Privately some raffish men whispered to one another: ‘What a glorious way to go!’ but most of them thought to themselves: Jesus! I’d hate to be caught in a mess like that. My farewell performance. No thanks. And many thought: I couldn’t do that to my wife. And the kids.
This feeling was strengthened by reports of how traumatic Gus Ranger’s ugly death had been for his wife. Reverend Quade was not invited to deliver a eulogy at the memorial services at the Palms, and for the good reason that no such services were offered. Dr. Zorn had given orders: ‘If Mrs. Ranger insists, of course we’ll go ahead, but she hasn’t left her rooms, so let’s not suggest it.’ Muley Duggan persuaded a few men to attend a service he organized at a downtown Tampa mortuary but no wives participated.
Andy did not wait long before visiting with Mrs. Ranger in her lonely apartment. When he sat with her he gave her the warmest assurance that he personally would see to it that she was offered a smaller apartment if she decided to remain at the Palms, which he advised her to do. ‘You have your friends here. You already know everyone, and there’s no need whatever to try to find a new life.’ When she said she’d have to think about costs now that Gustavus was no longer there to manage their investments, he reminded her: ‘You know that your monthly costs drop with only one of you occupying these quarters, and they’ll drop even more if you accept my invitation to take smaller rooms.’
But since this was his first experience with a widow who might be staying on, Mrs. Clement having died almost simultaneously with her husband, he wanted to make sure that the women in the center knew that he and his staff would do everything in their power to make adjustment to a single life easy, friendly and inexpensive. He stayed with Mrs. Ranger more than two hours, reviewing all aspects of her financial situation and especially the alternatives she might consider: ‘I want you to share with us your plans and your hopes, and if you’d do better shifting to some other retirement area, we’ll give you the warmest possible cooperation. Mrs. Ranger, we were established to provide comfort and safety to people like you. You’ve made yourself a member of our family, and as family members we’ll give you sound advice. I hope you’ll stay with us.’
He asked also about her family members and what she might expect of them. He wanted to know what relations she had with any Tampa church, who her doctor was, what condition her will would be in with Gus gone, and whether she would feel more at ease if she had a room on the lower floor, or even one on the top floor with a broad view of the colorful swampland to the north. Everything he did in those mournful days proved that he was personally interested in her welfare and was prepared to serve as a business counselor to succeed her husband. He did not have to pose as a Good Samaritan, he was one.
But in the days that followed, when Mrs. Ranger was weighing carefully her choices, Andy became aware that one staff member was treating this widow less as a distraught elderly client than as an elderly beloved sister who faced great emotional problems. He heard Nurse Varney say one day when she was counseling Mrs. Ranger about some minor medical matter: ‘You don’t gots to bother with expensive tests for a thing like that. Go to the Eckerds down the way and ask the pharmacist what’s best for a sinus attack. He’ll tell you, total cost maybe four-fifty for one of the new medicines.’ He had noticed before that when Nora spoke to residents about the serious problems of life, she reverted to the Negro dialect of her youth, the one her mother had used when sharing her folk wisdom. Now he heard her say: ‘What you really gots to do, Mrs. Ranger, is start right now to get out into the community. Go to a restaurant now and then. Help out in some church. See if the school down the way needs a morning helper to read to the children.’
When Mrs. Ranger said: ‘I’m ashamed to show my face. I’m here in your office only because I have this sinus pain,’ Nora led her to a corner chair, pulled one up for herself and lectured the bereft widow: ‘Mrs. Ranger, we don’t want no more such talk in this place. Listen, my dear friend,’ and Andy saw his nurse take Mrs. Ranger’s hands in hers, ‘every peoples gots trouble, lots worse than yours sometimes, but they live on, find trusted friends, dress up each Saturday night as if it was a party, and get on with their lives.’ When Mrs. Ranger held fast to the nurse’s hands and began to cry, Varney snapped: ‘None of that! Did you know that Mrs. Rexford has a daughter, bad brain damage, her mind stopped growing about age five. Girl’s in a home for the past forty years. And poor Mr. Duggan, his wife doesn’t even remember who he is, that’s trouble too, Mrs. Ranger. And the ambassador, his wife died young, I cared for her, a lovely woman, he like to died, but you see him now, active in his corner with his talky-talky men. He keeps living.’ For some minutes she continued sharing with Mrs. Ranger the secrets of the Palms until it sounded as if half the residents lived with some dark misery in their closets: ‘But they keep on living. Peoples gots to stay in the fight. You know what they say in the football television? “No pain, no gain.” You got pain, yes, but so do all peoples.’
