328
SAUL BELLOW
the trouble. But his own kind of psychiatry. He looks down on every–
body, including highbrows, but he always believed himself the brainiest
there is. The way people keep booze hidden? He's kept books. People
mustn't know he was studying. He hid them in the clothes hamper
in
the toilet-and read. Freud. Plato. Pascal. Kierkegaard. He evolved
his own type of therapy.
PSYCHIATRIST:
What is it, can you tell me?
WINKLEMAN:
He's acting out his whole life. Somebody comes in, like
the dry-cleaner, a United Parcel man, the exterminator-anybody.
And they start to act. He coaches 'em.
PSYCHIATRIST:
Extraordinary. And why do they ... ?
WINKLEMAN:
He's a star. They
think
he'll do something for them.
They're flattered. He has a lunatic charm. And he bribes ... bribes
like crazy.
PSYCHIATRIST:
With actual money?
WINKLEMAN:
Whatever it takes. Shoes, neckties, automobiles, candy,
bananas. When we were kids he used to give me licorice to go to the
toilet with
him.
He can't stand to be alone. Bribes to
his
kids, to
his
wife, his mistresses.
(Tries
to
sit)
PSYCHIATRIST:
No, lie there, Mr. Winkleman. I think better that way.
l
WINKLEMAN: (
Hangs his fedora on his foot and lies back)
To act out
his life with him he prefers people with a Freudian background. He
lives
in
a building full of analysts, and he pays the elevator man and
the doorman to procure the oldest patients. Some have become at–
tached
to
him.
PSYCHIATRIST:
And what's his object?
WINKLEMAN:
Insight ... And he's offering half a million bucks to any
medical school which will accept his system. For a chair.
PSYCHIATRIST:
Five hundred thousand? Any takers?
WINKLEMAN:
Not yet. But the Eastern Psychiatric something is meeting
at the Waldorf, and Bummidge is appearing for fifteen minutes on
closed circuit television with a little lecture and demonstration of
his
method.
PSYCHIATRIST:
Ha! Ha!
WINKLEMAN:
Are you coughing, or scoffing. He bribed somebody on
the program committee-leave it to him. Meanwhile, his children
are both on the outs with him. His wife-they don't live together.
His
girl friend, a silly whore. You'd pick her up in any hotel lobby for
a quick push. Buy her a fifth of gin, she'd be happy. Not Bummidge.
He does everything big. She has an apartment, car, furs, and she's
aiming to
marry
him.
