by Belva Plain
When Thérèse came, Lara took her on her lap. The child, wriggling, turned to look up at her.
“Where’s Peggy?” she demanded.
“Peggy’s sick, darling.”
“When is she going to get better?”
“We’re not sure yet.”
“Oh. Can I have that cake?”
Lara had lost her appetite, and most of her dessert was still on the plate. “Of course,” she said.
Connie was feeling a particular shame. How often on behalf of her own little girl had she not envied the beauty of her sister’s child! And here sat her Thérèse, healthy and bright, on Lara’s lap; what must be Lara’s pain as she made the comparison?
They were to drive to the city that day, and Lara was to fly home from LaGuardia Airport instead of Westchester.
“Thérèse has to see the pediatrician for her regular checkup, and I ordered some summer things on Madison Avenue. Anyway, a little change, a little window-shopping, will do you good,” Connie told Lara.
These errands accomplished, they stopped to give Thérèse an ice-cream treat and then walked slowly back up Fifth Avenue, on the Park side in the shade, to the apartment. Suddenly, nearing the museum, they stopped short.
“The man on the bench,” Connie whispered. “Oh, my Lord, look, it’s Richard.”
Her first impulse was to cross the avenue. It was one thing, strangely touching really, to receive his birthday and his Christmas cards, but another thing actually to see the man again. After her moment’s hesitation it was too late to turn away, for he had recognized them and stood up.
“Well, Connie, this is a surprise.”
“How are you, Richard? You remember Lara, of course? And you’ve never met Thérèse. Darling, say hello to Richard. He’s a friend of Mommy’s.”
There! Hadn’t she managed that smoothly? But then awkwardness set in. Since one couldn’t very well just walk away now, something more had to be said, and Connie said the most obvious thing that rushed into her head.
“Lara’s visiting from Ohio.”
When, murmuring some politeness, he acknowledged this fact by turning toward Lara, Connie observed him and was astonished at what she saw. His shirt, which was open at the neck, was plainly dirty. He wore a cotton jacket, but no tie; the jacket, too, was soiled, and he needed a shave; an unkempt blond growth of hair, about three days’ worth, glinted in the light.
Moved by concern and curiosity, she asked him what he was doing. Was he still in advertising?
“I got fed up with that place. Actually, I’m between jobs. I’m taking a vacation.”
“Nothing wrong with that,” she returned brightly, and was irritated by her own fatuous answer. Still, one couldn’t, after all, expect to feel completely at ease in an encounter with one’s former husband. She smiled; the smile also was too bright.
“But you haven’t changed, Connie.”
“Not in seven years?”
“Well, you do have this lovely girl. Thérèse,” he mused. “You always did like anything that was French. And she could be a French child, with her dark bangs and that dress.”
Indeed, the dress had been bought in Paris. He noticed everything. He always had. But what had happened to him?
Lara, too, was conscious of something very strange. And turning up her wrist to show her watch, she reminded Connie of the time.
“Oh, Lara, your plane, of course! Goodness, we have to rush! Sorry, Richard, but—”
He nodded. “Go ahead, don’t be late.” And giving a little wave like a salute, he sat down again on the bench.
They crossed the avenue. Connie, looking back, saw that he was still sitting there, not watching them. His head was sunk on his chest, and he was apparently just staring at the ground.
“What can be wrong with him?” she cried. “Those terribly sad eyes! He looks sick, like a sad, sick beggar.” And Connie shuddered.
“Drinking, do you think? He looked as if he might be.”
“He never drank. Never. But I suppose …” She had no idea what had happened.
They walked on without speaking anymore. Lara was pretending not to have stared quickly at Connie and then looked as quickly away. She’s wondering, Connie thought, what my feelings are. Well, what are they? Disconnected memories speed through my head: those first vivid days in Texas and the euphoria; the child I destroyed would certainly be different from the one whose hand is now so tightly held in mine … how queerly it all unfolds … poor gentle Richard—what’s happened to him?
