Estelle did not see it this way. To her, it was “just blasted bad luck, one hell of a mistake,” as she had told Mrs. Macmillan when instead of Priscilla’s head and face hovering over her, as she came out of the coma, it was Mrs. Macmillan’s. “One hell of a mistake that I hope never in my life to make again!”
“Well, how you feeling, Estelle?”
“Not too bad, Bernice.”
“What the doctor say?”
“About what, Bernice?”
“Well, did he tell you if, and when, you coming out? This costs money, yuh know? You didn’ come in here with no Blue Cross, nor no Physicians-and-Surgeons benefits! And every blasted day that you laying down here and licking your mouth with that woman, Mistress Macmillans, it is costing Bernice money. It is money outta my pocket. That is why I asked you what the doctor say?”
“The doctor say Thursday.”
“Good! That is only a few days off. He say Thursdee, eh? Good.” Bernice then thought of having to spend so much time waiting for Estelle to get dressed on Thursday, of all the money it would take to get her back to Forest Hill by taxicab, of all the time and the money she would have to spend on Estelle as she crept back to good health. And for one spiteful moment, she saw Estelle travelling by foot all the way to Marina Boulevard. But she soon put that brutality out of her head. “What else the doctor say, Estelle?”
“Like what?”
“Well, Jesus Christ!” Bernice did not realize that her voice was so loud, until a few patients and visitors nearby turned to look. She lowered her voice, and hissed, “Did he say if you are going to have the baby? Did he say you not going to have the baby? Did he say if you damage your womb? What what what? What the hell did he say to you, Estelle?”
“Nothing like that, Bernice.”
“Nothing like that! Nothing like that! But you still haven’ told me one damn thing, Estelle. What’s your condition? If you do not tell me, who is going to inform me? Mistress Macmillans? Or do you want me to go and ask Priscilla, and make myself more ’shamed than I was when I brought you in here, bleeding like a, like a damn …”
“Bernice, the doctor say I am all right, man. All that happened is that I caused slight damage down here,” and she patted herself below the abdomen, to indicate. “And that was fixed from the night I was admitted.”
“You not pregnunt no more? Is that it?”
“No, Bernice.”
“You not pregnunt no more with the baby, then?”
“No.”
“Praise God! Praise God for that! But you sure? Well, that’s good!” And for the first time during her visit, she felt she could relax and smile a genuine smile. “I can’t tell you how good I feel to hear that you lost that child, girl. I don’t think you’re able to understand the trouble you was letting yourself in for, in this place. And the winter soon come, too. No open-air clotheslines to hang-out diapers on, baby carriage to think of and buy, and those things so blasted dear and expensive! Child? And then there is baby food, ’cause the mothers in this country don’t breast-feed no children these days. That is old-fashion, things of yesteryear that people back home are still doing. But not up here in Canada. And you can’t work when you have the baby, small. You don’t have no job, no baby-benefits; and even so, the paltry six dollars or so a month that the government puts in your hand for upkeep and having the child isn’ enough for child-support. You won’t be able to afford to pay baby-sitter and nursery-school at the same time, and on top o’ that, with no man to support you …”
Here she paused to think. And Estelle thought she saw the thought forming itself. She worried that Bernice would ask her about Sam Burrmann. The thought flashed across Bernice’s brows, and her brows took on a deep worrying furrow. It was coming at last, Estelle was certain. And she prepared herself for it. But all Bernice said was, “Estelle, you remember me telling you that this place is not fit for a single woman who is black to live in, all by herself? Well, now you understand. You would understand it more if that child was still in your womb. And though I would have liked you to get this experience, because you couldn’ blame nobody but yourself for bringing this experience on yourself, still as your sister, I couldn’ wish such a terrible judgment on you.” She took a deep breath and continued, “You see all the adoption agencies they have in this city? Well, I will tell you the reasoning behind them. They is Caffolick, Anglican, Jewish and Protestants. And all of them are full-up to the top with unwanted kids. That’s what they call them in this country, unwanted children. Back home we calls them outside-children. Back home we does cherish children! never mind they born outside wedlock, but be-Christ, they born inside love! Now, in spite of all these agencies being full-up to the brink, the Canadian girls’re still going out on the streets and getting pregnunt with more unwanted children and bringing them and putting them on the doorstep o’ these adoption places. Or else they throwing their children in lakes, or as I read in the papers the other day, in sewers. You can find some in garbage pails, in incinderators in the big
