Better in the Dark (4 page)

She could not turn to him now; not now or ever again. She tried to tell herself that the sick children meant more than her pride, that their welfare was worth anything she might endure at Mark’s hands. But she said nothing, listening to him breathe as he slept, as the hours of the night went over.

“Morning,” he said to her as she turned away from the light.

“Morning, Mark,” she said dully.

“You were asleep when I got in last night. Tired?”

“Yes. We had our hands full on the floor. And you?” She knew he would lie to her. She expected it, but when it came, it was salt on a raw wound.

“You know this damn Project. If it isn’t one thing, it’s another. You know what sticklers the administration is on statistics. I got tied up at the lab, running experiments.”

“Yes,” she said. “I know.” She watched him climb out of bed, his nude body beautiful as marble in the soft morning light. She closed her eyes so that she would not have to look at him. “We ran into a strange case last night,” she said as conversationally as she could.

He stopped in the middle of pulling on his shorts. “Oh? What was it?”

“A new admit. It looked like diphtheria. I didn’t think that was possible these days, but you might want to run a check on it. Maybe the strain’s mutated.”

“I haven’t seen it, if it has,” he said, making it plain that if he had not seen it, it had not happened. A crease of annoyance appeared between his fine brows. “What makes you think it’s diphtheria? It’s probably a bad case of bronchitis.”

“That’s what I thought, but the computer diagnosed it as unknown. An unknown viral infection. It would recognize bronchitis, wouldn’t it?” She hoped she sounded cool and reasonable. “She’s got the gray face and the cough.”

His crease deepened to a frown. “I haven’t heard of any mutation that could get through a vaccine. And this is just the one case, you say?”

“Yes.” She opened her eyes and studied the ceiling. “That part has me puzzled, too. I thought the girl might be resistant to vaccines. I haven’t found that with diphtheria before, but I suppose it could happen. It
is
possible, isn’t it?”

Mark nodded, irritation fled. “That’s it, then. I wouldn’t let it worry me, if I were you. Not unless you see a lot of cases.” He had pulled on his shorts and was stepping into his slacks. “You shouldn’t let yourself get so involved, Natalie. You make errors in judgment if you do. It’s a mistake to be so involved, believe me.”

She nodded, not finding the words to answer him. When she did speak again, it was on something entirely different. “I thought I’d take Philip out to the Great Belt Park. I don’t have to be at the hospital until two. It’s a nice day for the Park, don’t you think?”

“I guess so,” he said as he reached for his smock. “Look, Natalie, I might be in late tonight.”

“More work in the lab?” she asked, and heard no bitterness in the words.

“You know what the Project is like,” he said by way of apology.

She felt her throat tighten as she said, “It doesn’t matter, Mark,” and knew that it was so.

The three hours she could spend with Philip felt too short. Often she wished for a whole day when she and her son could wander about the city with-out worrying about the time, about her duty schedule at the hospital. But three hours would let them see the Great Belt Park, the zoo there and the trees. She dressed for the raw winds and took the bus to the swath of green that girded the city, her son clinging to her hand.

While they were watching the birds by the Monkey Climbing Rock, Natalie noticed a woman on the adjoining bench, and felt the annoying sense that she was familiar. After a moment it came to her. “Mrs. Chisholm?” she said to the drab, muffin-shaped lady in the untidy coat.

The woman slewed about, confused.

“Mrs. Chisholm, over here. Here!” Natalie waved. “I’m Dr. Lebbreau, remember? Dr. Howland’s wife. Natalie Lebbreau. This is my son, Philip.”

Mrs. Chisholm’s wrinkled face smiled lopsidedly. “I thought you were from the hospital,” she said in an unaccountably shaky voice.

“Mrs. Chisholm, what’s wrong? Don’t you feel well?” Natalie started forward, her hand extended.

“Oh,” said the older woman, rubbing ineffectually at her eyes. “I’m all right now, truly I am. It was simply seeing you, you know...”

“Me?” Natalie frowned, and thought she should not have spoken. She covered her mistake. “We’re missing Chisholm, believe me. I hope he’s back with us soon.”

“Back?” She stared. “Oh, dear...” There were tears in the seams of her face. “I realize I shouldn’t... I thought everybody knew ... I’m not used to it yet ... It’s so soon...”

Natalie asked the question although she had already sensed the answer. “Not used to what? What has happened, Mrs. Chisholm?”

Mrs. Chisholm had pulled an old-fashioned handkerchief from her handbag and was swabbing her face with it. “He died. I can’t get used to it. This is dreadful ... forgive me, my dear ... carrying on... I thought... Oh, dear.”

“Chisholm is dead,” Natalie said stupidly. “No one told me. I wouldn’t have believed this, Mrs. Chisholm. If I’d known, I wouldn’t...” She felt Philip tug at her arm.

“Yes. Edward died ten ... was it ten? ... ten days ago.” She looked steadily at Natalie. “It seems longer, somehow.”

“We were told that he was on a leave of absence,” Natalie said, as much to herself as to Mrs. Chisholm.

“Mommy, don’t,” Philip said, pulling more firmly on her arm, alarmed. He realized that his mother was upset, and he was frightened. “Let’s go, Mommy.”

