by Belva Plain
Once, in the elevator, Martin saw her parents, two people grown abruptly small and old. The mother huddled and shivered, although July blazed outside. When they saw Martin, they turned away and he understood that they were holding him responsible and would always hold him so.
At the office he continued to hold regular hours. Eastman did not come in. Obviously, he had interrupted his vacation only for the Moser girl. It seemed to Martin that the secretaries looked at him with curiosity and compassion. Probably they had been told he wouldn’t be with them much longer.
And for Vicky Moser the days rolled slowly through their routines: feeding tubes, spinal taps, antibiotics, anticonvulsive. If she lives, Martin thought, she may not be able to talk. She may not be able to move. Or she may be able to talk only nonsense and move with the violence of an animal. Even though officially the girl was not his patient, in his mind she was so still. With him she had entered the desert, so to speak, and he must see her out of it.
Whatever happened, they would say it was his fault Eastman would see to that, had seen to it already. And it wouldn’t be his fault. Still, what if it were?
He began to pray: O God, don’t let her die; she’s only eighteen. Strange that he should pray! He had had no interest in religion for years, being neither for it nor against it. He wondered whether his beseeching was not perhaps some sort of theatricality, watching himself at humble prayer in a fine old tradition, without believing a word of it. And then he remembered his father’s rounded cadence in the moldy green parlor before winter breakfasts and he felt like crying.
O God, don’t let her die!
At the hospital, late one afternoon as he was about to go into Vicky’s room, Martin met Eastman coming out.
“Anything you want?” Eastman asked bluntly.
“Just to know how the patient is doing.”
“My patient,” Eastman said, “is doing badly. I plan to operate again in the morning.”
Martin was appalled. “Operate again? But why?”
“Self-evident, I should say.”
“I would guess there’s hemorrhaging, which ought to subside. If you ask me, we should give it some more time.”
“I’m not asking you. I’m of the opinion that there are splinters in there, and I’m going back for them.”
“Doctor,” Martin said earnestly, “let’s put personal feelings aside for a minute. I give you my word there are none. I removed them all.”
“Damn it! You couldn’t have!”
No stranger would have believed that this man could ever be genial. His eyes were hostile; his lips folded inward, making a gash across the chin.
“I’m having X-rays in the morning, naturally, but I can tell you right here and now what they will show.”
He swung around. His shoes slapped the floor smartly all the way to the elevator.
When Martin went into the room he saw at once that there had been no change. The very air felt cold, as if some chill were issuing from that poor body, as in a crypt where the dead have lain for centuries. He stood a moment, shuddered, and went downstairs again, out to the searing street Here were the smells of life—gasoline and dog droppings and a sugary whiff from the open door of a bakery.
Why had she not revived? There were no splinters, he knew there weren’t. Still, suppose there were? Eastman was going to operate again, and she wouldn’t be able to take the shock. If she died—
He thought of the times he had been present when a family received the news of death. A husband, a mother or a child dies; some people can accept such loss in wordless despair; others scream, protest that it can’t be true. It was the mast terrible errand a doctor ever had to carry out, and one never would, never could, get used to it.
That night Martin scarcely slept. At five o’clock he got up and walked through echoing streets to the hospital. He half hoped Hazel Janos would be there, then recalled that she went off duty at midnight. A bulky, middle-aged woman in white was dozing upright in the chair beside the bed.
“Is there any change?” he whispered, and the woman answered, “None.”
Gently, Martin raised one eyelid, then the other, and turned his flashlight on. There was no contraction of the pupils. He sighed.
Then he lifted the blanket, reached for a limp arm and stroked it Was there, or did he imagine a very, very faint withdrawal of the flesh, a reaction to his touch? He felt a swift rise of expectation and as quickly stifled it He pressed harder. Was there a movement, the merest fraction of movement?
“Did you see that, Nurse?”
She turned up the light and leaned over the bed.
“Here. I’ll show you.”
Again Martin pressed the arm, and now he was sure he saw a slight withdrawal.
“Did you see it? Did you?
“Yes. Yes, I think I did. Oh, Doctor, do you think possibly—”
And the two of them, the aging woman and the young man, stared at each other across the bed.
“I don’t dare hope,” Martin said. It may mean nothing at all, he told himself, only a reflex, a flicker in a dead brain. It probably does mean nothing. Yet he hoped.
At seven the shifts changed and a new nurse came. He heard the two women whispering in the corridor outside the room as he stood watching by the bed. Still the girl lay, the marble effigy on the tomb. At eight o’clock orderlies arrived to wheel her below for X-rays.
“I hear they’re going to operate again,” the nurse remarked with curiosity. She had a handsome, cold face. Martin didn’t answer. Hazel Janos would care, he thought suddenly.
At eight-fifteen Mr. Moser entered the room, stopped when he saw Martin and frowned. “I thought you were off the case.”
“I am. This is purely unofficial. I’m humanly concerned to see how my work turned out.”
Mr. Moser sat down next to the nurse. They spoke in such low tones that Martin couldn’t hear, but he wasn’t supposed to hear. He was to be excluded.
