A Death-Struck Year

by Makiia Lucier

  The operator interrupted, sounding frazzled. “Your address?”

  I gave it. “Will you be terribly long? The woman is—”

  “Help will be sent directly.” And with that, the phone went silent.

  “Aargh!” Vexed, I dropped the receiver and ran up the stairs.

  “They’re on their way,” I said, at Kate’s questioning look. We both knew that could mean anything. Kate pressed a cloth against the man’s forehead. The woman had fallen asleep, and the sound of labored breathing filled the room. I unlatched the damaged window, careful as I pushed it open. As an afterthought, I pulled on my mask.

  “I wonder how long they’ve been like this,” I said.

  “Long enough.” Kate pointed her chin at the night table, where a newspaper lay beside the water glass. “It’s yesterday’s paper.”

  “I should wait outside. I don’t want them to miss the house.”

  Kate nodded. “I’ll be fine.”

  The ambulance arrived forty minutes later. Kate and I stood on the sidewalk as the stretcher-bearers loaded the man onto the truck. He was still unconscious. The woman grasped my hand as she was carried past, and would not let go. I bent my head to her ear.

  “You’re both being taken to the Auditorium.” I tried to reassure her. “To the hospital. You’re safe now.”

  But the woman only gripped my hand tighter. “Jamie,” she whispered. “Please.” She dropped my hand and disappeared into the truck. A moment later, the ambulance sped off.

  “That was terrifying.” Kate watched as the truck grew smaller in the distance. “I just want to sit down and cry.”

  I was only half listening. I turned to look up at the cracked window.

  “Cleo?”

  I dashed back into the house and up the stairs, entering the bedroom where I’d seen the baseball bat and camera. Draped over a chair was a navy school jacket. I picked it up and turned it over. My scalp prickled.

  Footsteps sounded in the hall.

  “For heaven’s sake, Cleo.” Kate walked in, aggrieved. “What is it?”

  I held up the jacket so she could see the name neatly stitched onto the inside of the collar. Jamison Jones.

  “Kate,” I said. “Where’s the boy?”

  We searched the house from top to bottom. We looked under beds and inside armoires. Kate ran outside to check the shed. I peeked into the attic, earning nothing but a face full of cobwebs for my trouble.

  In the study—a room filled with heavy wood and dark leather—Kate and I examined a framed photograph on the mantel. Mrs. Jones was seated. She wore an enormous feathered hat. Mr. Jones stood behind her, gruff and serious, along with a skinny teenage boy who looked just like his father.

  “Did she actually say he was missing?” Kate asked.

  I shook my head. “She just said his name. And she said please.”

  “Please what?”

  “I don’t know,” I said, frustrated.

  Kate was quiet for a moment. “She was sick, Cleo. Maybe she didn’t know what she was saying. He could be with relatives. I’m sure he’s fine.”

  Her words made sense. More sense than my own doubt—that tiny niggling feeling that refused to leave me alone. I tried one last thing. Jack had built this house, after all, and he had learned from Papa. I walked over to the glass-fronted bookcase. Standing on tiptoe, I carefully felt along the top edge.

  Kate came to stand beside me. Her expression made it clear she was beginning to think I was touched in the head. “What are you doing?”

  I felt along the sides, brows knit in concentration. “There’s a room hidden behind my brother’s study. The only way to get in is by pressing a button on the bookcase.”

  “A secret room?”

  I nodded.

  Kate searched the opposite edge of the shelf. “What do you have in it? Gold? Jewels?” She sounded intrigued.

  I smiled. “Mostly just drawings and plans.” And crate upon crate of illegal whiskey, but I kept that to myself. Kate looked disappointed. Finally, I stepped back, feeling foolish. “You’re right. There’s no one here.”

  Kate laid a comforting hand on my arm. “It’s good he’s not here. It means he’s safe somewhere else. Let’s go out through the back. We can lock up and leave the key where we found it.”

  I agreed. In the hall, a grandfather clock stood directly below the staircase. I’d been so distracted earlier that I’d overlooked it. It was made of pale blond wood. A curving hourglass figure gave it a feminine appearance. An owl perched on a narrow ledge just below the clock’s face. A carved wooden owl, just like the one on the porch.

