Two-Part Invention: The Story of a Marriage

by Madeleine L'engle

  Tuesday morning. The first official day of autumn. The day I was supposed to go to New York. Crosswicks is wrapped in fog. Bion is able to drive me down to the hospital and drops of slow rain trickle down the windshield like tears.

  As soon as we see Hugh, we know that things are not good. He has been throwing up, watery green bile. He is breathing with difficulty. His voice is weak, but almost the first thing he says is, “I thought you were going to New York.”

  “I’m not about to leave till you’re feeling stronger.”

  “But the party—”

  “We can reschedule it.”

  His concern keeps surfacing. “What about your Authors Guild meeting?”

  “The vice president will take it for me. He’ll be fine. We had a long conference call yesterday afternoon while you were sleeping. Don’t worry.”

  Laurie is already in the hospital doing morning rounds. She comes in and Bion and I look at her anxiously. The nurse is ready to bathe Hugh, so we go out into the corridor. Laurie goes to the nurses’ station for Hugh’s chart. Checks the results of tests. Michael has written, “Situation deteriorating.” I did not need to see it written down to know, yet it is still shocking.

  We come back to the room and tell Bion to go home. He has work to do. Laurie sits with me until she has to leave for a meeting.

  Hugh whispers, “I never was so glad to see anybody as you this afternoon.”

  “It’s still morning, darling. I’m going to be with you all day.”

  We hold hands until he falls asleep.

  Is he dying? Today? I don’t know. Modern medicine has made it less and less easy for us to predict the imminence of death.

  Joe comes in. Hugh is too weak to talk, but he manages a smile, both on his lips and in those great blue eyes, so often remarked on by the nurses. He slips into sleep, and Joe and I talk quietly. I am so grateful that these two good men have found each other.

  Joe says to me, “Hugh is the victim of modern medicine.”

  Hugh lies there, the two small prongs of oxygen in his nose. The chest tube is still in place, the chest tube that was the result of the effort to give him hyperalimentation. His belly is sewn up so that the wound cannot come apart.

  But what was the alternative? The treatment Hugh was given has cured people. The older methods, such as radiation, were successful only in postponing death, not in killing this kind of cancer. Had he not been given the platinum, what kind of death would he have suffered? I don’t know the answer to these questions. But because we have new ways of treating disease, we use them.

  Hugh has had no intractable pain. The worst has been from the chest tube, which the surgeon admits is painful, but the pain has never been beyond relief. If we had to make all the choices again, what would we choose?

  And I remember Ed saying, “I have thought about this long and prayerfully, and it is what I would do for my father.” So we had to do what there was to do.

  At the end of a long letter Scott Peck wrote: “On an intellectual level, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross’s stages of death and dying come to mind, and it seems to me, at least in retrospect, that Hugh had reached stage five (which very few are fortunate enough to do) which is a stage of light and, basically, resurrection. It was a real privilege to witness. Obviously, your marriage had something to do with that extraordinary phenomenon. Although I had heard some of the details from Lily, I cannot imagine what the next six weeks were like for you. But I gather, rightly or wrongly, that they were strangely peaceful.”

  In a strange way, yes.

  Daily, Hugh and I express what we feel, simply by saying and saying again, “I love you.” Hugh and I have been saying it off and on for forty years. It comes off the lips of our children, our godchildren. It is all that needs to be said. I told Gretchen yesterday that Hugh and I have no unfinished business. There are no dangling strings left to be tied. I don’t want him to leave me, but even more I don’t want any more useless suffering for him. He is so gallant, so gallant, even today managing to smile for the nurses. For me.

  I look at him, beautiful as an El Greco saint, for that is still the analogy that keeps coming to my mind. When I get home I look at a snapshot of the two of us together, Hugh’s face alert and alive. I observe and contemplate this child of love, made of the same stuff as galaxies and stars. And I know that the only meaning is love.

  Laurie comes to pick me up and take me home after her evening rounds. On the drive back I tell her that I want to be with Hugh all the way to the end; I want to be with him when he dies.

