“Thank you,” he said.
She smiled happily and returned to her end of the table.
When Jesse was out of this house, walking the streets of Lockport, becoming familiar with this city—in which he would spend the rest of his life—he felt at times, undetermined, undefined, as he had felt in that awkward period during which the adoption was taking place. For weeks it was “taking place,” his fate being handed from one official to another, one welfare worker to another, adults who had no real interest in him, who did not know him. For a few minutes on the bridge this morning, his head ringing with the noise of the crashing waterfall, he had felt the same way. But when he was here, at home, especially when he was in the kitchen with Mrs. Pedersen, his very blood seemed to warm, to murmur his name to him. Jesse Pedersen. He ate the muffin hungrily, as if it were somehow mixed up with this feeling.… He must remember this. This moment in the kitchen, here, Mrs. Pedersen bent over the table, scraping a pile of onion skins into a container used for garbage, her nose round at its tip, a pudgy, girlish nose, her eyes slightly watering from the onions, her forehead warm and moist from the heat of the stove. He felt a fierce, powerful love for her, a certainty of love. He must remember this feeling. Sometimes when he strolled around Lockport alone, circling the high school he would attend in another month, he felt a strange despair, a sense of hollowness, emptiness, that was located in the center of his body, beneath his heart. It was a hunger that alarmed him. And when he turned toward home, headed home, his hunger increased as he walked, until by the time he entered the Pedersen home he was ravenous with hunger. This seemed to happen all the time.
“Jesse, dear, have another little muffin. It won’t spoil your appetite,” Mrs. Pedersen said. She buttered him another muffin and then buttered one for herself, her plump fingers moving quickly and deftly with the knife. On her fingers she wore several rings. One was a wedding band studded with small diamonds; the ring with it had a single large square-cut diamond. Flashes of light from these diamonds seemed to transfix Jesse. Diamonds! Mrs. Pedersen was a beautiful woman in spite of her size. Sometimes she smiled at him while Dr. Pedersen was speaking during one of their meals, and Jesse felt surprise, almost alarm, at the beauty of the woman’s face, squeezed and condensed by the bulk of her flesh, as if she reminded him of someone else, and the face she presented to him was not her true one.
“This is a delicious muffin, if I have to say so myself,” she said. She licked her fingers. She buttered another muffin for Jesse and another for herself, smiling happily. “Jesse, will you help me in the rose garden this afternoon? I hate to bother Henry. He has so many other things to do, he’s such a help to Dr. Pedersen and me, I hate to bother him with the roses.…”
“I’ll help you,” Jesse said.
“Oh, thank you. I would really appreciate it. Hilda hates the sun, she hates the outdoors and she’s contemptuous of my flowers—and Frederich, well, you know how Frederich is, he’s so wrapped up in his music—” She paused, her head inclined to one side. From another part of the house, as if from a distance of miles, came the single, spaced, choppy piano notes. For some reason Frederich played only one key at a time, with his forefinger. “Oh, dear,” Mrs. Pedersen said, looking at a tiny diamond-studded watch on her wrist, “dear, it’s almost time for Dr. Pedersen to come home! Please go and wash your hands and face, Jesse. Be sure you wash very carefully. You know how particular Dr. Pedersen is.…”
Jesse finished the muffin, brushing crumbs off his face, and went to wash up. Washing was a ritual, careful and solemn. All the Pedersens washed carefully, with a special medicinal soap; Jesse had been surprised at first, but after Dr. Pedersen explained to him the reasons for washing, for “scrubbing,” he understood, and remembered with disapproval the years of his life he had been dirty, his hands crawling with germs. Now he understood how the invisible world of germs ruled the visible world, how there were friendly bacteria and unfriendly bacteria, and how it was necessary to control them as much as possible. So he scrubbed his hands up to the elbows and washed his face.
When he went out to the dining room, Dr. Pedersen was just coming in. “Good afternoon, Jesse,” Dr. Pedersen said. The dining room was a large, sunny room with glass doors that opened onto the deep back yard, where roses and other flowers bloomed. Jesse’s heartbeat quickened at the sight of the table. In the center, a bouquet of yellow and pink roses in a silver container; a set of silver candlesticks; the tablecloth itself made of white lace, gleaming white, like an altar cloth. The five chairs around the table were cushioned in deep red velvet, four of them without arms and the fifth, at the head of the table, Dr. Pedersen’s chair, with elegant curved arms that were also cushioned.