  Without thinking, I reached for the bird and tried to shove it forward, then back. When it didn’t budge, I twisted it, like a doorknob.

  “What . . . ?” Kate began.

  We heard a loud click.

  The clock wheeled slowly to the side before shuddering to a stop. A doorway was revealed. An odd smell tickled my nose. I was reminded, strangely, of the chemistry lab at school. A muted red light appeared, and I heard Kate gasp behind me.

  It was a darkroom.

  Photographs were strewn about the tiny floor space, along with several cameras and upended shallow trays. Lying in the midst of it all was a teenage boy. He was curled into a ball, and he was shivering, his lips so cracked they’d started to bleed. He looked exactly like his father.

  Jamison Jones.

  Chapter Twelve

  Sunday, October 13, 1918

  It poured all afternoon. Raindrops, sharp as pebbles, whipped at our faces, and the wind tried its best to send our skirts right over our heads. Kate and I scurried back to the Auditorium hours earlier than we’d intended. Hannah wasted no time putting us to work. After we’d dried off, she’d given us each a white apron to protect our clothing. Kate was sent to help in the kitchen. I was to go upstairs to the new ward for women and children.

  Downstairs, the orchestra floor had grown crowded. So had the assembly rooms. Doctors and nurses slept in cramped dressing areas behind the stage. Many of them had not left the Auditorium in days. Despite the shortage in staff, Hannah had managed to move all the women and children to the second floor.

  I stood in the doorway and looked around. A dance troupe must have used the room as practice space. It was bright and airy with wooden floors, scarred and scratched. Barres were pushed up against a wall covered in mirrors. A single pair of pink ballet slippers hung from the chandelier, dangling by a length of satin ribbon.

  This ward had fewer beds. I counted sixty or so cots. Nurses and volunteers went about their business. Dr. McAbee, whom I’d met yesterday, was off in a corner. He was a large man, gruff but kind, with a white mustache and eyes that protruded slightly—reminding me a bit of a walrus.

  Edmund was halfway down one aisle. Seeing him, I remembered Kate’s words. I squared my shoulders and headed his way, ready to tell him, politely, to mind his own business. But I faltered when I came across Mrs. Jones. Her pregnancy looked even more pronounced under a thin blanket. She slept soundly, having been told that Jamison was downstairs with his father. But Hannah had kept the seriousness of their condition to herself; both Mr. Jones and his son were doing badly.

  I lingered by the foot of the bed, wondering at the unfairness of it. Kate and I had found them alive. We’d sent them here. Yet it still might not be enough to save them.

  Beside Jamison’s mother, a woman coughed and coughed and coughed. I left Mrs. Jones and gave her neighbor some water, which didn’t help. Mrs. Howard was over at the next cot, sponging down a little girl who’d soiled herself.

  There was a small medicine bottle on the shared nightstand. “Should I give her the codeine?” I asked the nurse, holding up the bottle.

  Mrs. Howard glanced over, harassed. “Yes. Just a teaspoon. Mark it on her chart.”

  I did. Then I continued down the aisle, tensing when I saw Edmund leaning over William Cooke’s bed. My carefully prepared lecture flew from my head.

  The boy lay on
his side. Asleep or drugged—I didn’t know which. “Is he worse?” I asked. I glanced at the nearby beds and squeezed Edmund’s arm. “Where’s the baby?”

  The children’s mother, Tess Cooke, slept in her bed. The cot beside her had the tiniest rumple in the center. It was empty.

  Edmund was masked. But his eyes were smiling, despite the nails I dug into his arm. “She’s right there.” He inclined his head toward the next aisle. “With Mrs. Clement.”

  Mrs. Clement was another volunteer, a widow whose youngest son had been killed in Europe. She was cradling Abby’s head against her shoulder with one hand as she walked down the aisle, bouncing her gently.

  “And William is a little worse,” Edmund continued. “But this I can fix. Are you squeamish?”

  I dropped his arm. “Why?” There were some questions you never wanted to be asked in an emergency hospital.

