Deadly

by Julie Chibbaro

  Of course, I cannot and do not tell her anything.

  Where I was once the observer, now I am the observed. This attention is like a constant bright ray in my eyes that I cannot shut off. It’s painful and upsetting, all the personal questions, the probes into my privacy. Miss Lara pinned me to the vegetable cart to ask when I had attended medical school. Our butcher, Mr. Barren, withheld meat from me. He wanted to know where exactly this Germ Lady was imprisoned, and wouldn’t give me the soup bones unless I told. He seemed very nervous about me touching the meat cases, as if I myself carried disease.

  Once false stories are printed in the newspapers, my neighbors believe them. It’s impossible to correct every misstatement, especially since I’m forbidden to speak about the case.

  Seeing my name in the newspapers has changed me down deep. It’s given me a sense of responsibility, it’s made me see how important the truth is.

  I wish there was a way to tell the truth. To make people understand.

  Mary Mallon has been moved to a hospital on North Brother Island, between Queens and the Bronx, just a short ferry ride away. Mr. Briggs had her moved right after the first article appeared. This place affords the doctors the privacy to study her properly. They are contemplating removing Mary’s gallbladder, which they suspect is the culprit in producing the typhoid germs. I worry about this sort of experimentation with her; I think of the nightmare I had, her pleading with me to protect her. Mr. Soper assures me they will first try every other manner to cure her, as stomach surgery is fraught with the possibility of infection, for which there is no cure. There is no proof it would work, he says, but it may be her only choice, if she wants to return to her previous life.

  Perhaps that’s what makes this case so hard to explain to other people.

  How do I tell them: We are not sure how to treat her?

  We don’t know how to cure her.

  All we know is that she mustn’t cook for anyone.

  March 1, 1907

  Finally I found the right moment to tell Marm my decision about medical school. Our attention had been drawn to the newspapers, and maybe I was a little frightened of what she might say.

  Last night she looked so sweet, warming her knees by the stove, sewing a new bag for her midwifery instruments. I leaned on the arm of her chair and took one of her curls in my finger. My throat tensed; the words tangled there. I worried she’d be unhappy with me for wanting to go so far from her. I feared the cost would be too much for us. I didn’t want to burden her in any way.

  But I made myself speak. “Marm, I wanted to tell you about Dr. Baker. The woman doctor in the department?”

  “Hmmm?” Marm continued her sewing.

  I went on, “Well, she has presented me with the possibility of attending medical school.”

  Marm blinked up at me, shaking her head. I let go of her curl. She put her work aside. I stepped back a little.

  “I haven’t discussed it further with Dr. Baker, because I wanted to talk it over with you. But I think I want to go.”

  “Medical school?” she asked. “How is that possible?”

  I couldn’t tell if she was upset or … or something else.

  “There’s a college in Pennsylvania that takes girls,” I told her. “That’s where Dr. Baker herself went, and she says I could go there too.”

  Marm had a strange look in her eyes. Suddenly I wavered. Was I doing the right thing?

  “I—I wasn’t sure I wanted to go. But now—now I am,” I said.

  She stared at me. My hands began to shake; I clasped my fingers together. Then, I saw them—tears. Marm was crying.

  “Marm—oh, Marmy—”

  She reached up and pulled me into her arms like a little girl. I knelt to her and held her close to me. I could feel her tears on my shoulder through my sleeve, warm tears that made my eyes hot. We hugged each other tightly.

  “You make me so proud,” she said.

  Those words plunged into my heart, filling me with joy.

  I held my breath and listened to her weep, feeling my own tears slide down my face. I felt her whole body shake, and the strength of her arms as she clung to me. Proud of me—she was proud of me. The wonder of that struck me, all that she’s done for me, all that she’s given up for me, all that she has allowed me to do, to be. Then I saw why she cried—she had sacrificed for her children, she had lost one of us, I was all she had left. And I had done something to make her proud. I felt a great warmth in my chest, an honor. She honored me with her pride.

