it. Jean told him to shut up. If Jean was a hero, he was a reluctant one. He'd seen the real human spirit at work; he'd seen it man an assembly line of death with crackerjack efficiency. Heroism-he wanted no part of it. And he wanted no part of William either-William, whom he saw as just one more bleeding heart. And maybe, William thought now, stuck back in the present with its wheezes, whooshes, and whines, he was right.
But not now; now's different. Jean would have approved, he thought. He was giving up the ghost, and even though it was Jean's ghost, he would've approved. Heal thyself, William thought, then whispered it aloud. Heal thyself.
Mr. Brickman came to see him on a Tuesday.
'I never walk out alone anymore,' he said, 'but in your case I made an exception.'
'Thank you.'
'So'-Mr. Brickman peered at him-'what transpired here?'
'I didn't look where I was going.'
'Obviously. Where were you going?'
'To see a friend. Wrong house,' the words springing out of him as if on their own, like trained circus animals used to pirouetting on cue.
'I'll say,' Mr. Brickman said. 'By the way-what friend?'
'You don't know him,' William said, thinking that neither did he-know him. And also thinking that this wasn't bad at all, lying around pasha-like, chatting with friends, that it passed the time in a painless sort of way. And painless was what he was after, yessiree-just what the doctor ordered. Sometimes when he looked down at his body, at that mountain of gauze and plaster, he actually scared himself. It was like looking at his reflection in the mirror of the National Inn, only times squared. There he just looked like he was deteriorating; here he looked like he'd finished. A little like a rag doll with the stuffing all torn out. And it hurt-in between the narcotics, it hurt even to breathe.
'When are they going to let you out?'
'They keep saying when my medical condition improves. Either that, or when my Medicare condition doesn't.'
'They said that?' Mr. Brickman looked appropriately shocked.
'Just kidding, Mr. Brickman.' Though he wasn't, not really. Sometimes he got the feeling the doctors weren't consulting his chart so much as consulting his coverage plan. He got that feeling because they kept looking at his bed as if they were tired and wanted to sleep in it. No doubt about it, they wanted that bed. The problem was, he was still in it.
His next-door neighbor in the bed over, which in this room meant about the width of a bathroom stall, was wheezing something awful.
'Anyway,' Mr. Brickman said, followed by a sigh positively dripping with insincerity, 'this is the life.'
'If you say so.'
'Sure I do. You know, I was thinking about Eddie the other day.'
'What about Eddie?'
'Nothing. Just about him. About how he's dead.'
'Yeah. He's certainly dead.'
'Strange thing, isn't it?'
'What?'
'Being dead.'
'Yeah. It's a strange thing.'
'You shouldn't think about it,' Mr. Brickman said, patting his arm-or actually, his sling. 'Not in your condition.'
'I wasn't thinking about it.'
'That's the spirit. You know, someone called. He wanted to know how you were.'
But I don't know a someone, William started to say. Then stopped, feeling all of a sudden very cold, cold like death. Okay, stupid me.
'Someone,' William echoed. 'He wanted to know how I was. That's it?'
'That's it. I assured him you were mending.'
'Was he happy about that?'
'Well, sure, I guess. Like I said, he was concerned.'
'I'm sure he was. Didn't leave a number, did he?'
'Number? No. But if he calls again…'
'Sure, Mr. Brickman. If he calls again, you'll ask.'
'Naturally.'
Conversation withered after that, took a definite turn into small talk and then very small talk, and then talk that was just about infinitesimal. William, still thinking about his anonymous well-wisher, felt as if all those bandages that were wrapped around his body had suddenly wrapped themselves around his throat. Mr. Brickman, who wasn't exactly leading an exciting life these days as a virtual shut-in, seemed to run out of things to say. So he said goodbye.
'Thanks for coming,' William said, although he wasn't altogether sure now that he was.
Fifteen minutes after Mr. Brickman left, the day nurse-a large black woman who tended to talk to him as if he were under the age of ten-gave him his daily dose of nirvana. It worked too; a minute later he was in the middle of a strange dream.
A doctor was standing over his bed. The strangest- looking doctor he'd ever seen, his pupils black as a negative of snow, that black, framed by eyebrows the color of steel. He was an old doctor to be sure, but not a kindly old doctor. He wore an air of detachment about him, as stiff and starched and antiseptic as his smock.
'For you,' the doctor said, 'to help you sleep.' Something was in his hand-more painkiller perhaps?
'I'd like to talk,' William replied. 'I'd like to tell you something.'
'Yes…' The doctor hesitated. 'Well, why not.'
'It's just this. I'm off the case. That's all. Someone tried to kill me and then he called Mr. Brickman to see if he'd finished the job. I'd like whoever it is to know that I'm off the case. That there's no hard feelings. Could you arrange that?'
'Of course. But maybe he thinks you know too much. Did you consider that?'
'Actually, I have. But you see, he's wrong there. I know very little, almost nothing.'
'Ah well, in that case, maybe he'll listen. Don't you want to sleep now?'
'No. I want to talk. I told you.'
'But you're in pain. Aren't you in pain?'
'Yeah, I'm in pain. But I don't want to sleep. I'm… well… afraid.'
'Afraid? Afraid of what?'
'Of sleep. I'm afraid that if you put me to sleep, I won't wake up again.'
'Is that so bad a thing?'
'Maybe not. But all the same…'
Then the dream turned murky, that is, murkier than dreams usually are. It seemed to him that the door opened, that the door opened or a window did, that a television was turned off or turned on, and then the doctor was gone.
End of dream. He woke up what must have been hours later with a headache and a dry mouth, a little like a hangover without the fun.
NINETEEN
They let him out one week later. By that time his burden of gauze and plaster had been reduced to two small casts on his little toe and right wrist and three fat bandages wrapped around his chest. He was given a large bottle of codeine tablets to take with him, that and a set of orders, the major one being to stay put and not walk into burnt-out houses in the middle of the night.
