Calamity Town

So there was nothing exciting in that direction.

Nor anywhere else, except possibly in Nora’s.

It was strange about Nora. She had stood up so gallantly under the stresses of the arrest and trial that everyone had begun taking her for granted. Even Hermione thought of nothing but Nora’s “condition” and the proper care of the mother, and there old Ludie was of infinitely more practical use. Old Ludie said a woman was a woman, and she was made to have babies, and the less fuss you made over Nora’s “condition,” the better off they’d both be?Nora and the little one. Eat good plain food, with plenty of vegetables and milk and fruit, don’t go gallivantin’, go easy on the candy and do plenty of walking and mild exercise, and the good Lord would do the rest. Ludie had incessant quarrels about it with Hermione, and at least one memorable tiff with Dr. Willoughby.

But the pathology of the nervous system was so much Sanskrit to Ludie; and while the others were better informed, only two persons close to Nora suspected what was going to happen, and at least one of them was helpless to avert the catastrophe. That was Mr. Queen, and he could only wait and watch. The other was Doc Willoughby, and the doctor did all he could?which meant tonic and daily examinations and advice, all of which Nora ignored.

Nora went to pieces of a sudden. On Easter Sunday, just after the family returned from church, Nora was heard laughing in her bedroom. Pat, who was fixing her hair in her own room down the hall and was nearest, got there first, alarmed by a queer quality in Nora’s laughter. She found her sister in a swollen heap on the floor, rocking, laughing her head off while her cheeks changed from red to purple to yellow-ivory. Her eyes were spumy and wild, like a sea storm.

They all ran in then and, among them, managed to drag Nora onto the bed and loosen her clothes, while she laughed and laughed as if the tragedy of her life were the greatest joke in the world. Ellery telephoned Dr. Willoughby and set about with the assistance of Pat and Lola to arrest Nora’s hysteria. By the time the doctor arrived, they had managed to stop the laughter, but Nora was shaking and white and looked about her with frightened eyes.

“I can’t?understand?it,” she gasped. ”I was?all right. Then?everything . . . Ooh, I hurt.’’’’

Dr. Willoughby chased them all away. He was in Nora’s room for fifteen minutes. When he came out, he said harshly: “She’s got to be taken to the hospital. I’ll arrange it myself.”

And Hermy clutched at John F., and the girls clung to each other, and nobody said anything while a big hand took hold of them and squeezed.

The Wrightsville General Hospital was understaffed for the day, since it was Easter Sunday and a holiday. The ambulance did not arrive for three quarters of an hour, and for the first time within the memory of John F. Wright, Dr. Milo Willoughby was heard to swear?a long, loud, imagistic curse, after which he clamped his jaws together and went back to Nora.

“She’ll be all right, Hermy,” said John F.; but his face was gray. If Milo swore, it was bad!

When the ambulance finally came, the doctor wasted no time in further anathema. He had Nora whisked out of the house and away, leaving his car at the Wright curb to accompany her in the ambulance.

They glimpsed Nora’s face for an instant as the interns carried her downstairs on a stretcher. The skin lay in coils that jerked this way and that, as if they had a life of their own. The mouth was twisted into a knot, and the eyes were opalescent with agony.

Mercifully, Hermione did not see that face; but Pat did, and she said to Ellery in flat horror: “She’s in horrible pain, and she’s scared to death, Ellery! Oh, Ellery, do you think??”

“Let’s be getting over to the hospital,” said Ellery.

He drove them.

There was no private pavilion at the Wrightsville General, but Doc Willoughby had a corner of the Women’s Surgical Ward screened off and Nora put to bed there. The family were not admitted to the ward; they had to sit in the main waiting room off the lobby. The waiting room was gay with Easter posies and sad with the odor of disinfectant. It sickened Hermy, so they made her comfortable on a mission-wood settee, where she lay with tightly closed eyes. John F. just pottered about, touching a flower now and then, and saying once how nice it felt to have the spring here again. The girls sat near their mother. Mr. Queen sat near the girls. And there was nothing but the sound of John F.’s shoes whispering on the worn flowered rug.

And then Dr. Willoughby came hurrying into the waiting room, and everything changed?Hermy opened her eyes, John F. stopped exploring, the girls and Ellery jumped up.

“Haven’t much time,” panted the doctor. ”Listen to me. Nora has a delicate constitution. She’s always been a nervy girl. Strain, aggravation, worry, what she’s gone through?the poisoning attempts, New Year’s Eve, the trial?she’s very weak, very badly run-down . . . ”

“What are you trying to say, Milo?” demanded John F., clutching his friend’s arm.

“John, Nora’s condition is serious. No point in keeping it from you and Hermy. She’s a sick girl.” Dr. Willoughby turned as if to hurry away.

“Milo?wait!” cried Hermy. ”How about the . . . baby?”

“She’s going to have it, Hermy. We’ve got to operate.”

“But?it’s only six months!”

“Yes,” said Dr. Willoughby stiffly. ”You’d better all wait here. I’ve got to get ready.”

“Milo,” said John F., “if there’s anything?money?I mean, get anybody?the best?”

“We’re in luck, John. Henry Gropper is in Slocum visiting his parents over Easter, classmate of mine, best gynecologist in the East. He’s on his way over now.”

“Milo?” wailed Hermy.

But Dr. Willoughby was gone.

* * *

And now the waiting began all over again, in the silent room with the sun beating in and the Easter posies approaching their deaths fragrantly.

John F. sat down beside his wife and took her hand. They sat that way, their eyes fixed on the clock over the waiting-room door. Seconds came and went and became minutes. Lola turned the pages of a Cosmopolitan with a torn cover. She put it down, took it up again.

“Pat,” said Ellery, “over here.”

John F. looked at him, Hermy looked at him, Lola looked at him. Then Hermy and John F. turned back to the clock, and Lola to the magazine.

“Where?” Pat’s voice was shimmering with tears.

“By the window. Away from the family.”

Pat trudged over to the farthest bank of windows with him. She sat down on the window seat and looked out.

He took her hand. ”Talk.”

Her eyes filled. ”Oh, Ellery?”

“I know,” he said gently. ”But you just talk to me. Anything. It’s better than choking on the words inside, isn’t it? And you can’t talk to them, because they’re choking, too.” He gave her a cigarette and held a match up; but she just fingered the cigarette, not seeing it or him. He snuffed the flame between two fingers and then stared at the fingers.

“Talk . . . ” said Pat bitterly. ”Well, why not? I’m so confused. Nora lying there?her baby coming prematurely?Jim in jail a few squares away?Pop and Mother sitting here like two old people . . . old, Ellery. They are old.”

“Yes, Patty,” murmured Ellery.

“And we were so happy before,” Pat choked. ”It’s all like a foul dream. It can’t be us. We werq?everything in this town! Now look at us. Dirtied up. Old. They spit on us.”

“Yes, Patty,” said Ellery again.

“When I think of how it happened . . . How did it happen? Oh, I’ll never face another holiday with any gladness!”

“Holiday?”