A Pocketful of Rye

  ‘I’ll have to incise and go into the jugular.’

  She already had the lancet. He was too far gone to feel the incision I made in his neck. His eyes, glazed like the eyes of a dead fish, stared glassily towards the ceiling. And finally there it was, thin as a bird’s windpipe. I inserted the canula, then with my one free hand I simply broke the cord of my pyjama pants and let them drop with my trousers. Holding the other needle tight between my thumb and second finger I felt with my free forefinger for the big throb, just below the inguinal canal. I had it. Finally, with the unspoken thought: this is it!: I plunged the needle deep and laterally into my right femoral artery. I knew at once I had hit the big artery of the leg, the shock ran all through me.

  I kept it going, controlling the tube between my finger and thumb. I didn’t want to choke him up at the start. After a long moment the Matron said:

  ‘It does well, Herr Doktor.’ She had a finger on his left carotid. ‘The pulse begins.’

  The change, if you had not seen it before, or perhaps you would not wish to, was spectacular. He began to lose that shrunken look, to fill out and gain colour like an inflated breath test balloon. The pulse in his neck was quite visible now and his lungs were making up for lost time. Then his eyes flickered and he looked straight at me.

  It gave me the damnedest, silliest feeling I had ever had in my entire life. I wanted to burst, laughing at myself. Carroll, the sob-sister’s dream. What a squirt, standing there, completely debagged, leaning against the table for support, pants tangled around the ankles, the personal article dangling visible and loose. How in the name of everything correct and proper had I ever landed myself in such a clownish situation? Only because it was my fate to be wrong-way Carroll. My unlucky star, with a devilish sense of humour, had arranged it for me. I could not escape it. That was my one alibi that saved me from being a creep. I hated it worse when Hulda said:

  ‘Oh, it is so goot, fuhlt sich viel besser.’

  As I didn’t answer, she asked, hurriedly:

  ‘But he will bleed again?’

  ‘He’s getting enough healthy platelets to clot everything for weeks.’

  Actually, I was beginning to feel slack at the knees, but to punish myself and because I wanted no repeat of this performance, I would give him the full quota.

  ‘I think now he goes straight asleep.’ Hulda breathed it into my left earhole.

  Probably the alcohol still in my blood from the Kirsch was sending him over. Do him good too, the little rat. Better ease this over with Matron.

  ‘I took a simple hypnotic before turning in, he’s probably got a trace of it.’

  ‘Goot.’

  It had to end some time. He’d had more than enough now and was fast asleep. I disconnected, at the cost of another femoral spasm, put two fine stitches in his neck incision. He barely moved. Matron had everything ready and without blinking an eye at my private possessions, carefully and firmly taped the puncture on my leg. Then she settled him in the bed and covered him up. I didn’t want to see him again for years.

  ‘Now I go tell the poor mother all is well.’

  ‘Do that,’ I said. ‘But don’t let her disturb him.’

  ‘I return quickly.’

  Now I was glad to sit down. I shut my eyes and rested my head on one hand. I felt light on top, as though I had emptied my brains into him. Not that he needed them. Matron was back.

  ‘Ach, she has such relief, poor woman. But you must take her also a sleeping pill, or surely she vill not rest.’

  ‘Okay,’ I said, giving the stupidest affirmative in Christendom. It shows how low I felt.

  ‘Now I make you some coffee.’

  I refused it.

  ‘I want to sleep too.’

  I stood up. She was between me and the door. I couldn’t avoid it when she took my hand. What’s the matter with you Carroll, everyone wants to hold your hand?

  ‘Herr Doktor.’ She drew a deep breath. ‘ I think … I know I misjudge you. That was a most fine action.’

  There it comes again. Green lights and soft music. Carroll, the bloodgiving hero, pride of the comic strip.

  The old battle-axe was killing me. She kept watching me like a mother hen as I got a couple of sodium amytal capsules out of my bag – those red and green knockouts.

  ‘Good night,’ I said.

  ‘Gute Nacht, mein lieber Herr Doktor.’

  Chapter Sixteen

  As I struggled across the courtyard against the wind the village clock struck two, the sound muffled by the driving sleet. In the chalet a single window showed a narrow rectangle of light. I went in, without knocking, in a hurry. I needed sleep, and meant to make this short.

