Death of an Irish Diva (A Cumberland Creek Mystery)
Page 27
Vera’s mind wandered as the doctor was called away. He said he’d be back. She looked at the crisp blue hospital walls, with beautiful landscape paintings, all strategically placed. One was above the leather sofa so you could lie or sit in style to await the news about your loved ones and gaze into the peaceful garden gazebo landscape; one was above the chair; the hallways were lined with them. Vera saw herself walking down the hall and looking at the same prints twenty years ago. Tranquil settings of barns and flowers did not help the pain. She was only twenty-one then, and she thought she’d soon be back in New York City. As soon as her father healed, got home, and was on the road to being himself, she’d hop on the train to continue her dancing career. She had no idea she’d never see her father again—nor would she ever dance professionally again.
The last time Vera was here was with her father. The hospital had just opened, and he was impressed with the technology and the vibrant pulse of new medicine. The research arm intrigued him. Some older doctors were jaded and looked at the new hospital with suspicion, but not her father. Ironic that he died here, under the new establishment’s care.
She sighed a deep and heavy sigh.
“Vera!” It was Sheila running up the hall, wiry brown hair needing combing. She was dressed in a mismatched sweat suit. “Oh, girl! What on earth is going on? I’ve been hearing rumors. Is your mama okay? Lord!”
For the first time that day, Vera smiled. “Sit down, Sheila. You’re a mess.”
Sheila took a quick look at herself and laughed. “You know, I just threw anything on. Is your mother—”
“She’s fine,” said Vera. “She’s trying to tell the doctors what to do.”
“Really?” Sheila sat up a little straighter, looking very serious. “I can hardly believe that,” she said, and a laugh escaped. Then she grabbed her belly and howled in a fit of laughter.
Vera felt tears coming to her eyes through her own chortles. “You haven’t heard the best part,” she managed to say, trying to calm herself down as a nurse passed by, glancing at them. “Mama was stabbed and she never felt a thing.”
“What?” Sheila stopped laughing for a minute. “Are you serious?” Her face reddened and laugher escaped. “Oh, girl, only Beatrice. Only Beatrice.”
Vera’s mother had just been stabbed, and she and her best friend were laughing about it, like schoolgirls unable to control their nervous giggles. A part of Vera felt like she was betraying her mother. However, she knew if Beatrice had been in this room, she’d be laughing, too.
When the women calmed down, Sheila brought up Maggie Rae, which was the other startling news of the day. “Did you hear the news?”
Vera sighed. “Yes, I heard about it. I saw the ambulances and police at her house and went over to see what was happening. You know, I blame myself. I knew something was wrong. I just didn’t know what to do about it, or maybe I just tried to talk myself out of it.”
Vera thought about the tiny young mother, always with her children clinging to her, and with a baby on her hip—or in a stroller. She was pretty in a simple way—never made-up, always pulled her long black hair into a ponytail and wore glasses most of the time. Though once or twice, Vera had seen her wearing contacts, which really opened up her face. Even though Maggie Rae rarely made eye contact, she always held herself erect and moved with a graceful confidence and sway in her hips.
“Now, Vera,” said Sheila, “you hardly knew that woman. Who really knew her? She kept to herself.”
“She brought Grace in for dance lessons once a week,” Vera told her. “I know her as well as any of the rest of them. Except she was awfully quiet. And so small. Like a bird. Every time I saw her, it looked like she had gotten even thinner.”
“Hmm-hmm, I know. It’s odd. She was one of my best customers, but she never came to a crop,” said Sheila, who sold scrapbooking supplies for a living. “I invited her. She never came, so I just . . . stopped. You know, you can only push so far. “
They sat in their own silence, with the hospital noise all around them, each knowing her own sadness and her own triumphs and joys, but neither knowing what it was like to be pushed quite that far. To be pushed far enough to put a gun to one’s heart while the children were peacefully sleeping upstairs. What kind of darkness led Maggie Rae Dasher to that moment? And what do people ever really know about the neighbors and townsfolk who live among them?
“Did she leave a note or anything?” Vera wondered out loud.
Sheila shrugged.
A nurse dressed all in blue passed them; a mother carrying a baby in a carrier and holding the hand of a toddler limped along; someone was coughing and another person laughed. A man in a wheelchair wheeled by them, while another gentleman hobbled with a cane. Phones were ringing. Announcements were being made, doctors were paged.
“Damn,” said Sheila. “This place sucks.”
“Wonder where the doctor is?” Vera looked around. “I’m going over to that desk to see what’s going on. I should at least be able to see Mama.”
As Vera walked around the nurses’ station to try to find some help, she thought she could hear her mother’s voice.
“What?” the voice said. “Listen, you twit, you’ll do it because I said you will. Stop treating me like I am five. I am eighty, of sound mind and body, except for this friggin’ knife hanging out of my neck. And oh, by the way, I am a doctor of physics myself. So don’t tell me—”
“Mama,” Vera interrupted as she walked into the room. Sitting up in bed, her mother looked so small, which belied the sound of her voice and the redness of her face. “Calm down, sweetie.”
She folded her arms over her chest. “Son of a bitch!” She cocked her head and looked behind Vera. “What’s the scrapbook queen doing here? Am I dying or something?”
“Hey,” Sheila said. “You’ve got a knife sticking out of the back of your neck. Don’t get too cocky, old woman.”
“Huh!” Beatrice said, and smiled. “Glad to see you, too. Now, Vera, what are we going to do about this mess?”
“I told the doctor that it’s your body. You do what you want, Mama.”
“Yes, but,” she said, after taking a sip of water, leaning forward on the pillows that were propping her in an awkward position, which forced her to sit up so the knife would not hit the bed, “what do you think? What would you do?”
Vera could hardly believe what she was hearing. Her mother was asking for her advice. She couldn’t remember if that had happened before. “Honestly, if it were me, I’d want to be put out. I’d be afraid of moving, you know?”
“I don’t know about being operated on at my age . . . . You know they killed your daddy. What if they kill me, too? I can’t leave yet. I’ve got too much work to do, and then there’s you. I can’t leave you without a parent,” she said quietly.
Vera knew that’s what it would come to—this is where he died, not for his heart problems, but from a staph infection.
“Just do what she asks,” Vera said to the young doctor, who was still hovering. “She won’t move.”
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Copyright © 2014 by Mollie Cox Bryan
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ISBN: 978-0-7582-6633-0
First Kensington Mass Market Edition: February 2014
eISBN-13: 978-1-61773-029-0
eISBN-10: 1-61773-029-7
First Kensington Electronic Edition: February 2014