Pot of gold : a novel

by Michael, Judith

  Why would she do it? Why would she want to kill herself?

  She didn't, she didn't, she didn't. The words ran through Claire's mind beneath all the words she was saying aloud to Emma. She wouldn't try to kill herself. Something else had happened. She'll tell us what it was. Soon. When she wakes up.

  When she wakes up. "Emma, listen to me," Claire said urgently. "Listen. You will wake up. You'll get well and we'll do wonderful things together; I've got so many ideas about things we can do—" She stopped, holding her breath. She thought Emma's hand had moved in hers. "Emma.^" She waited, barely breathing, as if she were straining to catch an elusive sound. "Emma, do that again." And Emma's hand stirred against her mother's palm.

  Claire closed her eyes. In the cold brightness of the room, there were just the two of them, close together, and Emma telling her mother she was alive.

  Claire put her mouth beside Emma's ear. "I'm here, Emma, as close as I can be. Can you look at me.^ Can you tell me you hear me.'^ I won't go away; I'll stay right here. I won't leave you, I'll help you wake up, I'll help you get well. Emma, can you look at me.'* Can you open your eyes.-^ Can you tell me you hear me.^" She sat there without moving, leaning forward, holding Emma's hand, her lips brushing Emma's ear. And then she thought of how she used to sing to Emma when she was sick. She had not done it for a long time, but now, very softly, she began to sing, old nursery rhymes and folk songs that Emma loved: songs of love and homecoming, of partings and reunions, of parents and children and again, always, of love. Her back ached, her leg was numb and tingling, but she did not move. It had been over two hours since

  the nurse brought her to Emma's side, but still she held Emma's hand, and talked and sang and talked again.

  Emma thought it was a river, a sweet, murmuring river buoying her up. She floated on the river, and when she put her hand in the water, it was warm and gentle; there were no rocks or rapids, only softness and the low, steady sound that was so comforting as it held her and carried her forward, away from danger. She loved the river, she thought she had never loved anything as much as she loved the river, and she sank into it, giving herself up to it, letting it take her wherever it wanted to go.

  / wont leave you, Vll help you wake up, Vll help you get well.

  The voice seemed to be inside her, but she knew it was her mother's voice. And suddenly Emma thought, I didn't die. I was going to die but I didn't. I didn't die because my mother found me.

  "I'll help you get well." This time the voice was outside her, a whisper, a soft breath in her ear. Her mother's voice. Her mother had found her and was beside her, talking to her. Her mother would take care of her. "Emma, can you look at me.'* Can you open your eyes.'"'

  / want to, but they're so heavy . . .

  "Emma, can you tell me you hear me.?"

  Struggling, forcing her muscles to move against a great weariness, Emma opened her eyes—and looked into the eyes of her mother.

  "Oh, Emma, thank God, thank God ..." Claire leaned down, sliding her arms beneath Emma's shoulders to hug her and kiss her cheeks and forehead. "You'll be all right. I promise, you'll be all right."

  Oh, my mother is so beautiful, Emma thought; nothing is more beautiful than my mother. She wanted to tell her how beautiful she was, and how much she loved her, but no words came. She tried to talk, but her throat and mouth could not push out the words. She thought them; they were in her mind, and she made sentences of them in her mind, but it was too hard to push them out; that terrible weariness that weighed on her eyes kept her throat and mouth from moving. She tried and tried, but nothing happened; she could not talk.

  It frightened her. Maybe she would never talk again, or maybe

  she wasn't awake at all; maybe she was dreaming her mother was there and she was still dying. She remembered thinking she was dying. She couldn't remember very much, but she did remember that. She looked past her mother, at the white curtain, and looked back again, wondering where she was.

  "You're in the hospital," Claire said. "In New York. We brought you here when we found you. You were very sick. When you're better, we'll take you home."

  Who.'' Emma wondered. She looked at her mother.

  "Can't you talk.^ Try, Emma." Claire watched Emma's lips open. No sound came out; her eyes were filled with fear. "It's all right," Claire said quickly. "It's because you're weak. You'll be fine in a little while; you'll be fine. Right now I'll do the talking; you nod if you understand. Emma.'' Do you understand.''"