‘Yes, but mine is so public.’ She burst into tears and covered her face with her hands, as if trying to hide from cruel strangers. ‘I’m so ashamed.’
For some moments the nurse allowed her to cry, then said softly: ‘Mrs. Ranger, they’ll whisper about it for maybe a week, then it’ll die down. What you do is learn to hold your head high. You’re a proud woman. You’re a good woman, as good as any of them, and if they stare at you, stare right back, head high as if you were saying: Go to hell! and in one week it will pass.’
When the widow continued to weep, Varney grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her, saying in a harsh voice: ‘Snap out of it, sister. How do you think I felt when my man left me with no money, no job, and two small daughters? How much shame did I have to swallow? Mrs. Ranger, all peoples gots misery. We all gots shame. And yours is standard issue. Come on! Smile!’
When Mrs. Ranger composed herself she said: ‘I’ll see what the man at Eckerds has to say about my sinuses.’ There was a pause, then: ‘Nurse, may I kiss you good-bye?’
‘I ain’t leaving,’ Varney said, ‘and neither are you,’ and she embraced the widow.
On the last day of April, marking the completion of Andy’s first four months at the Palms, he conducted a tour of inspection to check on the buildings and grounds. He started by having Ken Krenek drive him out to the first of the great palm trees reaching toward the clouds, and he inspected each one as he walked westward toward the massive gateway to the buildings. He understood that in due course one or another of those majestic trees would die and have to be replaced, but he could detect none that seemed threatened: ‘Anyway, those out in the savanna grow so fast that replacements would be possible.’ Then he had a better thought: If they can do with dead palms what they did to replace those Brazilian pepper trees that were so splendid, we could move in nearly mature palms and no one would be able to spot the difference.
With mixed feelings he turned his attention to the left-hand side of the entrance row, for although the Brazilian pests had been sawed off and rooted out, they had been replaced, through the generosity of Mr. Taggart, by a gorgeous line of nearly full-grown oleander shrubs that formed a sturdy hedge of dull-red flowers set among bright green leaves. ‘They’re curious,’ Andy said as he checked their growth, finding each of them firmly rooted in the short time since the cutting of the Brazilians, ‘because they carry a deadly poison. There are stories galore of lost wanderers who slept under a growth of oleanders and died because the poison from their leaves dripped down on them. Probably an old wives’ tale, but we do know their leaves are poisonous to eat. Yet how beautiful!’
He also walked south of the buildings and saw with a pang of regret where the ruins of Judge Noble’s chair rusted at the edge of the channel. The big pool was in good condition and the walking path south had good footing. ‘The Palms is a sanctuary tucked within its own little paradise. I hope we can protect it.’
Indoors, he inspected first the health center and was pleased to observe the bright colors of the
new paint in the hallways of Assisted Living and Extended Care. He shuddered when he passed Room 312, where Mrs. Carlson still survived amid her wonderland of tubes, insertions and electrical connections, but he had learned to keep his mouth shut about that medical aberration. He had been indoctrinated in the fact that neither he nor any other Palms employee had anything to do with that room. What happened there was determined by the courts of Florida.
When he reached Gateways he was gratified to see it was such a treasure in the retirement system, clean, cheerful, well ordered and brightened with vases of flowers. But he was less happy when he reached the ground floor and telephoned the main desk to send him a key so that he could inspect the new hobby room. When Delia, the efficient receptionist, said: ‘I have strict orders. No one can go to that room without being escorted by one of the five men building the plane,’ he asked: ‘Not even me? This is Dr. Zorn.’
