Wickett's Remedy (45 page)

She found a doctor; she said the requisite words and returned to quarantine. Somewhere along the way she was joined by the other doctors and an escort with a wheeled gurney. Each doctor was trying to be the first to reach the quarantine door without it looking like that was what he was doing. She could barely hear for the buzzing in her ears but she could read the doctors’ intentions perfectly. The doctor who won the race was Dr. Peterson, with his clever fingers that did not tremble as they opened locks.

Frank had straightened his pajamas and started his breakfast, but he was pale.

“There’s nothing wrong with me, Doc,” he insisted, shuttling food to his mouth. No one else was eating.

“Wickett reports you have a fever,” one of the doctors said.

“Aw, she’s just upset over all that’s been going on.” He shrugged. She prayed he would not look at her but when her prayer was answered, she did not feel grateful.

“It’s probably nothing,” one of the doctors lied, “but just in case, you wouldn’t want to get your buddies sick, would you?”

“But isn’t that the whole point?” Frank said. “You want me and my buddies sick, but we ain’t been obliging you and that makes you look bad, especially now that Dr. Percy—”

She shook her head. It was bad to say that name here.

“I think you’d better do what the doc here says,” the escort cautioned, moving toward the bed.

Frank raised his hands. His fork gleamed in the light coming through the windows. “Where’re we going, Doc?” He sighed. “To the room where Dr. Percy was?” He looked toward her, but she could do nothing. There was nothing she could do at all.

“Don’t worry,” one of them replied. “You’re going to be just fine.”

“Dr. Percy wasn’t fine,” he said, “and I’ve got his blood.”

None of the other men spoke. As terrible as this moment was, she would have done anything to freeze it in place, barring the arrival of something worse.

“Cole died of complications due to pneumonia,” one of them explained slowly, as though speaking to a child. “You’ve no need to worry on that score. Pneumonia is not hematogenous.”

“That’s a nice ten-dollar word, Doc,” he replied. “But answer me this: if you don’t even know how people get the flu, how do you expect me to believe you know how they catch pneumonia?”

“I don’t like the way you’re holding that fork, Bentley,” the escort warned and moved toward the gurney. “I think you’d better calm down.”

Frank dropped the fork soundlessly on the bed. “I’m calm,” he replied. “I’m talking nice and calm—ain’t I, Sammy?”

“You’re calm as a clam, Frankie,” Sam assured him.

He nodded. “You see? Don’t worry, Doc, I ain’t gonna be any trouble. I’m going now.”

The escort held the gurney steady while Frank climbed onto it. On the gurney he looked inert, as if his body had been replaced with clay.

“We’re with ya, Frankie!”

“Don’t let ’em getcha!”

All the voices were calling out at once. She did not know how he could possibly keep them straight.

“Don’t anyone else get sick,” he answered. “You’ve done your part. Now you can all go home.”

“You too, Frankie! You’re going home too!”

“I know I am,” he replied. “All I need’s a good night’s sleep, and away from Georgie’s snoring I’ll be sure to get it, so don’t give away my bed.”

“We won’t, Frankie. It’ll be here waiting,” the voices called as he was wheeled out the door.

For the rest of the day, the world existed on the other side of a gray curtain. When she visited the recovery room, she was told by Nurse Foley that Frank was sleeping. She asked to see him, but something about her voice was off; Nurse Foley looked at her strangely and would not let her in. She would have preferred to root herself outside that door, waiting for the chance to peer inside, but instead she limited herself to one visit an hour. Sometimes Nurse Foley allowed her in, pushing aside Frank’s bed curtain just enough to reveal his sleeping form before herding her back out. Most of the time Nurse Foley would not let her in at all. In between visits, Lydia carried out her duties; she ate at the expected times. In the dining hall the talk was of the future. Some wanted to be done with Gallups while others hoped their efforts might be salvaged after all. Even looking at the moving mouths she could not attach the streams of words to names or
faces. She was thankful no one spoke to her. She was not sure what would happen if she tried to talk.

The sun set. She told herself she was tired. She donned her nightclothes and buried herself under the blankets even though it was only seven. She closed her eyes and repeated the word “sleep” to herself so many times the word lost all meaning and became only the sound of her mind struggling against itself. And then at some point, sleep came.

When she startled awake the moon shone brightly through her window. Someone was crying. She put her hand to her mouth, but it was not her—the sound was coming from Cynthia Foley’s bedroom. In the hallway the noise was louder. The bedroom door was thinner than their shared wall. She knocked, softly at first and then with more force.

“Joe?” came Cynthia’s voice from the other side of the door.

