Morning Is a Long Time Coming (19 page)

The doctor began asking (in real American-style English) a lot of questions such as: Exactly where is the pain? How would you describe the pain? What did you eat last?

As I pointed to the spot, I struggled to find words to convey the fearful sensation of a heart paralyzed by pain.

Then abruptly, as if he’d heard it all before, the doctor spoke to one of the attendants. “I want a G.I. series. Call X-ray. Tell them we’re sending Patricia Bergen right up. Tell them that I want a flat plate of the abdomen and to give me a wet reading as quickly as possible.”

“You mean ... it’s not my heart.”

The doctor made reassuring taps on my shoulder. “Your heart sounds okay, but I want to keep you here in the hospital while we run some tests on your stomach.”

I motioned Madame to me and this time it was I who reached out for her hand while explaining in my best Alliance-Française French about the doctor’s initial findings. When I heard her sigh, I felt at the same time warmed and saddened that it was a stranger who cared that I was sick. “What’s the matter, Patricia? Did somebody say
boo
to you?” Actually cared whether I would live or whether I would die.

23

W
HEN
I
WOKE,
it was too dark to see my watch, but it felt as though it had to be not later than three o’clock in the morning. Anyway, everything began coming back in orderly procession: the argument, the freezing walk, the old church of St. Severin, my sickness, Madame, and finally this room here in the American Hospital.

I stretched out, feeling tired, but strangely exhilarated to be both warm and free of pain. I remembered too how that
happened. Twice the doctor had given me a pain reliever by mouth and twice it had ended up in a pool of cream-colored vomit. But the third time, the phenobarbital bypassed the stomach for a direct entry into the bloodstream via a hypodermic needle.

Actually I couldn’t believe how good I felt, especially for someone who had only hours before been given bad news. “Your X-rays, Miss Bergen, indicate the presence of a four-millimeter lesion, a good-size ulcer in the lower duodenum.” Still I felt a whole lot more than merely comfortable. Sort of out there floating in phenobarbital-colored space.

And, my dear Dr. Kopelman, there’s something to be said for you. Relieving me like you did (under the most honorable of conditions) of all my responsibilities.

Maybe, though, the catalyst was God himself wearing the bold black stripes of a referee and signaling down to earth: “That girl looks weary. I’m calling time out!”

Here at the American Hospital, the days passed, and I liked the way they were passing in pleasant slow motion. Outside of having to drink my cream and eat my chalk, nobody demanded anything of me. And I was neither in pain nor lonely. Roger came every evening, and during the day there was that endless bridge game in the solarium which was usually seeking a fourth hand.

The hospital library had a lot of good old stuff, and occasionally some pretty good new stuff. My favorite was a brand new book by a first novelist called
Other Voices, Other Rooms.
That one I read twice.

The door opened and Diatra, a nurse’s aide from Sicily, walked through carrying my glass of cream, accompanied by
two chalky pills. I made an involuntary face and Diatra responded with an if-you-only-knew-how-good-this-is-for-you face of her own. One reason, I suspect, that Diatra has such expressive looks is that she never much bothered to learn either French or English.

After she left with the drained glass, I pulled open the drawer of my bedside table to get a lemon drop which better than anything cuts the combination of chalk and cream. That’s when I saw the letter. I told myself that I had already read it, and one thing is sure, this letter doesn’t deserve an encore.

Before coming to the hospital last night, Roger stopped at the general delivery counter of American Express and, sure enough, they had handed him this. I slipped the letter from the envelope and despite my reluctance began reading:

January 1, 1951

Dear Patricia,

Well, I guess you sure can be real proud of yourself. You did just what you said you were going to do when you up and ran off like you did to Paris, France. Just the same, I sincerely hope that you can have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year so far away from your loved ones.

I’m going to tell you the truth (your daddy doesn’t think it’s going to do a speck of good) as only a mother can tell it, and I sure hope you have enough understanding to take it like a daughter should.

Patricia, I beg of you to please come home for everybody’s sake. We need you. I had to go to the doctor’s. He put me on nerve pills, but don’t worry any about me. Worry about your daddy!!! He’s too proud (you
know how he is) to tell you himself, but he’s plenty hurt. Everybody in town knows where you are and they tease him and he tries to bear up, but it’s so hard.

Like last week, George Henkins was in the store and he made a point to tell your dad that he oughta be more like him. Mr. Henkins bragged that he’s the boss over his land, his niggers and his womenfolk.

Your daddy and I want you to know that we’re not going to bear grudges for what you did to us. If you’ll just come right on home as soon as possible, all will be forgiven. It’s
not
too late to build a new life for yourself. Please, Patricia, because we
are
your parents and we do love you.

Love and kisses,

Mother

PS. When you write, please don’t fill up your pages with any more long descriptions of churches and other buildings. You know we’re not interested in that sort of thing.

I put her letter back into the drawer, took out a pen, and addressed an aerogram:

Mr. & Mrs. Harry Bergen

c/o Bergen’s Dept. Store

Jenkinsville, Arkansas

U.S.A.

Dear Mother,

As you requested, this letter will be devoid of “any descriptions of churches and other buildings.” What this letter will be is another serious attempt to show you why I’m unable to grant you your request to return to Jenkinsville.

Just because a few people like Mr. George C. Henkins razzed my father because I have traveled to a foreign country shouldn’t make either of us uncomfortable. And, anyway, since when did Mr. Henkins (who Father himself has referred to as “a third generation high level crook”) become qualified to pass down moral judgments on others?

His statement to Father that he’s “boss over his land, his Negroes, and his womenfolk” says to me that he’s a more successful tyrant than Father. And I certainly wouldn’t challenge the accuracy of that statement. Because it’s quite true that Father is no longer boss over me.

