moment.
It almost did.
He had almost completed his work when an aide came out of a nearby utility room and entered the nurses’ station. Whitaker allowed himself only a furtive glance, but he didn’t think he’d ever seen her before. That was probably true, he assured himself, since most of the staff worked the same shifts each day. And ordinarily, Whitaker was not active in the hospital at this hour.
As he pretended to study the chart he had been altering, he kept turning so that his back was to the aide. At every moment he expected her to notice his peculiar behavior and challenge him. Or even worse, to summon that guard who had disappeared somewhere.
Once challenged, he knew he would become a blithering idiot. Oh, God, he prayed, I don’t know how you’re going to get me out of this, but please, please, get me out of this.
As if in answer to his prayer, the aide left the station. He watched her out of the corner of his eye. She walked down the hall and into a patient’s room. She did not reemerge. She stayed in. Miraculously, yes miraculously, she had paid no attention to him. His mission was still intact. And it was nearly completed.
He examined the stickers. They were not neatly placed, that he had to admit. The out-of-sync positioning of the stickers was attributable to his nervousness and consequent trembling hands.
And yet, as he checked the chart critically once more, it looked quite normal. After all, genuine hospital personnel spent no time at all on producing a neat chart. They slapped things together in a perfunctory manner born of necessity. Yes, it looked better, more authentic, this way than if he’d been able to be precise.
His work was done. It looked to be a success. But, as he replaced the chart and departed, he was more than willing to give the entire credit to God, whose humble and unworthy instrument Bruce Whitaker was pleased to be.
Meanwhile, back in room 2218, two exhausted, perspiring bodies panted in Bed B. There was no sound but the heavy, satisfied breathing of George and Helen—and that of Alice Walker’s methodical chewing.
“Oh, oh!” said Helen.
“Oh, oh!” said George.
“Oh, George! I’ve never . . . come . . . like that . . . before!”
“Matter of fact . . .” Snell thought on what he was about to admit. “. . . matter of fact. . . neither have I. Amazing!”
“You are something else, my man!”
“I know that. What I can’t quite figure out is, so are you.”
“We-ell, thanks . . . I guess.”
“You’re welcome.”
“Give me just a couple of minutes to get my breath, then we can get dressed.”
“Get dressed! We’re only halfway through.”
“Halfway! You’ve got to be kidding! I’ll be lucky if I can walk!”
“Baby, you ain’t seen nothin’ yet!”
“Oh, God! You mean—”
“The Maneuver!”
“George, I don’t know what you’re talking about. But whatever it is, I think I’ll break in half if you try it.”
“Baby, you are about to find out what a climax is.”
“George, you’re out of your mind! You can’t dish out any more just the same as I can’t take any more. You’re going to kill the both of us!”
“What a way to go!”
Snell raised himself on one elbow; he seemed to need more room, but was willing to go with what he had. He raised one arm high above his head and reached back as far as he could without falling out of the bed. With the other hand he began positioning Helen to receive him.
“George! George!” Helen was close to instant panic. “George! She stopped breathing! She stopped breathing! George, stop! We’ve got to help her! George! Alice stopped breathing! We’ve got to help her!”
George did not seem so inclined. “There are some things once you start ’em, there’s no stoppin’ ’em!”
“George!” Helen pushed as hard as she could.
* * *
By now it was becoming almost routine.
It was late at night. The bright overhead lights in the corridor should have been off, but they were on. A crowd of staff and patients had gathered. At the center of the group stood Guard George Snell and his superior, Chief Martin. There was much hubbub. People who could inch close enough tried to touch Snell or pat him on the back. All seemed very pleased, with the exception of Chief Martin, who was wearing his usual look of skepticism.
“So,” Chief Martin began to recapitulate, “you just happened to be walking down this corridor at the right time. And what made you go into Mrs. Walker’s room?”
“Well,” said a modest George Snell, toeing the carpet, “she had stopped breathing.”
“You heard her stop breathing.” Martin used his most incredulous tone.
“Uh . . . no . . . ’course not. I heard her choking. That’s it, I heard her choking.”
“Then what?”
“Well, I looked around for some help. But all the nurses and aides were occupied, I guess.” Snell glanced down at his side where Helen Brown stood, a smug smile on her face. For some unaccountable reason, Snell feared that Helen might mention how it was she was occupied. But she said nothing.
“So?” Chief Martin prompted.
“So there being no one else around, I entered the room and ascertained that she was indeed not breathing . . . uh . . . choking.”
“So?”
“So then I picked her up out of bed and performed the Himmler Maneuver.”
“Heimlich,” Helen whispered.
“Heimlich!” Snell corrected himself. “And then this lady”—he gestured toward Helen Brown—“came in and . . .”
“I see,” Chief Martin said. “How did you happen to know about the Heimlich Maneuver?”
“Uh . . . I read about it, I guess. Shoot, everybody knows that. It’s all over the place. Information on how to do it.”
“Then how is it that Mrs. Walker has bruises all over her side?” Chief Martin pressed.
“I guess she must have hit her side on the guardrail when I picked her up out of bed. I didn’t have time to be very delicate, you know.”
“What is this, Chief, the Inquisition?” one of the nurses challenged. “After all, Officer Snell just saved a woman’s life. This is a time of celebration, not incrimination.”
“All right! All right!” Chief Martin knew when he was creating a needlessly hostile crowd. And he knew when to retreat. “I just have to get the facts for my report. But you’re right. Congratulations, Snell! Drop into my office before you leave in the morning and we can finish this report.”
Snell might just as well have been revealed to be Superman in disguise. Patients and staff pushed forward to congratulate him. It was clear that everyone felt safer physically, emotionally, medically, and spiritually for having this shining knight on duty to protect them. If an election had been held at that moment, Snell would have been a shoo-in chief executive officer against whoever else might be running.
Only one person other than Snell knew the truth. But Helen Brown was not talking. If she had . . .
Helen Brown could not recall the exact moment when she became aware that something was wrong. It had to have been sometime between their initial torrid coupling and George’s yet-to-be-demonstrated bravura performance. It must have been a reflex of her health-care training. There was a moment when that hypnotic chewing sound was supplanted by a small inoffensive strangling noise, followed by an ominous silence.
It was at that moment, as George was about to strike, when Helen realized that they had only a few seconds to act or a fatal calamity would occur in the neighboring bed.
She had been unable to convince George that this was an inopportune moment for his beau geste. So she had shoved him—hard. Taking into account their comparative size, a shove, no matter how vigorous, would have been
