It’s not fair and I know it, but I have lost so much of my life in these past months. Emptiness has been growing in me for weeks, and anger unfurls so neatly in its place.
Sorry, I’m about to say, but Jack is too quick for me.
“Without a job? Stella, you quit! It’s not my fault that you couldn’t handle some pushback from Principal Gardner—”
“Some pushback? Jack, he wanted me to put the kids in straitjackets!”
“Look.” Jack throws up his hands. “All I mean is that I went through a goddamn war. You’re so desperate to hear me talk about it, tell you stories like they’re fairy tales, but you don’t understand. I held men in my arms as they died. I killed men. Meanwhile, you can’t even stand up to an idiot boss without running. You think you could handle war?”
He’s giving me a piece of what I want, sharing a fraction of the memories that haunt him. But all I hear is the last part. You can’t even stand up to an idiot boss without running.
“I am a teacher,” I hiss. “Not a soldier.”
“You were a teacher. But you left.”
I step back, nearly tripping over my chair.
“You’re good at leaving,” Jack continues. His voice barely sounds like his own. “You left your students. You left your mother in the hospital the night she died. And now it looks like you’re trying to leave me.”
I see my mother crumpled in her hospital gown. I hear the nurses telling me I can’t go in. And even though I’d never obeyed an order my whole life, I listened. They were giving me a gift, letting me keep the image I had of my mother instead of forcing me to replace it with that of the weak creature she’d become.
So I obeyed. I let my mother die alone, and I regret it every day.
“You think I’m leaving you, Jack?” I look at him, a large tear shivering its way down my nose. “Fine. I’ll go.”
“No, Stella—I didn’t mean—”
I grit my teeth, inhale, force my anger back down from boiling. “I’m sorry. But I am going. It’s something I need to do.”
“Stell . . .”
I wait, hoping against hope that Jack will offer to come along. My childhood home would seem so much less empty with his laughter, and I smile as I imagine him bringing me pancakes in the bed I slept in till I was eighteen. I’ve spent years taking care of other people’s children, and now I’ve lost the one person who was always around to take care of me. Maybe Jack will put aside his own fears just this once?
“Fine,” Jack finally says.
“Fine, what?”
“Fine, you can go.”
My irritation returns in full force, fueled by hurt. “I wasn’t asking for your permission,” I huff as I turn from the room to pack.
CHAPTER NINE
Althea Anderson, August 1926
I should have known better than to skip the residence’s weekly tea. I creep up the stairs and find the social directress, Miss Caswell, planted staunchly before my door.
“Hello.” I smile politely, pressing my hairpins more firmly into the folds of my hair.
“Do you have time to sit down with me?” Miss Caswell inquires. “In the library, perhaps?”
I cannot say no. She knows as well as I that I need not be at the hospital until seven tonight. I have three hours.
“Of course.” I smile weakly. “That would be lovely.”
She leads me to the second story, and I am grateful the rest of the women are sipping tea downstairs so I don’t have to field their looks of concern. One would think that years of living at a boarding school would have trained me well in socializing with other girls, but I have always been slightly inept in that regard. Too serious, too focused.
Miss Caswell and I settle into the library armchairs, facing each other with practiced decorum. “Remind me. What shift are you on?”
“Emergency. I just finished obstetrics.”
She smiles. “What is your preference?”
I hesitate briefly but cannot lie. “Obstetrics.”
She nods. “Many of our girls are partial to that ward.”
I smile slightly and wait. Surely we don’t sit here alone while the rest of the girls celebrate downstairs just to make small talk.
“And you are finding your accommodations here satisfactory?”
“I—yes, of course.” I’ve been here two years already. “Always.”
“The social events are to your liking?”
“Certainly.” I search for an example to give her. Yesterday, I skipped visiting Margaret to play a game of tennis with the other girls. Not because I wanted to, of course, but because I thought it best to show my face. I don’t want anyone questioning where I’ve been. Now, I’m grateful for my decision. “The tennis, the plays we’ve seen. I’m very appreciative.”