  She released me, finally, and wiped her cheeks, and patted mine. I stood and slipped into my chair and took up the newspaper to hide my still trembling lip. I heard Marm pick up her sewing.

  She is proud of me. Does she know how much that means to me? Does she know how closely she has guided my life, and how grateful I am to her for such a show of care? Looking at her, I see how I might be if I had a daughter of my own with the man I love—I would want for her everything I could not have for myself. I see now why people have children—to extend themselves, to become more than what they could be alone.

  I vow to do my very best to be a worthy part of Marm’s greater self.

  March 2, 1907

  Encouraged by Marm’s approval, I went upstairs to Dr. Baker’s office today to talk to her. She welcomed me in. I took a deep breath and said, “I spoke to my mother about it. I have decided to become a doctor.”

  Her sober face broke into a gleaming smile. She said, “Oh, Prudence, I’m so pleased. Our profession needs more women like you, with good minds and a firm discipline. I’m positive you’ll do well.”

  I felt all the weight of her expectation and feared she thought Marm would be able to afford it. I had to tell her how impossible that would be. I met her eyes and said, “Dr. Baker, as a midwife, my mother earns very little—”

  The doctor held up her hand, stopping me. She said, “If you do well on the entrance examination, there will be occasions for funds donated or lent from prominent families. The New York moneyed families love to support smart girls like you.”

  “I did have yearly funds to attend Mrs. Browning’s,” I said. “The first was given to me personally by Mrs. Morgan on my sixth birthday—”

  I stopped; I meant to assure her, or myself, but it had the tinny sound of bragging.

  “Yes, we could ask the Morgans, or the Vanderbilts, or the Livingstons,” she said, leaning back in her chair.

  She tapped her fingers together, looking at me with her shrewd eyes, then she turned and reached behind her, pulling a book from her shelf. She held it and said, “But you must do well on the test! In order to pass the entrance examination, you must have an overall understanding of the human system. Begin your studies with this.”

  She handed me the book. I looked at the title. The Biology of Man.

  She turned and reached again, this time producing True Blood Chemistry and the Myth of the Four Humors.

  “In exchange for your diligence, I will tutor you,” she said. “We’ll start with biology, the blood, and anatomy.”

  She reached for Gray’s Anatomy.

  When I told her I had a copy of the book at home, she raised an eyebrow at me with a small smile and took instead The Effect of Germs in Everyday Life, a book on the work of Dr. Louis Pasteur.

  “There is no time to waste,” she said. “People’s lives will depend on how well you know your material, Prudence.”

  I pulled the heavy books from the desk and hugged them to me. I felt as if she had turned a lens inside me and a hundred questions came into focus. How difficult was the test? Where would I take it? Did I have a chance of passing it? Could a girl like me really go to medical school?

  As if she knew my questions, Dr. Baker said, “I will help you arrange for travel to Pennsylvania for the test. I have every confidence you will do well on the examination, Prudence, and that they will accept you into the school. I would not have recommended this path to you if I didn’t believe that.”

  Dr.
Baker picked up her pen and pulled a stack of papers toward her. I stood, feeling as if she had released me. “When should I come for a tutoring session?” I inquired.

  “When you have finished reading those books,” she said. “We will discuss the body, then I’ll take you into the dispensary and you can visit patients with me.”

  I thought of those dirty children I saw in the halls, and their sad mothers, and the idea of tending to them—of being given permission to examine them closely—posed a whole new series of questions. What would I see? How would I be of help to them? How did Dr. Baker decide what illness a person suffered from, just by looking at them?

  I returned downstairs, distracted by these questions. Mr. Soper showed an instant curiosity about the books I was carrying and asked about them. His nearness and interest sent a blush flaming up my neck.

  I looked down at the books, my heart pounding in my throat. “I—I just came from Dr. Baker’s office,” I said. “She’s encouraged me to go medical school.”

  His eyes took on a warm light; he nodded.

