A White Room (34 page)

After Ethel calmed down, I retrieved my bag and pulled out the laudanum. Although made of opium, laudanum couldn’t relieve his pain, and stronger tinctures were not available through a druggist. The country had grown fearful of opium’s dangerous effects after newspapers warned that Chinese migrants spread opium abuse and addiction, so laws had been passed restricting its use to strange places in the cities called dens. Morphine was one of the strongest opium derivatives, but it was controlled by medical practitioners. I couldn’t get it without Dr. Bradbridge. I gave Larry more than the usual amount of the opium mixture, no longer fearing the consequences of liberal dosing. Then I gave him some extracts made from dandelion root, a diuretic, hoping it might help dispel the liquid in his limbs, but I didn’t know if it would work. I’d also brought some camphor liniment to ease itching. I gave them all to Ethel and told her how to administer them.

“I swear, Mrs. Dorr, he doesn’t drink.”

“I believe you.”

She rolled the medicines out of her hand onto the floor next to Larry. “I’ll get your things,” she said between sobs and sniffles. She went to the trunk and pulled my clothes out. She occasionally whimpered as she helped me re-dress. What would she do without a husband? She wasn’t just going to lose the man she loved. Without him, she and Jacob would not survive.

I clasped her arms and looked into her puffy eyes. “It’s not over. I will do everything I can. If anything can be done, it will be done.”

She nodded with her eyes down. I think she had placed all her hope in the real physician. I know I had.

Thirty-Two

1900

The Evans’ Residence

St. Louis, Missouri

M
y father screamed. He screamed! It sounded like a bull charging, tearing through walls, breaking glass, having been poked and prodded and stabbed into a frenzy. I had never heard my father outright scream before. I barreled up the stairs and raced down the hall only to be halted by the doctor at the door. “What happened?”

James made it a second later. “What’s going on?”

Then my mother rushed up behind us. “What’s wrong?”

Dr. Morris dried his hands with a cloth, but they were stained pink. “The tumor is out.”

My father wailed.

“Then why is he screaming?” I asked.

“He’s waking up from the chloroform, and the morphine I gave him hasn’t taken effect, but it’s all right. He won’t be in any pain in a few minutes.”

“But the surgery? He’s supposed to be better,” James said.

“The pain is from the surgery.”

My father moaned again from behind the door.

“Did it not work?” my mother asked.

“We have to wait and see.” He lowered his voice and locked eyes with my mother. “As I stated before, he will likely need more surgery and the chances are…”

“But why is he in so much pain from the surgery?” James demanded.

“He’s going to be in a lot of pain now, and it may worsen. You’ll have to give him regular doses of morphine.” He looked back at my mother. “Mrs. Evans, I will explain how you can administer it yourself.”

The sounds from the room quieted.

“Mrs. Evans, we should speak about what happens next,” Dr. Morris said.

“Excuse me.” I stepped around him and into my father’s room. I shut the door with two clicks. There he lay without a shirt, his stomach bloated and red, black stitching digging deep into blue and purple skin in a jagged line across his stomach. “Father?”

“Sara?” He whispered my mother’s name.

“It’s Emeline. Mother’s outside. Do you want me to get her?”

“No,” he whispered. He appeared to be near sleep.

The wash basin still held brownish water that Dr. Morris had used to clean his instruments. He had cleared off the dressing table nearby to lay them out. A bottle of morphine and a syringe lay on the nightstand atop a folded white cloth. I inched to the side of the bed next to the cleared-off table. To think Dr. Morris had been in here—standing right here—cutting something out of my father.

“Emeline.”

“Yes?”

“It hurts. God, it hurts.”

I hesitated, shocked to hear him use the Lord’s name. “The doctor said he gave you something.”

“No. No. I can feel it. I can feel everything…inside.”

“I’m going to get the doctor.”

“Wait. Don’t leave.”

I darted back and took his hand. “I’m here. I’m here.” I couldn’t avoid staring at the stitched wound across his belly. I noticed wet blood along the seams, gleaming.

“I can’t stand it.” He moaned through clenched teeth as if he were holding up twice his weight. “I can’t stand it.”

“The doctor said—”

“Make it stop. God, make it stop.”

I glanced at the morphine on the nightstand. I snatched up the bottle and quickly read the tiny printed instructions. Doctors were recommended to give a certain dosage and then a subsequent dosage if the first did not take effect within fifteen to twenty minutes. I took the syringe from the clean cloth. I inserted the needle, pulled the plunger and watched the liquid fill to the appropriate level. I pulled it out and pushed the plunger just a little to force air out. I remembered Miss McKenzie showing me how at the Grantville infirmary. I inserted the needle into his forearm and gently pushed the plunger.

“Thank you.” He exhaled. “Thank you.” He relaxed.