“Hm. I simply wonder whether you find something lacking, Althea. Or perhaps whether our company is not enough for you?”
My thoughts snap back to Margaret. Could Miss Caswell be alluding to her, to my frequent visits to Coney Island? “I don’t know what you mean.”
“This may remind you.” Miss Caswell pulls an envelope from the pocket of her coat and hands it over. “I am not familiar with any ‘Michael Perkins’ living in our ladies-only boardinghouse . . .” She looks up pointedly. “Are you?”
I suddenly understand why the women at the hospital scream when contractions begin. My stomach roils, and my vision clouds. I take the envelope blindly and force myself to look down at it until my sight returns.
Michael Perkins
Room 4B
440 East 26th St.
New York City, New York 10010
The return address is Margaret Perkins, 1208 Surf Ave. Thank God they didn’t put Luna Park. But Michael Perkins’s address is mine.
I roll my shoulders back, sit up straight. “Certainly you aren’t suggesting that this letter arrived here intentionally.”
Miss Caswell has the good grace to suck in her cheeks with embarrassment. “You know it is my responsibility to ensure that all my charges are safe, Althea. No matter how untoward it may seem.”
Safe. She and I both know what that means: respectable, reputable. Single, Christian, and of good breeding, as the nursing application stressed.
I wonder briefly whether Miss Caswell would be more horrified by a man living in my room or by the truth. Whether a baby born out of wedlock or a kidnapping would be a greater sin in her eyes.
“Of course, Miss Caswell. I understand. And I am grateful. But for over two years I have lived here without a problem.” I speak with a confidence I do not possess. “Frankly, I’m mortified that you could so much as suspect me of something such as . . . this.”
Miss Caswell’s cheeks color slightly. “I still must do my due diligence.”
I am steady and reliable. I make decisions after weeks of deliberation. But now, for the second time in a month, I lie with the rashness of a man. As if I am as confident as I pretend to be.
“It must be a mistake,” I repeat. “You can open the letter and see.”
Miss Caswell arches an eyebrow as she slips her slender finger under the tongue of the envelope. I clench my toes as I remember Louise’s silver ring, its dizzying never-ending sheen. I close my eyes briefly, regain my balance. I’ve no idea what is in that envelope. I had not expected the Couneys to send anything when I’d written my own address in place of the Perkinses’. Why on earth would they?
The answer to my own question rises like the wail of an infant. Something has happened to Margaret. I lurch forward. There are so many possibilities: breathing complications, malnutrition, choking, illness. Anything could have happened to the girl in the two days since I’ve seen her. She lies barely alive in a glass box at the fairground, and no one knows she is there. Tears begin to prick my eyes, and I squeeze my lids tightly. Why, why is Miss Caswell so pai
nfully slow? With precision, she pulls the contents of the envelope from its mouth, perfectly slit. What comes out is not a letter but a card. Stiff white paper and printed words.
She lifts it to her eyes.
“What does it say?” I modulate my tone to mask my fear. But Miss Caswell smiles, flips her fragile wrist so I can read the words on the sheet.
One month and still kicking! I love you, Mom and Dad.
Love from your daughter,
Margaret Perkins
Below the words sits a thumbprint, tiny as a comma. “Oh,” I gasp. Margaret’s little print presses into my throat so I can hardly breathe. Those whorls are so vulnerable, half-smudged where Margaret must have slipped or squirmed. Michael Perkins, who would have kept this fingerprint from existing in the world at all, does not deserve this note. But my anger is tempered by relief. Margaret is safe. Margaret is safe, and so am I. Nothing in this letter connects me to the child or the father.
Miss Caswell’s bony frame has lost some of its rigidity; she is as grateful as I.