  Laurie explains that it is not that easy. If he starts to go, there will be a Code Blue, nurses and doctors will come rushing, I’d be thrust out of the room.

  “No.”

  He’d be put on a respirator, isolated in ICU.

  “No.”

  After the big bladder surgery, the first night that Hugh was in ICU he was on a respirator, a tube down his throat so that he couldn’t talk. There was a gastronasal tube, heart monitor, IVs; his hands were loosely tied to the sides of the bed. The next day, when the respirator was gone and he was able to talk, he told us how terribly frustrated he had been that he could not make the nurses understand that he was deaf and couldn’t hear.

  I don’t want that for him. In his own room I am able to be with him all day. In ICU it’s basically five minutes on the hour, though they are good about bending the rules. But they could not be good enough.

  Laurie then explains to me that the only way to avoid this is to have NO CODE written into his chart.

  At dinner that evening I talk with her and Bion about it. I tell them that Hugh and I have promised each other, not once, but several times, that we would never allow this prolongation of dying to happen. I tell them that I want to honor my promise. They look at me, nod in agreement. I telephone my daughters, telling them, too, about the promise. They, too, agree.

  This morning NO CODE is written into his chart.

  Actually, he is a little better this morning. But I am glad that the decision has been made. Both Michael and Herb are in complete accord.

  One of the nurses tells me that this is what was done with her husband. The doctor simply told her that this was how it was going to be handled; no “heroic measures” to prolong dying. About my age now, she was twenty-five years younger when her husband was dying, and she said she fell apart, but as she looks back on it, she wouldn’t have had it any other way.

  “Today,” I said, “the doctor would not be allowed to make that decision, no matter how much he felt it needed to be made.”

  She agreed. “You have to do it. But it’s a hard decision.”

  “I love him.”

  I think of Lady Julian. “Wouldst thou witten thy Lord’s meaning in these things? Wit it well. Love was his meaning.”

  On Thursday, Hugh is very weak. He is dehydrated, despite the IVs, and his mind wanders. He goes back to his childhood in Oklahoma. I know that this is often a sign that death is approaching. Sometimes he thinks he has to learn lines, go to rehearsal. Sometimes his mind is completely clear.

  It is a beautiful day, and Thursday is Laurie’s afternoon off; she and Bion go for a climb. Autumn is unusually early. The trees are turning their brilliant reds and golds. Leaves are falling.

  They pick me up a little before seven. I have promised to take them to a small local restaurant for dinner. None of us feels like cooking, cleaning up. I tell them that I am terribly anxious about Hugh.

  We kiss him good night, tell him that we love him. Bion says, “We’re taking Mother out to dinner.”

  Hugh says, “Have a good dinner,” manages to smile for us, is with us.

  As soon as we get home after the meal Laurie calls the nurses’ station. Hugh is sleeping quietly.

  I open a small mail-order package, and there are some socks I ordered for Hugh when it still seemed likely that he would be with us for Christmas, and this undoes me utterly. We realize with terrible finality that Hugh is not going to come home, and we hold eac
h other and weep together.

  Was it two days ago that Herb and I, in the corridor outside Hugh’s room, talked about the possibility of his coming home, of having a few months of quality life, of enjoying the new addition and all that we have done while he has been in the hospital?

  We sob brokenly, sharing our grief.

  In the morning I have just finished my pre-breakfast swim when the phone rings. Laurie comes out. The hospital has called. I hurry to get dressed. As we are leaving, Michael calls. I say that we’re on our way.

  When we get to the hospital the elevators are on upper floors, so I run up the stairs. Michael is in the room. Hugh has vomited, and ingested some of the fluid. His breathing is strained, and he has on the oxygen face mask. He is not conscious.

  I hold his hand. Touch. Look at Michael and tell him I know he has done everything possible.

  He nods. “One domino fell over after another.”

