Miss Julia's Marvelous Makeover

by Ann B. Ross

  “Oh, Miss Julia,” she cried, “they bringin’ him home!”

  “Who?”

  “The amb’lance folks an’ whoever take him to the hospital—I don’t know who all they are—them folks workin’ on the ’lection.”

  “You mean Sam? Sam’s been to the hospital? What’s going on, Lillian? Why didn’t you call me?”

  “Yes’m, Mr. Sam who I mean, an’ I don’t know what’s goin’ on, and I didn’t call you ’cause they jus’ call me an’ say they on the way home with him. That’s all I know.”

  The bottom dropped from under me and I had to grab the back of a chair to stay upright. Fear and panic filled my mind with a white haze—I couldn’t think, I couldn’t plan, I didn’t know what to do. My precious Sam in the hospital!

  “But they’re bringing him home?” I asked, struggling to make sense of what had happened—whatever it was.

  “That’s what they tole me. Listen!” Lillian turned away and headed for the front door. “I think they here.”

  I hurried after her, dreading what I’d see—Sam bundled up on an ambulance stretcher, white-coated attendants by his side, campaign workers wringing their hands as they followed him in.

  It was nothing like that at all. Sam came walking in on his own two feet with his campaign manager, Millard Wilkes, telling him to take it easy as he turned back to his car.

  “Where’s the amb’lance?” Lillian asked.

  I didn’t give Sam a chance to answer, just flung myself at him, crying with relief. “Oh, Sam, what happened? Are you all right? Did you get hurt? Come sit down.”

  “I think I better,” Sam said as he took the first chair he came to in the living room.

  I noticed that his tie was off and stuffed in his coat pocket and his face was almost as white as his shirt, but his deep blue eyes were as bright as ever.

  I pulled an ottoman up close beside him, took his hand, and tried to appear calm and collected. Lillian had about wrung the dishrag in two as she twisted and turned it in her agitation.

  “Tell us, Sam,” I urged, desperate to know what had happened, yet not wanting to know.

  “Well,” he said, leaning his head against the wing of the chair, “I guess I had a little episode. I was at campaign headquarters and we’d just finished making out my schedule. I hadn’t been feeling well all morning—a little indigestion, I thought. I’d taken something for it, but the pain kept getting worse. I wanted to just come home, but everybody got concerned, and before I knew it they’d called an ambulance.” He straightened up and gave me his twinkling smile. “And once the EMTs are called out, there’s no turning back. They trundled me off on a stretcher and I ended up in the emergency room.”

  “Oh, my word,” I moaned. And there I’d been, using the time I could’ve been with him looking after that unappreciative and sullen girl who’d been foisted on us.

  I stuffed those uncharitable thoughts to the back of my mind and asked, “What did they say it was? I mean, the episode or the spell or whatever you had. Did they call Dr. Hargrove?”

  “Yes, he came, took one look, and called a surgeon.”

  “A surgeon! Oh, Sam, why?” I nearly crumpled up inside. The thought of Sam being cut open scared me so bad I could hardly stand it. Calling a surgeon meant that something needed to be cut on or out or into. I mean, that’s what they did.

  “Well, he’s not sure yet, honey. Dr. Allen wanted to admit me to the hospital right then and start some tests. But I had to come home first and get some things arranged.”

  “Sam Murdoch! Nothing’s more important than your health! What do you mean—things to arrange?”

  Lillian chimed in. “If you got your health, don’t matter whatever else you don’t got.”

  “That’s right,” I affirmed. “Listen to her, Sam. Now tell us what all you have to arrange and let us to do it. You can just sit here and rest, or maybe you want to lie down?”

  “No, I’m all right here for a few minutes. Then I need to go upstairs and pack something for the hospital, then get on the phone and try to get some substitutes for all the events on the schedule.”

  It wasn’t like Sam to want to sit for a few minutes, especially when he thought he had things to do. I’d also begun to notice that he seemed to be short of breath—no way, I determined, was he going to climb the stairs or get on a telephone. My fear was beginning to turn to anger—he should’ve stayed at the hospital, should’ve let them admit him and let the doctor get started on the tests and whatever treatments that would cure him.

