The Devil's Blessing (17 page)

"Who's that?" Otto asked.

"That's Richard," she said. "Can't you tell?"

After a moment, he could. He had all the tell-tale signs of tuberculosis. He looked sickly, like someone with the flu, but the real tell was the bloody napkin that was next to him, that caught his coughing and his hacking and his weight, or what was left of it. He looked like a small skeleton. But none of those reasons were Otto was so confused. It was the boy's age.

"I had no idea that he was a baby."

"Ulrich didn't tell you?" she asked, genuinely perplexed. "We just had him four months ago."

And that's when it all made sense. Richard was never a young man like himself, nor was this young lady Ulrich's daughter. She was Ulrich's young wife. It was a classic May-December union that Otto had failed to recognize. He was an older man--not that much older--but older nonetheless. He had had a lovely young bride.
Good for him
, Otto thought.
It was the least he deserved.

"Why, what did you think?"

"Oh, no, nothing," he said, lying again. Luckily, the subject turned quickly to the pressing matter at hand.

"Can you bring it?"

"Bring what?"

"The medicine," she said.

"Oh, of course," he said, nearly knocking over the curtain that was Richard's makeshift room. He quickly returned with the sack.

"Do you know how to administer the medication?"

"You mean like giving someone an infusion? Oh, no!" he said, with a nervous laugh.

"Give it to me," she said, grabbing the sack, spilling all the boxes on the floor.

There were several brown boxes, most the size of a man's hand, but others in varying sizes. She opened each box, leaving the first one open, and then quickly opening and closing the rest. She kept doing that until she found what she needed.

Inside the first box and the following ones were bottles of penicillin. Finally, in the last box, was a syringe.

"There is no gauze or antiseptic," she said. "We're going to have to sterilize him ourselves. Can you watch him for a bit?"

As he was saying that he could, she was already getting up and leaving the small chamber. That was when Otto finally had the opportunity to get a good look at the small boy.

He was pale, just like his mother, except his paleness came from being sickly. The whiteness of his skin nearly became yellow in the creases and cracks of his new, small face.

His breathing was labored, but it was steady. He was asleep, but his mucus-filled lungs could be heard as his chest rose and fell.

Richard's eyes were slightly opened, but even they had small flakes of yellow crust. His face was hollow. But even after all that, he still looked like a handsome young boy—to Otto, at least.

Soon, the young woman entered the room, and that's when it hit him.

"What's your name?"

"What?" she asked, totally confused by the question. She was carrying a small steaming pot and a few pieces of cloth. As she laid them down, she realized, and understood his question.

"Ah," she said. "Ursula," she said, with a smile. "Ursula. And you?"

"Otto," he said, happy to use his first name.

"Otto," she repeated. "That's a nice name. Nice to meet you, Otto. Would you help me with my son?"

"Yes, of course!" he said. He had fallen into a schoolboy daze, lost behind whatever was happening behind those eyes.

It was a cramped place, both tense and peaceful. Richard's makeshift room was in a small corner of the home. There was a closed hatch door that would usually let light in, but had to be closed. The cold air from outside was determined.

Candles. They surrounded baby Richard from every angle, each of different size. With a loving mother working over him, it was like a something he would see in a dark corner of a church, Ursula and Richard, the Pieta.

At first she tried to just pull out the medicine from the vile by pulling on it with the syringe. After realizing that the air pressure was too tight inside and that air needed to be pushed in first, it was already too late. The rubber that was being used on top of the vial had given way and small parts were now floating in the medicine. It mattered not. It was like a bottle of wine who's cork had come apart inside. Using the needle like a straw was easy enough.

With the syringe filled and his body cleansed with warm towels, all that was left was the hard part. The actual infusion itself.

"Have you ever done this before?" she asked.

He shook his head no. She nodded in return that she understood. They both accepted that this would be the job of the mother and the mother alone.