  “Is Dr. Baker helping you with the entrance exam?” he asked gently.

  “Yes, she is—she will be,” I said. My cheeks felt fevered under his gaze.

  “Well, if you need further aid, let me know,” he said. “I’m an engineer, but I do know a little something about medicine.”

  How he smiled and looked at me! The kindness in his face—I could barely thank him. Somehow I was able to escape the office this evening without revealing too much emotion. I can hardly allow myself to imagine Mr. Soper helping me to study. What if I make a mistake, or don’t remember something? I don’t want him to see me falter. And his nearness would cause a distraction too great for me to overcome.

  Despite my ambition, I do not look forward to leaving my chief for school. I feel sometimes as if I am an outline of myself, and each thing I learn from him is like a colored piece of yarn that gets knitted inside that outline, filling me, making me more defined. The longer I work with Mr. Soper, the more a pattern of him knits into me. He has become such an important, inseparable part of my whole being.

  March 6, 1907

  These books Dr. Baker gave me are different, not dull or dusty like Latin texts, but full of fascinating stories. All day I carry the one I’m reading on Dr. Louis Pasteur, and open it whenever I have a spare moment.

  He was the first to prove the germ theory.

  It used to be thought that disease was caused by something outside of ourselves, like clouds of bad odors, or something inside ourselves, like the four humors (blood, phlegm, yellow bile, and black bile).

  Dr. Pasteur had the radical idea that something alive was feeding on us, and that was making us sick. He got the notion from observing grapes fermenting into wine, and then souring. He examined the ruined wine under the microscope and discovered that there were creatures living in it. Germs, bacteria. He found them everywhere—in the water and food that humans consumed, in our bodies—and his brain made a great leap. He connected these germs to the ones that were making people ill.

  I think of the lambs on Anushka’s farm, the three sickly ones with runny eyes and sores in their mouths, and then I think of Dr. Pasteur, of the sheep he saved. He watched them die of anthrax and knew he had to help them.

  He applied his germ theory to the sheep. He removed the anthrax germs from them, killed them, and injected the dead germs into healthy sheep, making their bodies accustomed to the disease, and so immune to it.

  It’s a brilliant mind that can even imagine such things as bacteria. Doing these experiments, how did he know what to look for? When he saw the wine, what made him think there might be something alive in there? How did he make the connection between wine and anthrax?

  I wish I had the ability, as Dr. Baker described, to see the larger picture. Even more than that, I wish I could make leaps and see things that the rest of the world doesn’t see. Perhaps I will one day, once I’ve studied everything.

  I must push myself to think harder.

  March 7, 1907

  What occurred this morning has altered me in a way I cannot reconcile. I have not spoken to anybody about it, and am not sure how I ever will.

  A stranger came into our office today. At first I thought it was another reporter who somehow got past the police guards and was hunting me down for more details on the Mary Mallon case. It turned out the man had read my name in the newspaper and came with a secret that he’d been holding on to for nearly a decade.

  For some reason, I don’t know why, I feared his presence the moment I saw him. Whatever news this man had to offer, Mr. Soper would hear, but I could not stop him from taking the chair across from me, and I certainly could not ask Mr. Soper to leave.

  He said his name was Tim Wilcox. He was missing his right leg and walked with canes. His clothes hung loosely from his thin chest, his eyes seemed ill and watery as he stared at me.

  “You look just like him,” he said quietly.

  “To whom are you referring, sir?” I asked.

  He handed over a large coin on a chain, though it didn’t seem like a regular coin.

  “Your father. That’s where I met him,” he said, pointing to the coin.

  All the breath in my body left me. I shook my head. My mind was suddenly blank. “I’m sorry, I don’t understand,” I said.

  “That’s his war badge,” Mr. Wilcox said. He tapped a cane against his good leg. “After the Spanish blew up the USS Maine docked in the Cuban harbor, me and your father were sent to fight alongside Roosevelt.”

