The squad car passed Mara and Luisa as they reached the mouth of the garage. The night light drained the dirt from Mara’s face and clothes; in silhouette they looked like a respectable mother and daughter, Luisa in her crimson cocktail dress, Mara in jeans, on their way home from the theater. The squad car moved on. Brian Cassidy returned to his office behind the cashier’s window.
Mara squatted down next to Madeleine. Madeleine shielded her face with her Bible.
“Cowards, cowards, quitters, they’re all cowards, Blessed Mother, cowards who want to destroy You. They will go away and leave me here, they’re fools and evil spirits, but You will take care of me.”
“I won’t hurt you,” Mara said. “We’re here to help protect the wall and to sing the goddess’s praises.”
When Madeleine continued to whimper Mara scooted further from her, until the homeless woman relaxed enough to lower her Bible. Mara crossed her legs, shut her eyes, and began a loud incantation to Gula:
“O Goddess, we your unworthy servants call to you to appear in power and majesty. Drive away these men who oppress us. Remind them that life and death are in your hands. Your tears on this wall are a sign. Woe to those who ignore it, pestilence will rain upon them like hail, their testicles will wither up and rot, their urine will turn black.”
Madeleine started to get excited. “It will. Their urine will turn black. They come and spray on the wall, they do their business on me, but the Holy Mother turns their urine black.”
The two garage attendants who worked the graveyard shift came out to the street to watch. The garage stayed open all night so that hotel guests could come and go at any hour, but for the most part it was a long dull shift: action on the street livened things up.
If Brian Cassidy knew about it, he would make them get out the hose and drive the newcomers away, but the two attendants, earning minimum wage and barely getting by, didn’t like tormenting a homeless woman. They had to, mind you, if they were ordered, because they didn’t want to end up on the streets themselves, but they’d just as soon the manager stayed inside his office.
Anyway, the new girl who was shouting next to the bag lady was young and, like any young woman, attractive. A little plump, but Nicolo liked to see a young woman who wasn’t afraid to eat. Working at a pricey hotel you saw so much food going to waste because all these rich women liked to prove how skinny they were by eating one lettuce leaf and throwing away a whole plate of salmon or pasta. It was shocking. Naturally homeless people hung out around the hotel’s Dumpsters: they could be sure of four-star leftovers most nights.
Luisa, leaning against the wall as she pulled on her bottle, was still angry with the manager at Corona’s for supporting those men against her. She was a diva; she had offered the finest jewel in her repertoire, the Violetta which had charmed Piero Benedetti and brought Europe as well as New York to her feet, and those Chicago morons, those beer-drinking Mammon worshipers, had thrown her out on the street. Just like her brother. In fact, the boors at the bar were probably her brother’s hirelings, sent to watch for her and make sure that no matter where she tried to sing in Chicago she would be humiliated.
She became aware of the two garage attendants. There had been three men at Corona’s, but only one had been truly insulting: these must be his friends, come to make amends. She put the bottle down, steadied herself with a hand against the wall, and again belted full-throttle into “Sempre libera.”
Her voice was no longer the liquid gold that had bathed Benedetti twenty years ago. She wobbled in her upper register, cracked on the notes in the changeover, but she hadn’t lost any of her power. The noise floated past the cashier’s station to Brian Cassidy’s box of an office.
He came out, muscles moving easily under his suit jacket. “Nicolo, what’s going on out here? How come you’re just standing by while these broads create a disturbance?”
Nicolo held out his hands. “Boss, they hurting nobody. So she drunk, she singing, who hearing her?”
“I am. So is anybody using the garage. I want them out of here.”
As if summoned by his words, a Lincoln Town Car pulled into the bay, and a couple got out. The man tossed his keys to Nicolo; the woman took a brief look at Luisa and scuttled into the garage.
“A new service, Cassidy?” the man said. “Concerts for the guests while they wait for their cars?”
Brian Cassidy licked his lips. “Sorry, sir. I’m about to handle the situation.”
