by Joan Sargent
Melissa spoke aloud. "I'm going to die. I hope it will be soon."
Chapter VI
Earlier, the thick walls of the school building had shut out the sound of the hurricane, but now it screeched in such a high whine that Donna remembered the notes that were lost to human beings and that dogs were said to hear. Surely if that whistle went much higher it would be inaudible. For a moment, she pushed from her the words that Melissa Hartson had just said in that clear, despairing tone. Then she turned back to her patient. It wouldn't do to let the girl think that the sooner her end came the better it would be. Donna went back to where Melissa sat and put an arm about her shoulders.
"You aren't to talk like that," she said soothingly. "You're going to be fine. You have to be. What would your Jack do without you?"
"Why doesn't he hurry?" Melissa asked then, her thin hands rubbing together in a sort of frenzy. "Doesn't he know he has to get me out of this place and to a doctor? Has he gone away and forgotten me? He ought to be here with me." Her voice was only less shrill than the storm.
Again Donna soothed and comforted. "Remember, he's gone to get sheets and a blanket. It's getting colder, you know."
Melissa hugged herself at the suggestion. "I'm already c-cold. Tell him to hurry."
But Jack had hurried. He was banging on the door and calling out. Donna turned toward the sound, moving swiftly to let him in. Melissa came to her feet and screamed, the sound rising and falling, echoing in the almost empty room as Donna struggled with the lock. When at last she was able to loosen it, the door was snatched from her hands with such force that she was flung to the floor. She scrambled to her feet and took Jack's burden from him.
"You're stronger than I am," she told him. "Get that door fastened. I'll get the bed made."
Missy was pacing up and down, flinging her arms about wildly, moaning, and muttering. As Donna approached, she could make out the words: "I want my mother. Why doesn't my mother come? She would stop all this hurting. I want my mother."
Because she could think of nothing practical she could do for the girl, Donna set about making the table-bed which had been selected, pinning the rubber sheet in place, tucking the sheets with the expert quickness of much practice. Jack dealt with the door and came back to his wife, walking with her, speaking gently to her, trying to reason with her. Above the sound of their footsteps and the starched whisper of sheets, the wind continued to wail ever louder.
The bed was ready now and Donna coaxed the suffering Missy into it, covering her with sheet and blanket. As if only now had her body realized that it was cold, the girl began to shake. Her hands with their bright-colored tips reached out and clung to Jack's as if he cupped her life in his palms.
She was whimpering with a fresh onslaught of pain when there came a second knocking on the door. Donna nodded to Jack that he was to remain where he was and went to answer it herself.
This time, Hank Fincher was seeking entrance. He carried one end of a tall standing mirror, and the boy Dusty, who had been so full of insolent young maleness only a few hours before, carried the other. Each man carried still another electric lantern.
Donna allowed them to come inside, staring with some puzzlement at their burden. She could certainly use the extra lights, but a mirror? She could think of nothing less likely to be useful in a predicament such as this one.
"Where did you get that?" she gasped, struggling again with the reluctant door. "Put it down and give me a hand here."
Dusty obeyed, and received a warm smile along with her murmured, "Thank you." She turned then to Hank, her eyes big with wonder. "What on earth did you bring that down here for?"
He answered her last question first, tugging the heavy mirror across the floor toward the impromptu delivery table. "It came from the sewing room upstairs. Dusty, help me lift it up on that table there. No… maybe we'd better bring it closer first. Here."
Between them, they tugged the long, black-topped table to the spot Hank had indicated, then lifted the mirror to stand upon it before Hank finished explaining to Donna. "It's a trick I saw in a late television movie not very long ago. One of those biographical things. About Thomas Edison. They used a mirror and an oil lamp to make light for an operation. It looked to me as if we could do the same thing here. Dusty, bring all those lanterns over and put them in front of the mirror. A little farther out. Yep. Yep, that's exactly right."
Donna's eyes were lifted to the principal's face in pleased admiration. "Hank, that's wonderful. It makes almost as much light as the overhead ones would. I feel a million times more optimistic."