The car was already waiting at the curb for Lara. When the driver opened the door, Connie laid a hand on Lara’s arm, detaining her.
“Lara … try to take care of yourself. Did you ever think living could be so damned hard?”
“It’s just as well we didn’t think.”
Connie sighed. Bad memories … Richard … Peggy on the hospital bed … the eerie stillness in that room …
She sighed again and kissed her sister, saying only, “Get home safely,” then stood there watching while the car merged with traffic on Fifth Avenue.
“If by some miracle Peggy should be well again”—too often Lara had caught herself saying or thinking the words, and had reprimanded herself because sensible people didn’t count on miracles. That age was past.
And yet it happened.
It was Connie who witnessed it. One afternoon in the third week when she was making her regular stop at the hospital, Connie saw Peggy open her eyes. As, still in a state of shock—“I shall be shocked for the rest of my life when I think of it”—she described the happening, the child’s eyes had opened just long enough for the two pairs of eyes to meet in mutual astonishment. Then Peggy’s had closed again.
“I don’t know how I even had enough strength in my legs to run down the hall. I think I just screamed at the first nurse I met. And the doctors came running, and more nurses. Can you imagine what went on? The excitement? Then I telephoned you, Lara, and you know the rest.”
Within the hour Martin’s plane flew to Ohio. Davey left the plant where he had been discussing an order from a southern hospital, Sue left school, and Lara, trembling and laughing, joined them at the airport.
Before they arrived at the hospital in the early evening, Peggy had awakened for a second time.
“Mommy,” she had whispered. Her frightened gaze had swept the room, and finding the faces all strange except for Aunt Connie’s and Uncle Martin’s, not finding Mommy, she had begun to cry.
Connie stroked her hair. “Mommy’s coming soon. She’s on the way,” she whispered over and over.
And Mommy came. By now they had Peggy propped against pillows, half sitting and half lying. Lara came rushing. She saw no one, spoke to no one; the little crowd parted to let her through, and she fell on her knees beside the bed. Davey, behind her, reached down and curved Peggy’s arms around the mother’s neck.
Nurses standing in the background cried, too, and a young male intern on his first week of service had to turn away.
“How do you explain this?” Martin asked Dr. Bayer. “It’s incredible, a miracle.”
“Well, it’s so rare a happening that you might well call it one,” was the response. “The swellings that come with head injuries seldom take this long to subside. This coma has lasted an extraordinarily long time. Extraordinary.”
“When may we take her home?” asked Davey.
The doctor shook his head. “She won’t be ready for a long time yet. We can’t be sure how much of her mental function has been restored, how much memory or cognition. We don’t even know whether she can walk. You’ll need to keep her here for extensive therapy.” As the parents’ faces fell, he added kindly, “However, what’s very much in her favor is her age. So we don’t in any way mean to sound discouraging, but only to counsel patience.”
And so the families entered the next phase.
Peggy was to spend, it was estimated, another three to eight weeks in intensive care; then if all went well, she might be take
n home and brought back every day for rehabilitation therapy, which would take another two to three months.
“Oh, but we live in Ohio,” Lara cried out in dismay. “How can we—”
Davey began a proposal, “Maybe there’s a place—” to which Martin at once objected.
“Davey, there’s nothing like this anywhere near where you live. You know that. She’ll stay with us, and Connie will drive her over here every day for her treatment.”
Lara and Davey looked toward each other, she reading his mind: I hate to take favors.
“I know you think it’s too much to accept,” she told him in front of everyone, “but you would do it for them, Davey,” and finished mentally, absurd as it seems to think of Martin Berg’s ever needing a favor.
“Of course,” Davey said.
“Good,” Martin answered promptly. “And the weekend offer of the plane still stands.”
