Blair Burkett had become a regional hit, drawing a laundry bag of fan letters from the start and requests to air twice a week instead of once. The city’s largest newspaper was considering sponsorship, and the station owners had said salary increases were possible after the first of the year. Sometimes, sitting before the typewriter while Leyton worked and Mari napped, Julianna found it hard to believe she was part of the lively team at WYRC, that she had actually chosen the road less traveled for a quiet graduate in English lit.
“The dog days of August.” Virginia sighed, lifting her hair from her neck and holding it in a loose bun on the back of her head. She had grown out her short waves and now wore a straight and swingy Greta Garbo bob.
“Hmm,” Julianna murmured her agreement, eyes not leaving the radio script that lay before her on the kitchen table. Her pen moved across the page she was on, searching for typos to edit.
“You really have been inspired lately,” Virginia noted, impressed. “So many amazing escapades for Miss Blair Burkett.”
“She keeps my mind working,” Julianna said. “And let’s not forget, she saved my sanity during July.”
“You look tired.”
“I am,” Julianna admitted, laying down the pen then picking up the script and fanning her face with it. “Mari has been sleeping so well through the night, but last night was an exception and we were up a lot. I think she’s got a small cold, probably from teething.”
“Poor baby.”
Julianna started to push back from the table. “I need to check on her.”
“No, you keep editing. I’ll go.” Virginia rose from her seat and let her hair fall back to her shoulders.
Julianna went back to her work as Virginia left the kitchen. In this episode, Blair was getting tangled up with a former rumrunner now hiding out as a breeder of llamas. She was only just writing a story about his ranch when—
“Julianna!” Virginia screamed from the top of the stairs. It catapulted Julianna from her thoughts, and she bolted from the kitchen.
“What?” she called back. Reaching the bottom of the staircase, she looked up to see Virginia, pale and trembling. “Virginia, what’s wrong?”
Virginia pointed toward the nursery. “It’s Mari,” she said, voice cracking. “She’s limp . . . she’s . . .”
Julianna felt herself go cold as the sound of her own heart flooded her ears. She had cringed at the horrible stories of babies not waking up. She mounted the steps two at a time and raced down the hallway, stumbling once and falling against a telephone stand, leaving the receiver dangling by its cord.
The nursery door stood open, allowing Julianna to see Mari’s white crib from the hallway.
Please God, she prayed. Please let her be breathing. I couldn’t stand it if . . .
She ran to the crib and gripped the railing, her whole body slumping in relief when she saw that Mari was awake, her blue eyes scanning the ceiling.
Thank you.
“Look at her right leg,” Virginia said from behind. “I tickled her foot and she didn’t respond. Then I jiggled her foot, then I kind of pinched her. Julianna, she didn’t feel a thing.”
Julianna followed Virginia’s pattern, growing more alarmed as each touch failed to trigger a response from the baby. She lifted her leg and bent it at the knee. Limp, as limp as the Raggedy Ann doll propped on the dresser.
Julianna whirled around, hand cupped over her mouth. “Oh no,” she mumbled to Virginia. “The summer cold . . . it’s a symptom. I should have suspected.”
Virginia quickly wrapped her in a hug. “Maybe not.”
But Julianna was rapidly nodding her head against Virginia’s chest, her eyes watery and wide with fear.
“Polio!” she gasped.
Dr. Ferlyn came to the house, his face weary and his eyes sad. This was not the pediatrician’s first house call of this nature. Not today; not this week.
He performed Mari’s spinal tap on the kitchen table, warning Julianna beforehand that the long needle was an intimidating sight. She recoiled when she saw it, horrified that it was going to be inserted into Mari’s spine.
Dr. Ferlyn removed a topical anesthesia from his medical bag. “This will numb the area.”
Her face like a free-flowing river of tears, Julianna held Mari down as the doctor performed the procedure. Virginia slipped a supportive arm around Julianna’s waist, but it did nothing to alleviate her feeling that she was the cruelest mother in the world. She pressed her cheek against Mari’s soft head, taking in the powdery scent of her skin.