  Emma nodded. It was hard to move, but her chin rose and fell enough for her mother to see.

  "Good, that was very good." Claire squeezed Emma's hand. "You're going to get stronger every minute; you'll see. Well, what shall I tell you.'' Gina and Alex and I found you. Hannah's here, too; she came just a little while ago. All the people who love you best—"

  "Oh, this is wonderful," the nurse said, appearing beside the bed. "Hello, Emma, we've been waiting for you to wake up. Excuse me, Mrs. Goddard." Claire moved back, and the nurse took Emma's blood pressure and temperature. She checked the intravenous fluid, adjusting the valve slightly on one of the bags, checked the oxygen flow, watched the monitor showing Emma's heart rate and breathing. "Welcome back," she said, and her voice was tender and thankful. "I have a daughter," she said to Claire. "She just had her fifteenth birthday." She paused, and Claire knew what was going through her mind. Because we all have the same nightmares, she thought; all the parents in the world. There's nothing I can tell this woman that she doesn't already know; in fact, she's seen worse than Emma and worse than anything I can imagine. "I'll get the doctor," the nurse said. "She's in the hospital; she'll be here in a few minutes."

  "Emma's all right now, isn't she.'*" Claire asked. "Now that she's awake . . . V

  The nurse hesitated. "I don't know. Sometimes there's dam-

  age that we don't see for a ... I can't really say, Mrs. Goddard; the doctor can tell you much more." She leaned over the bed. "Hang in there, Emma; you're doing fine."

  Emma was struggling to understand what had happened. Her throat hurt; she hurt all over, especially in her stomach, as if she were bruised inside, as if she had had a terrible fall or she'd been in a fight, but she could not remember falling and she had never, ever, been in a fight. But she hurt, and it made her feel heavy, but at the same time she felt empty and light-headed, the way she felt sometimes when she hadn't eaten and she and Brix were in his bedroom, doing drugs with the television on, just the picture, not the sound. She felt she wasn't connected to anything, not even herself. There isn't any Emma anymore; she's gone. She went to dinner with Brix and she disappeared.

  She was terrified. Vm here! Vm me! Vm Emma! Vm here! But the words were trapped inside her. She heard her mother and the nurse talking, but her own voice was gone. She didn't have a voice; she didn't have anything. She was a hollow shell, brittle and heavy with weariness, so heavy she could not move; she could not even lift her hand.

  Dinner with Brix. She remembered that: she and Brix had gone to dinner and he'd said some terrible things. She couldn't remember what they were, but she knew they were awful. She couldn't remember anything but Brix's cold face and the waiter looking worried as he pulled out the table.

  Brix. Her lips formed the word.

  "He's not here," Claire said briefly. "I don't know where he is. We found you in your room in the hotel, Emma, alone; no one was with you. You were very sick. Something happened to make you sick."

  Emma closed her eyes. I'm going to die, I'm going to die, I'm going to die.

  "Emma! Open your eyes! Please, Emma, you're going to be all right, you're going to get well; listen, I'm here, I'll help you, but you've got to open your eyes again—"

  "Excuse me, Mrs. Goddard." The doctor stood beside Claire. "I'd appreciate it if you'd stay in the waiting room for a few minutes; it won't be long, and then you can come back."

  "But I want to know if she's all right—"

  "Fll talk to you after I examine her. I'm sorry, Mrs. Goddard, bu
t I can't tell you anything until then."

  Claire lingered, watching Emma's closed eyes, her face settling back into stillness. But the doctor stepped in front of her, bending over Emma, and after another moment she went back to the waiting room.

  "Well.^" Hannah demanded.

  "She woke up. She can't seem to talk; I think she tries, but nothing happens. But then she went back to sleep." Suddenly Claire felt herself collapse. Alex jumped up and held her as her knees buckled and she began to fall.

  "Here, sit down," he said, and brought her with him to the couch. "You've been in there almost three hours, and you haven't slept and you haven't eaten."

