The Diceman

I walked away.

Flamm caught me again just as I was leaving.

`Sorry to bother you again, Doc, but four of the guys on your list are still here and four guys who aren't on your list

have just left.'

`Are you positive, Mr. Flamm, that you now have five patients left on the ward?'

`Yes sir.'

`And that only thirty-eight have left?'

'Yes sir.'

`Are you sure my name is Rhinehart?'

He stared up at me and began using his big belly nervously.

`Yes, sir. I think so, sir.'

`Yon think my name is Rhinehart?'

`Yes Sir.'

`Who is that patient - over there?'

I asked, pointing to one I'd never seen before and hoped was a new admission.

'Er . . . ah . . . him?'

`Yes, he,' I said coldly towering over him.

`I'll have to check with the attendant, Higgens. He-'

`We're going to be late for the opening curtain, Mr. Flamm. I'm afraid I can't rely on your fuzzy memory for names to delay us any longer. Goodbye.' `Goo - goodbye, Doc-'

'Rhinehart. Remember it.' Have you ever walked down Broadway in the middle of a line of thirty-eight men dressed variously in khakis, sneakers, sandals, Bermuda shorts, hospital fatigues, torn T-shirts, African capes, bathrobes, bedroom slippers, pajama tops and sweat suits and led by an utterly serene eighteen-year-old boy wearing a white hospital robe and whistling `The Battle Hymn of the Republic'? Have you ever then walked beside the beatific boy to lead such a line into a Broadway theater? And looked natural? And relaxed? When half the seats were in the front row? (The summer doldrums made it possible for me to get seats at the last minute - 4.30 P.M. that afternoon - but twenty of them cost $8.50 apiece.) Have you then tried to seat thirty-eight odd people when half the seats were scattered like buckshot over a five-hundred seat theater? When three of your patients were walking zombies, four manic-depressives and six alert homosexuals? Have you then tried to maintain a sense of dignity, firmness and authority when one of these unfortunates keeps coming up to you and whispering hysterically about when are they all supposed to escape?

`Rhinehart!' Arturo X hissed at me in anguish. `What the hell are we doing here at Hair?'

`My orders were to bring you to Hair. This I have done. The die specifically rejected the option that I release you on

Lexington Avenue. I hope you enjoy yourself.'

'There're four pigs standing at the back. I saw them when we came in. Is this some. sort of trap?'

`I know nothing about the police. There are other ways out of a theater. I hope you enjoy yourself. Be happy.'

`The Goddam houselights are dimming. What the hell are we supposed to do?'

`Listen to the music. I have brought you to Hair. Enjoy yourself. Dance. Be happy.'

Through it all Erie Ca

except .for two seconds just after the end of the first act (`Groovy show, Dr. Rhinehart, glad we came'). But Arturo X

squirmed in his seat every second that he wasn't lunging up the aisle to speak to one of his followers or to me.

`Look, Rhinehart,' he hissed at me near the end of the intermission. `What will you do if we all get up and dance and

go onto the stage?'

`I have brought you to Hair. I want you to enjoy yourselves. Be happy. Dance. Sing.'

He stared into my eyes like an oculist searching for signs of retinal decomposition and then barked out a short laugh.

'Jesus…' he said.

`Have a good time, son,' I said as he left.

`Dr. Rhinehart, I think the patients are whispering among themselves,' one of my big attendants said about three

minutes later.

`A dirty joke no doubt,' I said.

`That Arturo Jones has been going around to everyone whispering.'

`I told him to remind everyone to catch the bus back to the island with us.'

`What if someone tries to make a break for it?'

'Apprehend him gently but firmly.'

`What if they all make a break for it?'

`Apprehend those with the most acute socially debilitating illnesses - the zombies and killers in brief - and leave the

rest to the police.'

I smiled at him serenely. `But no violence. We must not give our hospital attendants a bad name. We must not upset

the audience.'

`Okay, Doctor.'

I seated myself between the most clearly homicidal patients, and when the men in our row began to rise to join the

dance to the stage, I wrapped one of my huge arms around the throat of each of them and squeezed until they seemed strangely sleepy. I then watched the interesting opening to Act II Where thirty or so oddly dressed members of the cast who had apparently been posing as members of the audience around me began to dance down the aisles and upon to the stage frolicking with each other in a friendly roughhouse way. The onstage part of the cast pretended slight confusion but continued to sing on as the new weirdies mixed with the Act I wierdies and sang and danced and frolicked, all singing the opening number `Where Do I Go?' until most of the newcomers had gone.

The police questioned me for about half an hour at the theater, and I phoned the hospital and told the appropriate staff members there of the slight difficulties we had encountered and I phoned Dr. Ma

`My God, my God Luke, thirty-three patients. What have you done? What have you done?'

`But your letter said `What letter? NO, no, no, Luke, you know I would never write any letter about thirty-three - oh! #161;you know it! How could you do it?'

`I tried to see you, to phone you.'

`But you didn't seem upset. I had no idea. Thirty-three patients!'

`We held onto five.'

`Oh Luke, my God, the papers, Dr. Esterbrook, the Senate Committee on Mental Hygiene, my God, my God.'

`They're just people,' I said. `Why didn't someone call me during the day, a note, a messenger, something? Why was

everyone so stupid? To take thirty-three patients off the ward'

`Thirty-eight.'

`To a Broadway musical'

`Where should we have taken them? Your letter said `Don't say that! Don't mention any letter by me!'

`But I was just-'

`To Hair!' and he choked. `The newspapers, Esterbrook, Luke, Luke, what have you done?'

`It'll be all right, Tim. Mental patients are always recaptured.'

`But no one ever reads about that. They get loose - that's news.'

`People will be impressed with our permissive, progressive policies. As you said in your let-'

`Don't say that! We must never let a patient out of the hospital again. Never.'

`Relax, Tim, relax, I've got to talk some more to the police and the reporters and '

`Don't say a word! I'm coming down. Say you've got laryngitis. Don't talk.'

`I've got to go now, Tim. You hurry on down.'

`Don't say-'

I hung up.

I talked to police and the reporters and minor hospital officials and then Dr. Ma

Lil, I'm happy to report, was wi

I was tremendously keyed up and could barely sit still in my chair, but they kindly dealt me in, and by ignoring their further questions I was finally left to concentrate on my abominably bad luck with the cards. I lost badly to Fred Boyd on the first hand and even worse to Arlene on the second. By the end of seven hands without a wi