Lydia heard the creak of a mattress, followed by footsteps, but she disappeared before the footsteps could reach the door.

Outside it was cold but she did not mind. Nor did she mind the small, sharp pebbles as she crossed the compound. She did not worry about being seen. She did not worry about anything except how fast she could reach Frank’s room.

She had never been in the hospital so late at night. In the silence of the building she found it difficult to believe anyone save herself was inside. She fought the urge to yell his name as she neared the door. She turned the knob. There was his bed, the only curtained bed in the far row. She could hear his exhalations, slow and regular, from inside the curtain. She
reached toward the curtain and slowly, quietly, eased it aside.

He slept on his back, one arm at his side, the other thrown above his head, the bedsheet rising and falling with his untroubled breath. His color had returned. She knew his forehead would not feel warm if she touched it.

As she prepared to close the curtain she heard him whisper.

“Liddie?”

He opened his eyes.

“I knew it was you,” he said.

“You ought to go back to sleep,” she whispered.

“I’m wide awake,” he answered. “I slept all afternoon. If we whisper I’m sure we won’t wake anyone.”

“I should go.”

“Don’t,” he countered. “Not yet.”

“Are you truly feeling better?” she asked.

“Feel my forehead.”

“I don’t need to,” she answered. “I can tell you don’t have a fever.”

“So can I.”

“You don’t have the flu,” she whispered.

“I don’t have the flu,” he echoed.

“Frank,” she said.

One of the sailors shifted in his sleep. The room was filled with the interwoven rhythms of breath. She had missed that sound, the simple confirmation that she was not alone.

“Stay with me,” he urged. “Just for a little while.”

“Someone might hear us,” she whispered.

He smiled. “We’ll be very, very quiet.”

She stepped toward him. She reached for the edge of the mattress and slowly, quietly, eased herself down. She knew his scent; it was an immutable part of her though she had only encountered it once before. She memorized the arc of his eyebrow, the curve of his lip. She skimmed her hand along the the plane of his cheek, alive to his skin against her palm.

The 1918 influenza epidemic—whose cause is still a matter of debate—killed more Americans in ten months than died in all twentieth-century wars combined, and killed well over 20 million people worldwide. The epidemic is generally thought to have originated in the United States and to have shipped overseas with American soldiers en route to the final battles of World War One.

Gallups Island (now known as Gallops Island), in Boston Harbor, was in November and December of 1918 the site of a United States Public Health Service study designed to determine the cause and mode of spread of influenza. The subjects—inmate volunteers taken from the Deer Island Naval Prison—were subjected to the tests described in this book’s later chapters. The only person to catch the flu was a junior medical officer, who died.

Most of the newspaper articles in this book are taken from period newspapers.

A slew of nonfiction works contributed to the writing of this book, but I am particularly indebted to
America’s Forgotten Pandemic
by Alfred Crosby and
The Plague of the Spanish Lady
by Richard Collier for their insight into the 1918 epidemic; and to
South Boston, My Home Town
by Thomas O’Connor and
I Remember Southie
by Leo Dauwer for their portraits of life in early twentieth-century South Boston. Dr. Ed Uthman kindly shared his knowledge of period autopsies.

Thanks to the New York and Boston Public Libraries and the Library of Congress for their lovely reference librarians, their beautiful reading rooms, and their smorgasbord of reference materials.

Thanks to Wendy Schmalz, agent extraordinaire; and Bill Thomas, ready editor. Thanks to Maria Carella, Christine Pride, Shauna Toh, and Alice van Straalen.

Thanks to Stefan Economou and Ruth Murray for hosting my Boston expeditions.

Thanks to Mark, Ellen, and Saryn Goldberg for unflagging love and support.

In the five years it took to write this book I relied on the honesty, intelligence, and advice of Julie Ashley, Oliver Broudy, David Gassaway, Megan Kelso, Jason Little, Chloe Mills, Lisa Rosenthal, and Michael Wilde to help keep this book from foundering or veering terribly off-course. I am honored to call each of them reader, editor, and friend.

One of the most slippery issues in writing is knowing when a book is finished. Sometimes the answer is self-evident: one reads the final draft and is filled with a sense that the work has reached its ultimate form. When every word is in its rightful place and there is not another thing to be done, one can release the story into the world with a smile and a wave. But often the decision to let a story go is more complicated. After five years of writing and rewriting, it seemed that I had taken
Wickett’s Remedy
as far as I could. As I prepared the hardcover edition I wondered how it would read to me in a few years or how I might have approached the project as an older, more experienced writer—but the fact of the matter was that after five years it was time to move on. Then, a year later, the chance arose to take a second look.