When it was over, Dr. Ferlyn studied the fluid drawn from Mari’s spine. Julianna knew he would have to get it tested but wondered if he knew what he was seeing just by looking at the fluid. She couldn’t read his face, but she knew the doctor had only recently begun his practice in their area, having come from Topeka, Kansas, where a polio epidemic had broken out a few years ago.
“There is a chance, Mrs. Drakeworth, that this will prove to be polio.”
Of course, Julianna knew he was going to say that, but not just because he had once treated patients during an epidemic. She had known it from that moment in the nursery. Still, to hear him voice the possibility descended on her like a black cloud, growing more ominous as it moved in, throwing a black shadow over everything. She grabbed the back of a chair, fighting for balance.
“Here, sit,” Virginia said as she led Julianna around the chair and helped her ease into it. “I’ll get some water.”
Dr. Ferlyn began packing his bag. “The public only talks about the worst cases of polio,” he said kindly. “Fact is, most patients recover with little or no damage. Did you know that?”
Julianna shook her head, grateful for the hope he was offering. She only knew about the iron lungs and withered muscles, years spent in homes for crippled children and lives confined to heavy leg braces or wheelchairs.
She looked at Mari, who was looking at her, the little face broken into a mile-wide smile that proudly showed off two front teeth in the bottom row.
She has no idea, Julianna thought as a fresh pool of tears began building up inside her. She only hoped Mari would have a future to smile about.
Waiting out the test results was pure torture. Julianna felt like it would be the baseline to which she would forever compare times of fear and anxiety. She jumped when the phone rang, vacillating between wanting to answer it and wishing she could just ignore it. And it seemed to ring with such a shrill, like a siren, that brought her heart to her throat. She was both grateful to callers when they weren’t Dr. Ferlyn and angry with them for tying up the line.
When the results finally came back positive, life switched from moving in agonizing slow motion to head-spinning super speed. An ambulance arrived at the house and a nurse practically ripped Mari from Julianna’s clutching arms. The baby was whisked away to the hospital’s isolation ward while Julianna was barricaded in her home by a Board of Health nurse who tacked a placard to the house:
Quarantine
Infantile Paralysis
Poliomyelitis
So Julianna was left alone in the house, choking on tears as she faced the agony of being separated from a sick child.
Empty. I feel so empty.
Then again, she wanted to explode, to scream and even break something. Anything, anything to divert the thoughts that made her sick with fear.
Would the disease attack Mari’s lungs? Would she ever walk? Would she die? It wasn’t fair, keeping her from Mari, or barring any parent from sitting by the bed of a child so ill. To say that a mother could not brush the hair from her child’s forehead, or that a father was forbidden to clasp a pair of tiny hands in his own. It was cruel to rob parents of their right to protect. Not that Julianna could change things if she were at the hospital, but there was something about being close that offered comfort, some small degree of control. At least she would be able to make sure Mari continued to breathe on her own, could witness the treatment she received from nurses and doctors.
And I wouldn’t even be there.
She shook her head until it hurt, hoping to destroy the part of her brain that would allow such a thought inside. She climbed the stairs to the empty nursery. Though she dreaded the stillness, it was the only room in the house she wanted to be in. She would feel closer to Mari there, especially if she sat in the white wicker rocker they had spent so many hours in.
She paused in the doorway and buried her face in her hands. Then taking a deep breath, she dropped her hands and walked boldly inside. She went to the crib and picked up the pink, lace-edged blanket that lay inside. She raised it to her face and drew in the sweet scent of her baby and caressed her cheek with the soft fabric.
When she went to the rocker and sat down, the blanket was still pressed to her face.
She stayed that way for a very long time and had no idea how many minutes or hours had passed before she was jarred by Leyton calling to learn the test results.
He was due to return from a business trip the day of the spinal tap, but had spun on his heel and left the house upon learning Mari might have polio, preferring to wait out the lab results in the elegant suite of a downtown hotel.