What did it feel like to feel your insides, to feel where they had been sliced and nipped and stretched and sewn back together? I knew that thick layers of fat and muscle and tissue sat between the skin and the stomach. Dr. Morris had had to cut through all of it to reach the tumor attached to the inner lining of my father’s stomach. I cringed as I forced myself to imagine it, as if facing his agony could somehow take it all away. If I could take all of his pain and feel it for him, I would. I would take it all.

Thirty-Three

October 1901

Labellum, Missouri

B
efore I knew it, it was the night before the dinner party. September had come and gone so quickly with all that had happened with Annie and the Hughmens and with Walter having almost discovered us. I sat in the parlor and meticulously double-checked everything because I had found myself confusing recipes with cures. John sat nearby reading, completely unperturbed about the approaching event. He had no reason to fret. Everything, from the preparation of the house and food to the conversation, relied on the wife. The hostess was responsible for keeping conversation light, away from politics, religion, and gossip. Some of our guests loved to gossip, but I needed to keep their manners to the highest standards for Mr. and Mrs. Hawtrey, who would not be used to such behavior at a dinner party.

I heard a knock at the door and for a moment actually thought time had sped up and the dinner guests were arriving. “What?” I stopped and looked at John.

“Was that a knock?” he asked.

I sighed and laughed. “I thought I imagined it.”

“Who’d be calling at this hour?” He snapped his book closed and stood.

It was probably someone from Mr. Coddington’s office with some urgent matter. I returned to my checklist of worries for the dinner party. I feared for Ethel. I couldn’t imagine her having to be near Dr. Benedict Bradbridge after the way he treated her husband. I told her she didn’t need to serve at the party—I would happily give her the money, but she insisted. Then Larry told me she needed it, to feel useful, and he wanted to spend some time alone with his son, so I acquiesced. After Dr. Bradbridge’s visit, I read every book I could find on liver disease but found nothing on effective treatments. I visited every day to tend to Larry’s bedsores and see if Ethel needed anything like help with cleaning or with watching Jacob.

“Emeline?” John said from the parlor’s entrance.

I didn’t look up. “Yes?”

“You have a visitor.”

A wave of alarm hit my stomach and then rushed to my head. A patient? An emergency? What would I say to John? I stood, turned, and stopped. A young man with chestnut hair stood in the hallway. He wore a crisp gray suit with a striped tie stuffed under a matching waistcoat. A small woman hung on his arm. She had dark hair, nearly black under a crimson ostrich-plumed hat. She wore a cherry-red traveling suit, and her lips, although not painted, somehow matched.

“Good evening,” he said cheerfully.

I didn’t move. I could hardly breathe. My heart pounded and my lips shook. “James?”

“James? What are you doing here?”

He stepped into the parlor with the girl still hooked to his arm. “I thought it would be appropriate to visit so you could meet my wife.” He beamed. “Mrs. Carmine Evans, this is Mr. and Mrs. John Dorr.”

Carmine? Like her dress?

“Delighted.” She had a small voice.

I looked incredulously from James to Carmine and back.

“Forgive me for not sending word,” he said. “There wasn’t enough time.”

Still, I stared, bereft of speech. Why should he have informed me of his visit. He hadn’t even informed me that he’d moved up his wedding. The letter had said spring.

“Well this is marvelous timing.” John stepped over. “A time for celebration. We are having a dinner party tomorrow night with the best of Labellum society. You’ll meet them all.”

I didn’t speak. Was my mouth open?

“We wouldn’t want to impose.”

“No, no, of course not. Emeline prepared a feast. There are plenty of spare rooms.” John grinned at me and put his hand on James’ back and they headed for the door. “Let me help you with your things.”

I stood across from Carmine. She forced an uncomfortable smirk before twirling around and following them outside, leaving me standing there alone. I hesitated for a moment, exhaled, and walked to the open doorway. Outside, they hauled luggage off a buggy without a driver. Carmine stood on the landing at the top of the stairs outside the house. She acknowledged me with a dainty glance when I came up beside her. I folded my arms and studied her. She was young.

The men took in several bags, and Carmine and I followed. I kept my arms crossed.

“We can leave the rest for morning,” James said before turning to me. “Well, dear sister, are you going to tell me how you are?”

I responded in monotone. “Well.”

“Ah.” His smile faded.

John furrowed his brow and rubbed the back of his neck as he observed me with confusion. “She’s exhausted, I’m sure. She’s been planning for the party day and night for the last week.”

“Is that right?” James asked.

“Oh, yes,” John said. “She’s amazing.”

I eyed John.

“We’re quite exhausted ourselves,” James said.

“Let me show you to a room.” John led James and Carmine away. I lingered behind.

“What a lovely home,” Carmine said.

I glared at the back of her head.

“From outside it appears to be a two-story.”

“The stairs are hidden away at the end of this hall,” John said as we veered left.

“I see,” James said.

“It has an interesting layout. An architectural wonder!”