  She was seated on the edge of her bed, in her thin, cheap dressing-gown, bent forward, half supporting herself with an elbow on her knee. Although she had shed the coat and the wet nightdress, she still had on the snow boots. ‘I’ve brought you a couple of sleeping pills.’

  She came out of her thoughts with a start. Beyond that she did not move or speak. I went over and gave them to her. At least she let me put them in her free hand. A bottle was standing on the dressing-table. I saw the special clinic mark on it, the big copying ink: M.B.

  ‘Stolen from the store cupboard,’ I said.

  ‘How else would I get it?’ she said dully, adding an after thought. ‘You know I’m broke. And God knows I’m not a drunk, but just like yourself, Carroll, I need a drink occasionally. I did tonight.’

  I could agree with her there. She had that broken-down look about her I had noticed when she first arrived, but now there was no fight in her. It bothered me.

  ‘Don’t take the pills then. Brandy and the barbiturates don’t mix.’

  ‘Who cares?’ She sipped the brandy, it was neat.

  There was a silence.

  ‘I suppose I ought to thank you.’

  ‘Save it. I’m going to bed.’

  ‘Couldn’t you do with a drink? On the house.’

  I hesitated. I felt all in, the walls of the room had begun to tilt, and the label on the bottle said Martell Three Stars.

  ‘In your own interests,’ I said, when I had fetched a tumbler from the bathroom, ‘ don’t let your pal the Matron see this bottle. She already has strong suspicions in your direction. By the way, did you knock over a glass flask when you were pilfering?’

  ‘Yes. I heard someone coming. It broke.’

  So what? I merely said: ‘I’d forget that, if I were you.’ The cognac was good. The only chair was occupied by her wet coat, hung over the back to dry. I sat down on the bed. She was so unnaturally silent and depressed I had to know why.

  ‘What’s biting you, Davigan?’

  She did not answer for a minute.

  ‘For one thing I’ve just realized how ill Daniel is.’

  ‘You care?’

  ‘You think I don’t?’

  ‘On the evidence, I think you’re a pretty well-seasoned character, Davigan.’

  ‘What evidence, Carroll?’

  ‘Circumstantial.’

  ‘Because I don’t whimper and weep? I’ve stoppered up my feelings so long it’s become a habit not to show them.’

  Was it the brandy? We were mugging it like a couple of cross-talk comedians. It had to stop.

  ‘Let’s just say: You’ve had a rough passage, Davigan, and it shows.’

  There was a pause, then she said:

  ‘Have it your way, Carroll. Your trouble is you only think the worst of people.’

  ‘I’ve only seen the worst.’

  ‘That’s all you’ve ever looked for.’ And she gave me a long sad look that made me drop my eyes. Naturally I lamped her big ridiculous boots.

  ‘Why don’t you take off those blasted snow boots? You look so damn pathetic in them,’ I shouted, and pushing her back, I made a double swoop, unzippered them, and tore them off.

  Upended like this, lying back, with her knees up and apart and her thin wrapper flung open, she gazed up at me with such
a look of silent pleading and half frightened appeal, it hit me like a bomb. Everything seemed to happen instinctively and at once, and we were in bed under the blanket, her arms were locked around me, and her terribly wet tears running down my cheek.

  ‘You said you never wept, Cathy,’ I whispered.

  ‘This is my one big chance.’

  No one will ever get the record of those next long moments. Why should I pander to dirty minds like mine, and foul up what was certainly to that date the sweetest, and, in the aftermath, the most revealing experience of my slightly soiled life? The more so, since it might induce the false and pernicious hope that all was now set for a happy and sentimental reunion. Yet it is permissible to state that afterwards her arms still held me, as mine held her. She had no desire to free herself, roll over, and light a cigarette, until lust promoted another essay. Nor had I. Restful and at peace we still belonged to each other, united by the act, and grateful to one another. All frustration, all antagonism dissolved, there was in her a softness I would never have believed existed, nothing kept back in her response, a total surrender. Let’s be cynical and use Lotte’s jeering phrase: it was heart to heart, and roses round the door.

  She sighed at last, not releasing me.