“Poor Mr. Perkins—and Mrs. Perkins, too,” she laughs gaily. “Won’t ever get their card. I do wonder about the competency of the postal workers, once in a while.” Miss Caswell stands, tossing the sheet into the wastebasket. “Thank you, Miss Anderson. I hope you have not taken this personally. I have”—she nods—“been impressed by your conscientiousness these last years.”
“Thank you.” I bow my head. “I believe,” I add, noting that she is waiting for me, “I will stay here in the library. I have some studying to do before my shift tonight.”
“Quite right.”
She steps from the library with a nod of approval, leaving me beside the wastebasket.
I pull the card out and fold it gently against my breast. Such a precious gift should not be wasted. I’ll keep it, however undeserving Michael Perkins may be, and return it to him and his wife alongside their daughter.
I press my hand to my bosom, my thumb to Margaret’s. For now, the note will be mine.
* * *
—
By the end of August, I’m living a double life. I’m in the emergency room every night and at Coney Island most days. The nurses at Luna Park have come to expect me, and more importantly, they expect Margaret not only to live but to lead an entirely normal life. At eight weeks, she is four pounds—still much lighter than the average newborn, but finally outside the most dangerous range. “Soon”—Louise pokes Margaret’s tiny upturned nose fondly—“you’ll be moving to the big kids’ room!”
I laugh, looking past Louise and through the glass. Not a single one of those “big kids” can be more than five or six pounds.
“And it’s a good thing, too.” Louise looks up at me with lips creased in sobriety. “You know we close down at the end of the summer. When the park shuts down for the season.”
Of course, I know this. I’ve been anxiously charting Margaret’s growth, projecting what her weight will be at the end of her time here. Whether she’ll be viable for life back home with Hattie and Michael.
“Yes.” I resist the urge to take Margaret from Louise’s arms. “What do you do with the babies who are not ready to be released?”
The nurse shrugs. “We typically deliver them to various hospitals in the area, incubators included. It is far from the ideal solution, what with the transport and the lack of individualized care or training at the facilities, but we have no other options. You’re lucky Margaret should be ready to go.”
“I’m sorry,” I say stupidly.
“Sorry?”
“I work at one of those hospitals. I’m sorry we don’t have the incubators or the training.”
“Well.” Louise waves her hand. “I know how it is. It isn’t as if you have a say. One day”—she smiles down at Margaret—“when all these babies are grown up and healthy, they’ll see. Doctors, hospitals—they’ll finally start saving them all.”
One day is not good enough, I want to tell Louise. But she knows that. Why else is she here, after all, except to—slowly, steadily, against all odds—prove that these babies deserve a chance?
“Until then,” she confirms, “we pray. ‘Let the little children come to me.’ Surely if the world cannot see these babies’ value, their Creator can.”
I murmur agreement. How could He not?
Then I think of Michael Perkins, Margaret’s creator in the most literal way. My eyelids twitch. He could not see this girl’s value. He does not deserve her.
I speak before my thoughts cross a dangerous line. “I cannot wait to take the girl back to her parents.” I calibrate my expression to my words as I beam at Louise. “They will be overjoyed to see her again.”
Louise’s forehead creases in pity. “Isn’t it a shame that they haven’t been able to visit,” she clucks, shaking her head. “Sadly, it isn’t uncommon.”
I bow my head. “Very much a shame. But . . . there is simply no way it would have been possible.”
Louise’s smile cuts with understanding. “Then you’ve been a blessing to them, haven’t you?”
Blessing. From Old English bledsian.
To consecrate.
With blood.
* * *
—
But it is not blood Margaret begins coughing up the next week. Instead, green-yellow sputum seeps suddenly from between her round pink lips as I hold her late Sunday morning. “Louise!” I screech. “Maye!” I place my hand to Margaret’s forehead—hot. Her breathing is labored. “Louise!”
The nurse appears instantly at my side. She pulls a stethoscope from the folds of her gown and presses it to my baby’s lungs.