  “You’re not going to do anything,” I told him, getting to my feet. “Lillian, you know what to pack—his shaving things, some pajamas, and a robe and slippers. While you do that, I’ll make the calls for him.” I started to the kitchen to get the portable phone. “Where’s Lloyd?”

  “He at that country club, playin’ tennis or swimmin’ or something. You want me to get him home?”

  “No, I guess not. I’ll take Sam to the hospital, and when he gets home, you can tell him what’s happened and . . . oh, my Lord, I’ve got to get Trixie home. She’s at Hazel Marie’s and probably doesn’t have a clue of how to get back. Well,” I said, throwing up my hands, “maybe Hazel Marie can bring her or Granny Wiggins can walk her home. I can’t worry about that now.”

  Lillian stopped on the stairs and looked back. “You go on an’ take care of Mr. Sam’s ’lection bus’ness. I’ll tend to the rest.”

  “Yes, thank you,” I said, nodding in relief and wondering, as I often did, how I could ever manage without her. In many ways, Lillian and I were alike. We both had a tendency to lose our heads in the first flush of a panic situation, but we also tended eventually to calm down and get done what had to be done.

  And, although my heart was still racing and my hands were trembling, that’s what we started doing.

  Chapter 10

  I didn’t like leaving Sam alone even for a few minutes, but I took the time to call Dr. Hargrove while I was in the kitchen. Of course I had a hard time getting him on the phone—that snippy receptionist of his thought it her bounden duty to protect him from anyone who needed a word with him.

  “Just tell him it’s Julia Murdoch,” I told the receptionist. “Tell him it’s an emergency.” And continuing under my breath, “If you understand the concept.”

  And finally I heard him answer. “Miss Julia?”

  “Yes, thank you for taking my call. I am worried sick, Dr. Hargrove. What happened to Sam? Is he going to be all right?”

  “Well, right now, I don’t know what happened. That’s why I called Dr. Allen. It could’ve been nothing—indigestion, as Sam thought, or an early indication that something else is going on.”

  “Like what?”

  “Ulcers are a possibility, but most likely it’s an inflamed gallbladder. We’ll run some tests and have a better idea when the results come in. But he needs to get to the hospital so we can get started.”

  “I understand, but I don’t know why you didn’t keep him there when you had him.”

  “Well, you know Sam.” Dr. Hargrove chuckled, which under the circumstances I didn’t appreciate. “It’s hard to keep a good man down.”

  I didn’t see any humor in the situation, nor did I think that platitudes were a bit of help. “That’s all well and good, but what do you think? Is he going to be all right?”

  “It’s like this, Miss Julia: he seemed fine after a little while—his blood pressure and heart rate were normal, and he had no fever. But it’s only sensible to do some tests as a precautionary measure. You know, at his age . . .”

  There it was again: at his age, or as had been said to me so many times, at your age, and I was sick and tired of it. Why did one’s age have to qualify everything? And have you noticed that you can’t turn around nowadays without someone asking for your date of birth? It doesn’t matter where you are—in a doctor�
��s office, a lawyer’s office, a bank, or a place of business—some little twit a third of your age thinks it her right to demand your birth date. At least, though, they’ve stopped asking how old you are, having discovered that if they’re rude enough to ask for a specific number they’re likely to get a nonspecific and ever-changing answer. I finally figured out that they’re using your birth date to identify you instead of your Social Security number. Which doesn’t make a lick of sense because there’s only one Social Security number to a person, yet there must be hundreds, even thousands, of people who have the same date of birth. They’d be better off if they required something like fingerprints that can’t be duplicated or stolen, which, come to think of it, will probably be the next step.

  Only partially reassured by Dr. Hargrove, I decided to focus on the surgeon—when I could catch him—who would know more than Dr. Hargrove anyway. I took the portable phone to Sam, swinging through the library on my way, to pick up his address book.

