Guests on Earth: A Novel

by Lee Smith

  The piano! Suddenly I felt like playing “Deck the Halls,” “Away in the Manger,” “Hark the Herald Angels Sing,” and all the carols of the season. As we trudged back up the hill toward the hospital, I could hardly wait to get my hands on the keys.

  But we all stopped obediently when Pan held up his hand. Some of us put our heavy branches down; I did, shading my eyes as several of the men pointed up into the highest branches of the huge old oaks and sycamores we stood among. Mistletoe! Round clouds of it hovered in the highest branches, against the deep blue sky.

  “Okay, here goes,” Cal said, raising his gun; yet still it was a shock when the shots rang out in the cold, clear, quivering air—one, two, three, four of them. Three bunches of mistletoe fell to the ground.

  Yet so did the nice-looking man just ahead of me, crying out incoherently, drawn up into a ball, rolling this way and that like a crazy person—which he was, I suddenly remembered; it was so easy to forget, him in his tailored tweed jacket with the leather patches on the sleeves. His checked wool hat rolled off down the hill and then I could see the blue bald spots on his head, too, where they attached the electrodes. Though Dr. Pine arrived first at his side, it was Pan who was suddenly all over him, covering him up like a bear, rolling with him until he stopped and there they lay together, panting, like one huge animal.

  “My God, how stupid of us!” Dr. Pine said, almost to himself, slapping his own thigh.

  For of course this man was one of the shell-shocked veterans, though he’d been a very high-ranking officer, it was said.

  Somehow we got him back to the hospital, along with the rest of us, and our greenery.

  Later, festive wreaths hung on all the hospital doors, and fragrant evergreen bouquets filled all the vases. A garland lined the grand stairway, and a great ball of mistletoe hung from a red velvet ribbon in the fancy entrance of Highland Hall.

  MY NEW PART-STAFF status allowed me to drive the Hortitherapy truck on errands about the grounds. This was a big help, I judged, from the number of times Mrs. Morris asked me to do it. I remember her riding with me one day as I drove to pick up a load of rocks from workmen on a road at the back of the property and deliver them to an area near the old swimming pool, where they would be used eventually to build some sort of little pavilion. Together Mrs. Morris and I stood at the side to watch two of the grounds crews swing into action, handing the rocks off from one to another in a relay line, piling them up where the new structure was to be located.

  At the end, a number of the workers clambered into the truck bed for the ride back to Brushwood. I popped Pan a quick slap on the rear as he jumped up last, onto the bumper. Through the back window, he gave me a grin and a wave in response.

  With difficulty, Mrs. Morris hauled herself back into the seat beside me; she leaned over to place her hand over mine on the gearshift, so that I was forced to pause before starting the truck.

  I looked over at her.

  Her warm eyes, often puffy and rheumy, looked straight into mine, bright and intent. “He is a man, you know,” she said, squeezing my hand hard before she released it, before I started the engine.

  PERHAPS I MOST enjoyed the unscheduled moments in the greenhouse when we were between groups or events—sprawled out on the wicker furniture drawn up around an old gas heater, absorbed in the newspapers, usually several days old by the time they made it to Hortitherapy—Mrs. Morris chewing on a pencil eraser as she did one of her beloved crossword puzzles, Pan chuckling over the comics, or fixing something—he was forever fixing something, often with the help of Carl Renz, a huge, slow-witted lobotomy casualty. Several of these unfortunates had ended up at Highland, where lobotomies were not performed, though they were very popular at that time. Currently lobotomy was being promoted nationwide by the famous Dr. Walter Freeman, who had simplified the procedure by using a home icepick through the eye socket and was now traveling the country in his “Lobotomobile,” as he called it, performing his “transorbital” lobotomies at mental hospitals and doctors’ offices everywhere. Thank goodness he was never invited to Highland! Our own Carl Renz was a familiar and even beloved part of Brushwood. He liked to stand rather than sit, pacing in the background as we all busied ourselves around the stove.

  Often I took this time to scan the news, especially the news from Europe, which seemed impossibly far away to me now. “Look.” I held a crackling page out toward Pan. “Look at this.” It was a picture of the Eiffel Tower.

