Her eye caught on the stranger. She was younger than Mirielle by at least a decade. Her reddish-gold hair fell in waves to just below her ears in the same au courant style Mirielle had once worn. Her large, kohl-rimmed eyes twinkled in the overhead lamplight. When she laughed, her red-painted lips parted to reveal small, straight teeth. Jean had been right. This newcomer looked like a Kodak print of Clara Bow.
Mirielle turned around and unwrapped her candy bar. The chocolate-covered nougat was no longer appealing, but she was grateful for something to gnash her teeth on. Even the girl’s laugh sounded pretty.
After pulverizing a few bites of the Charleston Chew, Mirielle reached across the counter and smacked the service bell beside the cash register. No one ever used the bell unless Frank was in the back closet unboxing supplies, and its sharp ring cut through the happy chatter like a scythe. Mirielle withdrew her hand, regretting the noise.
“Hey, Polly,” Frank said, coming up beside her instead of going around behind the counter. “Sorry, I didn’t see ya come in.”
“Hey yourself. Do I have any letters?”
“I’ll check.” But he didn’t move. “It’s good to see you’re feeling better.”
“Thanks,” Mirielle managed. She couldn’t explain the flush of anger she felt, didn’t trust herself not to sock him in the jaw and walk away.
“I tried to make a pass by the infirmary to see ya, but ya know how persnickety Sister Verena is about men in the ladies’ ward.”
She didn’t laugh.
Either Frank was blind to her anger or had no sense of self-preservation, for he stepped closer and lowered his voice. “And sorry I didn’t catch ya before ya fell. I wasn’t expecting ya to pass clear out like that.” He brushed the line of stitches across her brow with the pad of his index finger. The tickle of his rough skin sent a pleasant shudder down her spine. Her anger stilled. Their eyes met and retreated.
She pulled back just as the jostle of chairs and clap of footsteps sounded behind them.
“See you in a few, Frank?” Billy said. Frank nodded.
Irene came up and wrapped Mirielle in a bear hug, squeezing all the tighter when Mirielle stiffened. “I didn’t know they’d released you, baby. You comin’ to roast weenies with us?”
“And marshmallows!” Jean said. The entire crowd had gathered around her and Frank.
“No,” Mirielle said, and then, a beat too late, “thanks.”
Irene released her after another squeeze. “Suit yourself.”
Mirielle watched them leave, Jean clutching the box of marshmallows, Billy and Mr. Li making a gallant show of letting the Clara Bow lookalike through the door first, oblivious to Irene and the other women who followed.
“She’s pretty,” Mirielle said when they’d left.
“Who?”
“The new girl.”
“Oh, Rose. Yeah. She and an older fella just arrived from New York.”
Mirielle glanced at the doorway. The group’s laughter sounded down the walkway. Soon enough, Rose would run out of kohl to rim her eyes. The laundry’s harsh soaps would cheapen her clothes. Her hair would grow out, and there’d be no big-city beautician to cut it back into a cute little bob. Soon enough, the disease would mark her too.
Mirielle set down her half-eaten candy bar, her stomach unsettled. How could she think such awful things? How could she wish them on a girl who was probably just as sad and scared as she’d first been?
She turned back to Frank. “The mail.”
“Oh, yeah, let me check.” He walked behind the counter and pulled out a shoe box full of letters. “For what it’s worth,” he said, flipping through the unclaimed mail without looking up, “I think you’re pretty too.”
So many men had said that to Mirielle over the years, the compliment was like a worn-out nickel—not half as shiny as it once had been. But it caught Mirielle off guard. She loosened the knot of her scarf and said only, “Oh.”
After a moment of silence, he pulled a letter from the box. “Here you go. Mrs. Pauline Marvin.”
Their fingers brushed as Frank handed her the envelope. Mirielle jerked back, then said too brightly, “Thanks.”
Frank cleared his throat. He stowed the shoe box under the counter and grabbed a rag. “I’m . . . ah . . . closing up soon, but you’re welcome to stay until I do.”