  My face felt numb, my mouth dry. I looked more closely at the badge, the imprint of the American flag, and the name stamped on it. I ran my finger over the letters, GREGORY GALEWSKI, ARMY ID NUMBER 3040. My father’s name.

  I looked up at the man. Words blocked my throat, the question at my lips.

  Is he alive?

  “We were overcome by land forces on the beach,” Mr. Wilcox went on. “I was shot in the thigh and your father carried me into the forest, to our headquarters, where they removed my leg. As you can see, I recovered. Not all of me, but enough.”

  He took a deep breath.

  “I’m sorry I can’t say the same for your pa,” he said.

  It couldn’t be! I stared at the man, trying to understand, trying not to believe him. I coughed and shook my head, swallowing back tears. We’ve waited so long, hoping for his return, and now this!

  I looked over at Mr. Soper. When I met his eyes, he stood and excused himself from the room, saying he had to see Mr. Briggs. I wanted to reach for him, but he slipped away.

  The man gestured to the badge in my hand. “Your father asked me to keep that from the medical doctors, to hide his badge so he would not be counted among the dead,” he said.

  “But why?” I whispered.

  “He was sick with the yellow fever. He wanted you to remember him … in a certain way. He wanted you to think he was shot, or taken hostage, he said. Not killed by disease.”

  My father seemed cruel to me suddenly, cruel in his desire to maintain his honor. Pride, it was blind pride that made him do it.

  “He wanted me to go to my grave with his secret, but then I saw your name in the paper,” Mr. Wilcox said. “With me not so far from my own grave, it wasn’t right. I thought you should know.”

  I closed my eyes, grateful that this man had come to me. My heart ached, but I knew the truth.

  I put the badge on my desk, looking at my father’s name. This piece of metal had hung around his neck. He had touched this man in front of me, he had saved his life.

  “Did—did he ever speak of me?” I asked. My voice sounded high and weak.

  Mr. Wilcox nodded. “You and your mother. And your brother, his son, Benjamin.”

  He shook his head sadly.

  “Miss Galewski, I want you to know I argued with your pa about his decision. But he was a stubborn ox and wouldn’t listen. Since he saved my life, I had to respect his wishes. Up till now, of course. I hope I
did the right thing.”

  I looked into his watery eyes; I wanted to reach over my desk and touch him, to bring back my father through him. I laced my fingers and squeezed them together as hard as I could.

  “Of course you did the right thing,” I said. “Thank you, Mr. Wilcox. If you hadn’t come, we would never have known. We’ve waited so long.”

  I could not help the cry that escaped from me, the tears that streamed down my face. I covered my eyes with my hands, pushing back the flood that tumbled out of me. I couldn’t stop it. Mr. Wilcox cleared his throat. He said my name. I looked up and saw him standing before my desk, holding out a handkerchief. I took it. He bowed his head and limped to the door and quietly left.

  I felt as if my insides had collapsed. How would I tell Marm? How would she feel? And how could my father have been so selfish? Didn’t he know how much we loved him? Did he think we would forget him? Not wait for him? All the years, all the sorrow we bottled up, all the hope that’s kept us going—how could he have done this to us?

  I heard footsteps outside the door and hastily wiped the tears from my face. I slid the badge from the desk and put it in the drawer where I also kept the few brief notes Mr. Soper had written to me. I had to focus on my work. I had to find a way to keep going. I opened a case folio and rolled a piece of paper into the typing machine. I placed my fingers on the keys and made myself move them.

  Mr. Soper returned. He sat at his desk and went to work without addressing me. I was relieved by his silent presence beside me. I don’t know how I lasted out the day, but somehow I did.

  When work finished this evening, I removed the badge and the notes from the drawer and fit them into my purse. Mr. Soper left the building with me and walked me to the streetcar stop. There, he took my hand. “I’m sorry for your loss,” he said.

  His touch reached straight into me. The warmth of his hand soothed my shocked heart.