‘I recognized your voice, sir. No, not even you.’ He asked Delia to roust out one of the team, and in time Maxim Lewandowski, the aged scientist, appeared. The accident that it was he who came to represent the tertulia of dreamers was unfortunate in that he seemed so terribly old and frail that to think of him building an airplane was, frankly, ridiculous. But once inside the crowded room he became a different person. Moving to his lathe, he pointed to a blueprint diagram that gave the specifications for the propeller; he was obligated to follow the specifications to the smallest fraction of an inch. The old fellow had mathematical measuring devices that enabled him to do this, and a handsome twist of laminated wood sanded to a micrometer smoothness and covered with a hard, luminous varnish glistened in the morning sunlight.
‘How about that motor you men ordered?’ Andy asked, and Lewandowski became once more the professor: ‘Dr. Zorn, the terms “motor” and “engine” are not synonymous. A motor is a device that runs on electricity provided by some outside force. Like the motor that operates the windshield wiper. An engine is a device that runs on the power it generates itself.’ He paused, then used an illustration he had often used in his seminars: ‘Can you imagine how long the wires would have to be if you tried to power an airplane on a flight from New York to Tokyo using a motor? Or just as bad, how big the batteries would have to be to store that amount of electricity?’ Patting the front end of the fuselage, he said: ‘To fly a plane, you need an engine. To operate this wiper, a little motor.’ When Andy said he had it clear, Lewandowski said: ‘And where do we get the electricity to run this little motor? From a generator attached to the gasoline engine. On a big passenger plane it automatically generates enough electricity to light the cabin, air-condition it and operate all the instruments in the cockpit.’
When Andy left the old man and his shimmering propeller, he had a better understanding of what the tertulia was attempting, but when he returned to his desk he was overcome with apprehension: ‘Good God! What if those old-timers do finish their plane, and take it out there and it gets into the air for eight or ten minutes and then crashes—with everyone watching—and maybe even television cameras? What a horrible mess. The story would make news across the nation. I wonder if I could persuade them to call this off. They’d object, of course—they’ve invested so much time—but I’d better try.’
He did, that evening, when he dropped by table four and asked if he might join them for dessert. ‘You can join us,’ Senator Raborn grumbled, ‘but you can’t have dessert. The yogurt machine is on the blink.’
‘We’ll get it fixed,’ Andy said for the twentieth time. When he had the attention of the four men he asked, tentatively: ‘Have you ever thought of just building the plane, leaving out the engine and giving it maybe to some industrial arts school in Tampa?’
Ambassador St. Près stiffened as he had in central Africa when his second in command at the embassy had asked: ‘Mr. Ambassador, do you think it prudent to take up flying … at your age, I mean? Why couldn’t you rely—’
He had stared at the young man and growled: ‘That’s an asinine question. Schedule me for lessons on Wednesdays and Fridays.’
Now, with equal stiffness but softer language, he said: ‘Dr. Zorn, I appreciate why you might be apprehensive about us old men taking our plane into the air over your establishment, but I assure you that was fully our intention from the moment we started building The Palms One, which is what we shall christen her. And our determination has never wavered. I have renewed my license every year as an act of faith. And I believe the senator does, too.’
‘Mine lapsed, but I can get it renewed,’ Raborn said.
‘So the plane will fly, Doctor, in capable hands.’
‘I wish you well. I’ll be there to cheer you on.’ But as he left the table he paused, looked back at the four elderly dreamers and made the wish: I pray that you clowns can keep it in the air, just this once.
Back in his office, he leaned back in his chair and juggled John Taggart’s imaginary blocks: This place is in great shape, Gateways is filled to capacity barring those two small rooms that Miss Foxworth likes to hold in reserve for unexpected visitors. Extended Care also filled to capacity. Then he smiled self-indulgently: But my best move was to bring good old boy Bedford Yancey and that wife of his, energetic Ella, down here. With their help we have Assisted Living under control and almost flourishing.
