The Mysteries of New Orleans (The Longfellow Series of American Languages and Literatures)

by Baron Ludwigvon Reizenstein

  The watchman set the child on the ground after he had opened the door leading to the mean apartment. Then he returned to his appointed rounds.

  Chapter 2

  THE NURSE

  Just as in the case of particular individuals, the history of nations is made remarkable not only by extraordinarily great deeds but also by lowly tasks carried out by silent sufferers. In fact, great and mighty deeds that appear at first glance to be worthy of praise often darken and fade into the background on closer examination—since their motives are found to have an impure basis. This is the case with those men who found it easy during the late epidemic to win an eminent name because of their wealth. They earned the enviable name of philanthropists to their suffering fellow man, just as does the tyrant who exploits and robs his people through his entire life but distributes money and food to the poor during a famine or some other disaster. These philanthropists from the “upper-ten” class were often such base persons, despite their great donations to charitable institutions, that whatever they gave with one hand they sought to win back again with the other, double or triple. Their names had to glitter in the newspapers, and the amounts that they had sacrificed on the altar of poverty and misery had to be precisely reported. Would they have given a cent under any other circumstances? The best and noblest philanthropists were certainly those who personally visited the hovels of the poor in this time, without having their deeds trumpeted forth in the journals; they did far more good with their direct help than those pseudophilanthropists who found it more comfortable and less perilous to simply give money to associations that help the miserable. Yet doing so would still be excusable, since not everyone is born a Samaritan, and they can put their idiosyncrasies aside—and we know how dangerous idiosyncrasies can be in an epidemic—but the fact they did not care whether these funds were spent to aid the poor is the stone that we cast at them. It must bear down on their conscience like a ton when it strikes them, if they even possess a conscience in this matter. Some examples will expose some of the ambiguity of their gifts and will also take away much of the false glamour with which the English newspaper mill has gilded their names.

  A certain Joshua W* gave the Howard Association the sum of two hundred and fifty dollars for the suffering of New Orleans.* One would say that it is a fine and noble deed for this man to contribute to a fund that will aid and rescue the poor sick of this city—it is good that Joshua W* did not neglect to give of his surplus to the needy; indeed, it is also good that during the dreadful tribulations caused by yellow fever he remained in the city, although he had the means to travel to the furthest corner of the world and avoid all danger. So those persons who have never had the honor of knowing him will judge him solely on the fact that he put two hundred and fifty dollars in the coffers of the Howard Association. Nevermind that he gave only in order that his renown should not lag behind that of other rich cohorts and moral Don Quixotes and that he should be celebrated in the newspapers. Mr. Joshua was in fact one of those whose cruelty and greed has brought about the death of whole families.

  Mr. Joshua, to be precise, owns a great number of houses whose roomy and well-ventilated apartments remained virtually empty through the entire epidemic because his propertied renters had left the city. At the same time, he also has miserable, pitiable tenements, true filth-holes that have not been improved or cleaned in ages. Just living in one of these places is injurious to health and leads to yellow fever, even without an epidemic in the city. These tenements are too old and dilapidated for the owner to expend anything on them. The boards are half-rotted, and the timbers on which these fever-factories stand are stuck in muck yards deep. Add to this the sweepings and refuse from preparing sea rations in neighboring houses, and the portrait of this paradise of a residence is complete. But Mr. Joshua understands how to make money from filth. During this dreadful yellow fever season, these tenements, numbering six to eight in number, were all rented to poor families who obviously could not afford his larger houses. If Mr. Joshua really had the sense of charity that his donation to the Howard Association was supposed to prove, why did he not take the poor families out of these open graves and put them into his healthier houses, which stood empty the entire summer? Well, that would be asking too much, the narrow-minded rabble of land-speculators will declare; how can anyone demand that he lose rent on account of some poor families who would be injured by staying in his tenements? Hasn’t he done enough by giving two hundred and fifty dollars to the Howard Association? This rabble is right, yes—but Mr. Joshua has not won as much rent from his swamp-holes as he might have hoped. Between 23 and 29 July, all of his renters succumbed to the disease, and the few old mattresses and broken chairs that he found as inventory could not even be auctioned as he had hoped. That is one of your Croesuses, New Orleans, who clothes himself in the mask of philanthropy in a terrible time! Is Mr. Joshua W* a murderer or not?

