Benedict Hall

by Cate Campbell

  The fireman swore, whirled, and headed back into the murk and smoke. The ambulance driver stood with Margot, staring down at the empty canvas stretcher. A silver chain was tangled in the gray folds of the blanket. Margot twitched the blanket’s edge with her fingers, and the jewel tumbled out onto the dark pavement. The ambulance driver said something, but Margot didn’t hear him. She was gazing at the sapphire, lying in the road, glowing with the reflected light of the flames.

  She had seen the stone only once, but she knew what it was. It was the jewel Preston wore around his neck. The one he had pressed against Loena’s fevered body in the hospital, the one he had tried to hide after the accident.

  As she stared at it, the turmoil around her seemed to recede. Sounds faded from her hearing. The smells of burning wood and chemicals diminished. Hardly knowing she did it, she bent, and stretched out her hand.

  When she picked it up, it was still hot from the fire. It stung her palm, and she had to release it, to drop it hastily into her pocket.

  A man shouted, and Margot looked up to see a fireman stagger into the street with someone leaning on his shoulder, someone who could barely stand, whose soot-smeared face was twisted in agony. The ambulance driver dashed back across the street to meet them, shouting over his shoulder, “Dr. Benedict! We found him!”

  It was Frank, thank God, Frank stumbling beside the fireman, Frank showing his teeth as he gritted them against the pain of his burns.

  The relief that washed through Margot left her dry mouthed and weak kneed. She stared for a long moment, wanting to be convinced, longing to be certain. Then, as if waking her from a transfixing dream, her training broke her shocked trance and propelled her forward. She ushered Frank into the waiting ambulance, and climbed in beside him, automatically giving orders all the way. As the ambulance started down Post Street, she was already cutting away his still-smoking shirt. He writhed in pain as she pulled the fabric away from his good arm.

  She said, “Sorry,” but she kept going. If the hot fabric clung to his skin, he would lose even more. The burns on his hand were already blistering. His good hand, his only hand. There was no time to do anything about his pain. The skin was charred in places, a bad sign. She sluiced the burns with cool water, grateful for the well-supplied ambulance. The vehicle careened around the corner, rocking on its wheels as it sped toward the hospital, and she braced Frank’s legs to keep him from abrading his burned skin any more. He cursed, “Goddamn it. Oh, goddamn it!”

  “Good,” she said to him, “you keep that up as long as you can. We’ll be there soon.”

  She forgot about her lost privileges until they were already at the hospital. Fresh fear clutched at her throat. If they turned her away, if she had to hand Frank over to someone else—

  But it was Nurse Cardwell on duty, and her cool gaze assessed the situation in seconds. Margot said, “Matron, is the operating theater available? It’s the only place clean enough.”

  Cardwell said, “Of course, Doctor. I’ll fetch a gurney.”

  Margot spoke to a nurse to order an injection of morphine. Frank sighed with relief as it was administered, and Margot said, “Rest now, Frank. We’re going to take care of you.”

  It wasn’t until she went to scrub, snatching a surgical coat out of a locker, that she realized the sapphire was in the pocket of her pleated skirt. It felt oddly heavy there. She reached down to touch its smooth surface. Had she actually picked it up, dropped it into her pocket? Why had she done that? She could hardly remember.

  “Ready, Doctor?” Cardwell stood in the doorway, already masked and gowned.

  Margot lifted her hand from her pocket and turned to the sink. “Two minutes.”

  In the operating theater, Cardwell and a younger nurse were waiting on either side of the surgical bed. Under the brilliant lights, Margot could see that the burns to Frank’s right arm and hand were mostly of the first degree, with the blisters of the second degree limited to the forearm and wrist. The cool water rinse had prevented further damage. She could treat the burned skin as soon as the chloroform took effect. She wasn’t going to think about her privileges at the moment. As Cardwell had recognized instantly, only in the operating theater did Frank have a decent chance of avoiding infection. That was the worst risk with such burns. If they became septic, there would be little she could do.