He considered for a brief moment whether he should write a report on his successes to Mr. Taggart, but his cautious nature warned him against premature boasting: ‘Play it cool, Andy my son,’ he could hear his father saying. ‘Save the letters to Chicago until you have this place locked into the profit column.’
As he sat at his desk, a strange lethargy began to creep over him. For a long time he did nothing, just letting his thoughts drift aimlessly, but he slowly realized that although he was pleased by the apparent success of the initial period of his custodianship, there was a deep unhappiness within himself—a gnawing dissatisfaction with the state of his personal life. He disliked being introspective—he feared the danger of plumbing the depths—but now he was forced to ask himself: Why am I so restless? Why, at the very moment of having turned this place around, am I so damned … unhappy? The instant he acknowledged—almost involuntarily—that he was profoundly unhappy his defenses crumbled: I’ve lost everything that matters to me—my wife, my work in the clinic. I was meant to be a doctor … and I threw it all away … through cowardice. I allowed that damned lawyer to destroy my life.
At this moment his protracted soliloquy was interrupted by a committee of three women who were part of a group rehearsing for an amateur gala to be performed on Memorial Day. They were dressed in the costumes worn by little girls around 1910: short, frilly dresses, lace collars high at the neck and saucy little blue-and-white hats. Their spokesman explained: ‘Dr. Andy, we’ve added a new song to our number and we want you to be the first to hear it. Come along, business matters can wait till tomorrow,’ and they dragged him off to the rehearsal room.
They were three from a group of seven, who, after apologizing for the fact that not all had memorized the new words, gathered about Andy and sang:
‘Dr. Zorn, he’s a dandy
Hair not red but kinda sandy.
He gives kids an extra candy
We feel safe to have him handy
Give the guy a shot of brandy.’
Muley Duggan, passing by on his way to his apartment after visiting with his afflicted wife in Assisted Living, heard the last line and scurried about to get a bottle of brandy and returned to pour Andy a hefty portion. Normally, Andy was abstemious, having watched several doctor acquaintances of his washed down the tubes in a flood of alcohol—‘I like a cold beer now and then, but that’s about it’—but this day had been so painful and the song such a vote of confidence that he guzzled the brandy with alacrity, grateful for its comforting heat passing through his veins.
Leaving the chorus and Muley, he returned to his office, where he began brooding again. Bitterly he asked himself: Is this to be the balance of my life? The respec
ted director of a refuge where delightful elderly women idolize you and the long years drift by?… At this moment, unaccountably, an inner voice he did not recognize as his own spoke decisively: Get yourself back on the main track. Find someone to share a life with. And don’t postpone it till you’re fifty.
Suddenly lighthearted, he went to his apartment and, thanks to the brandy, was asleep in less than ten minutes.
Shortly after that emotionally wrenching night when he had had to sort out his personal long-range goals, he received a letter whose potential for ugliness made perspiration spring to his forehead. It came from Chattanooga and carried in the upper left-hand corner of the envelope the ominous name of Dr. Otto Zembright, M.D. Before daring to open it, Andy leaned back, visualizing the Tennessee doctor who had been so proficient and helpful that snowy New Year’s morning when the girl lost both her legs in the car crash.
He remembered Zembright’s cautionary counsel never to play the Good Samaritan: ‘I’d have got the hell out of there as soon as I could,’ he had said. So it was unlikely that Zembright himself was about to bring any kind of action against him, but he might be warning him about someone who was. Memories of his days on the witness stand flooded back to him and he shuddered.
Unable to postpone opening the letter indefinitely, he gingerly slipped a desk knife into the fold at the top and took out the single sheet of paper. It contained only three sentences: ‘Father of girl is grateful. Nothing to fear. Please call me.’
Recessional: A Novel Page 21