He left to wipe down the tables, and Mirielle opened her letter, too eager to wait until she was back in her room. Two pages were folded inside. The first was a crayon drawing of their house. Mirielle smoothed the paper flat, running her fingers over the waxy colors. Evie had captured the fountain in the drive, the front arcade, even the terra-cotta-potted plants flanking the double-doored entry. Faces peeked out from the second-story windows. Charlie in one, wearing a boater hat and smile. Helen in another, adorned with a pacifier and a single curlicue of hair. Their Persian cat, Monsieur. Evie, a straight line of red for her lips and smudge of blue—a tear?—beneath one of her eyes. The other windows were empty.
Mirielle stared at the picture, wishing her face would somehow appear. But at least she appeared as a thought at the bottom where Evie had written in pencil, I miss you Mama.
“Miss you too,” Mirielle whispered before setting the drawing carefully aside to read Charlie’s letter. It was just a few lines clearly scratched out in haste. Helen was teething again and fussy. Evie was to have a part in the school Christmas play. Production was wrapping up on the new picture. Gloria had invited him and the girls to spend the holidays at her estate in Switzerland. Just the ticket—didn’t she think?—to get away from all the gossip for a while.
Mirielle’s hands trembled as she folded the letter and stuffed it in her purse. The swish swish of Frank’s broom sounded behind her. The crackle of the radio from the rec hall. The irregular thud of her heart. An empty glass sat a few feet away on the counter. Mirielle scooted off her stool and grabbed it. It was cool against her palm. Half a sip of soda fizzled at the bottom. Her fingers tightened around the glass. Gloria’s estate in Switzerland. Just the ticket, didn’t she think? Mirielle hurled the glass at the plaster wall behind the counter. It shattered on impact, showering bits of glass over the back counter and floor.
“Merde!” Frank said, ducking beneath a table. He glanced furtively around the room, then rattled his head and stood. “Hell, sorry, I thought . . .” He crossed the room to Mirielle’s side and gaped at the mess behind the counter. “What happened?”
“My husband’s spending the holiday in Switzerland.”
Frank looked down at her, his pupils wide and brow knit with confusion. His skin, a shade paler than before, glistened with sweat. Shell-shocked, Mirielle realized. “Sorry about the—er—noise. And the mess. I threw a glass at the wall.”
For several more seconds, he stared at her as if she were speaking Chinese. Then he laughed—a loud, full-bellied chuckle that made tears squirt from his eyes.
Mirielle frowned. Her husband spending the holiday with a beautiful woman in Europe was hardly funny. But Frank’s laughter was contagious. It unknit her frown and relaxed her shoulders. It tickled her diaphragm until she too was laughing and her eyes leaking.
“They could make my life into a comedy picture it’s become so absurd,” Mirielle said when she could manage to speak again. The laughter had dulled her anger, leaving her raw and hollow.
“My favorite type of picture,” he said.
Hers too. Though maybe not anymore.
Frank fetched the broom and swept while she wiped the back counter. The shards of glass clanked and tinkled when they dumped them into the trash bin. Otherwise the canteen was quiet. The radio in the rec hall had been dialed down to a whisper. The walkways outside were empty.
“Ya cut yourself,” Frank said, and Mirielle looked down at her hand. A thin line of blood trickled from her palm.
He pressed a clean, damp cloth over the wound. It didn’t hurt or throb or even sting. “Ya ought to have Sister Verena take a look at it tomorrow.” He didn’t h
ave to say this was how it started—a cut or scrape or burn, painless and forgotten or not noticed at all, later found to be infected, too much later when the entire finger or toe, foot or hand, had to go.
“I will.”
He held the cloth to her palm even after the bleeding had stopped. She stared down at his curled, rough hand. What would his fingers feel like against her skin? Not her palm, but the other parts of her still sensitive to touch.
“You really do think I’m pretty?”
The pressure of his fingers eased, but he didn’t pull away. “I do.”
“As pretty as Rose?”
His eyes narrowed, but he nodded.
She bit down on her bottom lip. “But Rose’s got such a stylish haircut and those movie-star eyes.”
The struggle between forbearance and desire played out in Frank’s expression. A struggle she shouldn’t encourage. When he spoke again, his voice was husky. “I fancy brunettes.”