  ‘Why didn’t we make a go of it, Laurie? It’s all been such a misery and a mess.’ I couldn’t stop her, she went on. ‘Davigan knew Daniel wasn’t his. Did he ever let me forget it? Poor man, I suppose it was hard for him too. He knew why I took him. Oh, if only you’d answered my letter.’

  ‘What letter?’

  ‘The one I wrote to the ship.’

  ‘I never had that letter,’ I said slowly, and it was the God’s truth.

  ‘How can I believe you, Laurie? You’re such a terrible liar, darling.

  But I love you, I always have, and heaven help me I always will. You know what, darling?’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  ‘Everything stems from that afternoon when we were kids in the woods. I’ve thought of it so often. Have you?’ Had I not? ‘That frustration … at the very moment … it set us against one another, made us fight each other.’

  ‘Hark at the little Kraffi-Ebing!’

  ‘It’s true. Let’s not quarrel any more, Laurence. You’re so sweet when you try.’

  ‘Shall I try again?’

  ‘Don’t desecrate it, Laurie. This isn’t just sex. I love you from my heart.’

  And she did, with all the rest too, snuggling to me afterwards and saying sleepily:

  ‘Don’t make me get up, love. That was always the worst. Creeping into that cold toilet like a drab.’

  How warm and comfortable and soft she was, her arms still round me. As she began to breathe deeply and quietly I felt myself sinking down, down into a sound and blissful sleep.

  Chapter Seventeen

  About a hundred years later I woke with a start. It must have been at least a hundred years for I felt that old. I was on my left side and a soft arm lay across my chest. With an effort I dismembered my wrist from the blankets and squinted at my watch. Ten minutes after nine. Not possible. But it was, and bright daylight glared in the room. Bright daylight and a cold indraught of air. Had that awakened me? I turned, with an effort, and there, with the open door behind her, unbelieving horror spread across her face, was the Matron.

  No, not a vision of the night, but sordid reality. The ultimate humiliating discovery on the morning after, the joke of the music-hall comedian, the lowest form of bedroom farce. What the butler saw! You could churn it out for a copper, turning the handle of the antique slot machine on some half-rotting pier.

  I did not find it amusing. My start had roused the third member of the party and for a long, long moment a painful silence bore down on the room.

  ‘You will come to my office in one hour.’ Hulda finally let this command go at me.

  Moving to the dressing-table, she picked up the brandy bottle, turned, and went out, holding it away from her like a hand grenade. The bang of the door shook the chalet, like an explosion.

  ‘Oh, God. I’m sorry, Carroll.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘We can’t laugh this one off.’

  I got out of bed slowly. She was before me. ‘ Just give me a few minutes and I’ll make your breakfast. Do let me, Carroll, I want to so much. There’s Nescafé and eggs and fresh bread in the kitchen. You need it, Carroll.’

  ‘I’d better not stay.’

  She saw that I meant it.

  While she watched me with concern, I began to drag on my garments. My joints creaked. The puncture in my leg was a permanent stitch. I felt myself a fully qualified candidate for the A.H.V. which, if you’re unfamiliar with these symbols, is the Swiss Old Age Pension.

  ‘What’ll happen?’

  ‘The worst.’

  ‘I’m sorry, dear,’ she said again, her hands still pressed together. ‘I love you and bring you nothing but harm.’

  I went across to my room.

  No coffee, no croissants, no fresh fruit on the sideboard. Deprived of these reviving elements, my spirits sagged lower. I would have given a lot for a sup of that cognac. I only had the Kirsch and the thought of that sugary draught was enough. I could have done with a good hot shower but I was already dressed. I brushed my teeth, not looking at myself in the glass, then shaved by the sense of touch. Naturally I nicked my chin. Now I had to look. More blood, I thought – it was watery and thin. When I’d finally made the cotton wool stick, I went out.

  First I had to see the fons et origo, the cause of all my trouble. He was sitting up in bed, washed, brushed and looking better than new. What else could you expect? All those rotten deceased white cells drained out of him and all that healthy blood pumped in. He was bursting with my red blood corpuscles. Just for the moment he was a brand new little bastard. I could have killed him.

  ‘Good morning, Laurence. I’ve been longing for you to come. How are you?’

