Mortailty & Mercy in Vienna (MMV) Summary

[John Bailey]

Cleanth Siegel, a 30 year old diplomat freshly returned to Washington, 
arrives at an address given to him by his (perhaps) girlfriend Rachel. The 
situation (following tortuous instructions to reach a destination which does 
not include Rachel) sparks an associative train of thought, touching on 
Siegel’s job (with the ‘Commission’), history (army, college), religious 
upbringing (Jewish/Catholic) and some of the figures from his past. He’s 
here for a party, but doesn’t want to be.

Siegel is greeted at the door by David Lupescu, a wild and woolly 
funhouse-mirror image of himself, and ushered into the pre-party apartment. 
Lupescu carries a pig foetus which he tacks to a doorframe and claims as an 
homage to Dadaism. He looks mad. Smells drunk. Talks funny. Comes to a 
sudden decision and leaves, bequeathing his position as host to the 
bewildered Siegel.

Siegel calls Rachel and is told that he’ll be on his own tonight, as she’s 
tied up with babysitting. Before she’s done, the first guests arrive: a 
Proto-Pig Bodine style sailor-suited Southerner with a retro-bohemian girl 
on his back. Some mild banter before the apartment is filled with roaring 
college boys, forcing Siegel and the neo-boho (Lucy) into a bedroom to talk 
privately. He confesses to her his predicament, and she informs him that 
Lupescu was “going native” anyway. This sparks another lengthy digression on 
the topic of “going native” in urban environments, following the trajectory 
of a former roommate named Grossmann who had lost himself to Boston.

Lucy offers to help Siegel if he’ll listen to her problems. He agrees, and 
she launches into a detailed and circuitous narrative of friends and enemies 
and lovers and rivals. This continues for fifteen minutes before they 
informed of increasing collegiate mayhem back out in the throng, and Siegel 
resolves to play the host as requested. He spots one of the characters in 
Lucy’s story, a Debby Considine, who has brought with her an Ojibwa fellow 
named Irving Loon. Considine reprises Lucy’s role as 
girl-with-a-burden-to-share, and Siegel again finds himself comfortably 
falling into Lupescu’s role of father-confessor.

This time around, his subject is concerned about Loon’s psychological state, 
linking it to the native American legend of the windigo and the modern 
interpretation of “windigo psychosis”. Siegel recalls what he has previously 
heard of this state, and the stories of the windigo, but upon returning his 
attention to Considine feels that his role is only to listen and give 
absolution, not to dispense “practical advice.” Soon enough, he has had 
enough, and returns to the party (again). He is introduced to Loon, who 
seems distant. A nervous Paul Brennan approaches and the father-confessor 
act is on again. By the time he is free, Siegel has been contemplating (in a 
paranoid manner) the idea that Loon is possessed of the windigo psychosis.

The party is slowing down when Siegel’s paranoia is proven not unfounded. 
Loon passes in a trance and fetches a rifle from the confessional bedroom. 
Siegel takes five seconds to consider his course of action before leaving 
quietly, and shrugging when the first screams reach his departing ears.





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