  “That’s Paris,” I said, my heart pounding, holding my breath. “I lived there. In Paris”

  He glanced at the picture and then at me, his gaze both alert and uncomprehending.

  Mrs. Morris looked up from her puzzle. “Perhaps you should go and check on the poinsettias,” she said to Pan.

  “Why, where are they?” I asked, as none were to be seen among the shelves of flowering plants and bulbs being forced into bloom.

  Pan took off in answer, me following. He darted outside and over to the larger toolshed, which I had never entered, assuming it was merely a storage space, for there was no end of grounds equipment at Highland to be stored. He threw the latch and hoisted the big garage door up along its tracks and we ducked inside; I paused to get my bearings in the semidarkness. I couldn’t imagine what we were doing in there! But Pan turned back to pull at my sleeve, and I crept forward, though cautiously. It was not the first time I had had the sense that he could see in the dark. Beyond the tractors we came to a nondescript door, like a closet. He opened it, pushing me forward. I stumbled over the sill to stand amazed.

  In the soft red light, I could barely make out the dozens and dozens of poinsettias, starting to bloom. It was beautiful, like being inside a heart.

  “Oh my God!” I said involuntarily.

  Behind me, in the darkness, Pan was laughing. Like a vine, his arm snuck around my waist, pulling me back against him; before I knew it, his warm breath was in my hair, his lips on the back of my neck. A feeling that I cannot describe swept over me, down to my very feet. I felt his lips on my neck, his tongue.

  “Evalina, are you in here? Pan?” Mrs. Morris stood in the open space beyond the tractors, her voice sharp. Carl Renz loomed behind her. “Are you there? Answer me. Answer me!”

  We stepped back, closing the secret door.

  Later, the blooming poinsettias would be brought out and placed all over the hospital for Christmas. Every time I saw one, I thought of that moment with Pan.

  FOR WEEKS I had been promising Freddy that I would show him the fabled Grove Park Inn, yet it was nearly Christmas when we finally got there. “Good God!” he exclaimed upon first glimpsing the hotel itself, banging his hand upon the steering wheel so that he inadvertently blew the horn, which tickled me. The better I got to know Freddy, the funnier he became—he was not at all the serious man he seemed at the hospital; and in some ways, after all my time in Europe, I was actually more sophisticated than he.

  Initially he refused to relinquish his keys to the doorman at the Grove Park Inn, for instance—one of a bevy of such doormen who met all arriving and departing cars. “How do I know they won’t lose them? It’s my mother’s car, you know.”

  I knew. “They never lose them,” I said, then enjoyed his reaction as we entered the cavernous lobby with huge fires burning in the fireplaces at either end. The tree stood at least thirty feet high, so bedecked with ornaments and lights that one could scarcely see its green needles. The rockers before the fireplaces and all the chairs in every group were taken. A holiday tea dance was in progress. Looking at these festive folk, I felt underdressed, even though I was wearing my good black dress and Ruth’s pearls for this occasion. A jazz version of “White Christmas” came from the grand piano, played by a tuxedo-clad old man, clearly a master. Couples were dancing on the shiny dance floor in front of the piano. Others sat at the little round tables, waiters and waitresses moving among them. I looked for Moira at the hostess station—or Mrs. Hodges—and felt oddly relieved to see neither on this occasion
.

  “Should we try to get a table over there?” Freddy asked, but I said, “No, not yet, there’s more to see,” pulling him toward the grand arcade where all the photographs of famous guests were hung—presidents, movie stars, and kings, as well a photograph of Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald in evening dress, which we looked at for a long time.

  We continued to an exhibit of gingerbread houses, a holiday contest in which the gingerbread constructions were truly works of art—not only the usual cottages from fairytale lore but also castles, mansions in the Newport style, and feats of whimsy, defying gravity. We wandered down the line slowly with the others, marveling.

  “Speaking of Mrs. Fitzgerald,” I said, suddenly remembering, “You know I made a dollhouse with her help once, in Art Class,” and then I told him all about it, in every detail.

  Freddy was extremely interested. “Where is it now?” he asked.