Dusty had buried his fists in his trouser pockets and was kneading his thighs, self-consciously not looking at the moaning girl almost at his elbow. "Is—is it all right if I go back out there now? I— I—" His throat seemed to have closed up and he did not finish his sentence.
Hank patted the embarrassed boy's shoulder. "Thanks, boy. You've done your good deed for the night, I guess. Sure. Go on back if you want to." He followed Dusty to the heavy door to fight the wind and make sure the latch was properly fastened.
Donna, infinitely more cheerful in the brighter light, had a new thought. "I bet there's still coffee in that big maker there. It might even be hot. Why don't we all have a cup?"
If the coffee wasn't piping hot, it was still warm, and she filled four thick cups and brought two to Missy and Jack. Hank followed with the other two, and Donna sought out a sugar bowl and opened a can of cream. Even Missy brightened as she sat up gingerly and began to sip the dark liquid.
"Coffee would be good even if you didn't like the taste of it," Donna murmured. "It smells so marvelous."
Missy smiled palely, pushing the damp hair back from her pointed face.
"There's more," Donna offered when they had finished. "Anybody?"
But no one wanted more coffee. Pain was coming down on Missy again, responsibility on Jack. Hank, almost as self-conscious as Dusty had been, squirmed on his chair, then rose and began to gather up the cups. "I'll rinse these and get back to the front. I'm in charge of things and you never know what might happen when your back is turned." He didn't want anyone to think his retreat was anything but necessity.
Donna set about timing the pains again. They were only slightly closer together than they had been. It was going to be a long, miserable night. First babies, Donna thought. Sometimes they were reluctant to come into the world.
Hank washed and dried the cups, murmured a good night and said he'd be in the front hall or his office if they wanted him. He had nearly reached the door when once more there came a knock. A voice called above the noise of the storm: "It's Cliff Warrender. Let me in."
The two men spoke briefly in the entrance and Hank slipped out. Only then did Donna see that Baby LaRue, her heavy make-up rather smeared since she had first arrived, stood in Cliff's shadow, two bottles clasped to her opulent bosom. Cliff shut out the wind, and the two came toward the now brightly lighted table just as Missy gasped, rolled herself into a cocoon and screamed.
Baby was tripping along quite like the dancer she claimed to be. "So we're having the hurricane baby right here at Flamingo this year. Honey, you'll be getting all sorts of presents for you and the young'un, and your pictures in the paper, all about how brave you've been. But havin' a baby like this isn't all beer and skittles, and that's a fact. But this nice man, Mr. Warrender, had the right idea. He's been going up and down the halls bummin' whiskey off everybody that had any. We're goin' to have you drunk as a lord in about ten minutes and you won't know what's struck you until you wake up with a head in the morning. Fetch a glass, Mr. Warrender."
"D-drunk?" Jack stuttered. "Is that all right? It won't hurt her? Or the baby?"
"It'll ease things up for her, I should think. Used to give it to soldiers when they had to amputate, or dig out bullets. What do you say, doctor?" Cliff turned twinkling eyes on Donna. "Ought to be all right, oughtn't it?"
Donna wasn't sure. She did remember a charity case when she was in
training who had been brought in roaring drunk and had produced twins. She certainly didn't know anything against it. She nodded her consent.
"Sure, it's okay," Baby insisted, looking a bit tipsy herself, her bright hair slipping to one side, her mascara and lipstick smeared. "I was with a side show once. Helped a lot of them girls when their time came. Nothin' to it. Mr. W., you found that glass yet?"
It was a tall glass that he brought from the kitchen. Baby screwed the stopper out of the bottle and splashed the whiskey into the glass, then held it out to Missy. The girl looked at it doubtfully, wrinkled her nose, and shook her head. "It smells—awful."
"Drink it down, honey. Quick, like it was castor oil. We're drinkin' for effect, not the taste. Toast the little one and lay it down the hatch."
Missy took a gingerly sip and fell to coughing. Baby shook her a little. "Drink it down. I don't want to have to hold your nose and pour it into you. Quick, now."
Missy drank. Baby took the glass, filled it again and held it out. Missy was not so reluctant this time, though she coughed once more when she had swallowed it.
