Ex Deo nascimur, in Jesu mortimur, per spiritum sanctum reviviscimus

Doug asked him what it meant.

" 'From God we are born,' " Fat translated, " 'in Jesus we die, by the Holy Spirit we live again.' "

"You're going to be here ninety days," Doug said.

One time Fat found a posted notice that fascinated him. The notice stipulated what could not be done, in order of de­scending importance. Near the top of the list all parties con­cerned were told:

NO ONE IS TO REMOVE ASHTRAYS FROM THE

WARD.

And later down the list it stated:

FRONTAL LOBOTOMIES ARE NOT TO BE PER­

FORMED WITHOUT THE WRITTEN CONSENT

OF THE PATIENT.

"That should read 'prefrontal,' " Doug said, and wrote in the "pre."

"How do you know that?" Fat said.

"There's two ways of knowing," Doug said. "Either knowledge arises through the sense organs and is called em­pirical knowledge, or it arises within your head and it's called a priori. "Doug wrote on the notice:

* * *

IF I BRING BACK THE ASHTRAYS, CAN I HAVE

MY PREFRONTAL?

"You'll be here ninety days," Fat said.

Outside the building rain poured down. It had been rain-ing since Fat arrived in the North Ward. If he stood on top of the washing machine in the laundry room, he could see out through a barred window to the parking lot. People parked their cars and then ran through the rain. Fat felt glad he was indoors, in the ward.

Dr. Stone, who had charge of the ward, interviewed him one day.

"Did you ever try suicide before?" Dr. Stone asked him.

"No," Fat said, which of course wasn't true. At that mo­ment he no longer remembered Canada. It was his im­pression that his life had begun two weeks ago when Beth walked out.

"I think," Dr. Stone said, "that when you tried to kill your­self you got in touch with reality for the first time."

"Maybe so," Fat said.

"What I am going to give you," Dr. Stone said, opening a black suitcase on his small cluttered desk, "we term the Bach remedies." He pronounced it batch. "These organic remedies are distilled from certain flowers which grow in Wales. Dr. Bach wandered through the fields and pastures of Wales ex­periencing every negative mental state that exists. With each state that he experienced he gently held one flower after an­other. The proper flower trembled in the cup of Dr. Bach's hand and he then developed unique methods of acquiring an essence in elixir form of each flower and combinations of flowers which I have prepared in a rum base." He put three bottles together on the desk, found a larger, empty bottle, and poured the contents of the three into it. "Take six drops a day," Dr. Stone said. There is no way the Bach remedies can hurt you. They are not toxic chemicals. They will remove your sense of helplessness and fear and inability to act. My diagnosis is that those are the three areas where you have blocks: fear, helplessness and an inability to act. What you should have done instead of trying to kill yourself would have been, take your son away from your wife-it's the law in California that a minor child must remain with his father until there is a court order to the contrary. And then you

should have lightly struck your wife with a rolled-up news­paper or a phonebook."

"Thank you," Fat said, accepting the bottle. He could see that Dr. Stone was totally crazy, but in a good way. Dr. Stone was the first person at the North Ward, outside the pa­tients, who had talked to him as if he were human.

"You have much anger in you," Dr. Stone said. "I am lending you a copy of the Tao Te Ching. Have you ever read Lao Tzu?"

"No," Fat admitted.

"Let me read you this part here," Dr. Stone said. He read aloud.

"Its upper part is not dazzling;

Its lower part is not obscure.

Dimly visible, it cannot be named

And returns to that which is without substance.

This is called the shape that has no shape,

The image that is without substance.

This is called indistinct and shadowy.

Go up to it and you will not see its head;

Follow behind it and you will not see its rear."

Hearing this, Fat remembered entries #1 and #2 from his Journal. He quoted them, from memory, to Dr. Stone.