But Seligmann remained silent.
“And what follows this breakdown? He abandons his practice, one of the most lucrative in New York. He allows his wife to take him on a world cruise, apparently recovers... but in Vienna, world’s capital of psychoanalysis, another breakdown. The first collapse had been ascribed to overwork. But to what was the second collapse, after a leisurely cruise, ascribable? Suggestive! Professor Seligmann, you treated him. What caused Cazalis’s breakdowns?”
Seligmann took the pipe from his mouth. “You ask me to disclose information, Mr. Queen, of which I came into possession in my professional capacity.”
“A nice point, Herr Professor. But what are the ethics of silence when silence itself is immoral?”
The old man did not seem offended. He set the pipe down. “Herr Queen. It is evident to me that you have come not for information so much as for confirmation of conclusions which you have already reached on the basis of insufficient data. Tell me your conclusions. Perhaps we shall find a way of resolving my dilemma.”
“All right!” Ellery jumped up. But then he sat down again, forcing himself to speak calmly. “At the age of 44 Cazalis married a girl of 19 after a busy life devoid of personal relationships with women although in his work all his relationships were with women. During the first four years of their married life Mrs. Cazalis gave birth to two children. Dr. Cazalis not only cared for his wife personally during her pregnancies but performed both deliveries. Neither infant survived the delivery room. A few months after the second fatality in childbirth, Cazalis broke down — and retired from obstetrics and gynecology, never to go back to them.
“It seems to me, Professor Seligmann,” said Ellery, “that whatever was wrong with Cazalis reached its climax in that delivery room.”
“Why,” murmured the old man, “do you say this?”
“Because... Professor Seligmann, I can’t speak in terms of libido and mortido, Ego and Id. But I have some knowledge of human beings, and the sum of whatever observations I’ve been able to make of human behavior, and of my own and others’ experience of life impels me to the conclusion.
“I observe the fact: Cazalis turns his back with cold purpose on his childhood. Why? I speculate. His childhood was predominated by a mother who was always either carrying a child or having a child, by a laborer-father who was always begetting them, and by a horde of other children who were always getting in the way of his wishes. I speculate. Did Cazalis hate his mother? Did he hate his brothers and sisters? Did he feel guilt because he hated them?
“And I observe the career he sets for himself, and I say: Is there a significant connection between his hate for maternity and his specialization — as it were — in maternity? Is there a nexus between his hate for the numerous progeny of his parents and his determination to make himself an expert in the science of bringing more children into the world?
“Hate and guilt — and the defenses against them. I’ve put two and two together. Is this permitted, Herr Professor? Is this valid?”
Seligmann said, “One tends to oversimplify in your sort of mathematics, mein Herr. But go on.”
“Then I say to myself: Cazalis’s tensions lie deep. His guilts are profound. His defenses against the unconscious becoming conscious — if that’s a fundamental identification of neurotic behavior — are elaborate.
“Now I observe his marriage. Immediately, it seems to me, new tensions — or extensions of old ones — set in. Even a so-called normal man of 44 would find a first marriage, after a life of overwork and little socializing — would find such a marriage, to a 19-year-old girl, unsettling and conflicting. In this case the young bride was from a thinblooded New England strain. She was emotionally of delicate balance, rather rarefied, on the frigid side, and almost certainly inexperienced. And Cazalis was as he was. I speculate.
“I say: It seems to me Cazalis must at once have found himself involved in serious sexual dissatisfactions, frustrations, and disagreeable conflicts. I say: There must have been recurrent episodes of impotence. Or his wife was unresponsive, unawakened, or actually repelled. He began to feel an erosive inadequacy, perhaps? Yes, and a resentment. It wouldn’t be unnatural. He, the highly successful entrepreneur of the biological process, can’t master the technique of his own marriage. Also, he loves his wife. She is an intelligent woman, she has a fragile charm, reserve, breeding; even today, at 42, she’s handsome; at 19 she must have been extremely attractive. Cazalis loves her as only a man can love who is old enough to be the father of the highly desirable object of his affections. And he’s inadequate.
“So I say: A fear is born. Undoubtedly this fear arises from altogether different causes, but it expresses itself in a disguised form: he becomes afraid he will lose his young wife to another man.”
Ellery drank some coffee and Seligmann waited. The ormolu clock on the mantelpiece kept a sort of truce between them.
“The fear is nourished,” continued Ellery, “by the great difference in their ages, temperaments, backgrounds, interests. By the demands of his practice, his long hours at the hospital assisting other men’s wives to bring other men’s children into the world, by his enforced professional absences from Mrs. Cazalis — frequently at night.
“The fear spreads like cancer. It gets out of control. Cazalis becomes violently suspicious of his wife’s relationships with other men, no matter how slight, no matter how innocent — especially of her relationships with younger men.
“And soon this fear grows into an obsession.
“Professor Seligmann.” Ellery eyed the old Viennese. “Was Edward Cazalis obsessively jealous of his wife during the first four years of their marriage?”
Seligmann picked up his pipe and rather deliberately set about knocking it out. “Your method, Mr. Queen, is one unknown to science,” he said with a smile. “But this of great interest to me. Continue.” He stuck the empty pipe in his mouth.
“Then Mrs. Cazalis becomes pregnant.” Ellery frowned. “One could imagine at this point Cazalis’s fears would recede. But no, he’s passed the point of reasonableness. Her very pregnancy feeds his jealousy and becomes suspect. Isn’t this a confirmation of his suspicions? he asks himself. And he insists — he insists — on taking care of his wife himself. He is undoubtedly excessively devoted, solicitous, and watchful. Gestation unfortunately takes nine months. Nine months in which to watch a fetus grow. Nine months in which to torture himself with a question which at last bursts forth in the full deformity of obsession: Is this child mine? Is it?
“Oh, he fights it. He fights an endless battle. But the enemy is discouraging. Kill it in one place and it springs up, viciously lively as ever, in another. Does he ever tell his wife of his suspicions? Accuse her outright of infidelity? Are there scenes, tears, hysterical denials? If so, they only serve to strengthen his suspicions. If not, if he keeps his raging fears bottled up, then it’s even worse.
“Mrs. Cazalis comes to term, goes through labor.
“And there she lies.
“In the delivery room.
“Under his hands.
“And the baby dies.
“Professor Seligmann, do you see how far I’ve traveled?”
The old man merely waggled the pipe in his jaws.
“Mrs. Cazalis becomes pregnant a second time. The process of suspicion, jealousy, self-torment, and uncertainty-certainty repeats itself. Again Cazalis insists on seeing his wife through her pregnancy. Again he insists on performing the delivery.
“And again his baby dies in the delivery room.
“His second child, dead like the first.
“Under his hands.