At the window he looked down to aimless scurry and hurry on the street below. From this height human beings were no more than water beetles on a pond. Awesome to think how in each one, that man lifting the trash can, that one inching his car into a parking space, raged a private, daily struggle with the universe!
When Dr. Eastman came in, Martin did not turn around.
“We shall have to operate,” he heard Eastman say in his quiet voice of authority. “There’s undoubtedly a splinter in there, maybe more than one. We’ll know, of course, as soon as the X-rays come up.”
In the room there was total silence. Martin, still standing at the window, felt eyes on his back. At eight-fifty a technician came in with the X-rays.
“Thank you, Mr. Poole,” Eastman said formally.
Now Martin turned around as Eastman held the X-rays to the light. The brain was a gray-and-white intaglio on the plate. Spare, Martin thought, like modern art. For a long minute or two Eastman studied it while Mr. Moser, puzzled and afraid, peered over his shoulder.
At last Moser spoke. “Well, Doctor?”
Eastman pursed his lips. “Perplexing. Perplexing.”
“What is?”
“There’s nothing. Unless—”
“Unless what?”
“Well, no splinters—that I can see.”
A strange sound, part laugh, part sob, forced itself from Martin’s throat. It was almost inaudible, but Eastman heard it. He looked over and then quickly away.
So I was right, Martin thought. But still, still there could be infection, couldn’t there? We were absolutely sterile, and yet one never knows.
When the door opened and the patient was brought back, the little group reformed around the bed. Eastman was silent. The others waited for him to say something.
And Moser said softly, “My wife is falling apart.”
Eastman nodded. “I know.”
“What do you suggest now, Doctor?”
“I’ve been thinking—another set of X-rays. There’s got to be something there. I’m still convinc
ed. The ventricles aren’t enlarged, the—”
“Look at this,” Martin said.
“At what?” Eastman said coldly.
Martin turned the flashlight on. “The pupil. She reacts. And this morning I thought I saw—”
“Yes, what?” the father cried.
“It may have been nothing at all.”
“What did you see?” Moser asked. “What did you see?”
“I am not sure. I don’t want to give you fake hopes—”
He pinched the girl’s arm. He thought her lips moved but he couldn’t be sure. And he stood there, stroking, then gently pinching, then pressing that thin white arm. And all the time, without seeing it, he felt Eastman’s gaze upon him, scorning and challenging.
Mr. Moser sighed. “Nothing. Nothing,” he murmured.
“I don’t know. I feel—” Martin began.
What he felt was a slight, slight reflex in the arm.
“I don’t know,” he repeated.
And Vicky’s lips moved. A little sound, a breath, the faintest groan came into the silence around the bed. Martin bent over the girl.
“Are you Vicky?” he whispered. The dry lips moved again, barely touching each other.
“Are you Vicky?”
The eyes flew open. For the first time in days they opened to the light; for a few tense moments they were blank, then subtle recognition gathered there.
“Have you been sick?”
She nodded. Her head barely moved on the pillow, but it was unmistakably a nod.
“You’re going to get well now, Vicky.”
She stared at Martin. Her eyes strained to understand.
“Yes, you are. Do you know I’m a doctor?”
Again she nodded.
Martin thought—be thought his heart was in his throat.
“There’s someone here to see you,” he said softly. “Look,” and he motioned to Moser.
Moser leaned over the other side of the bed.
“Is this your father?” Martin asked.
It was a long minute. “Is this your father?”
The girl’s eyes struggled to focus. The whole face struggled to come back from a far place. There was no sound in the room, no breath, no rustle, as the three men waited, their faces furrowed with their tension.
And finally, finally, into that agonizing silence came a word, very low, but audible and clear.
“Daddy,” she said.
Bob Moser grasped Martin’s hands. “I was half out of my mind, Dr. Farrell! For God’s sake, you can understand that, can’t you? If I was hard on you, if it was unforgivable, try to forgive it, will you? I’ll never forget you till my dying day. I—we—all of our family—we’ll never forget you.”
So much emotion, so much gratitude, were both overwhelming and oppressive. As quickly as he decently could, Martin fled.
Eastman caught up with him outside of the solarium. “I don’t mind telling you, Martin, this has been one of the worst experiences of my professional life. I just went off the deep end. It looked so bad there, just so bad.”
“I understand,” Martin said.
“I’m Sorry if I was unjust to you. I sincerely am. I was wrong and I admit I was.”
There was embarrassment in another human being’s discomfiture. And Martin fidgeted. “That’s all right. As long as it’s turned out well.”
“Turned out well? The girl’s going to come out of this and what can you add to that?” Eastman beamed. Light twinkled on his glasses; his teeth twinkled in a large, affable smile. “So let’s forget the whole business, Martin, and take up where we left off.”
Martin began quietly, “I’ve been doing some thinking, Doctor.”
“Yes?”
“And the sum total of it is—that I really want to go it alone from now on. It’s been a fine opportunity, working with you, and I’ve appreciated it, but—perhaps it’s a matter of temperament—I know I’d rather work alone.”
“Martin, you can have all the freedom you want. That’s what you’re telling me, isn’t it? I understand your position. I give you my word that from now on it will be the way you want it.”