  ‘Wunderbar. How are you?’

  ‘Wunderbar also. I’m feeling terribly fit. And I’ve just had a lovely breakfast from Matron.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Cereal and cream, soft poached egg and a glass of lovely pear juice.’

  ‘You’re making me hungry.’

  The pocket chess was there, on the side table by the bed.

  ‘How is the game going?’

  ‘Matron wouldn’t let me set it out on my knees. Not yet. So visually I’m replaying the one with Herr Bemmel. I see now where I could have used a better fifth move: Kt to Q7.’

  ‘Careful,’ I said. ‘Don’t let Bemmel win this one.’

  ‘Oh, this time I’m going to let him, just for fun.’

  ‘How’s the little scratch on your neck?’

  ‘Oh, fine.’ He looked at me archly. ‘Perhaps I cut myself shaving?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said sourly. ‘ Let’s say you’ve had a close shave.’ This was moderately witty for me, on such a morning, but he missed the point. He had no idea of what he had been through. I took his pulse.

  ‘Have your insides moved this morning?’

  ‘Yes. Matron said it was quite normal.’

  Matron was well in on this act now.

  ‘Well, take it easy. I’ll see you later.’

  ‘Please, Laurence. And … I know how you hate what you call slop … but thank you for everything.’

  While I was at it, I dragged myself round the ward. Sheer cowardice, of course, putting off the evil moment. Young Higgins, the synovitis case, had completely healed and could go home with the ex-pleurisy, the Jamieson girl, any day now, which would leave more room for the Christmas holiday lot. But why make Christmas arrangements, Carroll? You’ll not be here then, dear boy. I summoned up the blood, what was left of it, knocked at Matron’s door.

  ‘Herein.’

  I went in.

  She was at her desk, sitting up straight, waiting on me.

  This office was smaller than mine and furnished with her own things, surprisingly feminine – strange, I never thought o
f her as a woman; to me, despite the milk bars, she was sexless. Two finely worked samplers hung on the wall – how had she ever found time to stitch them? – and between them an old group photograph, row upon row of young nurses, already shapelessly garbed in white, novices of the night vigil – was she among them? She liked flowers and at the window, today, a fine pot of yellow chrysanthemums caught my gaze as, instinctively, it swivelled away from her.

  ‘Sitzen,’ she said, pointing to a chair. I sat. She looked me over. Already I had lost control of the interview.

  ‘Never,’ she went on, ‘ never in all my life, have I had such shock, such horror. To behave so, while that dear chile, so ill, was sleeping.’

  I studied the chrysanthemums in silence. They were the fine feathery variety that cost money.

  ‘And with the mother, too, which makes it most hateful of all.’

  Even though she slaughtered the syntax, she did make it sound pretty low. And for an instant I thought of coming clean and throwing the whole works at her. But no, that would not help. She would never believe me. That’s the worst of trifling with the truth. When you recite the Lord’s prayer they think you’re kidding them.

  ‘To spoil such fine work of that evening with such bad morality,’ she went on feelingly. ‘Are you not ashamed?’

  ‘I might be, Matron,’ I said humbly, ‘if I wasn’t so hungry.’

  She gave me another long look, then banged the little hand bell on her desk. The probationer came in, big-eyed, too scared to look at me. Had she been listening at the door?

  ‘Bring cafe crème and a croissant.’

  I could scarcely believe my ears. Was there, could there be, a gleam of hope, or was this merely the last wish of the condemned man?

  ‘Ja,’ she said, reading my surprise. ‘You do not deserve. And at first I am zo angry I begin a letter to the committee.’

  She broke off. The coffee and the crescent had arrived on a tray. They must have been ready and waiting by the stove. I balanced it on the arm of the chair and dunked the crescent.

  ‘But presently I think better. Perhaps it is not all blame for you. For a man such a thing is perhaps necessary, even forgivable. You see, although I am alte und grosse, I understand well the men and their neets.’ With one eye half closed she gave me a knowing look with just the suggestion of a leer, as if she had just read through the Kinsey Report. It would have been comic if it had not been so fortunate for me. Yet perhaps she did know. Perhaps some dirty old Swiss doctor had seduced her when she was a probationer. No, impossible, she was completely, inviolably virginal.