The Rat Race by Jay Franklin (book club books txt) 📕

your tale. Fearful and wonderful things have happened in this weary world, before now, by the will of the Lord. It is written by the Roman historian Tacitus that the pagan emperor Vespasian—that grand benefactor to whom the world owes the fine invention of the public comfort station—performed miracles in Egypt, making the blind to see, and healing the cripples. These miracles are as well attested as any in Holy Scripture. If the Lord permitted to a heathen potentate these gifts of spiritual healing, can I deny that He might for His own good reasons permit your soul to inhabit another man's body?"

"But what is my moral responsibility in this predicament, Dr. McGregor? Where does my duty lie?"

"It is all related to yon matter of free will and predestination," he insisted. "Your duty, man, is to fear the Lord and praise Him. You will have taken this other man's wife, will you not? You will have taken his money and his home, his name and his business. Aye, if you take these likely you will take his sins as well. Dinna believe that the Lord has no a reason for all this.

"Now," he continued, "'tis no great difficulty to reconcile free will and predestination."

"I'm not a religious man, doctor," I cut him off, "but you have given me help. Will you accept a check for your church—say a thousand dollars?"

"Aye, Mr. Tompkins, I will that! I cannot help you but I can only tell you to put your trust in the mercy and the justice of the Lord. 'Tis all a man can do."

So I wrote out a check for a thousand dollars to the order of the Tenth Presbyterian Church of Manhattan, and shook his hand.

He thanked me. "Now," he announced. "I must be on my way to comfort a poor body that's dying o' the cancer. 'Tis an old lady and she takes great comfort from her pain in the thought that she has been chosen by the Lord to suffer for the sins of others. 'Tis no a sound theology, mind you, but 'tis a mighty solace as her time comes nigh."

My next stop was at the office of Rabbi Benjamin Da Silva of the Temple Ben-David. Him I had located by consulting the classified telephone directory and had made an appointment to meet him in his study in the Synagogue. He was a slender, quietly dressed young man, with the eager face of a scholar and the air of repose of a mystic. The walls of his room were lined with books and as I noted Hebraic, Greek, Latin and Arabic titles, as well as German, French and English, I realized that I was dealing with a deeply cultured man. His voice was musical and low, as he asked me to be seated.

"Rabbi Da Silva," I began, "before I begin I would like to ask you to accept on behalf of your congregation a gift of a thousand dollars as a token of my gratitude for consenting to hear my story. Perhaps you can help me, perhaps not. As you realize, I am not of your faith but I need your wisdom. I am trying to find my soul."

"So are we all, Mr. Tompkins," the Rabbi assured me. "What is your problem?"

I recited the events which made it imperative for me to recollect the events prior to April second; I told him of the reasons that convinced me that I, Frank Jacklin, was living in Winfred Tompkins' body; I outlined the moral and personal problems involved in this confusion of personalities; I indicated the psychiatric and other tests that had been made. Naturally, I did not mention the Alaska, the thorium bomb, Z-2 or Von Bieberstein.

When I had completed my account, Rabbi Da Silva gazed abstractedly at the small coal fire which smouldered in the grate of his study.

"Why did you come to me, Mr. Tompkins?" he asked.

"Because I hoped that in your studies of the human soul, you might have found knowledge that would help me."

He sat silent for some minutes.

"For many centuries," he began at last, "there has been a curious belief among you Christians that the Jewish rabbinate possesses mystic knowledge of the occult. No doubt that belief derives from the early Middle Ages when the Jews became in part the means by which the science and culture of the Saracen East was brought to the ignorant barbarous West. That service was turned against us by the superstitions and prejudices of Christendom and we were regarded as akin to sorcerers and witch-masters. Even today in Germany, we are paying for our crime of having brought enlightenment to Europe in the Dark Ages."

"Then you can't help me?" I asked.

"I did not say so, Mr. Tompkins," the Rabbi replied. "Certainly I cannot help you in any occult manner. I cannot pick a book from the shelves, mutter a few words in Hebrew and resolve your spiritual problems with a whiff of brimstone. The casting out of devils is not included in Judaism. Indeed, it has gone out of fashion in Christendom."

"What can you suggest?" I inquired. "Many important events, including the possible capture of a dangerous Nazi spy, depend on my recovering my memory."

"Even with that inducement," the Rabbi remarked with an ironic smile, "I am not in a position to urge any particular course on you. Assume, for the sake of argument, that you are the victim of what is called a demoniac possession, Mr. Tompkins. Are you sure that you would be benefited by casting out the soul of Frank Jacklin and resuming command of your own personality? Is not Winfred Tompkins a better and happier man under the influence of Jacklin than he was as himself? In other words, Mr. Tompkins, you may not be seeking to cast out a devil at all, but an angel of the Lord. Of course, I am speaking in moral metaphor and not as a scientist or a theologian. My advice to you would be to ignore your loss of memory and live out your life as best you can and be thankful that whatever it is that caused this change has been for your betterment and has brought happiness to others."

I shook my head. "I know that I am foolish to insist, Rabbi Da Silva," I said. "What you say is just about what the psychiatrists advised. Yet I must open that locked door and see what is hidden in the secret room."