  The apartment we saw Gertrude enter with Lorie, the raftman’s daughter, was in a similar tenement, only a bit roomier and not so deeply mired in the muck. The dreadful and extraordinary circumstances that led to the deprivation into which the count’s family had descended for a second time will be imparted to the reader in a later chapter.

  Alerted by the sound of the door opening, a woman with her head pointed at the door half-raised her body from a narrow cot, which was covered by a hole-pitted mosquito net.

  “It’s you at last, my dear child?” she called out in a painful and concerned tone to Gertrude, who could barely stay on her feet but still lurched toward the bed from which the voice came.

  “Mother, I went to several doctors, but none wanted to come with me if I didn’t pay in advance—now I have no idea what to do—”

  “Oh my good child, you have heated yourself too much, give your mother a kiss and lie down with Amelie and rest a bit; otherwise you will get sick, too.”

  “Come, Gertrude,” a weak child’s voice now called out, “Mother is right, lie down with me—I am not as sick as the others. But bring me a glass of ice water, I am so thirsty.”

  Gertrude was only too aware that she was already sick, but the ardent child said nothing so as not to frighten her mother. After she gave her mother a kiss, she sank down on the mattress on the floor beside her mother’s bed, which served as little Amelie’s sickbed.

  A cheap candle burned on the mantel, alongside several empty mustard cans and some jars still containing a little castor oil. That was the total pharmacopeia that the count’s family could afford; Gertrude had brought the doctor’s prescriptions back from the nearby pharmacy unfilled, since the few cents they’d given gave her had not been enough to pay for the medicine. In a rude tone, the pharmacist had demanded either payment or a ticket and an order from a physician of the Howard Association, and when Gertrude had asked for more information about the association, he’d shoved the prescription back at her and told her to take it to another pharmacy. It was not even worth his time to tell her where to go to get tickets.*

  The room in which Melanie, the mother, now resided with her children was miserable. Gertrude would now sleep here for the first time. She had remained awake entire nights until now; if her eyes had closed due to exhaustion, she had dozed where she sat.

  Before this unfortunate family had moved in, the apartment had been held by a black washerwoman who also practiced a horizontal profession. Next to this room was a board enclosure that only received the dignity of being called a living space by the fact that human beings were present. The enclosure was roomy enough. What its earlier use had been will not be mentioned here. It would be a sin against the feelings that beset us in the face of so much misery and tribulation.

  A girl’s voice sounded feverishly from this enclosure, which received only a narrow ray of light from the candle burning in the front room.

  “Mother! Suzie is not moving; I have also called Father and Hugo twice, but I’ve heard nothing—”

  “Great God!” Melanie cried out as she tried to raise herself from
her cot. But she still sank back down.

  “Mother, Mother! I am afraid—is Gertrude with you? Bring the light in, I cannot stand up—I am so weak.” the girl’s voice repeated.

  “Gertrude!” Melanie gave a great effort to raise her tall body from the bed, but again it was in vain. “Gertrude, take the candle to Constanze.”

  The answer was a mere whimper.

  “Amelie!” Melanie cried out. “Amelie! Is Gertrude sleeping?”

  “Mother, dear Mother, I think I’m dying—” was the answer from the sickbed where Gertrude and Amelie lay.

  The unfortunate mother let loose with a cry of pain that would have broken the hardest heart.