Dr. Pedersen went up to wash and change his shirt, and when he reappeared, Mrs. Pedersen and Frederich had come to the table. Dr. Pedersen’s face was rosy. He clapped his hands together. “Ah, Mary, something smells delicious! You and Dora have been working hard all morning, I can tell.” He sat, beaming at them. Mrs. Pedersen made an impatient sound and got to her feet to fix a rose that was dangling over the side of the container, and Dr. Pedersen said, “Now, Mary, please relax! That rose is perfectly all right the way it is.”
“I’m sorry,” she said at once, sitting again.
She sat at the far end of the table, across from Dr. Pedersen. Jesse sat on Dr. Pedersen’s left, and Frederich would sit on his right. Hilda, who was not yet downstairs, would sit between Jesse and her mother.
“It has been a most exciting day at the Clinic so far,” Dr. Pedersen said. “You recall that puzzling case from Tonawanda, Dr. Harvey’s patient? The mysterious blood count? Oh, the lovely pink cytoplasm, the dark blue nuclei, what a puzzle to everyone! Well, it is finally solved; I hit upon the answer this morning. I had told Dr. Harvey again and again that only if I could see his patient, only if I could take hold of his patient’s hands and examine him, could I give him any kind of diagnosis.… Frederich, how are you on this excellent day?”
“Very well, Father,” Frederich said politely.
“Did you have a profitable morning?”
“Yes, I think so.”
Frederich’s manner was cool, courteous, even a little distracted.
“I’m glad to hear that,” Dr. Pedersen said enthusiastically. His face was slick and luminous when he was surrounded by his family. At such times his skin took on a damp, eager, healthy tone, as if the flesh were somehow in motion, warmed by motion. He was a wonderful man.… Jesse found himself staring at Dr. Pedersen as if memorizing his face. No matter how much he tried to remember, he was always surprised by the actual man, the actual face. Dr. Pedersen, so many years older than Frederich, really looked as young as his son. It was uncanny. Frederich was seventeen years old, but he looked middle-aged at times. He was very happy, very fat. He weighed more than two hundred fifty pounds, perhaps three hundred pounds.… He was not tall, not even as tall as Jesse, so that this weight was squeezed into a series of ridges and rolls and protuberances. He carried himself slowly, ponderously, with a habitual drag to his left foot. He spent most of his time in the house, up in his room on the second floor or back in the music room, where he sat in a special leather armchair at the piano, studying his music, picking experimentally at notes, scribbling onto a large piece of paper. The air of the house vibrated with his music—single notes, clear and stubborn little notes that were never hurried, like Frederich himself. Frederich’s face was small for the rest of his body, prematurely lined, with a mouth like his father, small and monkish. His forehead was pale and rather bony, unlike the lower part of his face. Perhaps because his brown hair had already begun to thin out, his forehead looked prominent. He sat quietly at the dinner table, unfolding his white napkin in two even, measured movements, and placing it on his lap. Jesse could see how his forefinger, at rest on the edge of the table, moved nervously, almost imperceptibly, as if it were still picking out notes on the piano.
“That Hildie,” Dr. Pedersen said, shaking his head. “W
hy is she always tardy?”
“I’m sure she’ll be right down,” Mrs. Pedersen said.
Dr. Pedersen frowned. Jesse watched his face intently, hoping that he would glance over at him and see that he was right on time, nicely washed and scrubbed and ready for lunch. Dr. Pedersen had instructed Jesse on the proper behavior for mealtimes, at home or away: “There is a small statue of yourself in your body, and it is that statue you must observe. Stability. Certainty. You will have the patience and the faith of concrete.”
Jesse tried to imagine a small statue of himself inside himself.
“And you, Jesse, how have you passed your morning? Have you been helping your mother with her rose bushes?”
“He’s going to help me this afternoon,” Mrs. Pedersen said.
“What have you been doing then, Jesse?”
“Reading a book.”