“It’s all right, Philip.” She lifted him into her arms. “Mommy has had some bad news, but it isn’t about you.” All the same, she pulled the child closer to her as she spoke.

“Is this your little boy?” asked Mrs. Chisholm, obviously relieved to have something else to talk about.

“Yes. This is Philip. He’s three and a half. And he already knows how to read his name. Don’t you, Philip.” She hated herself for this, for showing off her child. She remembered how much her mother had done it to her, and how she had squirmed.

“I can read,” Philip announced, eyes owl-wide.

“This is Mrs. Chisholm, Philip. She’s a friend of Mommy’s and Daddy’s. I haven’t seen her for a while.”

“He’s such a beautiful child. You’re very fortu-nate, very fortunate. Edward and I never had any, you know. We couldn’t afford them. My sister has two. She’s very proud of them, of course. Edward and I used to enjoy seeing them. He was very fond of children.”

Natalie sat with Mrs. Chisholm, talking about the weather, the condition of the city, the sad state of the local political squabbles, the new Limited Family tax plan, the rumors of famine in Mexico. There was no further mention of the chef.

Then, just as Natalie turned to go, Mrs. Chisholm leaned over and whispered, “They said it was his heart, you know, but it wasn’t. It was something else. They didn’t tell me, but I know it was something else. Edward’s heart was as steady as a rock. I used to be a nurse. I know.”

Cautiously, Natalie asked, “Do you have any idea what it might have been?”

“No. And that worries me. They wouldn’t let me see him, not at any time after he took sick. They wouldn’t even let me call him. They kept us apart. They said, at the hospital...”

“Westbank?” Natalie asked, wondering how Chisholm could have been in her hospital and she not know it.

“No, Strickland Memorial.” Mrs. Chisholm frowned. “I don’t know why they sent him there. They said that seeing me would upset him. But we were married thirty-eight years... I know he wanted to talk to me...” She dabbed at her eyes again, making a motion as if to fend off an attack.

“But what was wrong with him? Did they keep him in isolation?”

“Edward shouldn’t have died alone.”

She sounded so miserable, so frightened that Natalie was ready to discount her suspicions as the fancy of a lonely old woman. She put her hand on Mrs. Chisholm’s shoulder, an awkward gesture of comfort. “I’m sure they did all they could to save him.”

“They didn’t, you know.” She turned, looking evenly at Natalie. “They took him away. They told me he had been transferred to Central Intensive when I went to Strickland Memorial, but there was no record of him at Central Intensive.”

The image of Alan Mathew Reimer rose before Natalie to haunt her. He, too, had been transferred without a trace.

“I’m sorry, Mrs. Chisholm. It must have been dreadful,” she said, finding her fear returning.

After that, there was little to say. They parted company near the duck pond. Philip and Natalie walked back toward the housing complex. When Philip grew tired, Natalie lifted him, thinking how heavy he was becoming. As she walked, she tried to unravel the mystery she had found. Isobel Chisholm was not a woman to dramatize her grief, and if what she said was true, the Reimer boy’s case was not an isolated incident, but a new practice.

“What’s wrong, Mommy?” Philip demanded as they neared their building.

“Oh, nothing, Philip. Your mommy is a worry-wart. Come on, I’ll take you to the center and I have to get back to work.”

“Why did that lady cry?” he asked.

Natalie looked down at her son, seeing how fragile he was. “She was frightened, Philip. And she was sad.”

“Are you frightened?” His eyes, the same faded green as herown, were serious and intent. “Mommy?”

“Yes,” she said. “I’m beginning to think I am.”

W
HEN SHE ARRIVED AT THE HOSPITAL
, the girl Natalie had tested for diphtheria had been transferred. After two phone calls, Natalie knew that there was no way she could locate the child. When she told Gil this, he raised an eyebrow.

“She had diphtheria,” Natalie said in a steady low tone. “I ran some tests on the sample you left for me yesterday.”

“What does Mark have to say about this?”

A fleeting pain passed over Natalie’s face. “Mark didn’t run the series. I did. He was busy.”

Gil wondered at the bitterness in her voice. “Say, Nat, you’re all right, aren’t you? Is anything bothering you?”

“Of course something is bothering me. Two kids dead of diseases they can’t possibly have. That’s bothering me. And Chisholm’s dead, did you know? I saw Isobel today and she’s not satisfied that he had heart trouble. They transferred him, too, Gil. She doesn’t know where he died. There’s a lot that’s bothering me, like what’s going to happen if this thing grows ...”

“Chisholm’s dead?”

She quieted immediately. “I hadn’t meant to mention Chisholm. You won’t say anything, will you, Gil?”

“No, not if you don’t want me to. But what happened?” He glanced over his shoulder toward the nurses’ station, and was relieved to see that the two women there were paying no attention.

“I don’t know. That’s the terrible part.”

“Hey,” he chided her, “come on. It’s not that bad. There’s just a big misunderstanding, that’s all.”

She laughed sharply. “A misunderstanding. Of course.” She moved away from him. “Let’s start rounds, Gil.”

This was not what he had anticipated, but he accepted it. Doctors had certain privileges that paramedics had to respect. He let it go, thinking that she might open up later while they were on their break.