Spring Fire

by Vin Packer

  Some students sat in the chairs at the right of the entrance, and a telephone operator pulled out colored cords from her board and kept repeating, "University Hospital, one moment" in a singsong tone. There was a strange silence in the halls, and the elevator seemed crowded, though there were just the three of them

  The door moved back automatically, and they walked along until they came to the door with the screen in front of it. Mitch went in and they waited outside. Dr. Peters pushed the screen back when the nurse came out, and Mitch could hear the door close behind her. Slowly she walked toward the bed. When she saw Leda's face in the dim light, she knew why she was there.

  She said, "Leda?"

  Leda opened her eyes. She looked at Mitch without smiling. She didn't say anything, and Mitch moved closer.

  "Hello, Leda," Mitch said.

  Almost instantly Leda seemed to regain her energy. She smiled and tried to move up farther on the big pillow behind her head. "Hi, kid," she said.

  "How do you feel?"

  "God, I feel lousy."

  "I'm sorry, Leda. Terribly sorry."

  She was sorry, too. She knew it when she said it and looked right at the girl. She was plain sorry.

  "You shouldn't be sorry for me. I guess I ought to be sorry myself, Mitch."

  "No," Mitch said. "Everything turned out O.K. for me. You did your best, Leda."

  "You think so? You really believe that?"

  "Well, all I know is, I think it's best the way you did it."

  "You would," Leda laughed. "You would, Mitch. You know something?"

  "What, Leda?" Mitch had never seen a face like that. It looked old and lined with fear and worry. But it was Leda's face, Mitch realized, and there was something there in the look that was not too strange. Familiar.

  "If I ever do anything good, I don't know when I'm doing it. You know what I mean? I just do it, and then sometimes it turns out good. Do you know?"

  "Yes, I know, Leda."

  "If it turned out good for you, kid, I'm glad."

  "It did, Leda. It turned out good."

  "I was worried," Leda said, reaching over for her cigarettes. "Hand me one, will you, kid? Dr. Peters said I could smoke if I wanted today, but I didn't feel like it till now."

  Mitch gave her the cigarette and lit it for her with the small, blue-covered matchbox that said, "Clean-Rite Cleaners" on the top, and "You get it dirty—we'll get it clean."

  "I was worried," Leda continued. "I thought you'd be sore at me. I wouldn't have blamed you, either. I'm sorry about the letter. Nessy found it, you know. There wasn't much I could do."

  "I know," Mitch said. "Let's not talk about it, Leda. I'm glad you feel—"

  "Wait a minute. Why not talk about it? Why not? You don't believe that Nessy found that letter, do you, Mitch? Come on, Mitch. Even you don't believe that!"

  "Leda, please. Let's forget it."

  "Forget it! My God, forget it! You know what it's like to lie here in this goddamn bed and think about everything? Some circus, this is! Some big circus!"

  She laughed and she stopped laughing abruptly. For a moment the look of peace and ease came back to her face and she smiled. "I do feel better," she said. "Marsha and Kitten were here this morning. I haven't seen Jake yet."

  "Maybe you'll see him tomorrow," Mitch said.

  "Hell, who am I kidding? I'm not kidding you, am I, Mitch? I don't care if I ever see him again." Leda blew the smoke out and tried to sit up farther. Mitch moved over to help her with the pillow. Leda's eyes met Mitch's then under the light. They seemed to lose some of their green color, and there were lines around the sockets under them.

  "I'm not kidding you, am I, Mitch?"

  Leda caught Mitch's hand when she brought it back from the pillow. "You know I don't give a damn about Jake, don't you?"

  Mitch felt the coldness of Leda's skin. The same skin that used to feel warm and send chills through her and excite her. A momentary physical memory came back, but the warmth was fleeting and then dead when she looked back at Leda's face. She tried to pull her hand away but Leda held it tightly.

  "I told you the other night. I told you right that night, Mitch. Remember that. No matter what happens after I get out of here, don't forget I told you right. I probably won't see you again, anyway." Her voice seemed to break on the last sentence. She said, "Going home, Mitch? Back to Seedmore or Sneedmore or wherever it is?"

  "I suppose," Mitch said. She saw the tears in the corners of Leda's eyes.

  "You know I don't want to be without you, don't you?" Her fingers fastened more strongly on Mitch's and Mitch could feel her crushing them. She could feel her own eyes fill. It wasn't because of Leda. It was for Leda that she wanted to cry. She wanted to cry a long time for Leda.