Dr. Pedersen sighed and smiled. “No. Not reading a book, Jesse. You do not reply to questions in that guttural, abbreviated way.” He reached out to pat Jesse’s arm. “You reply in quite another manner, don’t you?”
“I was reading a book,” Jesse said, embarrassed.
“Yes. And what is this book, Jesse?”
“A book on the canal—”
Dr. Pedersen shook his head, annoyed. Frederich, who had been staring down at his plate distractedly, now glanced up at Jesse in surprise.
“I mean—I meant it is a book on the canal, a book about DeWitt Clinton and the political background of the Erie Barge Canal, the building of the canal—” And Jesse talked on quickly, while Dr. Pedersen nodded. He gave the appearance of being very interested in what Jesse said. He blinked in such a manner, so studious himself, that Jesse had the idea he might be checking off Jesse’s account against his own account of the book.
“Yes, that sounds fine. I very much approve of your interest in local history,” Dr. Pedersen said when Jesse came to a halt. “You need to go more deeply into the subject, though. The account you have given of the political times is sadly superficial. Is the book you’re reading a child’s book, by any chance?”
“Yes,” said Jesse.
“Yes, what?”
“It is a child’s book. It is from the Young People’s room of the library.”
“But, Karl, it seems like a fairly good book,” Mrs. Pedersen said quickly.
“Mary, please don’t interrupt us. Now, where is Hildie?”
They waited. Just then they heard Hilda on the stairs—a heavy, fast thumping. She hurried into the room and came to sit beside Jesse, breathing hard.
“You are a little late. Have you been busy?” Dr. Pedersen said.
“Oh, yes, Father, very busy, I’ve been—” She bit her lip and stared across at Dr. Pedersen. “I’ve been so nervous about tomorrow—I’m—”
“Nervous, why?”
“I’ve been doing what you said, I’ve been trying to get hold of myself, doing those breathing exercises—but I’m so nervous—”
“Hildie, you must not talk in a rush like that. Speak slowly. When you address the professors tomorrow, you must speak clearly, you know that.”
“Yes, Father. I’m sorry.”
She patted her cheeks and tried to calm her breathing.
“Repeat to us what you have said, please.”
“Yes. I have been very busy. I have been trying to rest my mind, to empty it of distractions. I have been doing the breathing exercises. You have instructed me not to worry, and I am concentrating on that. I am concentrating on not worrying.”
“Good. That is fine, very wise,” Dr. Pedersen said.
At last he bowed his head and pronounced a blessing on the meal.
Dora came out to serve lunch.
A first course of chicken noodle soup: in large gleaming white bowls, with mushroom caps and rough, coarse buttered toast. Jesse ate slowly in spite of his hunger. He felt a little shaky, he was so hungry. Across from him, Frederich raised his large soup spoon to his mouth in a monotonous, mechanical way. Hilda ate quickly, blowing on the soup to cool it, but leaning back behind Jesse so that Dr. Pedersen would not notice her. Jesse hoped she wouldn’t be scolded.
“Mary, this soup is excellent. It’s perfect,” Dr. Pedersen said.
“I’m so glad you like it,” Mrs. Pedersen said shyly.
Everyone brightened and smiled back and forth across the table, even Frederich.
The blueberry muffins were served hot, in a silver bowl, with a white napkin covering them. They were passed around and Dr. Pedersen began to talk of his morning at the Clinic. In addition to his solving of the case of the man from Tonawanda, he had taken on another case, a baffling one: “Herbert Kramer referred the man to me. I met him, shook hands, said nothing at all, observed his behavior, the size of his pupils. All very placid. Then I withdrew in silence. Stella pulled the dark blinds in my office and left me in perfect peace, with instructions not to interrupt me for any reason. No telephone calls. Not even emergency calls from the hospital. I sat in perfect stillness, with the ice pack on my head, and reviewed this problem. I believe I was able to communicate with the man after about ten minutes. It was an ordeal, an exhausting ordeal, and I will be returning to it this afternoon … I feel I’m very near victory.… You remember, Mary, Dr. Kramer from medical school? He telephoned only this morning and was very upset. The patient does not respond to any kind of medication. He is very anxious, very argumentative and frightened. He will not go to a hospital. His problem is a ringing in his ears, fainting spells, strange jumps and twists—he calls them twists—of the heart. But he has an ordinary cardiac shadow, a normal EKG, the blood tests have shown nothing, the urinalysis nothing. X-rays, nothing. He will not submit to a spinal tap or a bone marrow test. He describes the fainting as a whirling of the head rather than the walls of the room. After about ten minutes I was able to make contact with him, my spirit and his spirit—it was an exhausting hour I spent and I had to come away without accomplishing much—”
Dora took the soup bowls away. She returned with a large platter, which she brought to Dr. Pedersen. He said, “Mary, what is this? Not braised duck?”