Again, Baby gave orders. "Lie down, now. Don't want you fallin' on the floor."
Donna and Jack helped Melissa to lie flat, and she was silent for a minute. Then she spoke thickly. "Everything looks—funny. S-somebody drew a lion up there on the ceiling. See?" A wandering forefinger pointed out weather stains on the ceiling, stains that might have been interpreted as a cloud or a hamburger, or almost anything before anyone would have thought of a lion.
"Got to get a big knife and put it under the table here," Baby went on cheerfully. "Cuts the pain, that does. And you boys clear out. This is woman's business."
As Donna had predicted, the night was long and the baby did not arrive until nearly daylight. Under the influence of the unaccustomed whiskey, Missy dozed, roused to moan and mumble, then dozed again.
Still, it was not the sort of night Donna had expected. Baby LaRue was a chatterbox but, different from many old people, she neither moaned the decadence of the present nor glorified the virtues of the past. She was full of stories of her checkered life, humorous, sad, sometimes even tragic. She told them colorfully, holding the climax until Donna sometimes found herself sitting on the edge of her chair and holding her breath. In spite of her superstitions, Baby had a good deal of practical experience with the work in hand. And best of all, she remained self-confident and cheerful. Donna found herself feeling sure that she would be able to handle anything that might come up, in spite of an occasional twinge of anxiety that complications might set in. Now and then the expectant father came, peered at his wife and went away no less worried.
And then, just as the big clock on the wall indicated five, though the clouded sky outside gave no hint that it was time for day to begin, the baby was born—as easily as the nurse had ever seen one come into the world.
"A little girl," the old stripper crooned. "Life's a hard thing for a woman, but I guess it's got its good times, too. Want I should give her a little tap to get her started off right?"
She held the nearly scarlet bit of humanity up by the heels and gave her a gentle slap. A healthy howl answered.
Donna grinned. Tired as she was, she felt a sense of triumph. Baby LaRue grinned back at her, her hair more awry than ever, her make-up remaining only in small patches over her wrinkled face. She, too, was plainly tired, but her eyes were bright and excited. "What'd you reckon her to weigh?" she asked.
Donna laughed. "I wouldn't guess, but I'm pretty sure there are scales in the kitchen. You might go and find out."
She herself took up a towel, went into the kitchen and drew the last of the warm water from the tank into a bucket and went back to clean up her patient.
She was only half through when Jack appeared, pale, his boyish beard dark and patchy, his eyes full of vicarious suffering. The baby screamed from the scales in the kitchen and he asked in a shaky voice, "Is she—are they—all right? What's the baby crying about?"
"Your wife's fine," Donna assured him.
Miss LaRue appeared from the kitchen, the new arrival wrapped in a thick white towel. "Wouldn't you yell if you'd just come from a safe, warm place into a world like this one and didn't know, in spite of how mixed up everything is, how much fun there is in living? You've got a little five-pound girl, Papa. And she's perfectly beautiful."
It wasn't until some fifteen minutes later that Jack remembered the message he had come to bring. "There's been some fighting over there. A man's got pretty well cut up. Can you come and stop the bleeding?"
Donna hoped that, in the excitement, the new father hadn't let the warrior bleed to death.
Chapter VII
There were two men needing medical attention in Donna's office. One was pale and bloodstained. The other's face showed several abrasions and a swollen eye that would undoubtedly blacken as the day moved on. Donna sighed. She was as tired as she used to be when she had first started her training, worked her regular stint in the hospital, attended college classes and nodded over her open books as often as she studied.
But here was more work to be done. Neither of the men seemed familiar to her, and she decided that Mary Hendley must have registered them. Cliff was bent over the bloody patient, a thumb pressed above a cut on his arm. Hank had found a square of unbleached domestic that the last year's nurse had used in teaching first aid and was hunting for something to make a tourniquet.
The man with the bruised face was talking steadily.
