By Lida Prypchan
The Circular Tomb
Though difficult to believe, science advances, but nobody dares to delve deeper into the human beast.
“Listen up,” said the man in the gray suit, frowning: “Civilization?” Freud laughed at everyone who denied the existence of the beast that man carries inside. I make reference to this because I witnessed the transformation of a kind and charitable man into a vindictive one. He was an Anglo-Saxon who made us think of a not very emotional being, or at least that is what he demonstrated. Talking about him means showing him as a man who had three loves: his daughter Lucy, music and justice. His daughter fell in love with an athlete who mocked her feelings and, for this reason, she hanged herself. She was 16 years old when she did so. Her father hired a private detective to inform him of the reason that led his daughter to suicide. He learned who the athlete was, what he did, etc. Among other important things, he found out that a year before his daughter’s suicide, another girl had ended her life for the same reason, but using different means: poisoning.
A Latin man would have shot the man to blame for the death of his daughter, but realize that this is an Anglo-Saxon who is rather reserved in expressing his affections. He carried out a Machiavellian plan with the intention of avenging the painful disappearance of his daughter, a plan that he called called “The Circular Tomb.” He proceeded thusly: he rented an apartment on the top floor of a large building, changed his name, posed as an importer who had many affairs abroad and had to make frequent trips that sometimes lasted for months. He told the doorman and administrator that he had left many valuables in his apartment and that under no circumstances was anybody to enter.
In his apartment, he dedicated a little studio room for his purposes: he installed an air conditioner, set up a TV that would be on day and night, arranged a table on which he placed bread and water, and from the wall hung a thick chain with an iron ring on the end that would go around the ankle of the young athlete, whose name was David.
Meanwhile, he obtained some commercial papers with fake letterheads and, using one of them, wrote a letter to David, offering him a job with a great salary in a non-existent company. David, excited, quickly replied to the address indicated by Morton. Morton phoned him and they agreed on three things: 1. to meet at a famous restaurant; 2. that David would take his car; and 3. that he would not tell anyone about the job offered him, or the the day or the time of the meeting. Imagine them after dinner, heading to the room Morton rented. Once there, he poured him a drink laced with a sleeping pill. David fell down, exhausted. Morton removed his shoes, belt and emptied his pockets, placing a suggestive note in one of them, which I shall refer to shortly. The small room had a peculiarity: it was circular and, on the other hand, it was soundproof. The car was very easy to get rid of: he left it in a very crowded parking lot and, after two days, thieves appeared and did their work.
Finally David woke up with with an aching head and ankle, and then realized that a huge ring was weighing around his ankle. He tried to reflect and think that it was a sick joke Morton was playing on him. After a while he found Morton’s note in one of his pockets, which read: “I’m sorry, man, but I have to go; please be my guest until I return. I’ve left you bread and water. I will be absent for several days. Make yourself comfortable until I return.” His life consisted, from that day onwards, of eating bread, drinking water, watching TV, and waking up with the feeling that he was in a circular tomb. I forgot to say that he yelled until he could no more, but not a soul in that building heard. I suppose he cried and kicked to no avail. I know that one day Morton arrived with bread and water for his little prisoner. The young man was in a deep sleep and it showed that he had suffered greatly, and even worse: without knowing why a friendly-looking businessman would want to mortify him in such a cruel way. David died, I don’t know on what date, but Morton freed himself from a deep pain.
Revenge is common at all levels. The most exact formulation of it I read in a book written by a Polish man, titled “The Painted Bird”: “One has to get one’s revenge until reaching the point of not feeling the weight that burdens us. If people do something to us that does not hurt, revenge makes no sense, but if, even for an insignificant thing, we feel the tear of a sensitive fiber of our being, we become wild beasts.”
There are two ways: 1. either we achieve release through evil; or 2. we keep our pain and frustrated revenge, which withers with time, turning into bitterness.
How Freud knew us and how psychologists know us! And though it’s difficult to believe, science advances, but nobody dares to delve deeper into the human beast.
It is horrible to witness shows of base human passions! This often involves going crazy, looking for solutions for others and forgetting that one is also half human and half beast.