  "I brought muffins," Hannah said. "Just in case." She opened her enormous purse and brought out a paper bag filled with muffins in cupcake papers. "We can get more coffee."

  "I'm not hungry," Claire said. "I'm not tired."

  "What did the doctor say.^" Gina asked.

  "Nothing, yet; she's with Emma now. Slie'll call me when she's examined her. The nurse said they don't know—even if she wakes up—they don't know if she'll be all right."

  "Of course she'll be all right," Hannah said. "I've seen many people in comas in my time, and when they start responding, you know you're out of the woods."

  Claire was too tired to ask Hannah when she had seen people in comas. She leaned against Alex, looking dully at the table in front of them. Hannah was clearing a space among the magazines and setting out muffins. "I'll go get us some coffee," she said.

  "Did the doctor say how long it would be.^" Gina asked.

  Claire shook her head. "I guess a few minutes."

  "Then I've got time to make a phone call. I'll be right back." She walked down the corridor to the pay phone and leaned against the wall, her lips close to the mouthpiece. "Hank, it's Gina, I wondered if you got the memos and test reports I faxed you."

  "I called. I told your friend Roz I got them."

  "Oh. Well, I haven't been home and haven't talked to her; I'm at the hospital with a friend. So.'' What's your office going to do about it.''"

  "We're going to check it out, Gina, but not the week before Christmas. Even the Connecticut State's Attorney gets a hohday, you know. We'll wait till next week, or maybe after the first of the year. Nothing's going to happen in the next couple of weeks."

  "You mean you'll send people out to search Eiger Labs.'"'

  "I mean one of us will go out there and talk to the president of the company. As long as a product sits in their warehouse, they haven't committed a crime. They'd be in trouble if they shipped a product they knew could cause health problems—"

  "Or blindness."

  "In one test, according to the stuff you sent me, and not proven to have been caused by the cosmetic, though it looks like a high probability. What I'm concerned about here is keeping possibly unsafe products off the shelves of stores in Connecticut, so I think it's likely that we'd compel them to hold up shipping until we check everything out. Isn't that what you wanted.'"'

  "Sounds fine to me. I was just wondering . . ."

  "Now what.?"

  "I thought it would be good for Quentin Eiger's board, his partners, to know what's going on in their company."

  "How do you know they don't.''"

  "I'm guessing they don't. If you could call them, Hank . . ."

  "That's not the job of the State's Attorney, and you know it. We've been friends for a long time, Gina, and I love you and think you're terrific, and I definitely think you did a good deed sending me that stuff, but I'm not playing whatever game you're into now."

  "Then I guess I have to call them myself," Gina said, and as soon as she hung up, she dialed the first of the two numbers she had written in her pocket notebook and took a deep breath, so she could tell her story quickly and devastatingly, and then get back to the waiting room, to find out what was happening with Emma.

  As soon as he was back in his office, Brix called the hospital in New York. He spoke to the operator and then someone in the emergency room and finally a nurse in intensive care. "I'd like to know how Emma Goddard is; she was brought in—"

  "Are you a relative.''" the nurse asked.

  "I'm a friend, a good friend—"

  "I'm sorrv, we can only give out information to relatives."

  "But is she dead?" he cried.

  "No, sir," said the nurse, relenting as she heard the anguish in Brix's voice. "She isn't dead."

  Brix hung up. Not dead. Christ, what was he supposed to do now.'' He slumped in his chair, looking at his feet. He'd probably made things worse. If he was worried about her talking when she was crazy about him, she'd sure as hell talk now, when she thought he'd ruined everything. And if she lived and told the doctors she hadn't taken any Halcion, the whole goddamn bunch of them would think about other ways she might have gotten it, and the first thing they'd think of was him. Unless she died before they could ask her, and he had no control over that. Christ, what a fucking mess, he thought.

  His telephone rang. "I want you in my office," his father said.

  It's too soon. She wasnt due at Hale's office until this afternoon, and Hale wouldn't call him when she didn't show up. Not right away, anyway. It's too soon. He doesn't know anything. "Should I bring something.'' Any reports or—"

  "Just get the hell in here."