  Bion and Laurie come in. We are all touching Hugh’s hands, arms, shoulders, touching. I am not sure when Michael leaves. Herb comes in, presses my shoulder. “We’re with you.”

  Does Hugh understand that he is being touched, loved? Is there enough awareness in him for that?

  At ten o’clock I call Josephine, call Maria, tell them that their father is going. Still touching my husband, I hold the phone in my other hand and say goodbye to my daughters.

  Hold Hugh’s hand. Touching. Stroking. Suddenly light green fluid washes over my right hand. I hold Hugh’s head up, push the lever to raise the head of the bed with my other hand.

  Hear Laurie say, “This is it.”

  Hugh stops breathing. I am holding his head, his shoulder. Laurie goes out to call one of the nurses, who comes in with her stethoscope. There is no pulse, no heartbeat.

  I continue to hold him. To touch. Several nurses come in, whisper, “I’m sorry,” They cry with us.

  When Michael comes in to pronounce death, I say, “It is hard to let go beloved flesh.”

  He nods.

  Hugh is still warm.

  Twelve

  We go home. Josephine calls to say that they have been able to make a plane reservation, and she and Alan will leave at once with nine-year-old Edward and will arrive at Bradley late that evening. Charlotte calls to say that she and Léna will take the bus to Cornwall Bridge, as close as public transportation comes to us, and will arrive a little after seven. Maria and John will come the next day, with John’s parents again staying with the babies. There are many phone calls to make. I have called Hugh’s sister from the hospital. We make a list, dividing the calls.

  And our phone starts to ring.

  There has been no sentimentality, no false or guilt-ridden love. We have been able to avoid the death-prolonging so often forced on people by technocracy, which makes death far more difficult by what appears to be a vicious type of sentimentality. Thank God I was able to make the choice of NO CODE, to keep my promise to my husband. This time I had to do it for Hugh. He was too ill and too disoriented to make it for himself. But he made the choice with me, long ago.

  We have called Joe, who has meant so much to Hugh, and to whom Hugh has meant so much. We call Charlie, the Congregational minister who has been so faithful. We decide to have the funeral on Sunday at three o’clock in the afternoon, the best time for those who will be able to drive up from New York.

  The day is a blur. We receive a call telling us that the women of the church will take care of the reception at Crosswicks after the funeral—what Hugh would have wanted to have called his “party.” My community swings into action, into support. The funeral baked meats start to pour in. We are surrounded by love.

  I wanted this resolved, and I know it was time, but it is still a terrible wrench, an amputation. Hugh had already had a dreadful four months, and I didn’t want him to go on suffering, but I wasn’t quite prepared for how devastated I would be.

  I discover that tears are very hard on contact lenses. One would think that since the lenses rest on the eye’s tears, crying would be good for them, but it isn’t. Too much salt, I suppose. And I can’t wear glasses, am totally dependent on the lenses to see.

  I take them off and lie down, try to rest. My feet and legs start to cramp. Despite the daily swim I have been unusually sedentary, sitting by Hugh’s hospital bed day after day. And I feel cold, a deep, inner cold. It is not the terrible cold of hell, but simply the cold of shock following a great loss. I get up and into a hot tub and warm up and then am able to rest.

  My granddaughters arrive and there is much loving, much hugging. We eat a quiet dinner out on the screened porch. This is their first encounter with the death of someone dear and close to them.

  I am in bed, waiting, when Alan and Josephine and Edward arrive at eleven-thirty. Although it is late and we are all exhausted, both psychically and physically, of course we sit and talk. I ask Alan to do a Requiem Mass, and he immediately says he will celebrate it on Monday in Joe’s Trinity Church. And Tallis, who has been so close to us for so many years, will celebrate a Requiem for Hugh at the Cathedral when I can get down to the city. Celebrate, yes. We will celebrate Hugh’s life. I do not go in for what are called “white funerals,” with Easter music, as though Good Friday had never happened. The kind of celebration I can be part of is one of great joy for Hugh’s life, and of great and deep grief at the same time.

