The Mind of Mr Soames by Charles Eric Maine Page A

or amusement took possession of him that he allowed his reaction to show itself involuntarily in his features.
    ‘You like to eat food?’ Conway went on. ‘You like to walk in green field by lake? You like to wear nice clothes?’
    The patient made no reply. If anything his lips became a little sullen as if he sensed that the questions were merely a preamble to something unpleasant.
    ‘In life we have to do things we don’t like, too,’ Conway stated. ‘We have to do things which are good for us, even if we think they are not nice to do.’
    Mr Soames turned away from Conway to a small table on which were spread pieces of a simple wooden jigsaw puzzle. Tentatively he picked up one of the pieces, turning it round and round as if trying to divine its probable position in the overall picture.
    ‘You are learning to be a man like other men,’ Conway went on. ‘In order to learn you have to listen to what other men tell you, and you have to do what you are told. If you don’t, then there will be trouble. You will not have the things you like any more. Do you understand?’
    If the patient was still listening, he gave no indication of it. Already he had interlocked three pieces of the jigsaw and was toying with a fourth piece in a mood of bored concentration.
    ‘Already you have learned some useful things,’ said Conway patiently, ‘but there are many more things which you must learn, It is not enough to walk, and eat and talk. You have to learn about the world outside so that one day, when you are free to go into the world, you will be the same as other men, and you will know as much as they do.’
    Carefully Mr Soames fitted the next two pieces of the jigsaw in position. He picked up another piece, inspecting it in his characteristically unresponsive way.
    Conway exchanged glances with the male nurse who was standing a little to his rear. The orderly shook his head and said: ‘It’s no use, Dr Conway. When he gets one of these moods he just doesn’t want to know.’
    Conway stepped forward and took the jigsaw piece firmly from the patient’s hand. ‘Attend to me,’ he ordered.
    Mr Soames turned lethargically and stood up, holding out his hand.
    ‘Give it to me,’ he said, in the slow, carefully intoned voice.
    ‘You must listen to what I have to say first,’ Conway instructed, ‘then I will give it to you.’
    ‘It is mine,’ said Mr Soames. ‘Give it to me.’
    Conway pointed to the chair. ‘Sit down,’ he said.
    ‘Give it to me,’ Mr Soames repeated with single-minded persistence. He reached out and gripped Conway’s hand with fingers of steel. For a few moments the two men stood face to face, Conway tensed and slightly angry, the patient calm and relaxed, but immensely stubborn, and then the male nurse intervened. He gripped Mr Soames’s arm and tried to disengage it, but Mr Soames had no intention of letting go.
    ‘Do as the doctor says,’ said the orderly.
    ‘I want my piece,’ Mr Soames pronounced. His fingers tightened on Conway’s hand. ‘I want it. Give it to me.’
    ‘Sit down,’ Conway commanded, ‘or I shall take all the pieces.’
    Defiance crystallised in the patient’s dark, expressionless eyes. He began to twist Conway’s wrist slowly and purposefully, never taking his eyes off the other man’s face. At this point the male nurse made a determined effort to separate the two men, but to no avail.
    ‘Never mind,’ Conway said quickly. ‘Remove all the pieces of the jigsaw from the table.’
    The orderly did as instructed. Mr Soames stopped twisting and turned his head. For the first time anxiety modulated the blankness of his expression.
    ‘No,’ he cried. ‘I want them. I want them.’
    ‘Sit down and you shall have them back,’ Conway said, rubbing his wrist.
    Reluctantly Mr Soames surrendered. He sat on the chair, his eyes fixed stonily on the male nurse as he scooped the fragments of the jigsaw puzzle into his hands.
    ‘That’s better,’ Conway remarked.