"Well, we was playin' cards, peaceful as anything. Sure, there was arguments, off an' on, but peaceful, just the same. We was drinkin' some, too, but just friendly like. Worst enemy any of us had couldn't a-called one of us drunk. An' then this so-and-so—he's a Republican, see?—starts in cussin' the President, who's young, sure, an' makes mistakes, but is doin' the best he can, which is pretty darn good in my book. Well, he—" he indicated the bleeding Republican with a thumb turned half back to his wrist—"started in cussin' the boy for everything he's done since he took office, an' I got tired of it and told him to shut up and play cards. That was what started it. That desk, I reckon it was the teacher's and it ain't the most convenient card table I ever seen, neither, got turned over and busted open some an'—"
The rise and fall of his voice made an accompaniment as Donna took over adjusting the tourniquet and binding three lesser knife wounds.
"Fighting's one thing," Cliff interrupted the flow of words, his voice stern, "but did you have to use a knife? We're going to have to turn you over to the police, Vickers, when the storm is over. You know that."
The ardent Democrat began to whine. "There was five of us in it, Counselor. I ain't the only one. And he was in it as much as anybody." Again the double-jointed thumb indicated the man on whom Donna was working.
"You were the one with the knife, Vickers. But we'll have to take both of you in, I guess. Poague's right badly hurt. We can't just pretend it didn't happen," Hank countered. "Mr. Warrender and I are in charge here. We're supposed to keep order, among other things."
"But you ain't the police, neither," Vickers insinuated.
Cliff snapped out his words. "Ever hear of civilian arrest, Vickers? We're quite within our rights, holding you for the police."
Vickers shrugged and grinned. "Well, it ain't nothin' but assault—aggravated assault, maybe. I been in the pokey enough to know a few words of law myself. Reckon I oughtn't try to get ahead of a smart lawyer like you, Mr. Warrender."
Donna had finished with Poague, who hadn't said a word. Now he looked up at her and spoke in a weak voice. "I ain't gonna die, am I, Nurse? There was an awful lot of blood, and there ain't no doc in the place. But you're smart. You'll know if I'm gonna die?"
The girl shook her head at him. "I couldn't promise, but I'm pretty sure you'll be here to get drunk and fight during the next storm. Cliff, will you help him over to the cot? Now you— Mr. Vickers, isn't it?"
"Great God, Miss," Vickers spoke in duet with Donna, "he ain't
in no serious condition, is he? I never meant to hurt nobody. A fight, sure, but nothin' serious."
Donna didn't answer, but descended on him with iodine and applicator. She had hardly touched his raw face when he began to scream like a wounded animal.
"You let me be, Nurse. My face been beat up worse'n this a heap of times an' got well all by itself. You just leave me be." He lurched to his feet. "You got my knife, Counselor, and you got my liquor, Teacher. I'll be around when the storm's over, an' I rather be in a nice safe jail than have a woman with stuff like that there turned loose on me. Burns like fire, it does. I'll be okay, lady." He sidled out of the door, both hands held defensively before his face.
The two men chuckled. "He will, too," Cliff said, then turned to Donna. "How are things in the cafeteria?"
She sat down and brushed her red hair out of her eyes. "Everything's fine in the cafeteria. Those two children have themselves a five-pound baby girl and, as nearly as I can tell, mother and child are doing well. Even Pop may recover. I left Miss Baby LaRue in charge. She's a pretty efficient character, that old lady."
Cliff chuckled again. "The midwife looks sort of beat. Think some coffee would help? And maybe scrambled eggs and toast?"
Donna sighed. "It sounds heavenly, but not right now. I wouldn't move for a rajah's millions."
Cliff laughed. "Oh, I meant to prepare the sumptuous meal. I'm a pretty fancy cook, really. I live in an apartment and do at least two meals a day. Breakfast coming right up. You sit there and breathe deep. Join us, Fincher?"
Hank looked from Donna to Cliff. His mouth hardened with determination. "Yes, I'd like that. It's been quite a night for all of us. I'm not as tired as Donna. What can I do?"
"Nothing. Nothing at all," Cliff told him, all expansive host.
And there would have been three of them if a dark woman with a foreign accent hadn't appeared, puffing with her haste, and announced, "Mister Teach', the toilet down that way, she is runnin' over and spillin' on everything."