Private Life (23 page)

feet, put them down, looked at them again, then at the palms of his hands. Alexander was

listless, even limp. She glanced at Andrew, but Andrew might never have seen a baby

before, especially a squirmy, thrusting, active baby like Beatrice's boys. In fact, that's

what her mother had said about her brothers, too: "They were like springs. You tried to

hold them down for one instant, and they were up before you let them go." But possibly

Andrew and his brothers had not been as active, and poor Alexander took after them.

This was a fugitive thought--there was no reason to believe that any child of Mrs. Early

was listless or limp. She bit her lip. No more than five minutes since Andrew and Dr.

Bernstein had come into the room--their hair and whiskers still steaming--yet it seemed

like an hour. Andrew, she saw, was not about to prompt the doctor. Observations, he

would have been the first to tell you, often took quite a bit of time. She saw Mrs.

Wareham peek in the door. Behind her was the girl who did the washing and the

cleaning. She was Japanese. She looked about twelve, but Mrs. Wareham had told

Margaret that she was almost sixteen. Her name was Naoko.

Finally, Dr. Bernstein said to Andrew, "You had better come look at this."

Andrew clasped his hands behind his back, then stepped over to the bed and bent down.

He was at least a head taller than Dr. Bernstein. Mrs. Wareham and Naoko stepped

farther into the room. Dr. Bernstein said, "When you press on the skin of the chest, here,

the color underneath the surface yellow is very pale. See that?" Andrew nodded. "But it's

more than that. Here the belly is quite swollen. It wasn't this way right after birth. Here."

He felt Alexander's belly. "The liver. The spleen. Very enlarged. Enlarged overnight. See

how his limbs are stiffening up?" He lifted an arm. Then he shook his head. Andrew

stood up straight and looked at her. Dr. Bernstein said, "I have seen worse."

Andrew said, "Have you seen worse that recovered?" His voice sounded scientific

rather than fatherly. Margaret felt herself grow offended.

Dr. Bernstein sighed. "Once, I did." Then he added, "That child lived." He

stressed the word "lived." Dr. Bernstein gently wrapped Alexander back up. All this time,

he had made no cry, only a few quiet sounds. The doctor turned to her and said, "Mrs.

Early, you might try to nurse the boy again. Whether he takes hold and seems eager for

nourishment will tell a great deal about how he is going to grapple with his condition."

He put Alexander back in her arms, and the two men stared at her.

She wanted them to go out; she wanted all of them to go out, and herself and

Alexander to be returned to that time in the night when they could do things on their own,

without having to contend with this cacophony.

Andrew said, "What is his condition?"

"Jaundice.

Icterus."

Now, she thought, Andrew was going to ask Dr. Bernstein to tell him everything

that anyone had ever said about jaundice or icterus, but he didn't. The both of them

simply looked at her, and she offered Alexander the breast.

He seemed indifferent, or more than indifferent--he turned his face away, as if

trying to avoid it. It had been hours since the middle-of-the-night feeding, but he wasn't

hungry, or, she should say, wasn't anything. But she touched herself to his lip, and all of a

sudden he commenced sucking. As he went on, he sucked harder, as if sucking itself, the

milk itself, reminded him of something good. He nursed for some ten minutes. Mrs.

Wareham and Naoko left the doorway, and Dr. Bernstein looked on with evident

satisfaction. When they were finished, he took Alexander away from her again, laid him

on the bed again, unwrapped him. Alexander kicked his legs a few times and waved one

of his arms. This was a good sign. She imagined herself fortifying her son, building him

up like a little tower. She had never done much of anything, but, she felt, this she could

do. Dr. Bernstein said, "That seems to have had an effect. Sometimes this resolves on its

own. Depends on the child. I'm hopeful."

MARGARET settled in on Ohio Street and made herself stop thinking of the

future. Andrew brought her a couple of books and more clothes and some knitting she

had been doing for Alexander, but even after she was feeling well enough to get out of

bed (some three days, a very short time, according to Mrs. Wareham, who told her she

hadn't gotten out of bed after a childbirth in less than two weeks), the knitting looked to

her like an abandoned artifact of a lost civilization. She had been knitting Alexander a

little coat of red wool. Because of the color, she found she could not touch it. All day,

whenever Mrs. Wareham was not in the room pressing sustenance upon her, she was

staring at Alexander.

Yes, he was a strange boy, that much was evident. Not so bullish as the other boys

she had known. He did not remind her of anyone, but he was no less interesting for that.

Or, perhaps, he reminded her of her, of the strange lack she had of what her mother had

always called, in admiration of her brothers, and also of Beatrice, "the life force." Of

course, there was a lot to be said for the life force. People with plenty of the life force

found the world falling away around them. They didn't feel the cold or the heat. They

didn't hear what others said about them. If you were at the knitting circle, and you were

talking about Mrs. Tillotson, for example, only to go quiet just before she entered the

room, the woman would not even sense the enthusiasm with which all of her flaws had

just been canvassed. She had so much life force that she never doubted her own welcome,

and, indeed, whatever the women had been saying among themselves, when Mrs.

Tillotson entered the room they smiled in spite of themselves to see her--her energetic

walk, her healthy toss of the head, her pink dress with its green ruching, her lace parasol,

her knitting that was always carelessly done. If you had the life force, your surroundings

more or less escaped your notice, because you were too busy noticing yourself--your own

ebbs and flows were strong the way a well-bred horse was strong, and if you didn't pay

attention to them, they could throw you, the way such a horse could do.

