I Married A Dead Man (7 page)

               
They took the glass from her lips. She didn't want to ask any questions, any more. She did, but some other time, not right now. There was something they had to be told. She'd had it a minute ago, but now it had escaped her again.

               
She sighed. Some other time, but not right now. She didn't want to do anything right now but sleep.

               
She turned her face toward the pillow and slept.

9

               
It came right back again. The first thing. With the first glimpse of the flowers, the first glimpse of the fruit, right as her eyelids first went up and the room came into being. It came right back again.

               
Something said to her: Tread softly, speak slow. Take care, take care. She didn't know what or why, but she knew it must be heeded.

               
The nurse said to her, "Drink your orange juice."

               
The nurse said to her, "You can have a little coffee in your milk, starting from today on. Each day a little more. Won't that be a pleasant change?"

               
Tread softly, speak with care.

               
She said, "What happened to--?"

               
She took another sip of beige-colored milk. Tread warily, speak slow.

               
"To whom?" the nurse finally completed it for her.

               
Oh, careful now, careful. "There was another girl in the train washroom with me. Is she all right?" She took another sip of milk for punctuation. Hold the glass steady, now; that's right. Don't let it shake. Down to the tray again, even and slow; that's it.

               
The nurse shook her head reticently. She said, "No."

               
"She's dead?"

               
The nurse wouldn't answer. She too was treading softly. She too felt her way, she too wouldn't rush in. She said, "Did you know her very well?"

               
"No."

               
"You'd only met her on the train?"

               
"Only on the train."

               
The nurse had paved her own way now. It was safe to proceed. The nurse nodded. She was answering the question two sentences before, by delayed action. "She's gone," she said quietly.

               
The nurse watched her face expectantly. The pavement held; there was no cave-in.

               
The nurse ventured a step farther.

               
"Isn't there anyone else you want to ask about?"

               
"What happened to--?"

               
The nurse took the tray away, as if stripping the scene for a crisis.

               
"To him? "

               
Those were the words. She adopted them. "What happened to him?"

               
The nurse said, "Just a moment." She went to the door, opened it, and motioned to someone unseen.

               
The doctor came in, and a second nurse. They stood waiting, as if prepared to meet an emergency.

               
The first nurse said, "Temperature normal." She said, "Pulse normal."

               
The second nurse was mixing something in a glass.

               
The first nurse, her own, stood close to the bed. She took her by the hand and held it tightly. Just held it like that, tight and unyielding.

               
The doctor nodded.

               
The first nurse moistened her lips. She said, "Your husband wasn't saved either, Mrs. Hazzard."

               
She could feel her face pale with shock. The skin pulled as though it were a size too small.

               
She said, "No, there's something wrong--No, you're making a mistake--"

               
The doctor motioned unobtrusively. He and the second nurse closed in on her swiftly.

               
Somebody put a cool hand on her forehead, held her pressed downward, kindly but firmly; she couldn't tell whose it was.

               
She said, "No, please let me tell you!"

               
The second nurse was holding something to her lips. The first one was holding her hand, tight and warm, as if to say, "I am here. Don't be frightened, I am here." The hand on her forehead was cool but competent. It was heavy, but not too heavy; just persuasive enough to make her head lie still.

               
"Please--" she said listlessly.

               
She didn't say anything more after that They didn't either.

               
Finally she overheard the doctor murmur, as if in punctuation: "She stood that very well."

10

               
It came back again. How could it fail to now? You cannot sleep at all times, only at small times. And with it came: Tread softly, speak with care.

               
The nurse's name was Miss Allmeyer, the one she knew best.

               
"Miss Allmeyer, does the hospital give everyone those flowers every day?"

               
"We'd like to, but we couldn't afford it. Those flowers cost five dollars each time you see them. They're just for you."

               
"Is it the hospital that supplies that fruit every day?"

               
The nurse smiled gently. "We'd like to do that too. We only wish we could. That fruit cost ten dollars a basket each time you see it. It's a standing order, just for you."

               
"Well, who--?" Speak softly.

               
The nurse smiled winningly. "Can't you guess, honey? That shouldn't be very hard."

               
"There's something I want to tell you. Something you must let me tell you." She turned her head restlessly on the pillows, first to one side, then the other, then back to the first

               
"Now, honey, are we going to have a bad day? I thought we were going to have such a good day."

