physical premises in return for continuing-education credits for the medical staff and a percentage of the box office. Of the scores of requests received yearly, a good many were psychiatric or psychological in nature. Of those, only two or three were accepted.
Katarina de Bosch's letter had been one of several I received, just weeks after assuming my new post. I scanned it and rejected it.
Not a tough decision- the subject matter didn't interest me or my staff: the front-line battles we were waging on the wards placed the theorizations of classical psychoanalysis low on our want list. And from my readings of his work, Andres de Bosch was a middleweight analyst- a prolific but superficial writer who'd produced little in the way of original thought and had parlayed a year in Vienna as one of Freud's students and membership in the French resistance into an international reputation. I wasn't even sure he was still alive; the letter from his daughter didn't make it clear, and the conference she proposed had a memorial flavor to it.
I wrote her a polite letter.
Two weeks later I was called in to see the medical director, a pediatric surgeon named Henry Bork who favored Hickey-Freeman suits, Jamaican cigars, and sawtooth abstract art, and who hadn't operated in years.
'Alex.' He smiled and motioned to a Breuer chair. A slender woman was sitting in a matching nest of leather and chrome on the other side of the room.
She looked to be slightly older than me- early thirties, I guessed- but her face was one of those long, sallow constructions that would always seem aged. The beginnings of worry lines suggested themselves at crucial junctures, like a portrait artist's initial tracings. Her lips were chapped- all of her looked dry- and her only makeup was a couple of grudging lines of mascara.
Her eyes were large enough without the shadowing, dark, heavy lidded, slightly bloodshot, close set. Her nose was prominent, down tilted, and sharp, with a small bulb at the tip. Full wide lips were set sternly. Her legs were pressed together at the knees, feet set squarely on the floor.
She wore a coarse, black, scallop-necked wool sweater over a pleated black skirt, stockings tinted to mimic a Caribbean tan, and black loafers. No jewelry. Her hair was straight, brown, and long, drawn back very tightly from a low, flat brow, and fastened above each ear with wide, black, wooden barrettes. A houndstooth jacket was draped over her lap. Near one shoe was a black leatherette attache case.
As I sat down, she watched me, hands resting upon one another, spindly and white. The top one was sprinkled with some sort of eczematous rash. Her nails were cut short. One cuticle looked raw.
Bork stepped between us and spread his arms as if preparing to conduct a symphony.
'Dr. Delaware, Dr. Katarina de Bosch. Dr. de Bosch, Alex Delaware, our acting chief psychologist.'
I turned to her and smiled. She gave a nod so tiny I might have imagined it.
Bork backed away, rested a buttock on his desk, and cupped both his hands over one knee. The desk surface was twenty square feet of lacquered walnut shaped like a surfboard, topped with an antique padded leather blotter and a green marble inkwell. Centered on the blotter was a single rectangle of stiff blue paper. He picked it up and used it to rap his knuckles.
'Do you recall Dr. de Bosch's writing to you suggesting a collaborative venture with your division, Alex?'
I nodded.
'And the disposition of that request?'
'I turned it down.'
'Might I ask why?'
'The staff's been asking for things directly related to inpatient management, Henry.'
Looking pained, Bork shook his head, then handed the blue paper to me.
A program for the conference, still smelling of printer's ink. Full schedule, speakers, and registration. My name was listed below Katarina de Bosch's as co-chair. My picture below, lifted off the professional staff roster.
My face broiled. I took a deep breath. 'Looks like a fait accompli, Henry.' I tried to hand him the brochure, but he put his hands back on his knees.
'Keep it for your records, Alex.' Standing, he sidled in front of the desk, taking tiny steps, like a man on a ledge. Finally, he managed to get behind the surfboard and sat down.
Katarina de Bosch was inspecting her knuckles.
I considered maintaining my dignity but decided against it. 'Nice to know what I'm doing in November, Henry. Care to give me my schedule for the rest of the decade?'
A small, sniffing sound came from Katarina's chair. Bork smiled at her, then turned to me, shifting his lips into neutral.
'An unfortunate misunderstanding, Alex- a snafu. 'Something naturally always fouls up,' right?'
He looked at Katarina again, got nothing in return, and lowered his eyes to the blotter.
I fanned the blue brochure.
'Snafu,' Bork repeated. 'One of those interim decisions that had to be made during the transition between Dr. Greiloff's and Dr. Franks' sabbaticals and your stepping in. The board offers its regrets.'
'Then why bother with a letter of application?'
Katarina said, 'Because I'm polite.'
'I didn't know the board got involved in scheduling conferences, Henry.'
Bork smiled. 'Everything, Alex, is the province of the board. But you're right. It's not typical for us to get directly involved in that type of thing. However…'
He paused, looked again at Katarina, who gave another tiny nod. Clearing his throat, he began fingering a cellophaned cigar- one of a trio of Davidoffs sharing pocket space with a white silk handkerchief.
'The fact that we
'What's that, Henry?'
'Dr. de Bosch
'I see,' I said.
'Yes, indeed.' The color had risen in his cheeks, and his usual glibness had given way to something tentative, shaky.
He removed the cigar from his pocket and held it between his index fingers.
From the corner of my eye I saw Katarina. Watching me.
Neither of them spoke; I felt as if the next line was mine and I'd flubbed it.
'High esteem,' said Bork finally, sounding more tense.
I wondered what was bugging him, then remembered a rumor of a few years ago. Doctors' dining room gossip, the kind I tried to avoid.
A Bork problem child, the youngest of four daughters. A teenaged chronic truant with learning disorders and a tendency toward sexual experimentation, sent away, two or three summers ago, hush-hush, for some kind of live-in remediation. The family tight-lipped with humiliation.
One of Bork's many detractors had told the story with relish.
Bork was watching me. The look on his face told me I shouldn't push it any further.
'Of course,' I said.
It sounded hollow. Katarina de Bosch frowned.
But it made Bork smile again. 'Yes,' he said. 'So obviously, we're eager for this conference to take place. Expeditiously. I hope you and Dr. de Bosch will enjoy working together.'
'Will I be working with both Drs. de Bosch?'
'My father isn't well,' said Katarina, as if I should have known it. 'He had a stroke last winter.'
'Sorry to hear that.'
She stood, smoothed her skirt with brief flogging movements, and picked up her attache. In the chair she'd seemed tall- willowy- but upright she was only five two or three, maybe ninety-five bony pounds. Her legs were short and her feet pointed out. The skirt hung an inch below her knees.
'In fact, I need to get back to take care of him,' she said. 'Walk me back to my car, Dr. Delaware, and I'll give you details on the conference.'
