Indignation Page #6

four times married,

a blatant adulterer,

an advocate of free love,

a self-confessed socialist

dismissed from his university position

and imprisoned during the First War

by the British

for what in plain English

I would call treason.

What about

the Nobel Prize!

I even admire you

now, Marcus,

when you hammer on my desk

and point to me so as to ask

about the Nobel Prize.

You have a fighting spirit.

I'm sorry, sir. I didn't know that

I pointed. I didn't mean to point.

You did, son. Not for the first

time and probably not for the last.

But that is the least of it.

To find that Bertrand Russell

is a hero of yours

comes as no great surprise.

There are always one or two

intellectually precocious students

on every campus, self-appointed

members of an elite intelligentsia

who need to elevate themselves and feel

superior to their fellow students,

superior even

to their professors.

Nonetheless, that is not what

we are here to discuss.

What worries me

rather is your isolation.

What worries me

is your outspoken rejection

of long-standing Winesburg tradition,

as witness your response

to Chapel attendance,

[inhales]

A simple undergraduate requirement

which amounts to, on average,

little more than a few minutes

per week of your years here.

In all my experience

at Winesburg

I have never come across

a student

who objected to that requirement

as an infringement on his rights.

What worries me

is how poorly

you are fitting

into the Winesburg community.

To me it seems something

to be attended to promptly,

and nipped in the bud.

I can't take any more of this.

[swallows hard]

Sir, I think I'm going to vomit.

Excuse me?

I feel ill. I think

I'm going to vomit.

I cannot bear

being lectured like this.

I am not a malcontent.

I am not a rebel.

I have the right to socialize

or not socialize

with whomever I see fit.

Furthermore, your argument

against Bertrand Russell

is not an argument

against his ideas

based on reason

but an argument

against his character,

i.e., an ad hominem attack,

which is logically worthless.

Sir, I respectfully ask

your permission to stand up

and leave now because I am afraid

if I don't I am going to be sick.

Of course

you may leave.

I just ask that you reflect on why

leaving appears to be the only way

you are dealing

with your problems here.

I'm genuinely sorry if you think

I've been wasting your time.

Leaving is not how I cope

with my difficulties.

I strongly object to you

saying that, Dean Caudwell.

Well, at least we got

over calling me 'sir.'

Marcus.

Just one last thing.

I have the impression

from your application

that you're a talented

baseball player.

Would you give a thought about

going up for the Winesburg team?

I played for that team myself

when I was a student here.

Dean Caudwell, my high school

had the worst team in the league.

I don't think

I could play at this level.

The pitching would be a lot

faster than what I'm used to,

and I don't think choking up on

the bat, the way I did back home,

is going to solve my hitting problems

at this level of competition.

So you're saying you're not

going out for baseball

because of the competition?

No! I am saying that I am

realistic about my chances

for making the team...

(Dean)

Alice!

(Marcus, off)

I was always a light sleeper,

though I never could remember

my dreams

or even whether I had

any dreams.

But for that day,

and night, and day...

what with the anesthesia,

I slept a great deal...

I remember vaguely thinking

I was married to Olivia Hutton.

I remember us

sharing a bedroom,

of me going off to work,

an argument

we had over dinner,

of a long drive

through a series of small towns,

and then us reaching

the ocean,

and a cabin by the ocean.

It's strange, being dead,

as I am now and have been

for I don't know how long...

"if" now' can be said to mean

anything any longer...

that I remember those dreams

as accurately as anything

I actually experienced in reality.

Good morning.

You're in the hospital, son.

You had your appendix removed. Just

in the nick of time, the doctors say.

I had my what?

Your appendix out.

Your dean, from the college, Mr.

Caudwell, was just now here.

I sent him home -

didn't want to wake you.

He's called your parents.

They know you're fine.

Your mother will be here

in a few days.

And you're to call your father.

But first...

I need you to do some business for me.

Into this.

(Olivia)

Dear Marcus, I can't see you.

You'll only run away

from me again,

this time when you see the scar

across the width of my wrist.

Had you seen it the night of our date I

would have honestly explained it to you.

I was prepared to do that.

I didn't try to cover it up,

but as it happened

you failed to notice it.

It's a scar from a razor.

I tried to kill myself.

That's why I went

for three months to the clinic.

It was the Menninger Clinic

in Topeka, Kansas.

The Menninger Sanitarium

and Psychopathic Hospital.

There's the full name

for you.

My father the doctor

knows people there.

[faucet running]

Where will you be able

to see these best?

I see them best

in your two hands.

I see them best with you

standing right there.

Just stay like that

for the next couple of days.

What are they giving you

to eat?

Jell-O and ginger ale. Tomorrow

I start on the snails.

You seem very chipper.

I am.

Can I see?

My stitches?

Okay.

Is the wound draining?

Is that tube dangling

down there a drain?

I don't know.

I suppose so. Yeah.

What about the stitches?

Well, we're in a hospital.

What better place to be in

when they come undone?

You are odd, you know.

Odder than I think you realize.

I'm always odd after I have

my appendix taken out.

Do you always get as big as this

after you have your appendix out?

[groans]

Never fails.

Of course we shouldn't.

We could both get thrown

out of school for this.

Then stop.

[loud groan]

There.

"I shot an arrow into the air.

It fell to earth I knew not where."

[door opens]

Excuse me.

[door slams]

Oh, my God. What is

she going to do now?

Nothing.

What do you

mean "nothing"?

How can you be so poised

about all this?

One call to the dean,

and we're out.

How do you know

she's going to do nothing?

She's too embarrassed to.

I don't understand

how you can be so...

So what?

Under control. So expert.

[faucet running]

Oh, yes, Olivia the expert.

That's what they called me

at the Menninger Clinic.

But you are.

You really think so,

do you?

I, who have eight thousand

moods a minute,

whose every emotion is a tornado,

who can be thrown by a word,

by a syllable,

am 'under control'?

You are blind.

Do you hate me?

No. I don't hate you.

I think maybe you hate me.

Maybe you should.

Will you come tomorrow?

Yes.

I need to see you walk to the end

of the hall and back with this.

Then you can use

the bathroom yourself.

Marcus!

Oh, hey Sonny.

So Caudwell sent you?

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