Guests on Earth (30 page)

“Hush, honey, I’ll fill you in.” Ruth was right behind her. “Jinx is fine, everybody’s fine. Just keep going.”

The men stood up. “Good morning, girls, our apologies for this rude awakening, heh-heh,” the big policeman said. He had a wide, fake grin I hated. It was not really an apology, either. He liked to scare people; you could tell. “Yes, you may go on about your business, for the time being. We know who you are, we know where to find you. We just have a few questions to ask your friend here.”

“What? Who?” Ruth said.

“Me, I reckon.” Jinx looked utterly bored.

The front door flew open and it was Mr. Pugh again, with Mr. and Mrs. Morris right behind him. ”Now just a minute here, you can’t barge into a hospital residence like this and disturb our clients!” Mr. Pugh looked as if he had not been to bed all night long. Mrs. Morris immediately went over to sit beside Jinx on the loveseat.

“Oh yeah, is that right?” The men stood up and the policeman held out a piece of paper to Mr. Pugh, who barely looked at it before handing it over to Mr. Morris, who was a lawyer.

“We have some questions to ask Miss Feeney concerning her—” the big policeman hesitated—“acquaintance with Charles Winston. Matter of fact, Miss Feeney is going to have to come downtown with us.”

The other man looked intently from one person to another but never said a word. He was some kind of detective, I thought.

Mr. Morris whispered something to Mr. Pugh while Mrs. Morris hugged Jinx. Behind us, Myra came out of her room and sank down upon the top step, starting to wail.

“You see?” Mr. Pugh said.

“Evalina, you and Amanda and Ruth go on now,” Mrs. Morris directed from the loveseat in her even voice. “Go ahead, take Myra with you. Everything will be just fine, don’t worry. We will take care of this situation, and we will take care of Jinx, too. She will be accompanied at all times. This is obviously a case of mistaken identity or something.”

It took some coaxing to get Myra into her coat and lead her out to catch the bus with Ruth. “Jiminy cricket,” was the last thing I heard Jinx say as we all exited the door together into the cold bright morning of March 7.

T
HE CONVOCATION IN
t
he Homewood auditorium was brief, low-key, and factual—exactly what we had come to expect from Dr. Bennett. It was neither a memorial service nor a religious service, but simply an acknowledgement of the previous night’s events. Dr. Bennett stood before us in his customary dark blue suit and red tie, flanked by an American flag in a stand, brought in for the occasion. My grand piano was closed.

“Good morning,” he said in his no-nonsense way that I always found reassuring though sometimes annoying. “We know that you were all upset and some of you were very alarmed by the disturbances of last night. We apologize for the police sirens and the noise, which was totally unnecessary, in our opinion. Be that as it may. As all of you undoubtedly know by now, these events came about from the unexpected death of our friend and client Charles Winston.”

“He was a war hero,” a male voice yelled out.

Dr. Bennett hesitated only briefly. “Yes, Captain Charles Gray Winston the Third was indeed a war hero, as he was a son and a family member and a friend to many—many of you here in this room as well as all over this state. Raised in Winston-Salem, he graduated from Virginia Military Institute before entering the United States Army. His untimely death is a great tragedy for his family and certainly for all of us at Highland Hospital who had grown to enjoy and respect and care for him.” A military man himself, Dr. Bennett faltered and almost choked up.

“Those who live by the sword will die by the sword!” rang out that same voice, which I now recognized as belonging to another one of the veterans, a large, agitated redhead with an especially fine baritone. There was a pause and then a brief scuffle as he was escorted out.

Dr. Bennett cleared his throat. “Of course this is a very emotional time for many of us. I urge you all to disregard whatever accounts you may read of Charles Winston’s death in the newspapers and remember him as he was in life, a valued and almost fully recovered member of our community. I encourage you to concentrate upon your own goals and your own recoveries.

“A routine police investigation is in progress, as required by law for any unattended death. We intend to cooperate fully with this investigation and urge you to do the same, though we ask that you please notify a staff member if you are so approached directly.

“And now let us bow our heads in a moment of silence and thanksgiving for the life of Charles Gray Winston the Third.”

Dixie grabbed my hand and squeezed it as the unaccustomed silence stole over us all like a warm blanket, like a blessing. Nobody spoke. Nobody moved.