  I’m alternately calm and carrying on with the things that need to be done, and overwhelmed. It’s the small things that do it, such as seeing the shaving brush we bought for Hugh when we were in Hong Kong—only last May.

  We’ve all been housecleaning like mad. John vacuums everywhere. Charlotte is in the middle of cleaning the fridge, and has polished the silver.

  The three older grandchildren, Léna, Charlotte, Edward, are going to read the lessons at the funeral Sunday afternoon.

  Sunday. The summer is over. Autumn is fully here. Hugh has what in the theatre is called “a full house” for his funeral. I am overwhelmed at the people who come—not only the Goshen community, but many from New York, and from the All My Children company. Our goddaughter Cornelia, who had flown out to her parents’ in Seattle on Thursday, flew back to New York on Saturday in order to be able to drive up to Crosswicks on Sunday, and will go back to Seattle on Monday. The response of love is overwhelming.

  The service is simple and dignified and beautiful, with the two ministers who have been so faithful during Hugh’s long illness taking it together. The grandchildren have rehearsed and rehearsed the Scripture readings; their grandfather would be proud of them. The hymns are “A Mighty Fortress Is Our God,” which we sang at my mother’s funeral, and “Joyful, joyful, we adore thee,” which was Hugh’s favorite, and doesn’t quite make me break down. Hugh had asked to be cremated, and the most difficult part is when Charlie picks up the box of Hugh’s ashes and carries them out at the end of the service.

  We don’t take count, but well over a hundred people come back to the house, and the Goshen churchwomen take care of everything—beautifully. It is a nice enough day so that we can spread out onto the terrace. Ernie and the boys, home from college for the weekend, the boys for whom we gave the cookout the day of the evening we knew that Hugh’s cancer had spread, go way above and beyond the call of duty and come on both Saturday and Sunday to clean up what is still a mess of wood and equipment, outdoors and in, and finish the screened porch so that all the food can be set up there, and basically the party—yes, that’s what it is, what Hugh wanted—is on the porch and the terrace.

  Oh, we had hoped that Hugh could come home, could be with us long enough to enjoy the porch. But it was not to be. He had worked through all the anger and confusion during the middle hospitalization and right after. During his final hospitalization, his last six weeks, all his sweetness and humor were to the fore. My love died a very good death.

  Monday morning at ten is the eucharist at Trinity Church. Again, it is simple, dignified. At the intercessions I offer thanks for the nurses, who were so
wonderful with Hugh. And during the greetings at the Passing of the Peace I am deeply moved to see one of the nurses there, on her day off. She says, “I want you to know I speak for all of the nurses when I say it was an honor to take care of him.”

  After the service we ask people to come home for lunch—fridge and freezer are still full of all the goodies we have been given, from casseroles to roasts. Bion and Laurie and I detour to the hospital to take the nurses some of the cakes and cookies, as a small token of thanks, and they are caring and pleased to see us. They truly loved Hugh.

  Now I am setting out into the unknown. It will take me a long while to work through the grief. There are no shortcuts; it has to be gone through.

  Slowly the house empties. Maria and John must go back to their babies. Josephine and Alan and their three leave. My friend Pat comes from Florida to be with me for a week, that same Pat with whom I have shared life and death and love and sorrow and tears and laughter since we were both gawky teenagers. The evening after she arrives she gets a phone call from her youngest son, and his wife has just had a baby boy. They had come from Fairfield to be at Hugh’s funeral just three days before the baby was born. The next Sunday Pat and I drive over for a visit. I am ultimately given the baby to hold, and since it is in my arms that this charming five-day-old creature falls asleep, I hold him longest, slowly rocking, holding new life.

  The phone continues to ring, many of our beloved godchildren who live too far away to have come to us, sobbing into the phone. One of my love-children wails, “But what happened to our prayers? Didn’t they do any good? Were they all wasted?”

  “No, no,” I reassure, “never wasted. Of course they did good. Hugh never had intractable pain. His last weeks were a beautiful witness of sweetness and courage and humor.”