Moons of Jupiter (26 page)

They were both jubilant. He waved his arm around in celebration, as if he was conducting an orchestra, and she leaned forward, laughing, clapping her hands on her knees.

“Oh, if everything was in pictures like that, we could have a lot of fun! You and me could have a lot of fun, couldn't we?”

M
RS. CROSS
made an appointment to see the doctor.

“I've heard of people that had a very bad stroke and their speech came back, isn't that so?”

“It can happen. It depends. Are you worrying a lot about this man?”

“It must be a terrible feeling. No wonder he cries.”

“How many children did you have?”

“Six.”

“I'd say you'd done your share of worrying.”

She could see he didn't mean to tell her anything. Either he didn't remember much about Jack's case or he was pretending he didn't.

“I'm here to take care of people,” the doctor said. “That's what I'm here for, that's what the nurses are here for. So you can leave all the worrying to us. That's what we get paid for. Right?”

And how much worrying do you do? she wanted to ask.

She would have liked to talk to Mrs. Kidd about this visit because she knew Mrs. Kidd thought the doctor was a fool, but once Mrs. Kidd knew Jack was the reason for the visit she would make some impatient remark. Mrs. Cross never talked to her any more about Jack. She talked to other people, but she could see them getting bored. Nobody cares about anybody else's misfortunes in here, she thought. Even when somebody dies they don't care, it's just
me, I'm still alive, what's for dinner?
The selfishness. They're all just as bad as the ones on the Second Floor, only they don't show it yet.

She hadn't been up to the Second Floor, hadn't visited Lily Barbour, since she took up with Jack.

They liked sitting in the corner with the Red Deer picture, the scene of their first success. That was established as their place, where they could be by themselves. Mrs. Cross brought a pencil and paper, fixed the tray across his chair, tried to see how Jack made out with writing. It was about the same as talking. He would scrawl a bit, push the pencil till he broke it, start to cry. They didn't make progress, either in writing or talking, it was useless. But she was learning to talk to him by the yes-and-no method, and it seemed sometimes she could pick up what was in his mind.

“If I was smarter I would be more of a help to you,” she said. “Isn't it the limit? I can get it all out that's in my head, but there never was so much in it, and you've got your head crammed full but you can't get it out. Never mind. We'll have a cup of coffee, won't we? Cup of coffee, that's what you like. My friend Mrs. Kidd and I used to drink tea all the time, but now I drink coffee. I prefer it too.”

“S
O YOU NEVER
got married? Never?”

Never.

“Did you have a sweetheart?”

Yes.

“Did you? Did you? Was it long ago? Long ago or recently?”

Yes.

“Long ago or recently? Both. Long ago and recently. Different sweethearts. The same? The same. The same woman. You were in love with the same woman years and years but you didn't get married to her. Oh, Jack. Why didn't you? Couldn't she marry you? She couldn't. Why not? Was she married already? Was she? Yes. Yes. Oh, my.”

She searched his face to see if this was too painful a subject or if he wanted to go on. She thought he did want to. She was eager to ask where this woman was now, but something warned her not to. Instead she took a light tone.

“I wonder if I can guess her name? Remember Red Deer? Wasn't that funny? I wonder. I could start with A and work through the
alphabet. Anne? Audrey? Annabelle? No. I think I'll just follow my intuition. Jane? Mary? Louise?”

The name was Pat, Patricia, which she hit on maybe her thirtieth try.

“Now, in my mind a Pat is always fair. Not dark. You know how you have a picture in your mind for a name? Was she fair? Yes? And tall, in my mind a Pat is always tall. Was she? Well! I got it right. Tall and fair. A good-looking woman. A lovely woman.”

Yes.

She felt ashamed of herself, because she had wished for a moment that she had somebody to tell this to.

“That is a secret then. It's between you and me. Now. If you ever want to write Pat a letter you come to me. Come to me and I'll make out what you want to say to her and I'll write it.”

No. No letter. Never.

“Well. I have a secret too. I had a boy I liked, he was killed in the First World War. He walked me home from a skating-party, it was our school skating-party. I was in the Senior Fourth. I was fourteen. That was before the war. I did like him, and I used to think about him, you know, and when I heard he was killed, that was after I was married, I was married at seventeen, well, when I heard he was killed I thought, now I've got something to look forward to, I could look forward to meeting him in Heaven. That's true. That's how childish I was.