“Thank you.” Dr. Bennett pulled out his familiar little notebook. “As of this moment, all groups, meetings, appointments, classes, and meals at Highland Hospital will proceed as regularly scheduled. Sign-up sheets have been posted outside the dining hall for the symphony and also for the upcoming trip to the basketball game in Charlotte. We remind you of the podiatrist’s visit to our clinic this afternoon; the bridge club meeting tomorrow afternoon at four p.m., refreshments furnished; and of course the ongoing preparations and rehearsals for our Mardi Gras party this coming Friday evening, to which everyone is invited. I’ll see you there.” His farewell gesture was a cross between a wave and a salute.

Despite Dr. Bennett’s attempt at establishing calm, rumors went flying all that long day, whispered in the halls between groups, over sandwiches at lunch, at the big tables in Art where people were putting the final touches on their fantastical Mardi Gras masks, and on the paths and sidewalks between buildings.

Charles Winston was married. No, he was engaged. Charles Winston was engaged to be married. He had shot himself between the eyes with a pistol. No, it must have been a shotgun, they said his brains were all over the wall. No, it was a pistol. They said his blood was all over the room. No, it was a pistol, but there had been two shots fired. What? Two shots. But everybody knows you can’t shoot yourself twice, can you, if it’s a suicide? Can you? So maybe it wasn’t a suicide.

“Maybe it was murder,” Karen Quinn whispered into my ear as I took my seat at the portable keyboard in the gymnasium. Then she jumped out onto the floor and got her straggly “second line” up on their feet to join her. I played the rocking intro to “Go to the Mardi Gras,” and they set off grumbling around the floor to the shuffle beat that soon proved irresistible. It did sound exactly like a parade coming down the street. After a couple of laps, I switched over to “Jock-A-Mo” while Karen built on the momentum to get them dancing. Harry Bridges, the redheaded veteran who had caused the ruckus in the auditorium earlier, was dancing up a storm now, taking a turn with several of the older ladies, who seemed to be enjoying themselves enormously. I will never understand anything, I thought. “Laissez les bon temps roulez,” big Karen said, dancing past, winking at me. Is this crazy? I wondered. But nothing is crazy in an insane asylum.

M
ARCH 9. THE
o
blivious sun shone brightly all that long day; by late afternoon, the snow was gone. Tiny blades of bright green grass glistened on the muddy hillsides. Forsythia waved by the dining hall door like the yellow flag of spring. “Look!” Dixie pointed to a clump of purple crocuses as we set off down the hill for rehearsal right after supper. But here came Freddy in his station wagon, slamming on the brakes and jumping out to pull me into the rose arbor.

“Why, what in the world!” I said.

“Bye now!” Dixie and Amanda were giggling.

Freddy was still dressed in his white doctor coat and a nice striped tie. He pulled me to him and gave me a big, minty kiss. “There!” he said as if it were a mission accomplished. Then he held me out at arm’s length and gave me a long searching look. “I’ve been missing you, Evalina, that’s all. I haven’t even gotten a glimpse of you for two, maybe three days.”

Was that true? I hadn’t realized it.

“But it’ll be all over soon,” Freddy said cheerfully, which gave me the most ominous feeling, somehow. My palm began to itch and my heart beat furiously.

“Evalina? Honey? What’s the matter. You’re white as a sheet. Do you feel okay?”

“I’m just tired,” I said. “There’s been so much going on.”

“That’s what I’m talking about. Charles’s death, and this performance coming up—I know you’re working yourself to death. But all this Mardi Gras stuff will be over with after the party, right? So I’ve got a big surprise for you, a special date on the next Saturday night afterward, an overnight.”

“Oh, I don’t know,” I said.

“At Lake Lure, Evalina!” he burst out like a child.

“But Freddy, that’s way too expensive. That’s crazy—you don’t have that kind of money. Why don’t I just sneak into Mrs. Hodding’s house again with a special bottle of wine?” At first Freddy had been too straitlaced to let me come to his boardinghouse on nearby Montford Avenue.

“Nope,” he said firmly. “This is something special. We’ve got some decisions to make. I’ve already booked the room and made our dinner reservations.”

