The Big Over Easy

The outdated St. Cerebellum’s mental hospital had been constructed in 1831 and was considered modern for its day. With separate wards for unmarried mothers, sufferers of milk allergies, unwanted relatives and the genuinely disturbed, St. Cerebellum’s once boasted a proud record of ill-conceived experimental treatment. With the high level of fee-paying curiosity seekers the litmus test of its success, St. Cerebellum’s even outstripped Bedlam as those requiring lunatic-based entertainment flocked to Reading in droves. But the days when you could pay sixpence to view someone who thought he was Napoleon were long gone, and despite continued and relentless modernization, it was still an anachronistic stain on Reading’s otherwise fine record of psychiatric treatment.

Jack and Mary entered the hospital at the main reception area and, after being issued with passes to avoid any more embarrassing accidental incarcerations, were escorted along the plain whitewashed corridors by a burly nurse with a two-way radio and a bunch of keys on his belt.

“You’ve heard about the plan to rebuild St. Cerebellum’s?” asked the male nurse.

“Sure,” replied Jack. “Fifty million should do it, yes?”

“And none too soon. We are both an outpatient center and a secure hospital for the criminally unhinged—even though the two halves never meet, it would be better for everyone to separate the two.”

“Doubtless,” replied Mary as some weird and maniacal laughter echoed up the corridors.

“Dr. Quatt is a brilliant woman,” said the nurse as they took a clanking lift to the third floor. “The popular view is that she’s as mad as a barrel of skunks, and many people see her as a perverter of all the decent virtues that bind society together, but they said the same about Galileo.”

“I must say I don’t remember the bit where Galileo grafted sheep’s hooves onto amputees,” mused Mary.

“Or subjected toads to Iron Maiden’s ‘Number of the Beast’ so loud they exploded,” added Jack.

“All her work was to alleviate suffering,” retorted the nurse defensively. “When they banned her, a dark veil fell over the medical-research community. We don’t expect outsiders to truly understand her brilliance.”

St. Cerebellum’s seemed like a little world unto itself.

A crackling message came over the nurse’s radio. He unclipped it and waved them to a stop. There was an almost unintelligible rasp of dialogue about a “patient in transit,” and he acknowledged the call before he turned to a nearby room, selected a key and unlocked the door.

“We are moving one of our secure patients,” explained the nurse as he ushered them into what had once been a small cell.

“It’s safer to lock ourselves in while he’s being transported.”

The lock clunked shut, and the nurse spoke briefly on the radio. Up and down the corridor, they could hear doors slamming and locks being thrown.

“Who is it?” asked Jack.

The nurse indicated the small glass porthole in the door. “Take a look.”

Jack peered out cautiously, which seemed daft, considering the door was iron-banded oak. After a few moments, he caught sight of six burly nurses who surrounded a tall figure wrapped in a strait-jacket and bite mask. Each of the six nurses held the patient by means of a long pole that was connected to a collar around his neck. As they drew closer, Jack could see the dark brown cakey texture of the prisoner’s skin, and with a shiver he knew exactly who it was. He had hoped never to see him again but was thankful at least that Cerebellum’s was taking no chances. As they walked past, the patient looked at Jack with his glacé-cherry eyes and his thin licorice lips curled up into a cruel smile of recognition. He winked at Jack, and then they were gone.

Jack stepped away from the window, his palms damp with perspiration. Images of the night he and Wilmot Snaarb had tackled the Gingerbreadman filled his head. He could still see Snaarb’s look of pain and terror as the cakey psychopath playfully pulled his arms out of their sockets.

“Are you okay, sir?” asked Mary.

“Yes, yes, quite well.”

The male nurse laughed and went to the window to check for the all-clear.

“Believe me, you really don’t want to get any closer to Ginger than that,” he said, placing the key in the door and pausing. “He’d kill you as soon as look at you.”

“I know,” replied Jack. “I was the arresting officer.”

“Nah,” said the nurse, “everyone knows that was Friedland Chymes.”

They were led into Dr. Quatt’s office, a light and airy room with a good view of Prospect Park through large floor-to-ceiling windows. There were testimonials and letters of support hanging on the walls, and bottled specimens that contained misshapen creatures covered every work surface. Jack and Mary looked more closely and winced: The carefully bottled specimens looked like some bizarre form of animal “mix and match.”