  When his eyes were closed and she was certain he was not conscious, Margot began the careful process of thoroughly, gently cleaning his arm and hand with peroxide of hydrogen, followed by a lavage of sterilized saline solution. She opened the blisters and removed the epithelium, repeating the cleansing each time. When she was done, taking great care so as not to miss anything, Cardwell applied clean bandages. Margot watched her carefully for any possible contamination, but Alice Cardwell was as thorough as she had been herself. Margot said, “He should be treated with picric acid as soon the granulation begins.”

  “Yes, Doctor,” Cardwell said.

  “And if there’s any difficulty, a bath of boracic lotion.”

  “I’ll make a note on his chart.” Cardwell finished the bandages on Frank’s right arm. As she lifted the sheet to cover him, she paused, looking down at his left arm. She clicked her tongue in sympathy. “Poor fellow!” she said. “This looks like it was done with a saw.”

  Margot had steadfastly avoided looking at Frank’s left arm up until now. She stepped around the surgical table, moving the light with her elbow so she could get a good view. “Oh, Frank,” she said. He lay quietly beneath the chloroform mask. His breathing, though light, was steady and clear. “My God. No wonder it hurts so much.”

  “You know him?” Cardwell raised her eyebrows.

  “I do.” Margot bent for a closer look. “And I know they tried to repair this in the military hospital in Virginia, but—” She pointed her gloved finger. “You see this swelling? I was looking at an illustration just the other day.” It had been in the surgical manual, the same text that was now nothing but ashes, but that didn’t matter. A book could be replaced, and the images were as clear in her mind as if she had the book in front of her. “It’s an amputational neuroma. The nerves weren’t cut short enough, and when they try to regenerate, these swellings adhere to the scar tissue.”

  Cardwell said, “The pain must be ghastly.”

  “No doubt.” Margot straightened. “The nerves should be resected.” She gazed at Frank’s face, so still now, so relaxed. She was used to seeing tension in his mouth, and finely drawn lines around his eyes. Who could imagine the courage it took to live with such pain?

  “I suppose,” the matron began, “you could ask Dr. Peretti—”

  “No.” Margot pictured the illustrations in the Manual of Surgery, the photographs, the drawings. She remembered the instructions with perfect clarity, as if she had known, when she studied them, that she would need them one day.

  “I can do it myself,” she said in a low voice. It was true, and she knew it. She felt filled with confidence, brimming with it, as she turned to the matron. Her voice throbbed slightly with determination. “I can do it right now.”

  Cardwell opened her mouth, then closed it, then opened it again. In a voice as low as Margot’s, she said, “Are you sure, Doctor?”

  Margot wondered, for the briefest moment, if she should doubt herself. She had never done this surgery, nor had she seen it done. She wasn’t even supposed to be here. And Frank—what if she botched it, made it worse? He had said he didn’t want her doctoring him. If she did this, he might never want to see her again.

  She felt the sapphire shift in her pocket, heavy and warm against her thigh. She took a breath. Was Preston dead? She didn’t know. But Frank was here, in the operating theater. He was already sedated, and he had been in pain for far too long. She knew what to do and how to do it. This was no time for faintness of heart, nor did she feel such a thing. She felt only certainty.

  With a steady voice she said, “Yes, I’m sure, Matron. I’ll need an assistant.”

&nbs
p; “There’s an intern on the second floor.” Cardwell turned to the younger nurse. “Robertson, go fetch Dr. Clay. Tell him to hurry. Scrub again when you get back.”

  Robertson, her eyes wide, scurried away. The matron went off to get a surgical tray, and wheeled it back.

  Margot said, “I don’t know which of my problems is worse, Matron, my personal relationship with the patient—or the fact that I’m not supposed to be in this hospital at all.”

  Cardwell scowled, and the web of wrinkles in her forehead clustered beneath her cap. “You have a patient who needs help. Feelings don’t matter. Neither do politics.”

  Margot gave a halfhearted chuckle. “I know. I doubt Peretti will agree.”

  The intern came in, pulling on his gloves as he backed through the door. When he turned and saw Margot, he stopped.

  Margot, her mind already on the task ahead, snapped, “Is there a problem, Doctor?”

  He was young, with an uncertain manner. His eyes flicked over Frank, lying quietly beneath the chloroform mask, then up to Margot. “I didn’t know it was you,” he blurted. He stood where he was for several seconds, reluctance in every line of his body.