  “Sit there, on the bed.” When I did, Edmund lifted William so his head rested across my lap. “I need you to hold his head here and here.” He demonstrated, cupping one hand along the back of William’s head, the other against his chin. “He needs to be kept perfectly still.”

  William whimpered in his sleep, a pitiful sound. Apprehensive, I did as I was told. The boy’s hair was a pure black, like mine, and his soft curls wove their way through my fingers. While I held the child’s head, Edmund pulled up a chair and sat before us. His hair was damp, slicked back from his forehead. I wondered if he had gone home to bathe and to have a few hours of sleep in his own bed. Or if he’d just used the showers by the dressing rooms—the ones normally reserved for performers. I saw my own tiredness reflected in his eyes. His face, handsome and serious, looked the tiniest bit thinner than it had yesterday. It made me wonder what he’d looked like before. Before the Spanish influenza, before the war.

  Edmund peered into William’s ear. A tray had been placed within reach on a small rolling cart. On it was a white porcelain bowl, a stack of gauze pads, and a collection of needles lined up in a row. There were clear glass bottles, five of them, the writing on the labels scrawled and illegible. Edmund reached for an instrument I did not recognize. It looked like a spoon, only the scoop part was much narrower, elongated. I watched as he used it to scrape dark yellow wax from William’s ear. He cleaned the spoon with the gauze, then continued the removal. He scraped and scooped, scooped and scraped. I looked at the wax sticking to the cotton. There was a disgusting amount of it. I would never look at a spoonful of honey the same way again.

  Not wanting to disturb Edmund’s concentration, but too anxious to stay silent any longer, I asked, “What happened?”

  Edmund set the spoon in the bowl with a small clatter. “He woke up earlier complaining of an earache. It’s common enough with flu, but with Spanish flu it’s worse. He has otitis media.”

  I frowned. “Is that Latin?”

  Edmund kept his gaze fixed on the child’s ear. “Hmm? Sorry, yes. He has a bulging eardrum,” he clarified. “His drum membrane is about to rupture.” He selected a needle from the tray.

  Uneasy, I looked from the needle to William’s vulnerable, exposed ear, guessing Edmund’s intent but unwilling to believe it. My voice was faint. “What are you going to do?”

  “I need to remove the extra fluid. It’ll relieve some of the pressure. Hold him still, Cleo.” And then in a move that nearly stopped my heart, he inserted the needle, thin and wicked-looking, directly into William’s ear canal.

  There were several ways to control one’s urge to vomit. In just the last day, I had learned this. Breathing through your mouth was one. The other was to concentrate on a single thing with all your might. To focus so entirely that everything else receded into the background. For this gruesome occasion, I chose William’s mother.

  Someone had washed her hair. It lay pleated in two braids over her shoulders, ending around her elbows. She lay on her back. With a start, I realized she was awake. We were in the center of the room, and the chandelier hung directly above us. Tess Cooke stared at the crystals glinting in the light, blinking in wonder, like an infant in a cradle.

  She must have felt my stare, because she turned her head with such painful slowness that my head throbbed in sympathy. Her eyes were light blue, shot through with tiny red veins. She might have been pretty once. It was impossible to tell.

  Where was Mr. Cooke? All we knew was that the railroad company he worked for had been notified. That didn’t tell us anything. It could be days, weeks even, before he was tracked down by telephone. I hoped he’d return soon. His wife didn’t look well at all. I was glad that she couldn’t see past Edmund to her son, who lay unmoving with a needle in his ear. I smiled at her, the only comfort I could offer, and watched her eyes close.

  Edmund continued to work away. Curious despite myself, I glanced down. He’d replaced the needle with a small suction instrument, which was just now removing a thick, reddish-yellow substance. My stomach rolled, though this time I was unable to look away. It was both fascinating and revolting to watch. William whimpered.

  “Nearly done, William,” I whispered. “What a brave boy you are. We’re nearly done.”

  Mrs. Clement approached with Abigail. She stopped when she saw what Edmund was up to, turned on her heel, and marched off in the opposite direction, a protective hand cupping Abby’s head.

