious thing. I did all I could think of. But—”
“You did very well, Hank. I’ll rattle some doors over on Lemon Street as soon as I leave here. If there’s anything important to dig up, I’ll dig it.”
“Please do whatever else I have probably forgotten.” He slowly shook his head. “I am a good doctor, bad detective. But you are probably a lousy doctor, true?” He started to smile, then said abruptly, “Aha! I will give you a picture of Rusty. A photograph, from one month ago.”
He reached forward and grasped one of the framed photos I’d casually glanced at earlier, got up and stepped briskly around his desk, handing the four-by-five color photograph to me. “There is Rusty, my most wonderful loud-barking male dog person. Beautiful, yes?”
“Yes.”
Actually, beautiful wasn’t exactly the right word, but I liked the friendly-looking—even a little funny-looking—animal immediately. He was seated on a green lawn, front legs holding him erect, looking straight at the camera with his red tongue lolling from one side of his open mouth. Definitely the handsome appearance of a German Shepherd, but showing more reddishness than normal mixed with the near-black and creamy tan of his coat. The eyes were large and dark, and he seemed almost to be grinning at the picture-taker. Also, above those liquid brown eyes were bunches of strangely misplaced white hairs that....
I took a closer look. “Hey,” I said with some excitement, “Hank, take a gander at those eyebrows—that’s what they are, eyebrows. They’re white—white, like mine! How about that?”
Hernandez tilted the framed photo in my hand, gazed at it, gazed at me, and said, “How about that, yes. I knew, when I first saw you, Sheldon, that you reminded me of something.”
He spoke very seriously, soberly—but then he lost it, burst into a guffaw and laughed uproariously, having a perfectly splendid time. All by himself.
When the noise diminished enough so he could hear me, I said stiffly, “Okay, I quit.”
Well, he merely made more whooping-type noises than he’d been emitting before. It took a while, but when he was back behind the desk and in his chair again, wheezing only slightly, I said, “Anything else before I get going?”
“All of importance—all, at least, that is necessary now—has been said, I think. If you have further questions? I may have neglected some things, like the questioning of people on Lemon Street about Rusty.”
“Couple of items,” I said. “Probably not important, or even germane. But when you were speaking on the intercom to your wife, and mentioned the Vungers, I thought I heard a comment about IFAI. The disease, I mean. Or was that something in Spanish?”
Hank looked straight ahead, toward the wall behind me, then left and up toward the ceiling, lips pursed, pointed gray mustache slanting downward. After a few seconds of silence he responded, in his usual rapid-fire delivery, “All right, I will tell you, Sheldon. Normally, you understand, the patient’s affairs are not to be discussed freely, they are confidential as if spoken to a lawyer or priest. But the Vungers were so pleased with results from my treatment, they urged me to tell others of their good fortune, their success, saying I could take out large advertisements and use in them their names if I wished—which, of course, I would not do and would go to jail if I did. So, this is not the usual doctor-patient secret relationship, under the circumstances.”