  “Lord, I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe it’s over at Homewood someplace. I can ask Mrs. Carroll, I guess, when they get back, though I doubt she’ll know either. Somebody probably threw it out.”

  We moved on down the row. I enjoyed the gingerbread houses themselves and also the children who had been brought to see them, especially the little girls all dressed up in velvet and silk dresses, with their white stockings and patent-leather shoes. I remembered how my own mother used to dress me up in white organdie. In New Orleans it was so seldom cold that I had had only one fancy winter dress for church, gray velvet with a white lace collar.

  Later, after we had ordered our tea, I leaned across the table toward Freddy, who sat there smiling in his nice navy jacket and a tie with little reindeer all over it, and said, “After my mother’s death I learned that I am the child of her and her father—her father was my father—and now I believe this is why she fled the parish and never went back. Someone came to our apartment for money, though, every week until we moved, and then they couldn’t find us, I suppose—it was a woman, I remember that much, I remember seeing her from the back, though I don’t know who she was—a cousin? A sister? Perhaps the money was for him, our father, or her mother, or perhaps it was blackmail money, for somebody else . . . what do you think?”

  If he was stunned, Freddy did not betray it. Instead he simply reached across the embroidered tablecloth and took both my hands. “I think your mother must have loved you very much,” he said.

  I can’t remember anything else about our tea, though afterward, as I nibbled the last macaroon, he said, “Let’s dance!” surprising me mightily.

  “I don’t know how.” I remembered the French heel fiasco with Robert, the only time I had ever tried.

  “It doesn’t matter,” said he with utter confidence. “I’ll show you. Come on”—leading me onto the shiny circular floor where a mirrored globe turned slowly. Freddy grasped me firmly and said, “Now just do what I do. Follow my lead. Right foot forward, that’s good, now left, now back . . .” and somehow, with his hand pressing firmly on the small of my back, I could do it—even twirling about beneath his arm held high in the air. For years, I had watched other girls performing this step. Freddy explained that his sisters, needing a partner to practice with for dances and dates, had pressed him into service as a child, with this result. He was a grand dancer, and I found that I had a knack for it myself, something I had never suspected, always having been the accompanist at every such occasion. I stepped and spun until I was dizzy and out of breath.

  “Let’s get some air.” I led him past the piano to the long French doors that a doorman opened for us, and then we were out on the wide terrace facing the vast sweep of open air and the mountains beyond, on every side. We walked over to the low stone wall and stood looking out at Asheville below us in the bottom of the bowl of mountains. Somehow, it had gotten to be twilight already. Long shadows slanted across the wintry plain of the golf course. The weak sun was mostly caught now behind gray clouds massing at the horizon, the entire scene a darkening palette of somber hue. Lights came twinkling on like stars in Asheville below.

  Someone opened the door for a minute so that we heard the music and the laughter inside. Then it cut off abruptly. Now I was freezing.

  “I guess it’s time to go back,” I said.

  “Just a minute.” Freddy put his arms around me as firmly as he had on the dance floor. “Evalina, you have told me something important today, and now I have something important to tell you.”

  “What is it?”

  “You cannot be in the therapy group any longer,” Freddy said, “because I am falling in love with you.”

  But when I closed my eyes at the moment of our kiss, I was dismayed to see a clear vision of a princess peering over the battlements of a gingerbread castle, looking down a mountainside like the mountain we were on, still searching anxiously—for what? for whom? Nevertheless, I was not a fool. I kissed him back soundly.

  PROMPTLY AT NOON on December 20, Brenda from the Beauty Box, the Overholsers, Dr. Schwartz, and I joined Dixie to stand under the Highland Hall portico and wait for her husband Frank to arrive. He had driven all the way from Georgia to pick her up himself. His mother, Big Mama, was at home with the children, who were said to be very excited about their mother’s return. So was Frank Calhoun, apparently; he had planned two nights in a big Atlanta hotel—plus a shopping trip! to Dixie’s delight—on the way back home, a sort of “second honeymoon,” he’d called it. Dixie was all ready: every dark hair curling perfectly in place, wearing a sky blue wool coat and matching blue beret that I had never seen before. She had pulled the beret down rakishly on one side, just so. Dixie was literally sparkling, herself—her white teeth, her bright blue eyes, her shiny red lipstick, “Fire and Ice,” I knew, for she had bought me some, though I had not had the nerve to wear it. In fact I knew that a lot of Dixie’s total effect was caused by makeup, but she was good at it, and it didn’t look like makeup. She was the most beautiful living person I had ever actually known, or even seen. Her matching red luggage was lined up along the curb like some small, uniformed army standing at attention.