  She had no time to wonder whether it was because she was in trouble with the board or because she was a woman doctor. “Well,” she said testily, “it is me. Are you ready?”

  He stood with the door half open, his gloved hands held out in front of him to avoid contamination. “I—I don’t know. That is—”

  Cardwell said, in the voice of authority Margot recognized all too well, “This is an emergency, Dr. Clay. Are you going to assist Dr. Benedict, or am I going to have to do it?”

  If the moment had not been so charged with tension, Margot might have laughed at the complexity of the intern’s expression. Alice Cardwell had not lost her touch. Every intern and resident in the hospital learned early and well to do what she suggested, and do it quickly.

  The young physician cleared his throat, stepped away from the door so it swung shut, and came to stand opposite Margot. She said evenly, “Thank you. This will be a resection to correct an amputational neuroma. We need to dissect out the scar, and the nerve ends. I may need a hand to free these adhesions.”

  In a voice faint with apprehension, the intern said, “Yes, Miss—Dr. Benedict. Whenever you’re ready.”

  Margot picked up her scalpel, ready to get to work.

  Frank woke slowly to brilliant sunshine on his face. He blinked, and tried to swallow. His mouth was dry as dust. He rolled his head on his pillow, and searched for the pain that greeted him every morning. All he found was a dull ache, held at a distance as if someone had put padding between the ruin of his left arm and his nervous system. Surprise brought him fully awake.

  He found himself in a hospital room. The painted iron bed, the stiff sheets, the drab walls all made him wonder for a moment if he was back in Virginia.

  Cautiously, he lifted his head. No, not Virginia. This room had a window opposite the bed, and the bedside table held a bud vase with a rose and a spray of baby’s breath. In all the time he’d spent in the hospital in Virginia, he had never once had flowers beside his bed. There was a carafe of water, too, and a glass, but when he lifted his right hand to reach for it, he found his arm was heavily bandaged, the fingers immobilized. He lifted his left arm, and saw that it was bandaged even more heavily than the right, the stump swathed in layers of gauze. The movement didn’t exacerbate the nerves as it usually did. Pain had been his constant companion for so long that its absence shocked him.

  He let his head fall back against the pillow, wondering how much medication he had been given. Enough, evidently, to soothe his arm. He wondered how to call for someone, but before he could decide, a plump nurse with sandy curls escaping from her cap put her head around the door. “We’re awake!” she said brightly. “How are we feeling?”

  Frank considered this. “All right,” he said, after a moment of assessing himself. “My head aches, and I’m thirsty. But I feel—” He paused, and then said, wondering at it, “I feel all right.” It was more than he could have said any morning, upon any awakening, for more months than he cared to count.

  “Well!” the nurse chirped. “Dr. Benedict will be so pleased to hear that.” She trotted to the bed with a rustle of her long skirts, and poured a glass of water. “Now, Major Parrish,” she said. “Your headache is because of the chloroform. Dr. Benedict left an order for pain medication when you need it.” She held the glass to Frank’s lips, and he drank it all. “And I’ll bring you some breakfast if you’re hungry.”

  “What happened to me?” he blurted.

  She smiled at him as she set the glass down. “I only know what I heard from Matron Cardwell when I came on duty this morning. Your hand and arm were burned when you tried to pull someone out of the fire at Dr. Benedict’s clinic. They brought you here. Dr. Benedict treated your burns, and while you were in the operating theater, she also repaired your—” She paused, and colored. “Your amputation,” she finished.

  “She—she repaired it?” Frank said. He closed his eyes, but he couldn’t shut out the image of Margot looking at his stump, handling it, all its ugliness exposed to her. Margot had operated on his arm?

  “Matron Cardwell is so proud of her! She has a special interest in Dr. Benedict, I think. She’s telling everyone what a brilliant surgery it was. I’m sure you’ll hear all about it. I’m told you’re a very lucky man.” She touched the flowers, straightened the sheet, plumped Frank’s pillow. “Now, Major, how do we feel about that breakfast?”

  Frank woke again to find a nurse with iron-gray hair beneath her starched cap standing next to his bed. She held a chart in one hand, a pen in the other. The pockets of her long apron bristled with lengths of cotton gauze, a stethoscope, a large thermometer in a glass case. “Good morning, Major.”