We stood inside the white lattice walls of the rose arbor, looking out upon the beautiful hospital grounds in the last of the light as people we knew and loved, patients and staff alike, went back and forth on the sidewalk. The climbing roses were already sending out spikes of new growth all over their trellises; spring was here, but suddenly I felt as if I were in a prison. I didn’t know how I was going to get out of it.

“Honey?” Freddy took me in his arms again, as big and solid as a bear. “Kiss me?

I did.

Anybody could have seen us.

I
WAS LATE
f
or rehearsal but it didn’t matter; it looked like everybody else was late, too, except for Mrs. Fitzgerald, who sat onstage at my piano bench, hunched over, legs crossed, tapping her satin slipper-clad foot on the floor as she eyed the door. “Get up here, Pie-Face,” she said to me. Nervously I took my seat next to her on the bench, opening the piano and arranging the sheet music I had brought in my book bag. Mrs. Fitzgerald didn’t budge, even as the others began to arrive. I already knew that Myra would not be here because she had “fallen apart” at the library and was now in the hospital “but just overnight,” according to Dr. Schwartz.

Jinx was not present.

Neither was Mrs. Morris’s daughter Nancy, nor Mrs. Morris herself.

“So where are they all? The rest of them? My corps de ballet?” Mrs, Fitzgerald shot a black look down at Phoebe and Dr. Schwartz on the front row.

“Well, it’s been such an unusual day, hasn’t it?” Dr. Schwartz said calmly. “I imagine you should just go ahead with the ones you’ve got—there’s another rehearsal tomorrow anyway, right?

“Dress rehearsal,” Mrs. Fitzgerald said darkly. She switched legs, now banging her other foot on the floor, and I shifted accordingly on the piano bench. “But where is that little redhead, little Orphan Annie I call her? She is the heart and soul of it, my heart and soul.”

When no one answered, she finally stood up and walked forward. She clapped her hands and said, “Dancers on stage!”

Up they came, indeed a diminished lot in the unforgiving stage lights. Amanda was pale and silent, Pauletta was red-eyed and twitchy, and even Ruth looked tired and unsure of herself. Only Karen Quinn and Dixie appeared ready to dance, Karen in her usual aura of health and solidity, Dixie radiating charm in every direction. Frank was coming up for the dance, she’d told me excitedly, and they’d be leaving a day or two later. So would Mrs. Fitzgerald, almost done with her course of treatments and headed off to New York City to visit her daughter, Scottie, and her growing family, which now included the much-heralded baby Eleanor. Amanda was leaving, too, but not for Tampa; she would be traveling in Italy with two old friends, her college roommates. She had filed for divorce from the judge.

“Places!” Mrs. Fitzgerald snapped as they tried to find their groups, though Pauletta had started crying in earnest now, rubbing at her face with the tail of her sweater.

I played the jaunty, now-familiar prelude.

But Mrs. Fitzgerald held up her hand. “This is ridiculous. My dear, can you not stop weeping? This is very annoying.” At which Pauletta cried even harder and Dixie left her own place and ran across the stage to comfort her.

“That’s it, then. Enough. Alors. Arretez!”

“This is going to be the biggest flop,” Ruth complained to Karen Quinn as they escaped offstage. “Nobody knows what they’re doing. We’ve never even gone through the whole thing. It’s ridiculous.”

Mrs. Fitzgerald whirled to point at her. “Nonsense! You are ballerinas, every one of you. Artistes. You shall be present for dress rehearsal tomorrow and you shall dance brilliantly. Superbe! Magnifique!” She grabbed her fringed purple shawl off the top of the piano and threw it haphazardly around her shoulders before rushing down the steps and striding up the aisle, still in her ballet shoes, muttering to herself, unlit cigarette already in hand.

“Oh, brother,” said Phoebe Dean.

“Oh no,” said Dr. Schwartz.

