PARTISAN REVIEW
549
Dtterson, who never expresses astonishment at anything others
tell him, and rarely disagrees, smiles ironically this time. "Perhaps
you've done something to get you in trouble with the civil authorities.
Your views on the war, for instance. Or some irregularity in your
practice, like prescribing illegal drugs, or not doing enough to pro–
long the life of a patient with terminal cancer, or-"
"No." Jekyll shakes his head. "Nothing like that. I'm sure it's
being done by people from the Institute."
"Wouldn't I know about it, if that were so?"
"Would you?" asks Jekyll.
"If I can see into the future"-glancing at the pupil in the corner
bent over his clipboard, Dtterson winks at Jekyll-"you might assume
that I can see into the present, too."
"And you don't see any danger, anyone shadowing me, keeping
track of my movements, trying to scare me into giving up what I'd like
to do?"
Dtterson lets fly one of his celebrated scornful looks in Jekyll's
direction. "What about your friend Hyde? I've told you he's danger–
ous company for you. Let me handle him. You can't."
"Nonsense," says Jekyll. "I never see Hyde any more. And be–
sides, you know 'what he's become now. Why, he just ..." he pauses,
'Just goes round and round in circles," he concludes with a
grin.
"Don't grin like an idiot. You didn't say anything funny."
"I did," says Jekyll.
"I, I, I" Dtterson roars. "Do you hear yourself?" He aims the
water pistol at Jekyll. "Who has the right
to
say 'I'?" He slams it to the
floor. "Not you! Do you hear? That's a right that has
to
be earned!"
Jekyll stares back at him defiantly. "And Ed Hyde?" he says. "Can
Hyde say 'I'?"
"Why not?" Dtterson replies. "As long as he keeps-as you say
-going around in circles. You understand now?"
Jekyll doesn't understand. Something better than that is hap–
pening. Dtterson has put an idea in Jekyll's head. But since it's not an
idea he intended to put there, it doesn't make his large bald head any
lighter; it only makes Jekyll's head heavier.
If
Jekyll bounded out of
his chair, flung himself onto the upholstered chair opposite him with
the man in it, and knocked his heavy head against Dtterson's-but he
must do it right now, when the balance of physical forces has tilted
