Dimiter by William Peter Blatty Page B

of his head he unlocked the door and entered his office.
The deadly Samia Virus is spreading
, he thought.
We must notify the World Health people!
Mayo shuffled morosely to the dark oaken swivel chair faithfully waiting behind his desk, sat down, and briefly scanned the accumulated chaos of the room. When he’d served as chief physician, a post he had mysteriously abandoned at around the time when his weight had begun to so dramatically drop, Mayo’s tight little office was a match for his mind: a silent temple of neatness and organization. But since his resignation the cubbyhole sanctuary had gradually become a mad warren where books and medical reports on shelves jostled humorous trivia and mementoes, while the once-bare walls were now gasping for breath under framed citations, photos, and oddities such as the faded printed label from a jar of a plum-colored liquid substance evocatively identified as “Nos-feratu Beet Juice”—just below the name appeared the word “Imported”—and a pair of quotations from Israeli humorist Ephraim Kishon. One was headed “Advice to Patients:”
     
Don’t be too fussy. If you ask for clear soup and get noodle soup, the nurse will tell you: “So eat the soup and leave the noodles.”
     
    The other Kishon quotation was beside it:
     
What can you get for a pound these days? A curse from a beggar.
     
    Prominently centered between a travel poster of Carmel, California, and a photo of the fog-shrouded lovers’ farewell at the end of the film
Casablanca,
these advisories steadied Mayo’s walk through the world.
    Mayo stared bleakly at the desktop’s clutter: Letters. Reports. Memoranda. Scribbled notes. With the tips of his fingers he pushed a few papers apart until the desktop’s bare stained pine was revealed like a patch of pale sea amid a jumble of floes. He set the mug down on the cleared-out space and gave some thought to his upcoming 10 A.M. lecture. He knew he needed sleep. But his mind was too agitated, still shadowed by a vague foreboding. He thought of the Band-Aid in his dream. What did it mean? As was his custom he had left his office door wide open, still another quirk in his habits that had started at the time of his weight loss, and now he lifted his head and looked out into the hall with a curiously sad and wistful expression, as if hoping that a long lost love might pass by. But the hall remained empty of life. Mayo sighed. He longed for the distraction of the morning paper, for the balm of immersion in routine, and, grown desperate, he reached into a wastepaper basket that was underneath his desk and hauled out the prior day’s
Jerusalem Post,
spread it out on his desk, and began to reread it, his eye skimming rapidly across the headlines:
     
    “SYRIA MIGHT RENEW THE SIX DAY WAR;”
    “WATERGATE GRAND JURY INDICTS 7;”
    “U.S. COLLEGE STREAKING CRAZE SPREADS TO EUROPE;”
    “22 CHILDREN DIE IN VIET CONG ATTACK;”
    and
    “PYTHON SWALLOWS BANGLADESHI WOMAN.”
     
    At the last two reports Mayo groaned but said nothing.
    He had used up all the worlds he could end that day.
    Seeking sunnier fare, Mayo turned to an ad for “C HUTZPAH ,” a perfume created by Aviva Dayan, the daughter of the celebrated Army chief of staff, and with this Mayo found the wry smile he’d been seeking. Her lips puckered in a sultry and provocative 0; Dayan’s photo stared back smolderingly at the neurologist over copy that declared the scent’s virtues:
     
    ARROGANT! DIRECT! PROVOKING! BUT AT THE
    SAME TIME REFRESHINGLY NATURAL LIKE THE
    SABRAS IN WHOSE IMAGE IT WAS CREATED!
     
    Near the bottom of the ad another perfume was touted:
     
    MAZELTOV—THE PERFUME THAT BRINGS LUCK!
     
    The rustling of newspaper merged with a chuckle as Mayo turned the page to a daily feature that was headed “What’s On In Jerusalem Today:”
     
Thursday Daily Walk: Fourteen Stations to Church of the Holy Sepulcher. Free snacks to follow at MandarinChinese Restaurant. Meeting Place: Convent