The routine was established. It seemed to Lara as if the little person who was Peggy Davis was being lifted and reinjected with life through the sheer loving will of the many who were concentrating all their strength upon her. Now hope at last came pouring through Lara’s very veins, to surge out in sudden bursts of happy tears or reckless laughter. Day by day came small, repeated spurts of growth. Peggy began to walk, tottering a little between the nurses’ hands, then taking her first steps unaided down the hall. Memory came back, as she began to ask about Sue and her friends in school. Carefully, she printed her name on a card to her teacher, who, along with half the town—or so it seemed—had sent cards to her. As the days passed, she demanded attention, and even lost her temper when Connie refused to give her a candy bar before dinner.
Dr. Bayer, who happened to walk in on the tantrum, was amused and pleased. “An excellent sign. A return to normalcy.”
He swooped down on Peggy and lifted her above his head. “My friend! Aren’t you my best friend? Come on, I’ll show you something. You too,” he told Connie. “There’s something you ought to see.”
In the glass-walled sunroom at the end of the hall, he pointed outdoors.
“Look. We don’t often get a chance to see this.”
Blurred by the soft rain, a magnificent rainbow arched across the sky and disappeared behind a tree.
“Oh, beautiful. Beautiful,” Connie whispered.
“The pot of gold must be right there in back of those trees.”
“I won’t even bother to look for it. We’ve already found its pot of gold.” And Connie stroked Peggy’s arm, which lay on the man’s shoulder.
“You’re right, of course,” he said seriously.
Something in his voice, a richness or a compassion, made her look into his face. For all these weeks she had seen him in Peggy’s room and had noted only that he was authoritative in a kindly way and that the child had begun to adore him. Now suddenly she saw him as if for the first time: a man about her own age, with a long, narrow face, long, narrow eyes, and a markedly cleft chin that softened the angularity of his bones.
Spontaneously, she said, “I hope you know how grateful we all are. And not only for your skill. You are so tender with Peggy! I should have told you so before this.”
“You’re very tender with her yourself.”
“She’s my niece, about as close as my own child. We’re a close family.”
“You’re fortunate.”
“You have no children?”
“I’m not married. I have no parents, brothers, or sisters. No ties.” He smiled. “Still, there are always compensations. At the drop of a hat I can pick up and go wherever I want to go in the world.”
“I hope you aren’t planning to leave us before Peggy’s all well again.”
“No, I’ve no plans now. I’ve been everywhere from Vietnam to Egypt, studying head wounds and injuries, so it’s time to stay put for a while. Come, Peggy, we’re going back to your room. You’ll have your dinner, and then you’ll have your candy.”
Connie, as she followed them, had a fleeting thought: He’s someone I’d like to know. But their paths, their ways, were far apart, and the thought vanished.
The day came when Peggy was discharged from the hospital. A room had been prepared for her at Cresthill, a rosy shelter filled with welcoming toys that stood, sat, and lay about: a dollhouse like a Swiss chalet; a stuffed polar bear, a mother Scottie with puppies in a basket, and a panda taller than Peggy herself; dolls—a bride, a Cinderella, and a Peter Pan; a real fish-tank with real tropical fish; a shelf filled with games and a blackboard with colored chalk. It was a mirror image of Thérèse’s room across the hall.
Lara gasped. “What have you done here? I can’t believe it.”
“Well, believe it or not, Martin bought them all,” Connie said. “He goes positively berserk in toy stores.” She opened a closet where hung a row of childish clothes, ruffled and flowered. “Peggy’s certainly grown a size since the winter, so I thought there’s no sense in your bringing old things from home.”
Lara shook her head fondly. “I know. You’re the one who goes berserk over clothes. Oh, Connie, they’re beautiful.”
Connie was pleased. “So you like your goodie packages?”
The “goodies” in their shining white boxes were numerous: a powder-blue velvet dress and pajamas hand embroidered with balloons and teddy bears for Peggy, two Norwegian hand-knitted ski sweaters for Sue, a snowsuit monogrammed in red for Peggy, and a British camel-hair coat fastened with leather buttons for Sue.
“I had such fun shopping. You know how I love to shop. Are the things really all right?”
“You’re a dear, and they’re all wonderful,” Lara said, wondering where and when Peggy would get to wear a powder-blue velvet dress back home. “But what can I say to all this?”