“Marian was at that skating-party too. You know who I mean by Marian. Mrs. Kidd. She was there and she had the most beautiful outfit. It was sky-blue trimmed with white fur and a hood on it. Also she had a muff. She had a white fur muff. I never saw anything I would've like to have for myself as much as that muff.”

L
YING IN THE DARK
at night, before she went to sleep, Mrs. Cross would go over everything that had happened with Jack that day: how he had looked; how his color was; whether he had cried and how long and how often; whether he had been in a bad temper in the dining-room, annoyed with so many people around him or perhaps not liking the food; whether he had said good-night to her sullenly or gratefully.

Meanwhile Mrs. Kidd had taken on a new friend of her own. This was Charlotte, who used to live down near the dining-room but had recently moved in across the hall. Charlotte was a tall, thin, deferential woman in her mid-forties. She had multiple sclerosis. Sometimes her disease was in remission, as it was now; she could have gone home, if she had wanted to, and there had been a place for her. But she was happy where she was. Years of institutional life had made her childlike, affectionate, good-humored. She helped in the hair-dressing shop, she loved doing that, she loved brushing and pinning up Mrs. Kidd's hair, marvelling at how much black there still was in it. She put an ash-blonde rinse on her own hair and wore it in a bouffant, stiff with spray. Mrs. Kidd could smell the hairspray from her room and she would call out, “Charlotte! Did they move you down here for the purpose of asphyxiating us?”

Charlotte giggled. She brought Mrs. Kidd a present. It was a red felt purse, with an appliquéd design of green leaves and blue and yellow flowers; she had made it in the Craft Room. Mrs. Kidd thought how much it resembled those recipe-holders her children used to bring home from school; a whole cardboard pie-plate and a half pie-plate, stitched together with bright yarn. They didn't hold enough to be really useful. They were painstakingly created frivolities, like the crocheted potholders through which you could burn yourself; the cut-out wooden horse's head with a hook not quite big enough to hold a hat.

Charlotte made purses for her daughters, who were married, and for her small granddaughter, and for the woman who lived with her husband and used his name. The husband and this woman came regularly to see Charlotte; they were all good friends. It had been a good arrangement for the husband, for the children, and perhaps for Charlotte herself. Nothing was being put over on Charlotte. Most likely she had given in without a whimper. Glad of the chance.

“What do you expect?” said Mrs. Cross. “Charlotte's easygoing. Mrs. Cross and Mrs. Kidd had not had any falling-out or any real coolness. They still had some talks and card games. But it was difficult. They no longer sat at the same table in the dining-room because Mrs. Cross had to watch to see if Jack needed help cutting up his
meat. He wouldn't let anyone else cut it; he would just pretend he didn't want any and miss out on his protein. Then Charlotte moved into the place Mrs. Cross had vacated. Charlotte had no problems cutting her meat. In fact she cut her meat, toast, egg, vegetables, cake, whatever she was eating that would cut, into tiny regular pieces before she started on it. Mrs. Kidd told her that was not good manners. Charlotte was crestfallen but stubborn and continued to do it.

“Neither you nor I would have given up so quickly,” said Mrs. Kidd, still speaking about Charlotte to Mrs. Cross. “We wouldn't've had the choice.”

“That's true. There weren't places like this. Not pleasant places. They couldn't have kept us alive the way they do her. The drugs and so on. Also it may be the drugs makes her silly.”

Mrs. Kidd remained silent, frowning at hearing Charlotte called silly, though that was just the blunt way of putting what she had been trying to say herself. After a moment she spoke lamely.

“I think she has more brains than she shows.”

Mrs. Cross said evenly, “I wouldn't know.”

