The Three Christs of Ypsilanti - Milton Rokeach [98]
Leon goes on to say that he was killed on August 18 (the day he received the phone call) and that on this day he received a merciful gift: a body.
I ask Joseph what he thinks about all this, and Joseph replies: “If he says he’s got a wife, he’s got a wife.”
Turning once again to Leon, I remark that I have always believed that his wife is merely an invention of his imagination. But, I say, I am amazed and frankly at a loss to understand the phone call and the letters. May I see the letters as proof? Leon replies that he doesn’t have the letters, that he flushed them down the toilet so they could be “processed into truthful-idealed dung.”
Thus far, the results seemed inconclusive. We could not tell with any degree of certainty whether Leon believed or disbelieved, whether he accepted the messages as genuine or rejected them as a hoax. There appeared to be some ambivalence in his reactions. But after all, the messages themselves had not required Leon to do anything out of the ordinary, and this fact in itself might have been responsible for our inability to come to any firm conclusions about his attitude toward them. We therefore decided so to phrase the next message that it would require him to respond with behavior rather than with words. We recalled that Leon, who had no use for money, never went to the employees’ store, which was also open to the patients. Suppose his wife were to suggest they have a rendezvous there?
August 31. Leon receives the following letter:
My dear husband,
I am very happy to say that I will be at the hospital today, August 31, and tomorrow, and I hope that you will come to see me in the Employees’ Store at 5:15 p.m. each day.
I am looking foward to seeing you after all this time and I hope that you will be able to recognize me.
Sincerely yours,
Madame Yeti Woman
After reading the letter, Leon tears it up into small pieces and throws it into the wastepaper basket. Later, at the meeting, he says that he received it today. He adds that he is going to take a bath, so that if he kisses his wife she won’t fall over. He says she is very understanding but that she can be very strict.
That afternoon Leon takes a shower, and says he is going to see his wife at the store. A few minutes later an aide sees him entering the store. After wandering around as if looking for someone, he finally leaves and returns to Ward D-16. There he asks the aide where the employees’ cafeteria is and, on being told, exclaims: “O, gee whiz! I went to the wrong place. I went to the store instead!” He then tells the aide that he was supposed to meet his wife there. He seems quite upset, and says he will see her tomorrow night instead.
September 1. Leon goes to the cafeteria for the second appointment, and arrives a few minutes late. One of the employees notices him looking about, and asks if he can be of help. Leon declines the offer and quickly takes his leave. When he returns to the ward he is visibly upset and angry. He tells an aide that he is very angry with his wife because she was in the back of the cafeteria having relations with a Negro.
In the next few days Leon’s behavior showed that he was under stress. Once he was observed doing something he had not done for a long time: flushing the toilet continuously for several minutes. His physician, he said, suggested this as a way of getting rid of undesirable electronic disturbances. He would remain in the sitting room alone, after supper, much of the time kneeling in front of the chair, praying, his gaze fixed on the ground card in the palm of his outstretched hand.
By now it seemed clear that Leon did believe in the existence of his wife. Had he kept his appointment