This Sweet Sickness
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| Author | Patricia Highsmith |
|---|---|
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Genre(s) | Novel |
| Publisher | Heinemann |
| Released | 1961 |
| Media type | Print (Hardback & Paperback) |
| Pages | 240 pp (hardback edition) |
| ISBN | ISBN 0-434-33508-8 (hardback edition) |
This Sweet Sickness is a 1961 novel by Patricia Highsmith about a young man who fancies a girl and is convinced that they are going to be married in the near future. Though he is aware of certain obstacles that are in his way before he can marry the girl of his dreams, the fact that he is really insane is only gradually revealed by the seemingly objective third person narrator (who in fact minutely chronicles the protagonist's downfall and who to a very large extent gives the reader an insight into the workings of the young man's mind rather than an objective account). The action takes place in New England in the late 1950s.
[edit] Plot summary
28 year-old David Kelsey leads a double life. During the week he lives under his real name at Mrs McCartney's boarding house and has a well-paid job as a scientist. At the weekends, while pretending to visit his invalid mother at a nursing home (while his mother has in fact been dead for quite some time), he assumes the identity of William Neumeister and stays at an isolated house which he bought under that name. Neumeister sees himself as a success at whatever he does (he has even won the heart of 24 year-old Annabelle), whereas Kelsey considers himself a failure. In both his lives he lives like a recluse. He has bought and furnished his house for Annabelle, the love of his life, who in reality has never come to visit him there. Every weekend he cooks dinner for two, with Annabelle present only in his imagination. One weekend two of his workmates, Wes Carmichael and Effie Brennan, "in the mood to do something a little nuts", decide to secretly follow him. On this occasion they see him enter the house without realising that it is his own and without Kelsey noticing it.
Kelsey somewhat suffers under what he calls "the Situation": Annabelle marries another man, a Gerald Delaney, and gives birth to a son. Kelsey is convinced that Annabelle has made a serious mistake, but he does not give up hope to get her in the end. He keeps writing her letters in which he insists that she leave her husband and marry him. Furious, Gerald Delaney comes to the boarding house to speak to Kelsey and is given directions by Effie as to where he might find him. Shortly afterwards Delaney shows up at Kelsey's house, where Kelsey kills him in the ensuing fight.
Kelsey calmly reports the incident at the nearest police station. The police have no reason to doubt what he tells them: that his name is Neumeister, that he is a freelance journalist who travels a lot, that he did not know Delaney or any of his family, and that he only acted in self-defense on being attacked by a stranger. Of course Kelsey's "Situation" is much more complicated now: He is positive that no-one must ever find out that Kelsey and Neumeister are the same person because (a) Annabelle would hardly forgive him and marry the man who killed her first husband; and (b) the police would all at once see a clear motive behind that killing and no longer buy his story about a stranger attacking him with a gun.
Consequently, Kelsey builds an astonishing web of lies, deception, betrayal and denial. When doing so, he has to rely heavily on the people surrounding him not telling anyone about their suspicions. Effie, who is in (unrequited) love with Kelsey, promises him she will never tell anyone that Kelsey and Neumeister are one and the same person. When Annabelle wants to meet Neumeister in person to ask him about the circumstances of her husband's death, he writes her a very sympathetic letter (signed Neumeister), which she accepts instead of a personal meeting. Kelsey also sells his house, quits his job, gets a new one nearer to where Annabelle lives, moves out of the boarding house and buys a new house, now in his real name.
He now wants to see Annabelle more often, but she remains elusive. One day he finds out that she is seeing someone else, a man called Grant Barber. When Kelsey shows up at her apartment he becomes violent. Also, he is no longer able to do his job properly. Some time later, when he learns that Annabelle has married Grant Barber, his mind quickly starts to deteriorate. When Wes and Effie visit him at his new house one weekend, he has memory lapses and uses the name "Bill" ("Call me Bill") in front of Wes, who subsequently becomes increasingly suspicious. The weekend ends in an argument, with Wes driving away in order to cool off. When he comes back he finds Effie in Kelsey's bedroom, with her neck broken, and Kelsey gone.
It takes both Wes and the police awfully long to "put one and one together". Although the police have been searching for William Neumeister, they have not yet found out that he is just Kelsey's alter ego. When they finally do realise, Kelsey is already in New York City, his mind quickly going to pieces. He buys a new suit, visits a museum ("Two, sir?"), and has dinner for two at an expensive restaurant (although he is of course on his own and not with Annabelle). In the end, with no cash left, he visits his old schoolmate Ed Greenhouse on Manhattan's Riverside Drive. When Greenhouse calls the police, Kelsey commits suicide by jumping from a ninth floor window.