  At the same moment, a half-dressed girl rushed in from the enclosure and grabbed for the candle, taking it with her. For an instant, fear had driven Constanze into that state of terror in which a feverish person can become virtually uncontrollable. Even though she had not even been able to stand up a moment ago, now it seemed as if her feet had wings.

  This impulse never lasted for long.

  For a few moments it was as still as death as Constanze rushed from the front room into the enclosure with the burned-down candle.

  Wasn’t anyone in the family able to make a move, even a cry of pain?

  Had Melanie forgotten Constanze’s cry of concern, and why had Constanze asked for the candle? Why was there this dreadful pause?

  We can see nothing here, where Gertrude and Amelie are lying, since Constanze has taken the candle away.

  So let’s go where the light is—let’s look into the enclosure.

  There stands Constanze with the candle in her shaking right hand next to the pitiful bed on which the old count, her father, lies with Hugo. Hugo has turned his face to his father’s. They are looking at each other, yet they are not awake. They lie there so peacefully, yet they are not sleeping. Both of them have their mouths wide open, and yet they are not speaking. How could they speak, since they are no longer breathing? No sound passes their blue-black lips.

  Cease your dreadful pantomime, Constanze! Let your tears run down, and make some sort of sound for your lost father and brother! Let us weep with you, but do not continue to stand there and do nothing!

  Your mother in the next room is not moving, but she is listening for your first word, your first call; she wants to know why you took the candle, Constanze!

  Then the eldest daughter of the count turns from her father and brother and looks at her bed, where she had been lying with her youngest sister, with Suzie.

  The same pantomime yet again, Constanze? Don’t be concerned that a drop from your candle will drop on Suzie’s cheek. Your little sister will not feel it any more.

  It is your good luck, pen, that you have portrayed an elevated tragedy, that you have not stooped to scratch out common terms such as black vomit and the like. It is your good luck that you do not use the profane language of a physician.

  People have tears and cannot weep; they have a heart and feel nothing; they have words, but those die on their lips—that is the problem with the greatest pain. The tears, the heart, and the words only begin once the pain has become a memory. So Constanze stepped out of the enclosure to her mother’s bed. The tall, noble figure of Melanie erected itself, now a mourning Niobe, and she heard her daughter say: “Mother! Father, Brother, and Suzie are no more.” The mother had already suspected what her daughter had to say when she returned with the candle. It was no longer a surprise.

  The curse of yellow fever often strikes swiftly and unexpectedly, and someone who is fresh and alert today can be dead tomorrow.

  Just as a beautiful garden announces its presence with its magical aroma, even when the entire night heaven is covered with black clouds, just as the fresh images of flowers entice us and draw our senses into fairy tale lands, so also that house, that chamber, called—even where the throttling angel of plague had swung his shining scythe. But here there are no blossoms in whose depths we can linger; here we are driven back by a primal warning force, and disgust and horror rises in those who had been driven to madness by unspeakable pain only moments before. That is the fearful curse of this plague! One is driven back by disgust, and even where one should feel sympathy, aversion rises along with its cold sweat and the stench of corpses. This is why Constanze did not reenter the enclosure; rather, she simply went to the door and quietly closed it. Mother saw this, but she said nothing. Both of them could have only one thought: “They have died, and they are calling us soon to be with them.”

  A wagon halted outside.

  At once the door opened and a young man entered, followed by a small girl in poor clothing.

  It was Lorie with a physician from the Howard Association.

  As soon as Lorie became aware of the hopeless situation of her friend Gertrude’s relatives were involved, she rushed off to get help at a nearby branch of the Howard Association. To be sure, she also had an obligation to return to the people she served as an attendant and for whom she had been hauling the ice block, which now lay in the count’s family’s apartment, melted by now to quite a small piece. But her childish heart commanded her to care first for her former playmate and her parents and siblings. Attendants were a rarity during this time, and it was usually necessary to pay a great deal to satisfy their—not unjust—demands. They were often taken by the illness themselves before they could be of the least assistance to their charges.