  “Now,” I said, retaking my seat on the ottoman, “who do you have to call?”

  “I need my calendar,” Sam said, beginning to rise. “It’s in the library.”

  “No, don’t get up. I’ll get it.” And back to the library I went for his calendar.

  “Well, actually,” Sam said, pulling a folded page from his coat pocket, “I’d better enter these events on the calendar first. Then we can decide who to ask to go in my place.”

  “Why can’t you just reschedule them?”

  “I don’t think I can—the next few weeks are booked solid. And if somebody doesn’t show up for some of these events, why, the party’s likely to think they have another Frank Sawyer on their hands.”

  “Maybe his knees are well enough to take over for you,” I suggested, wondering if Sam should be doing any campaigning at all. And wondering also if the episode he’d had was a sign that the Lord wanted Sam out of politics. Having Trixie on our hands could be another sign, as well. I was becoming less and less enamored of Sam as a potential senator—not that I’d been all that enthusiastic in the first place—but that was something he would have to come to on his own. I wasn’t about to suggest it.

  “No chance of that,” Sam said, responding to what I’d said, not to what I was thinking. “He’s still having trouble, so, no, I’ve got to meet my commitments one way or another.”

  “Wait a minute, Sam,” I said, becoming more alarmed. “Is there something you’re not telling me? Just how long are they planning to keep you in the hospital?”

  “Oh, I don’t know. A couple of days, I guess. And no, I’m not keeping anything from you. But the next few days are packed with campaign events, and I can’t just not show up without somebody in my place. Let the word get around that I’m unable to meet my obligations, and Jimmy Ray will have the election sewn up. He’s going after me hot and heavy as it is—he’s running a television ad against me next week.”

  “Why, the nerve of him! Make your calls, Sam, then let’s get you to the hospital. I don’t want you lying up there worrying about Jimmy Ray Mooney.”

  But after six or seven phone calls, he was having little luck in getting substitutes for a VFW meeting in Brevard the following morning, a speech at the Kiwanis Club luncheon, a Polk County neighborhood meeting in the afternoon, and a local roundtable forum that evening—all on the same day. And in the coming days, a neighborhood barbecue, the Rotary Club again, a street dance in Polk County, a local gathering at the party headquarters, a panel discussion at the League of Women Voters, and I don’t know what all.

  “I thought,” I said after the latest turndown, “that you said you’d have plenty of volunteers. Don’t they realize that you can’t do everything? Especially from a hospital bed? What’re you going to do, Sam?”

  “I’m going to turn to the one I can count on—you.”

  “Me? No, oh, no, I can’t do that. You said I wouldn’t have to make any speeches.” I looked at him, wondering which would be worse—having him in the hospital or me on a stump—and it was looking as if I would have both. “Well, you said not many, anyway.”

  “But you’d be the best one,” Sam said, smiling and drawing my head toward his shoulder. “Who better to represent me and sing my praises? And, honey, I’d rest so much easier in the hospital if I knew you were out carrying on the campaign.”

  That was a low blow, because of course I wanted him to rest easy in the hospital. He didn’t need to be lying in bed worrying and fretting about his commitments to the campaign, even if he had said he didn’t care whether he won or not. And of course, as his wife, I’d do any and every thing I could to ease his mind, even though I’d lost that loving feeling about a senate race. But make speeches? I wasn’t sure that was covered under the heading of wifely duties.

  “Well, we’ll talk about it, but right now let’s get you on over there,” I said, knowing that the best way to avoid a commitment of my own was to change the subject. “Here’s Lillian with your bag. Do you want to take something to read?”

  “Yes, there’s a stack of magazines I haven’t gotten to yet and the Gibbon book on top of them—they’re all by our bed. Lillian, if you don’t mind . . .”

  “No, sir, I don’t mind,” she said, turning to go back upstairs. “Be good to move ’em so I don’t stump my toe anymore when I make the bed.”

  I almost had to fight Sam for his suitcase when we started out to the car. He couldn’t stand for me to be carrying it, but I just walked out with it and let him follow behind. Lillian had the worst of it—she’d packed his books and magazines in another bag and it was all she could do to lug it out.