  She said, "Yes, I know that, Leda. Don't think about it."

  "It's hard not to think about it. God! God! God!" Leda let Mitch's hand go and moved her head back and forth on the pillow, clasping her own hands together and saying, "God, oh, God!" Then she did not move, but stared straight ahead and talked slowly. "You know something, Mitch? It's going to be all right. I've just got a feeling that it's going to be all right. I mean, maybe I didn't do too bad by you. Hell, there are plenty of colleges and sororities. You wouldn't have to go far away. I could still see you."

  A tear came down Mitch's cheek. God help her, she thought. Oh, God help Leda. She needs help now.

  Leda saw the tear. She smiled, and her voice rose. "You crazy kid! You're crying! You're crying!" Her own tears came forward. "You got me crying too," she said. "You crazy kid!"

  Leda reached for the ash tray and put the cigarette in it. The smoke spiraled up. Her face was wet, and she began to talk faster with the tears coming too. "Maybe you can see me again before you go. When are you going, Mitch?"

  "I don't know," Mitch said. "I'm not sure. It's up to the Dean."

  "You—you didn't tell her about me? I wouldn't blame you if you did. I want to know, though. Did you, Mitch?" The edge of her white cloth hospital gown was wet and the tears did not stop.

  "No," Mitch said, "I didn't tell her." Please, God, she thought, forgive me for lying to her. There are enough lies.

  "I wouldn't blame you, Mitch. I wouldn't blame you if you hated my guts. You do, don't you?"

  She began to laugh then, and to cry and sob, her shoulders shaking and her hands covering the wild expression of hysteria. Mitch kept saying, "I don't hate you, Leda. No, I don't hate you at all."

  The thick sound from Leda cut into Mitch's words and rang through the room, persistent and hammering. Mitch backed away, her heart throbbing, afraid to go near Leda while it kept up and Leda writhed in the sheets. Momentarily Leda's hand left her face and she stared ahead, quietly, unmoving, but this lasted only a quick second and she lapsed back again, laughing and weeping, her whole body convulsed.

  Fear ran through Mitch, and when the nurse opened the door and took the needle over to Leda, Mitch looked back once more, and left the room remembering Leda like that.

  Dean Paterson was waiting outside, and her arm went around Mitch's waist as they walked along the hall. Mitch could see the thin figure of Dr. Peters waiting at the end of the corridor, and she could smell the tangy odor of his tobacco.

  Chapter Twelve

  There was a warm sun that morning, and the air was so cold that the messenger boy could see his breath as he walked up the steps. He pushed the button and shuffled his feet and clapped his hands together after he laid the package beside him on the porch and waited for someone to answer the door.

  He could hear an alarm go off somewhere in the house. It was early in Greek Town, eight o'clock, and across the street at the Delta Pi house, the windows on the second and third floors were half open and the shades were down,

  A girl in a blue wool robe answered the door and signed for the package. The boy could see other girls through the door, filing lazily into a large dining room, wearing robes like the one this girl had on. He could smell bacon and eggs and hot
coffee while he stood there waiting for her to put her signature on his pad. She handed it back to him, and he picked up the package and gave it to her. Then he hurried down the steps to his bicycle, and took off at a good speed.

  Bebe Duncan rapped on the door to Nessy’s suite.

  "It's a package," she said, "from Kansas City."

  Inside, Nessy put the final touch to her dress, the small square-shaped pearl brooch. She was proud of the fact that she never ate breakfast in a robe, that she was always dressed for the day by eight o'clock in the morning at the latest. She fluffed her hair and gave one last jab to her nose with the powder puff.

  "Coming," she said, sliding the lock back and emerging from the room, her lilac perfume filling the hall where Bebe stood with the package. "We'll bring it into" the breakfast room." She smiled, walking stanchly ahead and leaving Bebe to follow with it.

  There was a noisy scraping of chairs as the Tri Eps stood up when Mother Nesselbush entered beaming and walked regally to the head table, where she pushed her fat hips into the chair. They all sat down again, and watched Bebe bring the package and Nessy take a knife to the string.

  "I think," she said, "that I know what this is." She looked very secret, with her lips puckered in a cryptic expression of pleasure.

  The brown paper fell from the box and Nessy reached into it and pulled out rumpled sheets of white tissue and another box, a red one. She set it on the table and lifted the cover. The Tri Eps gasped and sighed. The silverware looked beautiful and brilliant against the red velvet background.