“Say nothing,” Martin answered as he came into the room. He smiled with satisfaction. “She ought to feel at home here for a while, I think.”
“Don’t you dare worry a minute about her,” Connie said. “She’ll be just fine. She’s quite used to us already.”
From the window they could see the two little girls bobbing on the seesaw while the nanny carefully watched.
Connie read Lara’s mind. “Nanny’s been told to be careful of her, not to let her get too tired or to fall. Although really, Lara, that child has to be made of iron. She’s almost back to herself, from what I can see. Well, almost.”
And indeed, compared with Thérèse, Peggy was far the sturdier and the tougher of the two. It crossed Lara’s mind that if the situation were reversed, Peggy would not have been as gentle with her cousin as Thérèse was with her. Peggy had Connie’s drive and energy and sparkle; maybe that was why Connie, without realizing it, had become so attached to the child. So Lara mused, as she watched them playing on the stately lawns of Martin Berg’s great house.
“I think she’ll be spoiled there,” she frequently remarked to Davey whenever they departed for home late on Sunday afternoons.
He laughed. “It won’t hurt her. She’ll get back to normal soon enough when she gets home and has to help clear the table after dinner.”
On the Fourth of July the Bergs gave a party, a celebration for Peggy, who now, except for the slightest hesitancy in her walk, was practically recovered from the long ordeal. Eddy and Pam came. Sue came, at Connie’s suggestion, with a friend. And Peggy, to everyone’s surprise, wanted Dr. Bayer to come too.
“I want Jonathan to come to my party.”
“Jonathan? You mean Dr. Bayer.”
“I call him Jonathan because that’s his name.”
“She’s really in love with him,” Lara said. “What do you think, Martin? Would you mind?”
“Of course not. He’s a very nice guy, and we surely owe him a lot.”
Connie observed, “He probably won’t accept. He must have six other invitations.”
But he did come, to Peggy’s great delight, and proved to be a very pleasant guest, enjoying the children and tennis and a swim in the Olympic-sized pool.
At dusk they all sat down to supper on the terrace. Candles in five-armed silver candelabra flickered through the shadows, and two maids served. Sue and her friend Amy, who had expected the usual red-white-arid-blue picnic of fried chicken and corn on the cob, were obviously overawed by this unfamiliar splendor. They were also not particularly appreciative of duck à l’orange and Grand Marnier soufflé.
The fireworks, however, went well. As darkness fell, blankets were brought to the crest of the hill from where, as they sat on the grass, they could see the rockets from the township’s fireworks display go soaring through the sky.
When the last artificial stars had burst and fallen to the ground, the party broke up. Thérèse and Peggy, half asleep, were carried back to the house.
“Beautiful, isn’t it?” remarked Lara as she walked beside Dr. Bayer.
Connie, within earshot, heard his reply.
“It’s a palace.” And then he added, “I’d never want to live like this, though.”
Surprised, Lara asked why.
“I don’t know. I guess it would just be too much for me.” He laughed. “It’s academic anyway, a problem I’m not likely to have.”
“Nor I,” said Lara.
There was a pause, and Connie heard the doctor say, “Your sister’s a very kind and generous woman. I’ve seen her with children on the floor in the hospital—in the children’s wing, I mean. You’d never imagine that she lived like this, like a princess.”
“Oh, Connie’s very natural. She loves all this, but it’s never changed the way she behaves. People all like her. Everyone does.”
“Yes, I can see why.” He paused. “She has great charm.”
“We think so. Well, it’s been a lovely day, hasn’t it?”
That was typical of Lara, Connie thought, putting a proper end to the conversation lest it turn too personal. She would have liked to hear more. But that’s absurd of me, she scolded, as if I were an adolescent needing to be assured that I’m admired. Absurd.
Upstairs, a short while later in one of Connie’s country French guest rooms, Lara had her own odd thoughts.
Bayer was definitely attracted to Connie.… I caught him glancing at her all through the evening. They did look good when they stood together.… How ridiculous I’m being!