“Well? Do you know anything yet?”
“It was positive. Mari has polio,” she told him, almost unable to believe the words were coming from her mouth, that this child-preying disease had intruded upon their lives.
“That’s just great, Julianna!” Leyton exploded. “Do you know what this means?”
Through the phone, Julianna heard ice cubes rattling in a glass, a pause, and then the slamming of the glass on a table. “We’ll be social pariahs.”
Julianna’s blood boiled. She was so appalled by Leyton’s insensitivity that she just stared at the phone for a minute before saying, “How foolish of me. Why, I hadn’t even thought of that.” What she was thinking was how she wished she could reach through the line, grab those ice cubes he was rattling, and throw them in his face.
“What did you do?” Leyton demanded. “Take her to some public swimming pool? Expose her to a horde of low-class, germ-ridden brats? Really, Julianna, what did you do to allow this to happen to that little girl?“
“Oh, Leyton, please,” she interrupted. “You can hardly point fingers at class. President Roosevelt had polio.”
She knew Leyton couldn’t argue with that but was certain he would have to argue with something. She just wasn’t prepared for what he chose. “Blame it on Jace McAllister, then.”
Julianna gathered the dangling phone cord and gripped it in her fist. “What is that supposed to mean?” she asked, her words a slow and even challenge.
“Oh, you know what they say about the sins of the father,” Leyton cajoled. “Aren’t they passed down to the child?”
She let go of the phone cord, unleashing the fury that had risen within her, “You’re inhuman!” she shouted. “There might be a polio epidemic, my child has it, and all you can do is take shots. And you know what else, Leyton?”
Sounding amused, he said, “What’s that, dear wife?”
“I hope you get it,” she said, voice seething, “and I hope it kills you.”
She slammed down the receiver so hard that it clanged a false ring. Somewhere beneath her rage, though, the sane part of her wondered if it had been a terrible thing to say, even to Leyton. He could be so cruel, though, especially when he was frustrated or angry himself. It was maddening, one more thing to add to the list of things she was angry at. Herself, the disease, the world around her, and—above all—God.
Just then the doorbell rang, sending her stomping down the staircase and muttering to herself, “Can’t they see the sign on the door? Are they blind or just stupid?”
Reaching the door, she called out tensely, “I’m under quarantine.”
“I see that,” Cassie called back.
Calmed some by the familiar voice, Julianna’s tone lost its edge. “I can’t let you in.”
“Of course you can,” Cassie said. “No polio virus is gonna mess with me.”
Julianna slumped against the door, wanting so badly to unlatch it and let Cassie in. She needed her, needed the unshakable faith and deep wells of wisdom. Was it fair to do that, though? What if I’ve got it? She worried. I can’t expose Cassie.
A succession of thuds interrupted her thoughts, and she realized that Cassie was shoving herself against the door, set on shouldering her way in if that’s what it took.
“Might as well let me in,” Cassie insisted. “One way or another, I’m coming through, so save yourself the trouble of having to hang a new door.”
Relieved by Cassie’s persistence, Julianna quickly unlocked the door and flung it open, bursting into tears as soon as she saw the dark eyes that had loved her for so long.
“There, now.” Cassie brought Julianna’s head to her strong shoulder. “The Lord will help you through this.”
Julianna drew back, her anger rising again. “Don’t talk to me about the Lord, unless you can tell me what I’ve done to make Him hate me.”
“He sure doesn’t hate you,” Cassie said as she stepped inside.
“Oh, I think He does.” Julianna’s voice was shaky as she made her way into the parlor and sank onto the sofa. “And why, Cassie? Because I veered off the straight and narrow one time by leaving with Jace?” She slapped her hands on her thighs. “Is that it? He’s punishing me, first by taking Jace and now by striking Mari with polio?”
“Bad things don’t come from the Lord,” Cassie said, “though He takes the blame for a lot of them.”
Julianna was not ready to relent. “He lets them happen,” she argued. “Explain that.”