But if, like Alexander, you didn't feel that, if the life force was nothing at all

forceful, more a hope than an assertion, then the world was the vivid thing, the

fascinating and compelling thing. A quiet room like her room at Mrs. Wareham's grew

interesting, just in the way the sunlight shifted over the course of a day, or in the way the

fogdamp seemed to enter invisibly through the very walls. If you didn't have much life

force, then the mere weight of a blanket could tell on you, now just right, now too heavy,

now too light. If you didn't have much life force, then sometimes the face of your mother

looked one way, and sometimes it looked another way. Even though Alexander was far

too young to see her, she sensed that her proximity sometimes troubled him, sometimes

comforted him. When she sensed that it troubled him, she didn't stop holding him,

though; rather, she shifted her thoughts consciously away from him and onto something

else, but something not disturbing, something simple, like the rose-of-Sharon tree in her

mother's yard. Mrs. Wareham had told her to pray, and this was what she did--she

thought of flowers and leaves. As she did this, she imagined herself suspended, near

Alexander but not uncomfortably close. She thought he might like that better.

And they nursed. She loved to nurse him. Every swallow bolstered him, carried

him toward more life force--not so much of it that they might forget what they had

learned here, but enough so he could survive.

That Andrew came into the room less and less was fine with her--she thought it

was better, in fact. Andrew had more of the life force than Mrs. Tillotson or Beatrice or

anyone else she had ever met. It was located in his curiosity. In most circles, curiosity

was seen as polite, the opposite of talking only about oneself all the time, but curiosity

flowed out of Andrew in a torrent, bowling over everything before it. He would ask a

question, then another question, and the person of whom he was asking the question

would answer, and then answer again. But Andrew's curiosity was beyond answers, and

soon enough, he would be contradicting the person's answers and suggesting new ways of

looking at the matter, possibly instituting some sort of investigation that would finally

uncover the real truth. You had to admire how the life force operated in this way, and

people did admire Andrew: Why was he stuck on the island, with such a tiny telescope?

How could the island contain him (meaning his life force)? But his life force might be a

danger to Alexander. If Alexander was lying in his cradle, Andrew would lean over and

stare down at him with such intensity that she imagined suffocation. As a result, if she

heard Andrew enter the house (he always came at odd times), she would hurry to pick

Alexander up and hold him to her, half turned away from Andrew, using her shoulder for

a shield.

And she knew that Andrew was disappointed in Alexander. Something in her

resented this. All the time she worried about the baby, every time she lifted his little limp

hands and felt his fingers droop over hers, each time she surveyed his flaccid chest and

caught her breath, her next thought, or the thought after that, was "How dare ...?" How

dare Andrew be disappointed? Who did he think he was? It was a strange feeling, like

being suspended in midair, to know that Alexander's condition was disappointing and yet

to hate Andrew's disappointment. She started thinking of Andrew in a whole new way,

and sometimes when she was awake at night, if the night was clear, she would look at the

moon in the window and feel relieved that the moon was distant enough from Andrew so

as not to be affected or impinged upon by his life force, or his disappointment. The moon,

at least, was safe.

But then she thought, doubting all her other thoughts, What if the life force is

more like a contagion than a flood? What if Alexander needed measured doses of a

healthy life force rather than protection from it? It was a difficult question, and involved

two ways of thinking about the world, and life and death, that were more different than

she could manage at that time, in that place, looking into his little face, looking at his

little body, something so small that enclosed so profound a mystery. And, then, she

appreciated the life force. Mrs. Wareham or Naoko or one of the children would come in,

and they would seem so self-starting as to be miraculous. No effort at all was required

with Naoko, who was quick and efficient. She opened the door and was across the room

in a second, presenting Margaret with the sandwich or the cup of tea that she needed,

laying a napkin across her lap, smiling in a kindly fashion, pouring out the tea, asking her

how she was feeling, looking affectionately at the baby. Since she was small, she was less

imposing than Mrs. Wareham, and so Margaret could appreciate her and yet never had to

wonder how she was or if she would live or die. She embodied the life force at its best.

Margaret encouraged Naoko to pick Alexander up and hold him. The girl's life force, she

thought, could surround and warm him. Then, one day, Naoko said, "My mother would

like to visit you and the baby."

"Your

mother?"

"Yes. My mother is a midwife. She has birthed many babies."

Margaret stared at Naoko. She didn't know how to say no, so she nodded. Mrs.

Kimura came the next morning. Mrs. Kimura was small, like Naoko, but smooth rather

than quick. Naoko brought her to the door when Margaret was just finishing her

breakfast, and Mrs. Kimura bowed slightly and smiled. She was wearing a simple blue

coat and gray gloves, which she took off and gave to Naoko. Then she came over to

Margaret and shook her hand with a smile. She said something in Japanese, and Naoko

said, "My mother apologizes for her poor English, and asks that I translate for her."

Margaret

nodded.

Naoko said, "My mother asks if she may pick up the baby."

"Yes,"

said

Margaret.

Mrs. Kimura went to the cradle and lifted Alexander out of it, then rested him in

the crook of her left arm in a practiced manner. She held her arm rather high, and stared

for a long time into his face. Her own face was neither somber nor happy, merely

unreadable, and after a while Margaret despaired of learning anything from it. She stared

out the window at the green wall of the house next door. After a while, Naoko said

goodbye, and the two paused for a moment and then left. Margaret had nothing to say to

them. Naoko did not seem to think this was rude of her, but continued to attend to

Margaret's and Alexander's needs with quiet grace.