  So it was the same in private houses as in public charitable institutions. The protecting hand had to be paid, and one received only if one had something to give in return.

  Thus Lorie, although still quite a child but as capable and energetic as an adult, had been taken on by a prosperous family after their domestics died, one after another, of yellow fever. Her own mother had been swept away at the very onset of the epidemic. Lorie had offered her services as a nurse when the head of the family and two of his grown sons lay ill with the disease. She was promised three dollars a day, certainly very good pay for such a young thing as Lorie. She gave up this service in order to help her friend Gertrude, and in her enthusiasm she did not give a thought for the trouble she caused the other family. She couldn’t earn anything from the count’s family—still, how can children think about money when their heart leads? That is an adult prerogative.

  Lorie had been fortunate enough to find an energetic and conscientious physician. If she had come a half-hour later, she might have found one of those physicians who, rather than serving their patients, preferred to be paid by the association while they relax at the lake in happy dolce far niente. It is rare for a young physician to inspire the confidence necessary for healing, all the more so if their youth is supplemented by an uncourtly manner. There is a good reason for that. Most physicians who are too young have neither the experience that comes only through years of a trying practice nor that noble jewel called conscientiousness. This is particularly the case with physicians in our city. If a person starts out as a quack and saves one out of twenty patients—even by accident—then one can treat even an experienced physician with disdain. The physician who came with Lorie was not, however, in this category. Despite his youth, he was a physician of splendid renown, a yellow fever specialist par excellence. He had not only had good luck with those in the grips of the illness but also had developed a splendid routine with all the other illnesses that arose in our oppressive climate.

  The doctor stood for a few moments in horror as he became aware of the untold misery revealed before him. He had visited many hovels of poverty during this dreadful time, but it had never shaken him so much as this one. Constanze lay stretched out on the half-rotted boards next to the foot of her mother’s cot. She had fallen on the spot after she had brought her mother the message of death. Her right hand was clenched on her breast, while her left hand rested on her glowing forehead. All of her blood had gone to her breasts, her head, and the upper extremities, and there the wild currents rushed about like a sea of fire. From her stomach down to her feet, she was a
s cold as ice. Her lower body seemed already dead, while her upper body was being consumed by the glowing mixture that rushed about in it. The physician found the mother, Gertrude, and Amelie in the same condition. The two younger girls, particularly Gertrude, were hallucinating. Several times she called out Lorie’s name. In an instant, the practiced glance of the physician correctly determined that two of the patients had been treated but that the treatment had been interrupted. There was no mention of the doctor who had been called at first but stayed away when his second demand for payment had not been met. Now all four lay in the most dreadful fever, and there was no time to appraise negligent treatment. Since neither paper nor ink was available, the physician tore a sheet from his pocketbook and wrote a prescription. Then he gave Lorie the most precise instructions on what she was to do after he had departed and she had returned from the pharmacy with the medicine. He also promised to return in two hours and bring a nurse, in case she could not bear the burden. He saw only too well that it was too late, that a supernatural miracle would be needed for Constanze and her mother to recover. Salvation was only possible for Gertrude and Amelie. Despite that, the conscientious young man could not deny any of the patients anything and had to do everything in his power.

  When the doctor came down to the street and started to enter his carriage, he was amazed to find a man sitting in it, holding the reins in his hands.

  “You are a doctor?” the man declared in a commanding tone.

  “Yes,” the young physician replied with shock, stepping on a spoke of the front wheel.

  “I had already determined that from the miserable coach—it is good that I found it,” he declared.

  “But sir, what are you doing? What do you want? Who gave you permission to sit in my carriage and hold the reins of my horse? Get out, or tell me what you really intend to do.”

  Instead of replying, the man gave the physician such a dreadful blow on the forehead that he fell back without a sound on the sharp curb of one of the stones that divide the sidewalk from the street. At the same instant, a small, bent figure crossed the street to the carriage.