  —

  We finally got Sam officially admitted to a private room on the third floor of the hospital with a penthouse view of the parking lot and the spire of the First Methodist Church peeking over the trees. I did nothing for the next hour but sit and watch as one nurse or technician after another came in to fill out forms or draw blood—I didn’t watch that—or to check on Sam’s comfort. But no doctor came around—the only way I knew one existed was by seeing phoned-in orders being carried out. At least I hoped they were following orders from someone who knew what he was doing. “Just routine for a new admittance” was the only response I could get to my questions. Oh, except one nurse said, “You’ll have to ask the doctor.” Something I would’ve gladly done if he’d ever shown up.

  When we heard the rattle of supper trays being trundled down the hall, Sam said, “Why don’t you go on home, honey. Lillian will have your dinner ready and Lloyd will be coming in. As soon as Dr. Allen comes by, I’ll make it an early night. It’s been a long day.”

  Suddenly fearful again that he was sicker than anyone was telling me, I suggested that I spend the night in the one easy chair in the room. “I’d like to speak with that surgeon anyway, and it looks as if the only way to do it is to stay right here.”

  “No, ma’am,” Sam said in a mock-forceful way, “you are not going to do that. I want you to go home and reassure Lloyd and Lillian that I’m all right. Besides, you have Trixie to see to, too.”

  “Oh, my word,” I said with a sinking feeling. “I’d forgotten about her. For all I know, she’s lost somewhere between our house and Hazel Marie’s. Or else, Hazel Marie is ready to shoot me for leaving Trixie with her all day.”

  “You run on then,” Sam said, taking my hand. “Just, if you have time, would you call around some more? Call the same ones again and see if you can find anyone who’ll fill in for me, at least tomorrow and the next day. I should be able to manage after that.”

  Well, right there I knew what I had to do. “Stop fretting about the campaign, Sam. I’ll do it—not as well as you, but I’ll go to every one of those events and if my speechifying doesn’t suit the party, why, they can just do it themselves. Which is what they ought to be doing anyway.”

  Chapter 11

  As soon as I got home and stepped into the kitchen, I
heard voices and laughter coming from the living room. Raising my eyebrows at Lillian, I wondered who was visiting.

  “They all in there,” she told me. “Miss Hazel Marie an’ the babies an’ Lloyd an’ Miss Trixie, too. They all worried ’bout Mr. Sam an’ waitin’ to hear how he is. And me, too.”

  As a burst of laughter emanated from the living room, I frowned, thinking that they didn’t sound too worried to me. But to answer Lillian’s implied question, I said, “He’s doing all right, I guess, if he can do without all the blood they’ve drawn. But of course I haven’t seen his doctor yet. I think they all make rounds when family members are unlikely to be there, and do it on purpose, too. I’ll go back over after supper. Maybe somebody can tell me something then.”

  As I pushed through the swinging door into the dining room, the sounds of revelry increased in the living room. Vaguely wondering why Lillian had not been with them, I walked into the living room to find Lloyd and Trixie on the floor playing with the babies, while Hazel Marie sat smiling at their antics.

  “Oh, hey, Miss Julia,” Lloyd said, immediately rising and coming toward me. “How’s Mr. Sam? Boy, it sure knocked me for a loop when Lillian told us he’s in the hospital.”

  “Yes, how is he?” Hazel Marie rushed over to me, and I just managed to avert a comforting hug. “We’ve been so worried. What can I do to help? Do you need anything?”

  “Just to sit for a few minutes,” I said and found a seat in one of the wing chairs. Trixie, I noticed, had remained on the floor, neither greeting nor speaking to me. “I wish I could tell you more, but I don’t know anything. There’ve been people in and out of his room all afternoon, but not a doctor among them. But Sam’s in good spirits. The only thing he’s worried about is his campaign, so that’s why I came home—to make plans to carry out his immediate commitments. That seems to be the only thing I can do that will ease his mind.”