CHAPTER 15

I
DON’T THINK
I
h
ave ever been more nervous—Phoebe Dean, either. We arrived very early for dress rehearsal and she paced back and forth in front of the stage while I practiced my Mardi Gras music on the grand piano and Cal Green’s crew put the final touches on the stage set which they had constructed in Shop. “When the saints come marching in, oh when the saints come marching in, well I want to be in that number, when the saints come marching in!” Phoebe jumped up on stage to sing along with me in her big, churchy voice while Cal grinned at us and his crew of patients snapped their fingers appreciatively. “Yeah!” one large man yelled. It was amazing, really, what they had built—the sturdy wooden facsimile of a clock tower such as you would see in Europe, its plywood façade painted to look like ancient stones, Notre Dame in Paris or the Cathedral St. Louis in New Orleans. “Oh when the sun begins to shine, oh when the sun begins to shine—” Phoebe and I started in on the second verse.

Cal climbed atop a ladder while his helpers carefully handed up the big clock face we had all seen in the Art Room for weeks now, its black Roman numerals painted in Gothic lettering. Miss Malone herself arrived just in time to stand and watch this procedure, hands on her wide hips. “Oh Lord I want to be in that number, when the sun begins to shine!” We finished, and I switched over to “Tipitina,” which sounded good, too. Everything always sounded great on that piano. By then I was feeling better; a keyboard can always calm me down.

“That looks perfect, Cal,” Phoebe called out as he descended from the ladder.

Cal tipped his hat, that same old khaki hat he had worn for all the years I had known him at Highland. “Come on boys, let’s get out of here, we’ve got work to do.” His crew followed him reluctantly, with the big man dancing like crazy all across the stage, surprisingly light on his feet.

Then Miss Malone came up on the stage herself to look at the clock more closely. It seemed to pass her inspection. “Okay, Karen,” she yelled out suddenly, surprising me, “where are you?”

“Got it covered, Boss” came Karen’s voice from somewhere high overhead. “Here we go!” The first gossamer strip fluttered down from the catwalk far above the stage, waving behind the clock tower, followed by another, then another, then another, in shades of blue and red and yellow, Mrs. Fitzgerald’s favorite primary colors, I remembered. She always liked to paint straight from the little pots, never mixing the colors. The banners waved and shimmered nearly to the floor.

“Oh my goodness, how gorgeous, Rowena!” Dr. Schwartz cried out as she arrived, but Miss Malone was still not satisfied, calling up to Karen to move this one or that one in order to achieve just the right fantastical backdrop. Finally Karen was allowed to climb down, receiving a squeeze from Miss Malone for her efforts, and spontaneous applause from the rest of us.

I had just switched over to “Jambalaya,” tinkling the treble keys, when the back door opened and Phoebe leaned over the piano to say, “Uh-oh. Here comes trouble.” Of course we were all wondering this very same thing. Mrs. Fitzgerald entered, wearing her enormous purple shawl. I took my hand off the keys immediately, but Dr. Schwartz said softly, “No, no, Evalina, just keep playing, please, that’s a girl,” which I did, while Mrs. Fitzgerald strode purposefully down the aisle without a word and came to a stop before the stage where she stood dead still for a long second before finally clapping her hands together and crying “Bravo, bravo! Bravo, Rowena!” her face transformed, alight.

Miss Malone bowed her head in silent acknowledgment, according Mrs. Fitzgerald that great respect she always gave her. Miss Malone would have done anything—anything—for Mrs. Fitzgerald, I believe.

And Mrs. Fitzgerald was glowing as she stood transfixed before her festive tower.

“Oh, look!” “Wow!” “Look!” sang out the “hours” as they came tramping down the aisle, bundled up in their winter coats.

I kept on playing like a person possessed until Mrs. Fitzgerald finally waved her hand at me. “That will certainly do, Patricia!” she said, “That’s entirely enough out of you!” though with a smile. “It’s time to get down to business.” She threw her shawl across my piano and stood revealed in her black leotard and tights, with a swirling purple skirt that shone and moved as she moved, like liquid, like her banners.

“Come on, come on now, dears, it’s time,” she called out to the girls.

But the girls clustered together and hung back, keeping their coats on.

“What is it? Come on now!” Mrs. Fitzgerald moved toward the front of the stage.

“I think perhaps they are embarrassed,” Dr. Schwartz said softly. “This is the first time they have worn their costumes.”

Several of the “hours” nodded.

“What? Oh, that is ridiculous!” Mrs. Fitzgerald snapped.

But I understood perfectly. I would never have done what they were doing, not in a million years.

Mrs. Fitzgerald got that dangerous, smoldering look. “Places!” She clapped her hands.