“I can’t.” Cassie was matter-of-fact, not apologetic or defensive. She laid a hand on one of Julianna’s arms, tightly folded across her chest. “Here’s what I do know. Life’s full of sweet and full of bitter. When the bitter times come, you’re a lot better off if the Lord is in your life than you are if He’s not.”
“He could reach down and sweep all the pain away, Cassie.” Julianna unfolded her arms and rested her forehead in one hand.
“Yes, child, but history shows us it’s more His way to deliver us through things than to deliver us from things.” She gently lowered Julianna’s hand from her forehead then took her chin in hand and looked squarely into Julianna’s eyes. “It’s in our weakness that His strength is made great, on that you can mark my words.”
Julianna squeezed her eyes shut, feeling tears sting the inner lids. As always, Cassie had told her what she needed to hear. “I know,” Julianna said quietly. “I know. It’s just hard to have faith when you really need it. So many fears . . . worries. They get in the way.”
“They sure do.” Cassie nodded sympathetically. “But keep your eyes focused on our sweet Jesus. That’s how you keep circumstance from getting the upper hand.”
“Right now I have to survive this quarantine.” Julianna sighed. “Not seeing Mari, waiting to see if she worsens . . .” She pounded the arm of the sofa. “It’s making me insane.”
“This probably isn’t the best time to ask, but it’s got to be asked,” Cassie said, hesitating. “Have you done away with the linens?”
Julianna winced. “I don’t think I can stand to.”
“It’s a task no mama should have to do,” Cassie said, “but they have to be burned.”
“Cassie, will you . . .”
Cassie patted her leg. “That’s one of the reasons I came.” She hoisted herself from the sofa. “You stay put and let me tend to this.”
Julianna got up, too. “No, I want to see everything one last time.”
The women went upstairs to the nursery, where Julianna watched tearfully as Cassie gathered up Mari’s bedding, then nodded at the Raggedy Ann on the dresser.
“That too,” Julianna sighed, looking
stricken. “Mari sleeps with it.”
“I know it hurts.”
“That was one of the first Raggedy Ann dolls to come out,” Julianna recalled. “I was five when I got her.”
Cassie added the doll to her armload of items that needed burning. She wished Julianna was still a girl of five. It was easier then, back when all she had to do was scoot the child up on her lap and ease her cares with a fairy tale.
Now she just prayed Julianna would get to do the same for her own little girl.
Leyton sat at his desk, admiring his nameplate.
President.
What’s that? He frowned at some fingertip smudges on one corner of the desk then whipped out his monogrammed handkerchief and rubbed furiously until the offenders had disappeared. What kind of cleaning service had Richard contracted with? Well, he’d have to keep an eagle eye out for such signs of incompetence. They drove him crazy.
First on the afternoon’s agenda—find out Richard’s itinerary. He picked up the phone and called Polli with an I, greeting her as though they were meeting in a lounge.
“What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?” He gave his voice a mix of seduction and flirtation, kicking off a long string of giggles from Richard’s secretary.
“Hi, Mr. Drakeworth,” she gushed, sounding like a starstuck fan in the presence of a movie idol. “How’re you today?”
“Better now. It’s been a mad morning, but your voice is like a rain shower.”
She gave a breathy gasp, prompting him to smile. He could practically hear the girl’s heart lunging against her chest.
“Well, I won’t keep a busy girl from her work,” he continued. “I just need to verify something, Polli.”
“Sure, anything.”
“Our branch managers are having a meeting today at headquarters.” He laughed, pretending to direct it at himself. “I absolutely cannot recall whether or not Mr. Sheffield plans to attend,” he lied, knowing that Richard wouldn’t be present. Leyton just needed to know where he would be.
Leyton could hear her rapidly flipping through Richard’s appointment book. “Nope, uh, no . . . I mean, let’s see. Mr. Sheffield is having lunch at the Scotshire, then he has a doctor’s appointment, then he and Mrs. Sheffield have a museum board meeting and then,” she caught her breath, “they’re having dinner here.”
Seeking the Shore Page 10