  Back inside the hospital, papers had been signed and good-byes had been said. Perhaps because of her “missing carapace,” everybody who knew Dixie or had worked with her seemed to love her, not only me. Even Dr. Bennett started to shake her hand, then unexpectedly embraced her, wiping his eyes as he went back inside his office. I had been witnessing such phenomena for days. Truly, it was as though Dixie really was a princess, or some kind of royalty, a special person. Everyone had to touch her as they told her good-bye. All were sad, but I was devastated.

  Suddenly a ripple ran through our group—here he came! Dixie stepped forward, putting up a hand to shield her eyes from the sun.

  “Don’t forget,” Richard Overholser blurted out, “college!”

  “Hush, Richard,” Claudia said.

  “Lord God, would you look at that big old car!” Brenda cried as Frank Calhoun came into view driving the longest, whitest, shiniest automobile I had ever seen, like a vision from another life.

  “Oh, that’s Frank!” Dixie cried. “Here he is—” running lightly down the steps and straight out into the road to greet him. If there had been another car, she’d have been hit.

  Brakes squealed as her husband slammed them on, not parking but just stopping dead in the middle of the street. He leapt out, leaving his door wide open—we all got a glimpse of the red leather interior with wrapped gifts piled high in the backseat. Frank Calhoun was a big, vigorous man with a rugged, deeply tanned, and beaming face beneath his wide-brimmed leather hat, the hat of an outdoorsman.

  “Missy!” He swept her up in his arms and twirled her around and around until they looked like a spinning top. Then he set her down and gave her a big, long kiss. “Are you ready?” he asked, pulling back to look at her, and she said “Yes,” laughing, adjusting her beret.

  “Let’s do it then,” he said, bowing in the most courteous way to the rest of us, whom she introduced one by one as he moved among us shaking hand
s and thanking everyone for “taking such good care of my girl.” He gave Brenda and me special hugs. When he said, ”Oh, you are Evalina! I know all about Evalina,” I could feel myself blushing.

  “All right, boys,” he said to Bernard and Marcus, two hospital workers who hovered at the edge of our group, “Let’s load her up.” They put all of Dixie’s red luggage into the trunk, then brought the wrapped gifts from the backseat and placed them carefully on the steps of Highland Hall. “Now a few of these have got a tag on them,” Frank said, winking at me, “but as for the rest, y’all can just give ’em out however you want, to everybody that’s been nice to my baby.”

  “That’s everybody,” Dixie said, twinkling.

  “There’s some fudge and some fried pies in those two baskets.” Frank pointed at them. “So y’all had better get right on with it. Honey?” He opened the passenger side door.

  But first, Dixie ran over to whisper her parting advice in my ear. “You hang on to the doctor, now, you hear? And just forget all about that retarded yard boy!” Then she jumped in the car.

  Frank Calhoun got behind the wheel and slammed the door, tipping his hat to all.

  “Good-bye, good-bye!” we chorused as the car pulled out; he blew the horn in response, several long, musical blasts as they drove down the hill and out of sight.

  “My goodness!” Claudia Overholser said.

  “Well, what did you expect?” her husband asked peevishly.

  “But he’s so genuine, so much charm and goodwill, so generous . . .” Dr. Schwartz mused as if to herself.

  “And she absolutely loves him, doesn’t she?” I said. I had known this, but hadn’t understood it. Now I did.

  “Yes, and that’s the main thing, that’s the kind of thing we can never understand about a patient’s real life, those of us who only see them for one short hour here and there during what is just a short and removed period of time in their actual lives, an interlude—”