Mirielle gave a shy smile and stepped back, expecting him to follow. He did. She retreated another step. And another. Frank mirrored her movements, keeping the narrow distance between them until she was pinned against the counter. The sweet, syrupy scent of the soda fountain mingled with that of sandalwood and liniment. The bloodied cloth slipped from her hand.
He leaned down and whispered in her ear. “Ya sure ya want to do this?”
His breath tickled her neck. A shiver skittered down her arms. She nodded.
Frank’s lips moved from her ear toward her mouth.
Mirielle shifted. A piece of glass crunched under the heel of her shoe, the noise jogging her senses. Her surroundings sharpened into focus—the bright overhead lights, shelves of canned soup and cigarettes and chocolate bars, the scuffed floor and mousetrap in the corner. What was she doing?
She ducked away from Frank’s kiss and fled.
CHAPTER 41
“Did you review Mrs. Roscoe’s initial physical assessment?” Sister Verena asked.
Mirielle nodded, clutching the record book.
“And? What do you see?”
She gave Lula a sheepish smile and stepped closer. Mirielle had been poked and examined enough herself to know how naked and vulnerable Lula must feel. The privacy screen cast long shadows over Lula’s legs, and Mirielle regretted having to ask her to turn around, like a windup toy, so she could get a better look. The nodules on her legs—described in the initial record as ulcerated and weeping—were scabbed now and only a shade paler than her dark skin.
“Her legs look better,” Mirielle said.
Sister Verena frowned.
“Her lesions are scabbed and no longer appear infected.”
“Good. Write that down.”
Mirielle balanced the record book against her arm and scratched down her assessment.
“What else?” Sister Verena said.
Nothing else had caught her eye, but Mirielle looked again. She didn’t know Lula well. Not because she believed any of that nonsense in Mr. Griffith’s film. Indeed, Carville wasn’t like the rest of the South. The children—white, black, Oriental, Mexican—all attended school together. Anyone was free to sit in the canteen and drink a soda. At movie nights, no one was relegated to the back row. But segregated houses were enough to keep most of them on hello-only terms.
“I don’t see any other changes.”
“Read the initial findings.”
Mirielle flipped to the front of the record, flashing Lula an apologetic look. Outside, it rained, and the cold air crept into the infirmary. Gooseflesh covered Lula’s skin.
“Aloud?”
Sister Verena nodded.
“Diffuse thickening of the skin over forehead, cheeks, and back of the neck. Eyebrows and arm hair missing. Ulcerated and weeping nodules scattered across both legs. Mycotic infections of the fingernails and—”
“Stop,” Sister Verena said. She turned to Lula. “Please extend your hands, Mrs. Roscoe.”
When she did, Mirielle saw that the tips of her fingernails were thick and discolored, but the lower halves of the nails, the newer part, had grown in healthy.
“Keen observation is the most important part of a sound assessment, Mrs. Marvin.” Sister Verena handed Lula a blanket to drape over her hospital gown until her session in the fever cabinet began. “Thank you for your patience, Mrs. Roscoe. Your results so far are quite promising.”
Mirielle added clearing up of mycotic nail infection to Lula’s record, trying not to begrudge her the improvement. If they were seeing such positive changes on the outside, what might the fever therapy be doing on the inside? Was it clearing up the Mycobacterium leprae germs as well? Had Mirielle’s own disease started to recede before her bout of malaria only to surreptitiously return in the weeks since?
Lula wasn’t the only patient in the trial showing signs of improvement. When word got out, the list of the volunteers for the next round of trials would double. Triple. In all likelihood, Mirielle would again be relegated to the sidelines, jotting down assessments and taking vitals, watching others get better and go home while her disease remained.
Doc Jack arrived and readied the fever cabinet. Mirielle helped Lula climb onto the mattress. Once she was positioned correctly with her head beyond the confines of the box, Mirielle lowered the lid, fastening the sides to the base with a click. She remembered the way that sound had made her heart speed, how tight and confining the cabinet had felt around her. The heat, the burns, the nausea. Still, she’d happily trade places with Lula and climb inside.