  “What—what happened? How long have I been here?”

  “Two days now. You’re a little sleepy from the medication, but you’re going to be fine.” There was a little bustle on the opposite side of the ward, other nurses attending other patients. The nurse glanced behind her with a stern expression, as if admonishing someone, then turned back to him. “I’m Nurse Cardwell. I was on duty when you came in, and attended your surgery.” She turned a straight chair so it faced him, and sat down, her back very straight, her ankles primly crossed. She opened the chart, and said in businesslike fashion, “Can you tell me what you remember, Major?”

  Frank frowned, trying to think. The relief from his constant pain made him feel oddly giddy. Nothing seemed quite real, as if he had dreamed the events of the last days. “I remember the fire,” he said. “Preston was in the storeroom. He didn’t know there was oxygen there. I knew it would flare up, so I ran around the back.”

  “You burned your hand and arm rather badly.”

  Frank lifted his bandaged right hand. He looked up at her, suddenly uncertain. “Did he—did he make it?”

  “I’m sorry, Major. It seems Mr. Benedict did not survive.”

  “He—Benedict’s dead?” It didn’t seem right to him. It seemed unreal, like part of the dream. “I can’t believe it,” he said hoarsely.

  “It’s a shock, I know. The building burned right to the ground. There’s nothing left.”

  “They think his body burned, too?”

  “I understand they found bone fragments in the rubble.”

  Frank closed his eyes, trying to take it in. Preston dead?

  The nurse put a hand on his arm. “I’m sorry to be so blunt, Major. It’s not a pleasant subject, but—”

  “No, it’s all right. I’m not upset. I’m just—” Frank shook his head, trying to put the pieces together. “A lot to take in. Someone told me Margot—that is, Dr. Benedict—”

  The nurse’s thin cheeks wrinkled with a restrained smile. “Oh, yes,” she said complacently. “Dr. Benedict did beautiful work on your burns and also on your arm. Your burns could have been serious, but they’re going to be fine. Your arm�
��the amputation—was in quite bad condition. I’m sure you’re going to be much more comfortable from now on.”

  “But she—” Frank shook his head against the pillow, wondering if he was just too slow to take it in. “I thought—her hospital privileges—”

  “It was a problem, naturally, but there was no time to call anyone. It was the middle of the night, and your burns needed immediate attention. Dr. Benedict was still operating when several other doctors arrived for their morning rounds.”

  Her smile grew. With a satisfied air, she said, “They could hardly interfere then, so they watched from the gallery.” She stood up, tucking the chart into the crook of her elbow, dropping the pen into an already-crowded pocket. “No one could have made a better job of your surgery than Dr. Benedict, Major. It was most fortunate.” Then, briskly, “But she can’t attend you, because of the other problem. Her colleague Dr. Clay will be in. He assisted Dr. Benedict with your operation. And I promised to keep an eye on you as well.”

  She bent, and lightly touched the bandages on his hand, and then on his stump. “We’ll change these when the doctor comes. No need to trouble you now. Are you comfortable?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Mostly you need to rest.”

  She restored the chair to its original position, and walked out of the room with a purposeful step, nodding to the other nurses as she passed them. Frank stared after her, blinking in the clear sunlight. He couldn’t shake a feeling that it was all an illusion, that when he roused from whatever state he was in, his pain would return in full force. And Margot—after seeing the horror of what was left of his arm—she could have accepted her banishment from the hospital as a way to avoid him.

  He tipped his head back, and pondered the blank ceiling.

  The morning after Frank’s surgery, Margot went back to the Alexis. She called Benedict Hall, but no one answered the telephone. She called Thea’s neighbor, who reported that Thea was holding up all right, before she fell into bed to sleep for ten solid hours. She woke at six o’clock in the evening to a ravenous hunger. She showered, and put on a linen dress. The skirt and shirtwaist she had worn lay in a pile on the floor where she had dropped them. When she picked them up, she wrinkled her nose at the smell of smoke and chloroform. She dropped them on top of her valise. She had no hat. It had been hanging on the rack in her office, along with her coat and her gloves. All of it was gone, nothing but cinders, along with her precious books, her diplomas—and two bodies, utterly consumed by the oxygen-fed fire.