  "Gee," Bebe Duncan said. "With Mitch gone, they might take it back now."

  "No," Nessy said, her eyes dazzled with the silver pieces, her mind filled with vivid pictures of intimate gatherings in her suite with the other housemothers, and the way they too would gasp and sigh when they saw it. "After all, we did what was asked. We pledged the girl and gave her a chance."

  One by one the Tri Eps came by the table to touch the silver and run their fingers along the magnificent crest. They left their breakfast and hung around the table where the box lay.

  "We'll use it for the exchange with Delta Pi next week," Jane Bell said, holding a fork so that it caught the light and gleamed.

  "Lord, let's not wait till then. How about Sunday dinner, tomorrow?"

  "It isn't even out of the box yet."

  "Look at the demitasse spoons!"

  "Now all we need is cups."

  It was not long after she had opened the box that Mother Nesselbush was called to the phone. She left the girls in the dining room, exclaiming, fondling each piece, planning for its use, Marsha by that time advising all of them that they had better vote on whether to save it for special occasions or to use it every day. When Nessy entered the small phone booth outside the dining room, Marsha was asking for a show of hands.

  Mother Nesselbush's face was strangely animated when she reappeared and stood in the entrance. There was a look of grimness, oddly striped with fascination and a secret pleasure at the thought of the shock she was about to introduce to Epsilon Epsilon Epsilon.

  "Girls," she said. "Please—everybody."

  They turned and faced her and she waited. She looked down at the tablecloth and the rows of dishes filled with cold eggs and curled pieces of bacon. It was very quiet. She said, "Dr. Peters just called from the University Hospital. Leda Taylor has had a complete nervous breakdown. Her mother arrived late last night, and Leda is completely out of control. Absolutely broken!"

  There was silence, and then the noise of the sudden rush of voices, and the fork that fell from Marsha's hand and clattered to the floor. Mother Nesselbush held her hand up for silence. "We are to pack her things. I suggest that Marsha and Kitten come into my apartment immediately to make plans for this."

  The three of them left the dining room, and left behind them the gabble of high voices and the low buzz of awed exclamations.

  Nessy shut the doors to her apartment and leaned forward, whispering as though her words could be heard through the walls. "I saw it coming," she said. "When I talked to Dean Paterson yesterday I could feel it coming. She'll have to go to an institution."

  "Gee," Kitten said. "Leda!"

  "I could just read into everything the doctor said when he called. I just know she's a wild woman over there in that hospital. A wild woman!"

  "I wonder where she'll be sent?" Marsha said.

  Nessy's face was bubbling, and her eyes were shining as though she had fever. "She won't have a thing to do with her mother. There's only one place she could go. An asylum." She said the word "asylum" with a heavy tone of dread, and a note of finality for Leda, almost as though she had said "the grave."

  "Lord," Kitten said. "Leda in a nut house. Lord!"

  Marsha looked away from them and toward the window and the leaves running along the front of the house. She said, "As Tri Epsilons we must do everything we can for her. I wonder," she said dramatically, pausing, her brow wrinkled, "I wonder if—if insane people can read mail."

  * * *

  Dr. Peters lingered in the hall near the door as Susan Mitchell buttoned her coat and put her scarf around her head. "Then I'll see you on Tuesday," he said, taking her hand in a friendly good-by, "and have a nice week end, Susan. Any big plans?"

  "I'm going on a hay ride tonight. Robin and Tom and Lucifer and me. That's about all I've planned."

  He let her hand go and smiled as he held the door open. "Sounds like fun," he answered. "By, Susan."

  It was cold and there was a warning of snow in the fresh sweep of the breeze as Mitch walked along the path from the hospital. She had a clean feeling that was there whenever she finished talking with Dr. Peters, and she knew she was whole now. The tower bell struck five times, and distant figures of students carrying books hurried along the far walks, their breaths frosting faintly in the cold air. When she went by the auditorium, she could hear the university choir rehearsing for the Christmas pageant, and the nostalgic strains drifted out to her. Dusk was dressing the campus, and as Mitch walked with the music in her heart, she thought of Leda—hazily, as though she were someone she had known a long, long time ago.

  She knew that if it had been any other way—if Leda Taylor could have been helped, and could have at that moment walked there too and known the peace in the twilight and the first hints of frost on the grass and bushes surrounding Cranston—Mitch would have wanted that. Because it was true what she had told Leda yesterday. She didn't hate her. She didn't hate her at all, and she knew then that she had never really loved her.

  The End