The machine switched on with a whirr. Doc Jack watched the gauges, taking his leave as soon as the temperature and humidity inside the cabinet began to climb. Sister Verena lingered a bit longer.
“Make sure she remains adequately hydrated,” she said to Mirielle. “Check her vitals every hour and notify me immediately of any abnormal results.”
Mirielle nodded, not trusting herself to keep the sass out of her voice. After four weeks assisting with the trial in lieu of participating, she didn’t need such reminders. She watched Sister Verena cross the room and seat herself at the nurses’ desk. The sisters’ giant hats accented the slightest movement of their heads, a distracting and sometimes dizzying display. Especially with Sister Loretta, whose neck seemed like a loose spring, her hat like a kite caught in a fitful wind. But Sister Verena’s hat never bobbed or rattled or lolled to the side. When she walked, only her feet moved. When she talked, only her lips. When she sat, she might as well be a statue. Somehow, though, her eyes were everywhere.
Mirielle tried to ignore those eyes as she went about her work. She filled a small bowl with ice water and readied several hand towels to daub Lula’s brow when she began sweating. Mirielle mixed up a pitcher of saline and water and poured some into a glass with a straw, coaxing Lula to take a sip every few minutes. She tracked the needles as they moved inside the gauges—up, up, up—until they hovered at their set points. But mostly, she sat, watched, and waited.
About halfway through the session, Lula complained of cramps. Mirielle fetched Sister Verena, who drew up a dose of calcium gluconate in one syringe and a quarter grain of morphine in another. She slid open the side door on the cabinet, just long enough to inject them. Mirielle, standing close by, felt the wave of hot, sticky air as it escaped.
“That’s the last of the calcium gluconate,” Sister Verena said when she’d finished. “I’ll have to go to the pharmacy to get some more. Sister Juanita should arrive presently for her shift. I trust you can manage things in the short interim?”
“We’ll be fine.”
Sister Verena gave a huff. Or maybe it was actually a laugh. Mirielle couldn’t tell. She sat back down to watch and wait.
“Talk to me, Polly, will ya?” Lula asked, her voice soft and drowsy.
Mirielle pulled her stool closer. The tiny curls at Lula’s hairline fluttered from the gust of the fan. “What would you like to talk about?”
She gave a tiny shake of her head. “Anything.”
�
�All right, let me see . . .” Mirielle dipped a towel in the bowl of ice water. She drew it across Lula’s forehead and over her temples, stalling until she could think of something to say. “Paramount’s got a new picture coming out in a few months. No expense spared, I’m told.”
Since Hector died, Mirielle hadn’t uttered a peep about the film. Too dangerous. Too easy for someone to make the connection. But it felt good to talk about it, as if the words had lived too long cooped up inside her. Besides, thanks to the morphine, Lula wouldn’t remember. “My Best Gal, it’s called. Charlie West is the star. Gloria Thorne’s in it too and—”
“A love story?”
“No, not at all. A comedy.”
“Could be both.”
“Well, it’s not. It’s about a man who—” Mirielle paused. For all Charlie’s talk about the picture—the set, the budget, the other actors—he’d not told her what the story was actually about. “It’s about a man who wants to join the circus. . . .” Mirielle made up the plot as she went. Clowns and elephants and tightrope walkers. An aging ringleader, a handsome lion tamer, a pitiful bearded lady—played, of course, by Miss Thorne. Lula didn’t seem to mind that none of it made sense. Soon her eyes were closed, her breath slow and steady like one asleep.
Outside, the rain continued to plink against the roof and drizzle down the windowpanes. Mirielle leaned closer to the warm machine, resting her elbow on the shelf between Lula’s pillow and the half-empty pitcher of saline water.
A comedy. Wasn’t that how she’d described her life to Frank? They’d hardly spoken since that night in the canteen weeks ago when he’d tried to kiss her. An awfully fresh thing to do, considering she was married. Mirielle was right to avoid him. But she missed his company. His laugh. The way he made her laugh. And, if she were honest with herself, hadn’t she goaded him on?
The Second Life of Mirielle West Page 23