He went back into his office to call the police while Nicolo filled out the man’s garage slip. When Brian came back the couple was gone and Nicolo was parking the car.
Brian walked over to Luisa and shook her arm. “Can it, lady, before people start throwing old boots at you.”
“You impertinent ape, how dare you touch me?” Luisa blazed back.
“Listen, broad, you’ve got five minutes before the cops show. If you can still walk, make tracks and take your two pals with vou.”
Mara was on her feet. “Who died and left you in charge, you Nazi? This sidewalk is a public place. Did you ever hear of the First Amendment?”
“Yeah, and it tells me speech is not free to mouthy broads like you.” He slapped her face with the back of his hand.
“Help!” Mara screamed. “Help! Fire!”
She kicked Brian’s shins. He grabbed her and slammed her head against the wall. She collapsed to the pavement and started kicking at his crotch. He seized her left foot and started to pull her across the pavement, but she twisted and managed to wrap herself around his legs. He was a solid man; she couldn’t budge him, but he couldn’t get a purchase on her, either. Luisa looked on for a moment, her face haughty at the insults he’d hurled, but she suddenly thought of her whiskey bottle. Making sure the cap was screwed on tightly she tapped him on the back of the head with it. He let go of Mara and turned to punch Luisa.
At that moment the squad car returned. After a quick consultation with Brian Cassidy, the patrolmen wrapped up Luisa and Mara, scooped Madeleine up from the sidewalk, and cuffed the three women together in the back of the car.
16
Lost in Space
MARA WAS IN a spaceship sailing through the blackness of space. Strapped into the seat next to her was Beatrix. At the controls, her back turned to them, sat a woman in a bridal gown: only the white gown and veil were visible, but Mara knew it was Grannie Selena, because that was how she was dressed in her 1942 newspaper photo.
“Where are you taking us, Grannie?” she asked. “To Iraq?”
The woman at the controls didn’t speak, but Beatrix laughed. “Grandfather has dropped you down a black hole, didn’t you know? You’ll never find your way back up to land.”
Mara looked at her mother. It was a familiar face, from photographs Mara had found in Harriet’s desk when Harriet was at college. As in the photographs, Beatrix’s face was flat, without any human depth to it. As Mara looked the eyes turned into empty sockets. The hollow head continued to laugh: Mara was a ludicrous object, not lovable, uproariously funny only because she was unaware how absurd she was.
Mara wanted to get away from the two women, but the straps bound her tightly in place. She wanted to cry for help, but she couldn’t speak, and even if she did, in the vastness of outer space who would hear her?
17
Thunder and Lightning from the Great White Chief
I wonder if training at Midwest Hospital is designed to turn psych residents psychotic: if you can find your way back to sanity after your residency you’re qualified to treat the mentally ill. Don’t even know how to tell what happened. The Queen ordered Alice, begin at the beginning, which was … clinic, I guess, today being Wednesday.
Always a chaotic scene: receptionists sit at a desk, with glass panels in front and metal dividers to give individual patients illusion of privacy. What really happens is the patient immediately feels isolated. Anomie is heightened by attitude of clerks. Hanaper’s contempt for patients and staff translates to clerks, who treat p
atients with reflected disdain. Our Weds clinic treats psych and neurology outpatients. First you wait in line, then you get to the clerk, Charmaine for neurology, Gretchen for psychiatry.
Charmaine says, “You’re not on the list for Dr. Szemanski. You’re sure you have a neurology consultation? Oh, you’re here for the psychiatry clinic. Dr. Tammuz or Dr. Demetrios? You need to check in at Booth Three. No, I can’t check you in here. Didn’t I just finish explaining this is the neurology check-in? As the sign clearly says?” Pointing to a small sign on wall behind her. And the person has to go to end of other line. Melissa Demetrios, as senior resident, has tried to make Gretchen and Charmai ne exchange information and check in patients reciprocally, but no sale. Diminishes their sense of power—they couldn’t boss so many people around.
I go to Gretchen’s workstation after lunch to look at my schedule. Twelve people already waiting, for me, Melissa, or Szemanski. They look up with that strained hopefulness of the waiting room: Is the doctor here? Will it be my turn soon? Will I get good news?