“Do you hear rales?”
Louise just nods, crossing herself. “Que Dieu nous aide.”
The terrible word unfurls from both our mouths in eerie lockstep: “Pneumonia.”
I am not the calm, composed Nurse Anderson of Bellevue Hospital. I am frantic, desperate, rabid.
I take a deep breath but forget to exhale. I will not let Margaret succumb to this illness, not after she’s reached the two-month milestone. We must act. “She’s likely dehydrated.” I pat the baby’s diaper—dry.
Louise nods shortly, and I pass her the infant as I run for the eyedroppers. “Here, baby girl.” I return, fighting Margaret’s cough to get the milk down her throat. “You can do it, sweet Margaret. Swallow, Margaret, just swallow. You’ll be all right.”
She’ll be all right if we get her to the hospital.
Welfare Island rears again in my mind. Would I survive a transformed life of labor and shackles if I were arrested? If we register Margaret at the hospital and they find out who we both are?
Althea. I am asking the wrong questions. What matters is this: Will Margaret survive this if we don’t take her to the hospital? Or will she join Cybil in the ranks of those I have let die?
My voice changes as I look up at Louise. I don’t want to prompt Margaret’s registration and my own potential downfall. But I have to. I’d turn myself in to save her. “We need to take her to Coney Island Hospital, Louise. She needs medicine. The antiserum.”
“She needs the medicine.” Louise nods. “But I don’t think she needs the hospital.”
“What?” Hope tears the word from my throat. “Why not?”
“If she catches another infection from the other patients, it will kill her—if getting her there doesn’t do it first. She needs her incubator now more than ever.”
Blessed relief envelops me, my legs wobbling like peach preserves. “I’ll go, then. But they’ll need to type her pneumonia.” Treatment for one strain will cause complications for another. “Is there a capsule I can use to transport her sputum?” From there, if her pneumonia is pneumococcal, the doctors can type it and determine which serum will save her.
“Here.” Louise shoves Margaret abruptly into my arms and sprints o
ff. Her urgency both comforts and frightens me. Margaret is in good hands, but the situation, if capable Louise is ruffled, is dire. The infant’s face contorts as her lips open and close in a desperate plea for air. The silence accompanying the movement sets me shaking more than the sickly green-yellow of her mucus.
“Margaret, baby? Say something,” I beg her. “Make some sort of noise.” She’s never been quiet before. I rub my thumb gently across her flushed forehead where it fades into nose. “Please, baby girl. I’m here. You’ll be all right.”
I’m here. You’ll be all right. Can I say such a thing? Do I have the power to save this baby? Or have I merely hurt her? What if my greedy visits and insistence on holding Margaret gave her this illness?
Overwhelmed, I doubt my ability to stay here and hold this baby while she shakes and wheezes and dies. But my body is stronger than my mind. “None of us can know what we are capable of until we are tested,” Elizabeth Blackwell once said. The first woman to get a medical degree in the United States, Blackwell was capable of anything. I am capable of this. I was capable of risking my entire life to save Margaret from certain death, wasn’t I?
Now, I force myself to calm so I can hold Margaret gently and whisper to her, talk to her, soothe her with words like a lullaby until Louise comes bustling back. “Take this.” She thrusts a paper into my hands. “It’s signed by the doctor. They’ll understand the baby can’t come in.” She wields a bottle in her other hand and positions it beneath Margaret’s lips.
“Give us a little cough, Marg.” I thump her back. “Bring something up for us.” I am more confident now that I have a goal, a clear medical procedure to follow. Margaret chokes up more unnaturally yellow mucus, and Louise tips the neck of the bottle to catch it. Though each cough is painful to watch, we have enough sputum in the capsule for the doctors at the hospital to get a reading. Mouth grimly set, Louise seals the container. I am grateful she is beside me. Many would not be able to stomach such a task.
The Light of Luna Park Page 8