As suddenly as that, electricity filled the air.

“Oh, okay—” Dixie was the first, laughing as she ran up the steps with her red skirt floating out around her like a full-blown rose; then Amanda in yellow—all yellow, her flying hair, too; then Karen Quinn, large and orange. Ruth surprised me by looking absolutely beautiful in her electric blue skirt, frizzy red hair pulled back into a tight chignon. She waved at me as she ran past my piano. Shy Pauletta was pretty and graceful in her pink skirt—and not crying, for once. But Nancy Morris was the big surprise. In her shiny white skirt she looked lovely and moved slowly, with perfect composure, a real dancer, heading into a future that seemed to stretch before her across the stage. Mrs. Fitzgerald smiled at her. “Nice. Very nice, dear.”

But then the thundercloud came back, as Mrs. Fitzgerald counted on her fingers: “—five—six—only six? Where are the others? Where is my Little Orphan Annie?”

“Probably in jail,” Ruth said under her breath.

“Perhaps you can improvise a bit,” suggested Dr. Schwartz.

“This is totally unprofessional. Where are they? It will not do!” Mrs. Fitzgerald seemed to swell before our eyes, dire and regal, a menacing queen.

“Jesus Christ!” from Ruth.

“He ain’t in this dance” came Jinx’s flat nasal voice as she ran down the aisle. “I’m in this dance! And you are, too—what the hell are you doing down there?” now grabbing up Myra, who’d been cowering between the seats. “Come on! If I’m coming, you’re coming, too—” dragging Myra down the aisle with her.

All the hours were laughing now, and Mrs. Fitzgerald clapped her hands. “Places!”

I switched into the upbeat intro as—at last—the great clock took form before us on the stage. And now I understood the purpose of the colors, as the girls in the pastel skirts took their positions at the small numbers, the palette darkening as time progressed around the clock toward Mrs. Fitzgerald herself at twelve.

“Come on, now, come on!” Jinx, in green, pushed pale-blue Myra across the stage, pliant as a pipe cleaner.

“Oh buck up, honey!” Ruth snapped, and surprisingly, Myra did, slipping in at five.

Jinx went over to seven and stretched, perfectly at ease, grinning out toward the empty auditorium that suddenly seemed to fill with people, a phantom audience, a full house. And it was again true, as it was always true, that once Jinx was onstage, you had to look at her. You had to. Her flaming red hair moved loosely all over her head as she stretched, limbering up, her green skirt swirled out and then clung to her legs.

Mrs. Fitzgerald took her own place at the top of the clock, then nodded to me. I played louder, moving into the actual music. Each hour turned in place, then twirled, all the skirts swirling about them, the many ruffling layers making them look like so many carnations. And then the great clock turned, the whole clock went round, all those carnations, including Mrs. Fitzgerald, now one of them. The kaleidoscope, I thought. Of course, the kaleidoscope.

“Now we’re in business!” Phoebe announced.

But no one heard her, or took any notice of her, as round and round they went. It’s amazing what a costume can do—the physical transformation that occurs—the liberating effect upon the psyche. Though each girl must have tried on her skirt at least once in the Art Room at some point, presumably—or even several times, for fittings—they had never worn them in public, or all together. Round and round and round they went, then sallied forth in their groups of three to dance charmingly, that first hard sequence now fully natural, like the routine of our lives.

Each hour was distinctive, each different from all the others, each very beautiful in her own way, and I can see them yet in my mind’s eye—Dixie the blooming red rose she had been all her life; sweet pink Pauletta, whom I didn’t really know; Ruth with all that energy focused for once, a blue bolt of lightning; bright orange Karen Quinn, practical and useful as a marigold; Jinx, a streak of green neon; pale blue Myra, fluid as water; pure white Nancy Morris, all talent and resolve, like a distant star; Amanda come into her own at last, a sunflower of Provence; and Mrs. Fitzgerald herself, regal and secret as an iris, born to dance—oh why hadn’t she joined the San Carlo company when they asked her? Why not? Why do we do the things we should not, and not do the things we should? But no matter. For the garden blooms, the seasons pass, the great clock turns.

I strike the time.