               
"Could you find out something for me?"

               
"I'll try."

               
"The handbag; the handbag that was in the train-washroom with me. How much was in it?"

               
" Your handbag?"

               
"The handbag. The one that was there when I was in there."

               
The nurse came back later and said, "It's safe; it's being held for you. About fifty dollars or so."

               
That wasn't hers, that was the other one.

               
"There were two."

               
"There is another," the nurse admitted. "It doesn't belong to anyone now." She looked down commiseratingly. "There was just seventeen cents in it," she breathed almost inaudibly.

               
She didn't have to be told that She knew by heart. She remembered from before boarding the train. She remembered from the train itself. Seventeen cents. Two pennies, a nickel, a dime.

               
"Could you bring the seventeen cents here? Could I have it just to look at it? Could I have it here next to the bed?"

               
The nurse said, "I'm not sure it's good for you, to brood like that I'll see what they say."

               
She brought it, though, inside a small envelope.

               
She was alone with it She dumped the four little coins from the envelope into the palm of her hand. She closed her hand upon them tightly, held them gripped like that, fiercely, in a knot of dilemma.

               
Fifty dollars, symbolically. Symbol of an untold amount more.

               
Seventeen cents, literally. Symbol of nothing, for there wasn't any more. Seventeen cents and nothing else.

               
The nurse came back again and smiled at her. "Now, what was it you said you wanted to tell me?"

               
She returned the smile, wanly. "It can keep for awhile longer. I'll tell you some other time. Tomorrow, maybe, or the next day. Not-- not right today."

11

               
There was a letter on the breakfast-tray.

               
The nurse said, "See? Now you're beginning to get mail, just like the well people do."

               
It was slanted toward her, leaning against the milk glass. On the envelope it said:

                               
"Mrs. Patrice Hazzard"

               
She was frightened of it. She couldn't take her eyes off it. The glass of orange juice shook in her hand. The writing on it seemed to get bigger, and bigger, and bigger, as it stood there.

                               
"MRS. PATRICE HAZZARD"

               
"Open it," the nurse encouraged her. "Don't just look at it like that. It won't bite you."

               
She tried to twice, and twice it fell. The third time she managed to rip one seam along its entire length.

"Patrice, dear:

               
"Though we've never seen you, you're our daughter now, dear. You're Hugh's legacy to us. You're all we have now, you and the little fellow. I can't come to you, where you are; doctor's orders. The shock was too much for me and he forbids my making the trip. You'll have to come to us, instead. Come soon, dear. Come home to us, in our loneliness and loss. It will make it that much easier to bear. It won't be long now, dear. We've been in constant touch with Dr. Brett, and he sends very encouraging reports of your progress--"

               
The rest didn't matter so much; she let it fade from her attention.

               
It was like train-wheels going through her head.

               
Though we've never seen you.

               
Though we've never seen you.

               
Though we've never seen you.

               
The nurse eased it from her forgetful fingers after awhile, and put it back in its envelope. She watched the nurse fearfully as she moved about the room.

               
"If I weren't Mrs. Hazzard, would I be allowed to stay in this room?"

               
The nurse laughed cheerfully. "We'd put you out, we'd throw you right outside into one of the wards," she said, bending close toward her in mock threat.

               
The nurse said, "Here, take your young son."

               
She held him tightly, in fierce, almost convulsive protectiveness.

               
Seventeen cents. Seventeen cents last such a short time, goes such a short way.

               
The nurse felt in good humor. She tried to prolong their little joke of a moment ago. "Why? Are you trying to tell me you're not Mrs. Hazzard?" she asked banteringly.

               
She held him fiercely, protectively close.

               
Seventeen cents, seventeen cents.

               
"No," she said in a smothered voice, burying her face against him, "I'm not trying to tell you that. I'm not trying."

12

               
She was in a dressing-robe, sitting by the window in the sun. It was quilted blue silk. She wore it every day when she got up out of bed. On the breast-pocket it had a monogram embroidered in white silk; the letters "P H" intertwined. There were slippers to match.

               
She was reading a book. On the flyleaf, though she was long past it, it was inscribed "To Patrice, with love from Mother H." There was a row of other books on the stand beside the bed. Ten or twelve of them; books with vivacious jackets, turquoise, magenta, vermilion, cobalt, and with vivacious, lighthearted contents to match. Not a shadow between their covers.