A young woman is sitting at Charmaine’s desk: she looks ill, unkempt, hasn’t slept well. “I want to see Dr. Tammuz.”
Charmaine goes through her routine—this the neurology line, blah, blah.
“That’s okay, Charmaine.” He turned to the young woman, touched by the misery in her face. “I’m Dr. Tammuz and I’m about to start seeing people. Do you have an appointment?”
The young woman muttered she had no appointment, and no, no referral, that she’d walked in from the street.
“I’ll be glad to talk to you this afternoon, but it will have to be after I’ve seen all the people with appointments, okay? So why don’t you give Gretchen here your details,” Hector said.
“My details?” the woman whispered.
“Name, insurance, that’s all. It’s a hospital; we have to know how to charge for the service.”
“I’ll pay cash,” she said. “I—there are reasons for me not to say my name out here.”
“Dr. Tammuz,” Gretchen butted in, eager to take part. “People are waiting for you. I’ll take care of the administrative details.”
Gretchen got up from behind her counter and followed Hector to the tiny consulting room assigned to him on Wednesday afternoons, She shut the door and lectured him on how he couldn’t just add people to the clinic list on his own whim, because it totally disrupted the accounting in the unit.
“She said she’d pay cash. I’d think Midwest would be thrilled to take her on.”
“It’s not the money for one person per se, Doctor, but we get assigned rooms for so many hours, me and Charmaine work so many hours on Wednesday based on the patient load. It all gets out of kilter if we just let people walk in off the street assuming they can see a doctor for the asking.”
“I see,” Hector said. “So we should turn away people in trouble?”
“Oh, people who come in here think they’re in trouble. They should try raising four children alone on a clerk’s salary while their old man is on permanent disability, if they want to know what trouble is all about.”
A key to what bugs her. Obviously needs to be on the other side of the desk getting succor, resents having to give it. When I try to respond empathically, though, she bites my head off. Does agree to add young woman to this afternoon’s roster, though, and retreats to her workstation to send in the first of my waiting clients.
In the middle of my second appointment Gretchen buzzes me. I ignore her; she hits buzzer again, several times, rattling both me and my patient. At the end of our allotted fifteen minutes I find out Dr. Stonds is paging me.
“He wants to see you immediately,” Gretchen says, assuming a posture of virtue that makes me uneasy.
Tell her I can’t possibly go now, with so many patients to see.
“I called Dr. Hanaper when you didn’t respond to my first buzz. He thinks you should finish clinic after you’ve seen Dr. Stonds.”
Furious, with Stonds, for thinking he owns us all, and with Hanaper, for acquiescing. Furious at my own impotence. Apologize to waiting patients and head down to the surgery offices, where the god reigns en suite. Great contrast to our barren consulting rooms in clinic, with one plastic chair for patient, another for doctor, and a tiny metal desk for writing notes. Stonds sits in a huge office, with an antique grandfather clock, mahogany bookshelves. His personal secretary works in an antechamber as big as my whole apartment. Behind her is his private library-conference room, where he reviewed our psych cases a few weeks ago. After conferring with the deity, his secretary sends me into the throne room.
“Well, Dr. Tammuz? Well? What do you have to say for yourself?”
Abraham Stonds greeted Hector from behind his leather-covered desk. Brocade drapes drawn across the window blocked out the summer sun. The curtains, the desk leather and the walls were all in green; in the shadows created by the only lamp that was switched on, Hector felt as though he had walked into the bottom of an aquarium.
“About what, sir?” Hector, irritated at having to leave his patients on a whim of the old man’s, was thrown off balance by his opening question.
“Don’t play the fool with me, Dr. Tammuz. What were you proposing to do with my granddaughter? After the events of last night you have one hell of a nerve attempting to see her.”
Hector could feel his lower jaw droop slackly. He wondered if the old man was exhibiting dementia symptoms that his staff was concealing from the rest of the hospital.