Lately, I’ve had a lot of time to think about things and I have come up with at least one conclusion. And that is that I can never again live in Jenkinsville. Now that should, in no way, surprise you. You know that I want to explore something more of the world and you also know (for whatever reasons) we never did get along.

At home, I remember being too often emotionally upset and physically sick. One of the things you were fond of telling people was that I was “the biggest puker in town.” That used to get you a few laughs. Remember?

Well, what made me puke so much, I have recently discovered, is a peptic ulcer. At this moment, I’m writing you from my bed in the American Hospital, but by the time you receive this I will already be discharged.

My bills are being covered by a special fund of the American Student’s and Artist’s Center. I spoke with the Episcopal minister who administers the fund and
every time I told him that I’d pay him back as soon as possible, he responded by telling me not to worry so much.

I’m feeling pretty good now thanks to the really excellent care that I’m receiving and my doctor says that he wouldn’t be surprised if my next X-ray showed complete healing.

Now healing is one thing and preventing another lesion from developing is quite another. Besides diet and medication which I’ll probably be on for the rest of my life, I have to avoid high tensions and prolonged aggravations. So you see, there’s absolutely no possibility that I could ever again live in Jenkinsville.

I sincerely wish that I was able to help you both with the problems that my being here has caused, but I can’t at this time help anybody else for I’m just now learning how to help myself.

Love,

Patty

I sealed the envelope and got to remembering how I grew up believing that I was really tough. Tough enough to tolerate anybody’s punishment. And tough enough that nobody in this world would ever be capable of destroying that which was indestructible.

Indestructible. I know more about that now. The ulcer taught me that there’s no such thing as indestructible. It’s just another one of my Webster’s International Dictionary words. Just another word located somewhere between inclement and ineligible.

The ulcer also taught me a little something about guilt. It showed me that I didn’t have to feel all that guilty anymore, for they weren’t the only ones paying a price.

The door opened and Roger came into the room, lighting it up. He came directly to my bed to give me a kiss which seemed to reach deep within my body. Then he nodded back toward the door.

“I know,” I told him. “You don’t have to say it.”

“But wouldn’t you think,” he said, insisting upon saying it, “that a truly civilized hospital would provide their patients with a little privacy?”

I laughed. “Only Kopelman knows for sure.”

“Oh, I have something for you,” he said, suddenly making me aware of the ubiquitous bag. Roosevelt had his black cape, Hitler his jodhpurs, and Roger his tote. Of all symbols, it struck me that his was the only one totally lacking in self-aggrandizement. For what is more open, more giving than a bag?

“Pears,” he said, bringing out two perfectly formed ones.

“My favorite.”

“I know.”

“You’re nice to remember that.”

He looked back into the bag. A troubled look moved across his face. “There’s something else.”

“What?”

“I’ve been too busy—I never did get around to returning them.” He deposited the pair of once-rejected fleece-lined black boots on my lap. “In case you haven’t looked out the window, let me tell you that the real world is cold and slushy.”

I felt a sudden on-rush of feeling for this man. I brought him to me, using his shoulder to rest against. “You’re easy to love.”

“I want to be ... for you.”

“I mean, I’ve only known you for a few months.”

“Almost four.”

“And I’ve known them all my life and yet you give me so much more. You’re a much finer person than they are! I know that now. Why, do you think my father would care if my feet were dry? I can’t imagine that he would. So, if you’re the better man, then why do I consistently use him for the standard? He’s a lousy standard!”

Roger shrugged. “He’s all you’ve known. We French have a saying, ‘Nous marions nos propres couchemars.’ ”

“We marry our own nightmares?”

“That you are destined to seek from a husband what you have already experienced from a father.”

I thought about that until I thought I heard a slight knocking sound. There it was again, shy and tentative. “Oui,” I called out, “entrez.”

The door opened a wedge and then a face, a woman’s face that I had seen before but couldn’t immediately identify, emerged. “Est-ce que je peux entrer?”

I did know her! That’s the same face. It was Madame, who kept me from collapsing at the church’s baptismal font and comforted me all the way to the hospital. Surprisingly, she was a good deal younger than I had remembered (or to be still more accurate, probably needed to believe). “Oh, my God, yes it’s really you! Of course, you may come in,” I said, waving her enthusiastically toward me.

Now her step quickened, losing all hesitancy. She was now approaching me as though we were very old friends, who had only inadvertently been separated by time or space. We embraced and then we laughed and embraced once again.

“Vous allez bien?” she asked. “N’est-ce pas?”

“Oh, absolument. Merci beaucoup pour votre assistance—oh,” I said, turning to look at Roger, who seemed a lot less surprised than I felt. “This is who I told you about. The lady that I thought I’d never get to thank because I never learned her name.”

Roger stood and, with a kind of easy dignity, introduced himself and then for the first time, I heard her say her name ... Olivia Marcou. It was Olivia Marcou.

She explained that she had been wanting to visit me for some time, to see how I was getting along, but her employer at the stationery store had been keeping her late.

I heard myself expressing genuine surprise that she worked. Oh, I knew even as I said it that it sounded dumb, but I never thought of her as actually working. Unless, of course, she was Mother Superior of an orphanage or something extraordinarily useful like that.

That’s when it struck me that surprisingly, since she was so important to me, I knew practically nothing about Olivia Marcou. I didn’t know if she was married or single. Did she have children? How many and how old? Did she love them? A lot?

And I wondered about Olivia Marcou as a little girl—the games she played and the toys she cherished.

No, I didn’t know the first thing about her. Or maybe I did know the first thing. And the first thing became everything: When I needed her, she was there.