Martin shook his head. “Thank you, Doctor, but I’ve made up my mind. I can wait a few weeks until you find another man, of course. I’m sure there’ll be a dozen knocking at your door to take my place.”
“Don’t be foolish. Don’t cut off your nose to spite your face just because you’re piqued.”
“It’s not pique. I’d been mulling it over long before this, without knowing I was doing so.”
“There’s a depression out there, in case you haven’t noticed.”
“Oh, I’ve noticed, all right! But my wants aren’t very many. I feel I can manage.”
“You’re making a great mistake, Martin!”
“I hope not. But I have to try.” Martin put out his hand. “Thank you for everything, all the same.”
He walked on past the solarium. Wheelchairs stood against the walls. There was a rich smell of flowers; hospital bouquets were wistful, belying the very nature of flowers. He went on past stretchers in the corridors and visitors waiting in the lobby for admission cards. The loudspeaker called with urgence: “Dr. Simmons—stat, Br. Feinstein—stat.” My world, he thought.
Hazel Janos, powder-white from cap to shoes, was coming up the steps. Her eyes widened and brightened when she saw Martin.
“I think our girl’s going to make it,” he told her jubilantly. “She spoke this morning, recognized her father.”
“Oh,” Hazel cried. “I’m so glad! I prayed for her.”
“Say a little prayer for me, too, will you? I’ve taken a big leap. I’ve left Eastman and I’m on my own.”
“I will, but I don’t think you’ll need prayers. You’ve got success written all over you.”
“Have I? Strange, I don’t feel that way about myself. I don’t especially want it, either, if it means being another Eastman.”
“You’d never be like that. You’re soft inside.” For a moment she looked frankly into his eyes; then, flushing, turned away as though she had been too intimate, and went inside through the revolving door.
Martin ran down the steps. It might not be so easy, after all, to make his way without Eastman’s protecting hand. But it was time, as he had said, to try.
And he felt more free than he had felt in a very long time.
Chapter 15
We remember more than we think we do. We understand more of what we see than we are credited with understanding. Years after the fact, one day things fall into place and we say, “Ah true, ah true! I must have known that, really, when I was only five or six or seven.” Flickering as interrupted dreams, the voices—indignant, earnest, mournful—sound again behind shut doors and across the lawn. Sudden tendernesses and secret glances repeat themselves in a dim landscape at the back of a stage, behind a gauze curtain.
The child knew her mother was different from other mothers, from other people. How? When did she first perceive this shameful difference?
The child knew that her father had gone away and that there was something terribly wrong about that. She thought she remembered great height, someone bending down to her, always bending, and being picked up and hugged. There had been a statue in a wide green place, and they two had stood in front of it. There had been a tiny glass boat, hanging on a Christmas tree. She had put out her finger to feel the pointed masts. Gold walnuts hung on the tree. There was a huge glass ball, lavender, so smooth you wanted to stroke it or else to crumble and scrunch it, like that.
“You mustn’t break it,” her father had said.
It was he, wasn’t it? Who else could have said it, then?
Dogs had come barking. The house had been full of dogs. And there had been children, some vague girls and a boy, quite big, who called the jumping dogs away. But she had been frightened, and her father—who else could it have been?—had picked her up and told her not to be afraid.
She asked her mother about this memory, b
ut her mother had forgotten. Her mother had forgotten everything, it seemed, and although she always answered questions patiently, the answers never told anything. So after a while, Claire stopped asking.
One day at a friend’s house after school, an old woman said, “And you’re Claire Farrell! I knew your grandfather. He was a good doctor, a good man.”
“My grandfather? He’s not a doctor. He’s sick at home. He stays in bed most of the time, or on the sofa in the sun parlor.”
“Your other grandfather is the one I mean, child. Your daddy was a doctor here, too, but he didn’t stay very long.”
In the bottom drawer of a cabinet in the library, Claire found the photograph albums. Some of them were very old, bound in shabby red velvet with tarnished metal clasps. The people in these were strange; their wide skirts looked like lampshades. The men had full beards and solemn eyes. She could recognize none of them.
But there was another album, a black one with a broken spine. Here the pages were loose, and some of the pictures slid out of their pointed corners. These were familiar people: Grandpa, looking much the same as now except that his hair was dark; and Mother as a little girl, twisted even then. It was strange to think that a little girl could look like that. Here she was again, older this time, with a dress-up dress on and a pearl necklace, standing next to a laughing girl, much taller than Mother and not twisted. Claire carried the album to where Grandpa sat in the sun parlor.
“Who’s the pretty girl with Mother? That’s our porch they’re standing on.”
“That’s your aunt, Mary Fern. We don’t talk about her anymore. We don’t think about her. You’d best go put that away.”
“Why? Is she dead like Grandma?”
“No, she’s not dead, but she might as well be.”
“Why?”
“Because she was wicked. She did bad things.”
“What bad things?”
“Stealing, for one. Taking things that didn’t belong to her.”
When Mother came in, she was very angry. “I will not have you talking to the child like that, Father,” she said. It seemed to Claire that she was shaking.