  Shit. What's happened? Wc took two quick snorts of coke, then grabbed a stack of papers so his secretary would think he was on important business and walked down the corridor to his father's corner office. "Yes, sir, reporting for duty," he said, trying to make it a joke, but at the look on his father's face, his grin faded.

  "What the hell is going on with you and Emma.^"

  "Me and Emma.''" Brix repeated. "Nothing. I mean, I've been going out with her, you know that—"

  "What does she know about the PK-20 line.'"'

  Brix felt his stomach contract. "Nothing. I mean, she knows what it is; she's been in enough photographs with the stuff in her hand or whatever—"

  "She knows something about the tests, and you've known it, and you haven't told me. How did she know.'"'

  "Where do you get this.''" Brix demanded, thinking this was his only way out. Emma might still die; he could deny any rumors, he could bull his way through anything, as long as Emma wasn't around. "I mean, it sounds like some idiot's been making up crazy stories."

  "Her mother knows. Her mother's boyfriend knows. For all I know, the whole fucking world knows. What the hell is wrong

  with you? You can't fuck a girl without teUing her every goddamn thing that's in your head?"

  "I didn't tell her anything," Brix said, but the words came out weakly. The tightness in his stomach came back. Her mother knows. Her mother's boyfriend knows. She'd told people and she'd kept it from him. The little bitch; all the time she'd been swearing she hadn't told anyone, all the time she'd looked at him with those incredible eyes and he'd believed her, she'd been lying to him. Lying to him! What the fuck kind of love was that? "I didn't tell her anything," he said again.

  "Then how did she know? God damn it!" Quentin roared when Brix was silent. "How did she know? You're the only one she's been sleeping with; how did she—"

  "Well, I'm not so sure about that." It was like a lifeline and Brix grabbed it. "I mean, I don't know who she's been screwing. It could have been anybody. Maybe Kurt. Maybe Hale, after Roz moved out. She gets around, you know; I've been pretty sure for a long time that I wasn't the only one."

  Quentin looked at him with contempt. "She hasn't looked at another man since she met you, much less slept with one; she's been a lap dog, following you around, begging for anything you could give her, and if you were a man instead of a whimpering asshole, you wouldn't try to hide behind that kind of shit." He stood up and leaned over the desk, leaning on his hands, towering over Brix. His voice was colder than Brix had ever heard it. "I want to know what she knows and how she knows it. I'll ask her if I have to—"

  "No! I mean, she's not here."

  Quentin's
eyes narrowed. "Where is she?"

  "New York, at a photo session. I went in with her last night, but I wanted to get to work on time so I came back this morning. I don't know what she did after dinner last night; we had separate rooms. She didn't like it but I thought, you know, a big hotel, it would be better for her repu—" He stopped. He was talking too much.

  "She didn't go to the photo session."

  "What? I don't believe it! She's never missed one. Maybe she's sick. Did Hale check the hotel?"

  "I told her mother to tell her we wouldn't be needing her anymore."

  Brix stared at his father in bewilderment. "Her mother? You talked to her mother? How come? I mean, I thought you weren't seeing her anymore."

  "Her mother was worried about her. Her mother's boyfriend was worried about her. They were afraid you'd think she was a threat because of whatever she'd found out about the PK-20 line, and they remembered what you'd done in college when you thought someone had done something you didn't like."

  Brix sat frozen in his chair. He was ice-cold with fear. How did they know what had happened in college? Emma didn't know; she would have said something. How did her mother know? Anyway, his father took care of that mess a long time ago; why would anybody talk about it now? He shrank into himself, cold and alone. His father filled his entire field of vision; there was no one else in the world but that huge, commanding figure, leaning over him, but not with love.

  "They came storming into my house last night, looking for her, asking for the names of hotels you usually stay in. They thought she was in danger. Was she?" Quentin waited. ''Was she?"

  Brix shook his head. Once he started, he could not stop. His head wagged back and forth while he tried to think of something to say.