And ah, alas, now the hours must scatter, searching, searching, arabesque, arabesque, the plaintive notes, the frantic search until the clock strikes again and all the hours—all!—flutter offstage like a cloud of butterflies.

T
HE AUDIENCE WHISPERS,
r
ustles, and several among them start to applaud, then stop in confusion. A deep hush descends upon us all—the audience, the empty stage. The moment extends . . . and extends . . . until the suspense becomes unbearable.

Then voila! I hit the jubilant C chord and here they all come back, leaping and strutting, laughing and smiling, to form a lineup straight across the stage, like the girls in the Moulin Rouge. Even Mrs. Fitzgerald is fully engaged, enjoying herself, face like a flame. She nods at me, I hit the C again, and suddenly it’s the cancan, the cancan! As surprising and improbable as anything in life. “Kick, one two three! Kick, one two three!” she cries out. “Kick high! Over your head!” The beautiful skirts are petals, they are wings, lifting my chums, the hours, oh fly! Fly away, fly away, fly away home.

Our little audience is on their feet now, holding on to each other, laughing and crying, as are we all. Kick, one two three!

Together the hours bow, together raise their clasped hands then stand exhausted, amazed by what they have just done. Mrs. Fitzgerald awards them with her rare smile. “Go, go home now,” she says to them. “Get some rest. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

T
HE
M
OUNTAIN
T
IMES,
A
sheville, N.C., March 11, 1948—A fire started in the kitchen of the Central Building of Highland Hospital last night and shot up the dumbwaiter shaft, leaping out onto each floor. It was discovered by nurse Jane Anderson who had earlier administered sedatives to all the patients on the 5th floor. At 11:30 she thought she smelled smoke and went downstairs to investigate. She opened the kitchen door to behold a bizarre sight—the big kitchen table burning all around the edges of its galvanized top with the flames rising over a foot high, making it look like “one of those fiery hoops animals jump through in circuses.” Confused and terrified, she did not try to extinguish this burning rectangle but ran back upstairs to the nurses’ station on the fourth floor and started trying in vain to telephone her supervisor, Willie May Hall, over at Oak Lodge, as she had been told to do in case of a fire or other emergency. But the hospital’s telephone exchange was not working properly, so finally she called the Asheville Fire Department.

The first alarm came into their headquarters at 11:44 according to Fire Chief J.C. Fitzgerald—fourteen minutes after Miss Anderson first smelled the smoke. He said that the fire had been burning for 40 to 45 minutes by the time they got there. “If the alarm had been given 30 minutes earlier,” he said, “there would have been no need for anyone losing their lives.”

But the heat had grown so intense by the time the firemen arrived that their gushing water had absolutely no effect on the leaping flames. For the fire had spread rapidly, racing along the halls and filling the stairways with smoke. There was no sprinkler system and no fire alarm system. The top floor was entirely locked down to insure the safety of all those whose insulin shock treatments were in progress. But most windows and doors on the other floors were locked as well, severely hampering the efforts of the hospital staff, local police and citizens, and firefighters who arrived in force when they finally got there. The fire filled the sky. Orange-tipped flames laced with black and white smoke shot up from the hospital like fireworks, lighting up the whole night . . .

I RAN UP
t
he hill with Amanda and Ruth but then lost them amid the flood of shouting, converging townspeople. A sobbing black-smudged patient in his pajamas ran into me, going the other way. My eyes stung from the smoke.

The Central Building looked as if a child with a fiery crayon had painstakingly outlined it: the roofline, the walls, each floor, the windows in which black, gesticulating figures stood framed. I could feel the heat long before I neared the building—or got as close as I could get, I should say, for the police had cordoned it off to make way for those who were still going in and out, bringing patients to the waiting stretchers and ambulances. Everyone was screaming, or crying, or yelling—a huge moan went up as one of the burning fire escapes—for they were made of wood, too—broke loose and fell, with people on it.

Here and there I glimpsed familiar faces in the intense red glow, but not many, and not for long, and not Freddy or Phoebe or Dr. Schwartz or the Overholsers or anybody I really knew except for heroic Carl Renz, easily identifiable due to his size, who kept walking in and out of the burning building like a robot calmly carrying people in his arms. Two days later he would die as a result of his own burns. Mr. Pugh would be hospitalized for months.