Throughout time, much had been made about the roles of mothers and fathers with their children. It was always said, or many times unsaid, that the dirty work was done by the father and the loving work done by the mother. But that wasn't true. Both the loving and the hard work were always done by mothers. Mothers were the ones who reminded the child that they were loved—the hardest job on earth.

She had some spare rope that was more twine than anything. She kept wrapping it around each arm and each hand, desperate to find a vein. With Richard's loss of weight also came the fact that his insides were deteriorating as well, making veins as elusive as a smile.

But yet, she persisted, looking everywhere for a place to infuse him. Even a child's usually stout legs were now like mere hinges on Richard's failing body.

"I have an idea," she said, and began pressing on her son's neck.

Otto wasn't sure what she was doing, and then began to understand. She was applying pressure to her son's neck, trying to make the artery in his neck jump. And that it did.

The only problem was, poor Richard was awoken and began to wail, so loudly that the house echoed and so strongly that small pieces of red mucus began to fly out.

Otto panicked and looked to Ursula to see how she fared, but she looked as calm as someone who was staring into a motionless pond. This was not the first time she had seen this, he realized.
If this was nothing, what was hard
?, Otto thought to himself.
Maybe she wasn't as sheltered from hell as I thought.

"Here," she said, letting go of Richard's neck. "Hold him like I just did."

"You mean choke him?"

"No," she said, almost annoyed. "I wasn't choking him, and neither will you be. You'll just be applying pressure so I can stick him in his neck vein."

"I don't know," Otto said, slowly slumping back.

"What do you mean 'You don't know?' I'm not asking you your thoughts on what we need to do. I'm asking you to help me save my son's life!"

She doesn’t know
, he realized. She didn't know that she was next to a monster, a man less than a monster. Someone who had betrayed the laws and rules of every civilization. He didn't deserve to be around such a lovely family, and she didn't deserve to have his fiendish hands around her angel's neck.

"Otto! Are you listening to me? There isn't any time! You have to apply pressure on his neck, just the side. That's it. That way I can stick him. Please." The last word came out like a whimper from a child.

Okay
, he thought. He could do this. He wasn't choking the child; he would just be applying pressure. Just like she said. He needed to put the memories of what he had done behind him. If he wanted to ever get past what he had done, he would have to start, and it seemed like he needed to do it now.

He began to press, on the side of his neck, just as she had done.

"Harder," she said.

"Right," Otto responded, realizing he wasn't applying that much pressure. He didn't want to be near a child ever again, terrified of what he might do, and yet here he was, again, with his hands around one's neck. He wished the landmine would've hit him, instead of Ulrich.

He began to apply pressure again, real pressure this time. The child was still screaming and the fact that someone was now squeezing his neck only added to the volume and unhappiness of the small babe.

The child's color was changing, too. First pink, then red, and then finally to a terrifying blue. Otto was going to let go. He was going to have to let go. The child demanded it.

Just as soon as he was about to release his hand from Richard's neck, Ursula jabbed the needle into his neck.

Without being asked or even caring if it was right, Otto let go and fell back to the ground.

The child seemed stunned as he looked up into his mother's tear filled eyes. All while Otto was busy wondering how this was making him feel and how this would be affecting him, he had forgotten to take into account that the real horror being felt that day was with the mother's feelings, not his.

She shushed and shushed as she pushed on the metallic plunger. Richard neither cried nor smiled. It was as if even he was surprised to see the courage his mother had to infuse him.

After the penicillin was fully injected, she just as quickly pulled out the needle and covered the wound.

All three sat and exchanged looks that seemed to last an hour. Everyone was relieved.

The next day was a nervous one.

Their fear was about what was happening to Richard—more precisely, what was happening to his neck. It had become swollen where Ursula Wolter had infused him the previous night. It was as if someone had inserted a small rock into his skin and covered that mound in hues of red and purple.

"I missed," Ursula said, through tears.

"No," Otto said, as comfortingly as he could.