Da Silva smiled gently. "Yes," he agreed, "I see that you must. Bluebeard's wife felt much the same and the charm and universal meaning of that great fable is that humanity must always open the closed doors, even at the risk of destruction. All wisdom urges us to leave well enough alone, yet our instinct is wiser than wisdom itself. God bless you, Mr. Tompkins, and may you come to no harm if you find the key to this locked room."

"Thank you, sir," I said. "Now there remain only the Catholics. Perhaps a parish priest—"

"I shall be very much surprised if a priest advises you differently, Mr. Tompkins," the Rabbi observed. "Drop in again some time and tell me, will you?"

I gave him his check for the Temple Ben-David and went on to the rectory of St. Patrick's-by-the-Gashouse, where I asked for the priest.

"Sure, Father Flanagan's celebrating Mass," the aged housekeeper rebuked me.

"I'll wait," I told her. "I have a contribution for the church. I must give it to him personally."

"Glory be!" she remarked, and withdrew, muttering.

Father Flanagan was a burly, well-built young Irish-American with a friendly smile and a crushing handshake.

"Mrs. Casey tells me you have something for the church, Mr.—"

"My name's Tompkins, Father. I have a check for a thousand dollars. I'll give it to you now. There are no strings to it but I'd like to ask you to help me."

"Well, I'll be—You know, Mr. Tompkins," Father Flanagan told me, "just this morning at breakfast Mrs. Casey said she was praying that we'd finish raising the money for the new altar before the Bishop's visit, and here it is. Isn't that wonderful, now?"

"There you are, Father," I told him, "and welcome to it."

"Thank you, Mr. Tompkins," the priest said simply. "I shall remember you in my prayers and so, no doubt, will Mrs. Casey. You're not a Catholic, of course?"

"No," I replied. "I don't seem to be anything that makes sense medically, legally or morally. I need help."

So I told him the whole story from beginning to end, and added the advice I had already received from Dr. McGregor and Rabbi Da Silva.

Father Flanagan heard me out and then considered carefully.

"I've heard some strange things in Confession," he stated at last, "but they never taught us at Notre Dame how to deal with a problem like yours. I'd rather like to consult the Bishop before I undertook to advise you. Do you mind?"

"Yes, I do," I told the priest. "It's no disrespect for your bishop. It's just that I feel that this problem must be solved on a low level rather than by the higher echelons. In the Navy, we soon learned that the best way to get a problem loused up was to refer it to CINCPAC. What is your own reaction to my story?"

Father Flanagan pursed his lips and pondered for a moment. "Speaking as a man," he said, "and not as a priest, it looks to me as though you were sitting pretty, Mr. Tompkins. Naturally, I have no explanation for it and the psychiatrists seem to have given you a clean bill of health, so maybe you're not crazy. I have a vague idea that there's reference to something like your experience in the Patristic writings which I read when I was studying for the priesthood. It's all mixed up with the Gnostics and necromancy but it's hard to tell how much you can accept literally in that material. Pagan literature is full of it, such as Apuleius' 'The Golden Ass', in which a witch turns a man into a donkey, but that's admittedly fancy. As I say, you seem to be sitting pretty. By your own account, Commander Jacklin's life was pretty much of a failure and Tompkins was not exactly what you could call a huge moral success. Yet you, as Jacklin, seem to be doing a pretty good job with Tompkins' life. Why don't you let it go at that?"

"I can't, Father," I told him. "I've got to find out what Tompkins was doing just before Easter. Even if it's only for that one week, I've got to know."

"And you say that so far nobody has been able to help you?"

"Nobody," I replied. "The doctors call it trauma and say that my memory may come back to me at any time, but I can't wait."

He smiled. "'Can't' is a big and human word. Have you tried hypnotism? Or scopolamine? They aren't exactly liturgical and my Bishop would have a fit if he heard me mention them—he considers them on a par with mediums and spiritualism—but they have some value in restoring memory."

I slapped my knee. "Thanks, Father!" I exclaimed. "You've given me an idea. I'll try a medium."

The priest looked grave. "I wouldn't do that, now, if I were you, Mr. Tompkins," he told me. "That kind of thing is too close to Black Magic and devil-worship for decent men to play with."

"I hope I don't shock you, Father Flanagan," I replied, "but if God can't help me, I'll have to go to the Devil."

"I shall pray for you, Mr. Tompkins," the priest said.

CHAPTER 31

After I left St. Patrick's-by-the-Gashouse I went to a corner saloon and telephoned the F.B.I. I asked for Harcourt but was told that he was out to lunch, which reminded me that I was hungry. A private treaty with the bartender brought me a steak sandwich, and no questions asked. Apple pie and coffee followed, and were not too horrible. I smoked a cigarette, drank a second cup of coffee, and called the F.B.I. again.

This time Harcourt had returned from lunch and he talked as though he had swallowed the Revised Statutes of the United States but that they gave him indigestion.

"See here, Andy," I told him at last. "I'm not looking for legal advice, I want to consult a medium. Any medium. If I picked one out of the phone-book you'd have the headache of checking on her, as I suppose you're checking on the clergymen I saw this morning. So this time just save yourself the trouble, and tell me who I should see."

"The Bureau doesn't endorse spiritualists," he informed me, but the old J. Edgar Hoover spirit was running thin and his heart wasn't in it.

"I'm not asking the Bureau to endorse anything, not even a candy laxative," I replied. "Just