Mrs. Kidd sat with her head bent forward, thoughtfully. She could sit that way for half an hour, easily, letting Charlotte brush and tend her hair. Was she turning into one of those old ladies that love to be waited on? Those old ladies also needed somebody to boss. They were the sort who went around the world on cruise ships, she had read about them in novels. They went around the world, and stayed at hotels, or they lived in grand decaying houses, with their companions. It was so easy to boss Charlotte, to make her play Scrabble and tell her when her manners were bad. Charlotte was itching to be somebody's slave. So why did Mrs. Kidd hope to restrain herself? She did not wish to be such a recognizable sort of old lady. Also, slaves cost more than they were worth. In the end, people's devotion hung like rocks around your neck. Expectations. She wanted to float herself clear. Sometimes she could do it by lying on her bed and saying in her head all the poems she knew, or the facts, which got harder and harder to hold in place. Other times she imagined a house on the edge of some dark woods or bog, bright
fields in front of it running down to the sea. She imagined she lived there alone, like an old woman in a story.

M
RS. CROSS
wanted to take Jack on visits. She thought it was time for him to learn to associate with people. He didn't cry so often now, when they were alone. But sometimes at meals she was ashamed of him and had to tell him so. He would take offense at something, often she didn't know what, and sometimes his sulk would proceed to the point where he would knock over the sugar-bowl, or sweep all his cutlery on to the floor. She thought that if only he could get used to a few more people as he was to her, he would calm down and behave decently.

The first time she took him to Mrs. Kidd's' room, Mrs. Kidd said she and Charlotte were just going out, they were going to the Crafts Room. She didn't ask them to come along. The next time they came, Mrs. Kidd and Charlotte were sitting there playing Scrabble, so they were caught.

“You don't mind if we watch you for a little while,” Mrs. Cross said.

“Oh no. But don't blame me if you get bored. Charlotte takes a week from Wednesday to make up her mind.”

“We're not in any hurry. We're not expected anywhere. Are we, Jack?”

She was wondering if she could get Jack playing Scrabble. She didn't know the extent of his problem when he tried to write. Was it that he couldn't form the letters, was that all? Or couldn't he see how they made the words? This might be the very thing for him.

At any rate he was taking an interest. He edged his chair up beside Charlotte, who picked up some letters, put them back, picked them up, looked at them in her hand, and finally made
wind,
working down from the
w
in Mrs. Kidd's word
elbow
. Jack seemed to understand. He was so pleased that he patted Charlotte's knee in congratulation. Mrs. Cross hoped Charlotte would realize that was just friendliness and not take offense.

She needn't have worried. Charlotte did not know how to take offense.

“Well good for you,” said Mrs. Kidd, frowning, and right away she made
demon
across from the
d
. “Triple word!” she said, and was writing down the score. “Pick up your letters, Charlotte.”

Charlotte showed her new letters to Jack, one by one, and he made a noise of appreciation. Mrs. Cross kept an eye on him, hoping nothing would happen to turn him bad-tempered and spoil this show of friendliness. Nothing did. But he was not having a good effect on Charlotte's concentration.

“You want to help?” Charlotte said, and moved the little stand with the letters on it so that it was in front of both of them. He bent over so that he almost had his head on her shoulder.

“Anh-anh-anh,” said Jack, but he sounded cheerful. “Anh-anh-anh?” said Charlotte, teasing him. “What kind of a word is that,
anh-anh-anh
?”

Mrs. Cross waited for the skies to fall, but the only thing Jack did was giggle, and Charlotte giggled, so that there was a sort of giggling-match set up between the two of them.

“Aren't you the great friends,” said Mrs. Kidd.

Mrs. Cross thought it would be just as well not to exasperate Mrs. Kidd if they wanted to make a habit of visiting.

“Now Jack, don't distract Charlotte,” she said affably. “You let her play.”

Even as she finished saying this, she saw Jack's hand descend clumsily on the Scrabble board. The letters went flying. He turned and showed her his ugly look, worse than she had ever seen it. She was amazed and even frightened, but she did not mean to let him see.

“Now what have you done?” she said. “Fine behavior!”

He made a sound of disgust and pushed the Scrabble board and all the letters to the floor, all the time looking at Mrs. Cross so that there could be no doubt that this disgust and fury had been aroused by her. She knew that it was important at this moment to speak coldly and firmly. That was what you must do with a child or an animal, you must show them that your control has not budged and that you are not hurt or alarmed by such displays. But she was not able to say a word, such a feeling of grief, and shock, and helplessness rose in her heart. Her eyes filled with tears, and at
the sight of her tears his expression grew even more hateful and menacing as if the feelings he had against her were boiling higher every moment.