“Yes, dear, with that cream sauce you’re so fond of. Is it all right?”
Dr. Pedersen tasted it. “It’s delicious,” he said.
Everyone smiled again. Dora went to Frederich and served him; he thanked her with a curt nod of his head. Dora then came to serve Jesse. She always served Mrs. Pedersen and Hilda last.
“Yes, Mother, this is certainly very good,” Frederich said.
“I hope you all aren’t just being polite!” Mrs. Pedersen laughed.
Jesse began eating hungrily. The duck was delicious. His mouth nearly ached with hunger now. Tiny pinpricks, tiny sparks, seemed to be rushing from every part of his body toward his mouth, concentrated most fiercely in the moist flesh on the inside of his mouth.
“Your mother is the only consistent genius in this family,” Dr. Pedersen said.
Everyone laughed.
“Father,” Hilda said, “don’t you think that Mother could come to Chicago with us? I wish she could.”
“Perhaps your mother will accompany you the next time, Hilda. You know how much trouble these trips are,” Dr. Pedersen said.
“I’d be happy to go—” Mrs. Pedersen said.
“But no, Mary, not this time. Some other time.”
Hilda sighed as she ate. Her elbow sometimes brushed against Jesse’s, as if she were not conscious of him.
“I hate to be bothering you, Karl,” Mrs. Pedersen said, “but it’s really all right if I stay home. I don’t like to leave Frederich anyway. I was going to ask you if you’d thought any more about my driving lessons.…”
“I haven’t given it much thought, really. I’ve been very busy at the Clinic.”
“I know. I understand.”
“Mother wants to get a driver’s license, at her age!” Hilda laughed. She was addressing Frederich, but he did not return her glance.
“I know I’m very exci
table, I probably shouldn’t be allowed on the road,” Mrs. Pedersen said.
Dr. Pedersen smiled toward her courteously, but when he spoke it was only to request more butter from Dora.
“Oh, yes, and more muffins, please,” Mrs. Pedersen said.
There was a surge of emotion around the table, as if the family were about to exclaim out loud their joy with one another. Jesse felt their unity, their happiness. He smiled at Hilda and she smiled back shyly. Most of the time she tried to ignore him. He wanted very much to be friends with her, to be a real brother to her, but he did not know how to begin. Most of the time she would not quite meet his gaze—her small, sad, darting eyes eluded his—and she rarely spoke to him except at mealtimes. Like Frederich, she spent most of her time with her “work.” She was a mathematical genius, Jesse had been told. Mrs. Pedersen had tried to explain to him the kind of work Hilda did, but Mrs. Pedersen herself did not really understand. “Some things she works out on paper, but most of it she does in her head. I don’t begin to understand it,” Mrs. Pedersen had said. Jesse would have been frightened of Hilda, but she was shy, childlike, modest. Neither Hilda nor Frederich attended school. Frederich, years ago, had received a high school diploma, having received perfect scores on specially administered New York State Regents examinations without taking courses, but he had no interest in leaving home in order to attend college. Anyway, Mrs. Pedersen said that no one could teach Frederich anything. If he wanted to learn something he simply learned it on his own. And his musical compositions were his own, uniquely his own; no professor of music could help him. Hilda, though four years younger, had received perfect scores on the mathematical sections of the same exams, but she had failed the other sections and had shown no interest in improving her grades. For health reasons she did not attend school. Professors at nearby universities had invited her to study with them, but she had always declined.
She said sweetly to Mrs. Pedersen, “Oh, the mashed potatoes are just the way I like them! They won’t make mashed potatoes like this in Chicago.”