  My curiosity shifted from bulging eardrums to Edmund Parrish. He looked perfectly calm and capable. But I knew he couldn’t have had very much medical school training. Not with being shipped off to war. Or recovering from his injuries.

  “How many of these have you done?” I asked.

  Still working away at William’s ear, Edmund asked, “Ever?”

  “Yes.”

  “This is my second.”

  “What?” My hold on William tightened.

  “Dr. McAbee showed me how to do the first one,” he said, and I could tell he was fighting a smile. “You just prick and scoop. Don’t worry. I won’t let anything happen to your buddy here.” He glanced over in Mrs. Jones’s direction. “Busy morning?”

  And I remembered, suddenly, why I’d sought him out. “Yes.” I added, “I took Kate with me. Just like you wanted.”

  He paused, the suction instrument hovering over William’s ear. “You don’t sound happy about it. What’s wrong with Kate?”

  “There’s nothing wrong with her,” I said, exasperated. “And you know it. Hannah couldn’t spare her. You shouldn’t have said anything.”

  He didn’t bother to deny it. “Hannah’s responsible for everyone under her care,” he said evenly. “That includes you.”

  “I could have gone on my own. I’m not a simpleton, Edmund.”

  His green eyes narrowed. “No. But you’re a pretty girl, knocking on doors, in all kinds of neighborhoods. All alone. What happens if you knock on the wrong one?”

  I opened my mouth, closed it. Grisly scenarios danced around in my imagination. “That’s hardly cheery,” I finally said.

  He shrugged. “It wasn’t meant to be. And you can go ahead and be mad. I’d do it again.”

  Edmund went back to work, looking stubborn and unrepentant. I scowled at the top of his head. But as I saw firsthand how gentle he was with William, my annoyance began to fade. After several minutes, I couldn’t take his silence any longer.

  “I’m not mad,” I said grudgingly.

  “Good.” He dropped the instrument into the bowl. Taping a thick bandage over the boy’s ear, he said, “Let’s turn him over. It’ll drain anything I’ve missed, and I can have a look at his other ear.”

  We shifted William. I held him still while Edmund began the process all over again.

  “Have you always wanted to be a doctor?” I asked, watching him remove the needle from William’s ear.

  “Since I was ten.”

  There was the oddest inflection to his voice. I heard it, and I told myself that I should practice what I preach and stick to my own business.

  “Why?” I asked.

  Edmund
exchanged the needle for the suction instrument. “My mother died of tuberculosis when I was ten.” His gaze flicked to mine, then dropped. “I want to know why.”

  The words I’m sorry lingered on the tip of my tongue. But I knew what it was to be young and to lose your mother. And I couldn’t remember the number of times I’d been told I’m sorry. Or told my loss was part of God’s will or God’s plan. Well-intentioned words, every one of them. But they’d never made me feel better. Not one single bit.

  “What did you want to be before you were ten?” I asked.

  Edmund looked surprised. His eyes crinkled at the corners. “A judge, I guess. Like my father. And a cowboy. I’d forgotten.” He cleaned off the instrument with a fresh square of gauze, then asked, “What about you?”

  I had not meant to say it, but it came out anyway. “I haven’t the slightest idea.”

  He looked amused. “I wouldn’t worry about it. You’re only eighteen . . . nearly. Sometimes you need to go out in the world and live a little first.”

  I stared at him, hearing the echo of my brother’s voice.

  Edmund attached a bandage to William’s other ear before glancing up. “What is it?”

  I was saved from answering by William, who woke and started to cry. His wails frightened a nearby baby, who began howling. The wailing set off a vicious cycle; before long, the room had erupted in an earsplitting cacophony of weeping children. Edmund and I exchanged a panicked glance. He fussed over William while I hurried across the way toward another toddler. Mrs. Howard exclaimed, “Lord, what now!” I scooped up a little girl. And after that, there wasn’t any time left over to think.

  Chapter Thirteen

  Monday, October 14, 1918

  “I’m sorry, Lucy.”

  “We do not set these rules in place to torture you, darling.” My sister-in-law’s voice was faint and tinny-sounding over the telephone line. “They are for your own good. When I give you specific instructions, I do not expect to be ignored. Is that clear?”