“Last night, sir?” he said, trying to move cautiously, “I’m afraid I—”
“Are you a damned parrot, Tammuz, echoing everything I say? Yes, last night. When my granddaughter was arrested, thanks in large part to your officious meddling in matters totally beyond your expertise. And now you try to see her in your clinic on the sly? You think you can make a fool out of me? I’ll teach you vvho’s the fool here, young man!” And Dr. Stonds smacked the leather desktop with his open palm.
Hector became convinced the surgeon had suffered some kind of infarct. His own head splintered with colliding fears—that even if the old man was crazy, he could destroy Hector’s career; that Hector ought to summon help; that he needed to soothe Stonds and make his escape as fast as he possibly could, “Uh, sir, I wonder if you’re confusing me with someone else. I’ve never met Ms. Stonds.”
“How dare you?” In the dim light Stonds’s face seemed to swell like a giant shark in front of a stranded sailor. “When you told your clinic clerk to add her to your patient roster, that you’d see her without an appointment!”
“That was your granddaughter? I had no idea—she didn’t tell me her name—I’d never seen her before.”
Hector felt ill. After the events of last night … Had someone assaulted the Stonds girl? Had she come up with his name somehow, and decided to finger him for it?
“Hector Tammuz? That’s your name, isn’t it? Recommended by Dr. Hanaper to work at the Lenore Foundation’s clinic for the homeless?”
“Yes, sir, but—”
“And you’ve taken it upon yourself to get involved with a psychotic woman living around the foundation to the Hotel Pleiades, and to advise her on her legal rights?”
“No, sir. I know nothing about the law and would never give anyone legal advice.” Hector’s lips felt stiff and clumsy, as though they had been soaked in formaldehyde. “I have tried, unsuccessfully, to treat the woman for symptoms of acute schizophrenia and paranoia. I have tried to get her to leave the wall where she is living and come aboveground, but have failed in my efforts. That is the limit of my connection to her.”
“Don’t lie to me, young man!” Dr. Stonds hit his desktop again. “You gave your name to the man at the hotel garage. He told us he heard you advising this woman. He told us you said that the sidewalk was public property and the hotel could not force her to leave.”
In the middle of his fears Hector tried to remember the scene at the hotel garage. He spoke to so many people about so many things that the evenin
g already belonged to the distant past. His clearest image was of the garage manager’s arm muscles bulging against his jacket sleeves as he tried to justify the hotel’s harassment of Madeleine.
“I see you didn’t expect a witness to speak up, Dr. Tammuz.”
Dr. Stonds’s triumphant bark goaded Hector into speech. “One of the street people who brought me to see Madeleine Carter—the schizophrenic woman—made the point about the sidewalk being public property. I didn’t know that was the case. The guy from the garage probably thinks it was I who said it, because to him those women were ciphers. They’re homeless, one is black, so his memory is playing a kind of trick on him, putting information on the lips of the only person he recognized. I suppose you could call it a form of projection.”
Hector was amazed that he could speak so lucidly while the room rocked and bucked around him. Or maybe gibberish was coming out and he was too distraught to hear it. “But, sir, what does this have to do with your—with Ms. Stonds?”
“Don’t be insolent with me, young man! I’ve been hearing about you from Dr. Hanaper, that you’re a whiny crybaby who ducks his responsibilities, and I see how right he is: you try to pass off your own malfeasance onto a psychotic creature who wouldn’t know one end of the law from the other….”
As the diatribe continued Hector began calculating his debts, a technique for dissociation, since he made the same reckoning a dozen times a week. Ninety-seven thousand for education took first place, but there were lesser ones, including five grand for a used Honda. Rent was over six hundred a month. By the time he paid utilities, insurance, and his loans he had about two hundred dollars left for food, clothes, and entertainment—for those occasions when he could stay awake long enough to be entertained. If Stonds fired him, how long would it be before he joined Madeleine Carter under the crack in the wall? In fact, if he still had a job at the end of the afternoon, maybe he should invest in a sleeping bag so he wouldn’t have to wrap up in an old coat.
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