first time it happened, perhaps half out of his mind with frustration and anger because of his wife’s inaccessibility during the later months of her pregnancy with Victor and the postpartum recovery. As I understand it, Donatien Remillard was an insecure man who never managed to come to grips with his metapsychic potential. He was self-centered, susceptible to attacks of depression, and physically aggressive.”
Near tears, I agreed. “We were fraternal twins, not identical. Our temperaments were miles apart. He and Sunny … Don took her away from me. I don’t think he really loved her at all. He wanted her because she’d been planning to marry me. She was his most valued possession.”
Under Anne’s gentle questioning, I told her about my brother’s early life and his oddball relationship to me. Then I shut up and tried to get hold of myself. Anne could still be mistaken. On the other hand, all this made a horrible kind of sense.
Anne unwrapped the loaf of gamma bread and freshened it briefly in the microwave. She slivered the lox and put it in the IR-oven to warm, set the table, poured us glasses of milk, and got butter sizzling in the omelet pan. She wasn’t wearing her priestly rabat and dog collar. A small silver cross with a central cabochon of green jade hung from a thin chain on the breast of her white blouse. Her blonde hair was cut short and she was thin to the point of being haggard, with a wan face and eyes that were deep-sunken and dark.
I asked her how the split-personality thing worked. How lunatic Fury took over from quiet, unpretentious Denis.
“Every case is different,” she said. “But this is the way Denis’smental illness seems to manifest itself: Most of the time, his core persona is in control and he’s himself—Emeritus Professor of Metapsychology at Dartmouth College, Nobel Laureate, respected theorist and writer, loving husband, your own dear foster son, papa to Phil and Maurie and Sevvy and me and Cat and Adrien and Paul. But sometimes—there’s no telling what sets it off—his dyscrasic personality seizes the ascendant and takes over his mind and body. His rational everyday self is transformed into a thing so filled with pain and hatred that its only release seems to be in violence, murder, and megalomania. This second persona is completely separate from the core. Neither one knows the thoughts of the other. The abnormal persona seems to have goals diametrically opposite to those of the benevolent core. It may even have more powerful metafaculties, drawing upon areas of Denis’s mind that are ordinarily latent.”
“Fury!” I cried. “It named itself Fury. I was right there when it was born …
inevitably
, it said. I never understood what it meant by that.”
“The dyscrasic aspect of Denis calls itself Fury for an excellent reason. He had a classical education, and in Greek and Roman mythology the Erinyes or Furies were avenging spirits who tormented and destroyed
those guilty of violating the natural order
.”
“Sacré nom d’un chien,” I muttered, letting the tears flow at last. I had all but accepted Anne’s judgment on my poor foster son.
She broke eggs into a bowl and began whisking them. “Can you think of any incidents in Papa’s early life that might confirm my diagnosis?”
I mopped my face with my handkerchief and reluctantly tried to cogitate. “I remember one time when Denis was tiny—after I’d told Don and Sunny about his strong metabilities and they both agreed to let me teach him how to use them. It must have been about 1970. Denis would have been around three. Don came home plastered and in the mood to play a nasty practical joke on me. He slipped LSD into some cocoa he gave me, but baby Denis innocently blew the gaff and Don was mad enough to shit bricks. He came at Denis, ready to belt him or something, and the kid coerced him. It was spooky. One second Don was a bull on the rampage, and the next he was helpless and scared out of
Near tears, I agreed. “We were fraternal twins, not identical. Our temperaments were miles apart. He and Sunny … Don took her away from me. I don’t think he really loved her at all. He wanted her because she’d been planning to marry me. She was his most valued possession.”
Under Anne’s gentle questioning, I told her about my brother’s early life and his oddball relationship to me. Then I shut up and tried to get hold of myself. Anne could still be mistaken. On the other hand, all this made a horrible kind of sense.
Anne unwrapped the loaf of gamma bread and freshened it briefly in the microwave. She slivered the lox and put it in the IR-oven to warm, set the table, poured us glasses of milk, and got butter sizzling in the omelet pan. She wasn’t wearing her priestly rabat and dog collar. A small silver cross with a central cabochon of green jade hung from a thin chain on the breast of her white blouse. Her blonde hair was cut short and she was thin to the point of being haggard, with a wan face and eyes that were deep-sunken and dark.
I asked her how the split-personality thing worked. How lunatic Fury took over from quiet, unpretentious Denis.
“Every case is different,” she said. “But this is the way Denis’smental illness seems to manifest itself: Most of the time, his core persona is in control and he’s himself—Emeritus Professor of Metapsychology at Dartmouth College, Nobel Laureate, respected theorist and writer, loving husband, your own dear foster son, papa to Phil and Maurie and Sevvy and me and Cat and Adrien and Paul. But sometimes—there’s no telling what sets it off—his dyscrasic personality seizes the ascendant and takes over his mind and body. His rational everyday self is transformed into a thing so filled with pain and hatred that its only release seems to be in violence, murder, and megalomania. This second persona is completely separate from the core. Neither one knows the thoughts of the other. The abnormal persona seems to have goals diametrically opposite to those of the benevolent core. It may even have more powerful metafaculties, drawing upon areas of Denis’s mind that are ordinarily latent.”
“Fury!” I cried. “It named itself Fury. I was right there when it was born …
inevitably
, it said. I never understood what it meant by that.”
“The dyscrasic aspect of Denis calls itself Fury for an excellent reason. He had a classical education, and in Greek and Roman mythology the Erinyes or Furies were avenging spirits who tormented and destroyed
those guilty of violating the natural order
.”
“Sacré nom d’un chien,” I muttered, letting the tears flow at last. I had all but accepted Anne’s judgment on my poor foster son.
She broke eggs into a bowl and began whisking them. “Can you think of any incidents in Papa’s early life that might confirm my diagnosis?”
I mopped my face with my handkerchief and reluctantly tried to cogitate. “I remember one time when Denis was tiny—after I’d told Don and Sunny about his strong metabilities and they both agreed to let me teach him how to use them. It must have been about 1970. Denis would have been around three. Don came home plastered and in the mood to play a nasty practical joke on me. He slipped LSD into some cocoa he gave me, but baby Denis innocently blew the gaff and Don was mad enough to shit bricks. He came at Denis, ready to belt him or something, and the kid coerced him. It was spooky. One second Don was a bull on the rampage, and the next he was helpless and scared out of
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