"Then why is his neck so swollen?"

"It has to be that his body is so weak that he wasn't ready for the trauma. Plus," Otto added, "that bruise, as big as it is, isn't as big as it would be had you missed and put the penicillin into his skin."

"True," she said, genuinely knowing that Otto was right. She had given him an entire vial of penicillin, and, had she missed the artery, his neck would have been the size of an apple. But still, his swelling was concerning.

Richard's neck was bent slightly away from where he was infused. Had she given him too much? Too little? No one was sure. And even though it did look terrible, Richard was no different. No greater difficulty in breathing. No more cries of pain than usual. He seemed to be the only one oblivious to the small hemorrhage on his neck.

The day after infusing him, he seemed both worse and better. He was still coughing, but there was no more sign of blood. He was also smiling more— something that Otto hadn't seen since he'd arrived.

❧

The next day, what troubled Ursula was the bruise on his neck, and how it had spread.

"Great," she said. "I went from trying to save his life to killing him." She wasn't sobbing like before, but instead the tears rolled down quietly.

"Let me have a look," Otto said, slightly moving the mother away. It was nice, sleeping two nights in a row in some decent shelter. He nearly slept the entire time. He saw what he had expected and relayed the good news.

"See," he said, pointing to Richard's neck, "he's getting better."

"How? The bruise has gone from his neck all the way up to his ear. It's nearly gone to his face!"

"But that's where you're wrong," Otto said. "See, here, where you stuck him? The swelling is actually
down
. That bump isn’t as large as when you stuck him. It's now more like a normal bruise. And that swelling you think is spreading? It isn't. It's just the dead blood from the original bruise. It's just spreading since it has to. No, if anything, this is great news! His wound is healing like it should be."

She took a closer look, and again, Otto was right. The color was different. Otto pointed out that it was yellow and green, the colors of a wound that was healing. He had seen it plenty of times in the field. Men would get bruises all the time, and this was just the natural course. But still, she was a mother, and wouldn't be satisfied until the wound was completely healed.

"Thank you," she said, with a smile that mirrored her son's. She went off to make them dinner.

❧

"Where are you off to?" she asked. They were sitting on the ground. It wasn't as uncomfortable as Otto had thought it would be. Although the home was modest, the floor was made of wood. Not polished, but still finely sanded.

For them, they were sitting near the oven and the rest of what made up the kitchen. She had pillows for them to sit on, and the pot of soup was easy for them to share. They could have moved the table the few feet that they needed to get near the warm, still burning oven, but it was as if Ursula wanted to do something different. In times like these, one needed to find something to break up monotony of daily life.

"I'm a deserter," he said. "I'm off to the west to hand myself over to the Americans or the British."

"I figured as much," she said, much to his surprise.

"Oh, really? How did you come to that conclusion?"

"Look at you," she said, motioning her spoon at him. "You don't look like a civilian, and you surely don't look like a soldier."

He gave himself a quick look and saw what he already had suspected, but was never told of. His pants were that of a soldier—there was no doubt about that—but they were dirty beyond any commander's allowances. His boots were loosely tied, and he walked around with an untucked shirt, something that was definitely not allowed. His jacket was ragged but that was to be expected in a time of war.

"Your face," she said, answering the question in his mind. "No soldier would have a face like that."

"My beard, you mean?"

"Ha!" she spurted out, grateful she didn't have food in her mouth, or that her laugh didn't wake the baby. "Sure. If that's what you want to call it."

Otto stood up. "Do you have a mirror?"

"What do you mean? Now?"

"Yes," he said. He knew it wasn't civilized to get up in such a start during a meal, but the curiosity was too much.

"Yes. Give me a moment." She returned with a wooden mirror that was just twice the size of a brush.

"My God," he said, looking at himself for the first time in a long time. "Is this how I look?"

She seemed a bit confused with the question, and, after eating a piece of potato, she simply said, "Yes."