Z for Zachariah (12 page)

When I came back from the church I spoke to him, very softly, I just told him I was there. He did not wake up, or even flicker his eyelids. Yet I had a feeling he heard me, even if unconsciously, and that it was good for him to know someone was there.

In fact I was so convinced of this that I decided to read to him, quietly, sitting by his bed so he would sense where I was. I thought of the Bible, but in the end decided poetry might be more soothing, so I brought an anthology from my room and read Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard". It is sad, but I like it. I realized it was about death, but I was sure he could not understand the words at all; I only hoped he might hear the sound.

Again, I am not too sure for whose benefit I was really doing it. Reading the poem certainly made me feel less worried and confused. I thought that later I might also play the piano, something quiet, and using the soft pedal. It is, after all, in the next room, and he did like it when I played before.

After I finished Gray's "Elegy" I sat in the chair thinking about him and Edward.

I suppose I have to accept the idea that Mr Loomis shot Edward and killed him, and that is a terrible thought, because of what I hoped and because he is the only other human being I am ever likely to know.

But I do not know just how bad it is, or was.

From what he said in his dream, and from the holes in the suit, I cannot help believing he did it. But from what he said, too, I cannot be sure how wrong it was. In a way, it was self-defence. If Edward had taken the suit, and left, and had never come back, he would, in effect, have doomed Mr Loomis to stay in the laboratory—perhaps forever—
-probably
forever—and there he would eventually have run out of food, or water or air, and died. So in a way Edward was, when he tried to steal the suit, threatening to kill him.

Also, Mr Loomis may have been concerned about more than just staying alive. In his dream he said that the suit was too important to waste. He called it "the last useful thing". He may have been thinking not just of himself, but of human survival. At that time he surely still believed that there might be groups of people alive in shelters—underground Air Force bases, and so on—and the suit, the only one of its kind, might be the only way to contact them, and eventually for them to contact each other. It
was
too important to waste. If he was thinking about that, and if Edward would not consider it, if Edward was being selfish and foolish, then Edward was wrong.

In a way it depends on what Edward was like. If he was honest and sensible, and really meant to return the suit, and would have returned it, then maybe Mr Loomis should have let him borrow it. Except, of course, as he said—suppose something went wrong? But if Edward was just being thoughtless and trying to sneak away, then I cannot blame Mr Loomis so much.

But suppose, on the other hand, Mr Loomis was trying to keep the suit for himself? Suppose he meant to take it, when the time came, and strike out on his own, hoping to find civilization surviving somewhere? That was what he finally did.

So in a way it also depends on knowing what Mr Loomis was like—w like. And it is true that I really do not know that, not yet.

I keep wondering. If he lives and becomes conscious again—should I ask him about it? He obviously did not want to tell what happened, since in his own story of the laboratory and the suit, and his trip to Chicago, he never mentioned Edward at all. And yet it would be hard, with only two of us, for me to know this secret and try to hide it.

I will have to decide.

June 6th

This morning I went to church again. I had just about given up hope. He had lain absolutely motionless, with no flicker of life except the faintest of breathing, for more than thirty-two hours. I began to feel as if I were alone again after all. It was hard to think of him as a person; the belief that he could talk and think began to slip away. Yet I did not want to give up; I felt that if I did, he would too. That is why I went to church.

The day was cloudy, with a fresh, wet smell in the air. It had rained a little during the night, and would rain again. When Faro and I reached the church Faro ran and sniffed around in the grass where I had left the bird, but it was gone. I am sure the parents got it back into the nest.

This time I remembered to take the Bible with me, and also to say a prayer.

On the way back I picked some flowers, some wild roses that grow beside the road, and at home I put them in a vase and took them to his room. The apple blossoms had wilted and fallen off. He cannot see them, of course. Again, for my benefit.

Then I sat by his bed and counted his respiration as well as I could. I did it over three times, and as far as I could tell it had fallen from fifty to about thirty. It seemed also a little deeper.

I am not sure whether that is a good sign or not, but it may be.

I played the piano for half an hour, hoping it would penetrate to wherever he was.

Chapter Thirteen

June 7th

He is definitely better.

He still does not wake up, but his respiration is down to eighteen per minute, almost normal, and his colour has changed from blue to white. And he
looks
better. I have not yet taken his temperature but I can tell, from touching his forehead and then my own, that it is still high but not as high as it was.

Taking advantage of this improvement (which may, I know, be only temporary) I changed his sheets, blankets, pillowcase and pyjamas. To get the old sheets off and the clean ones on I had to roll him from one side of the bed to the other (this was one thing they had taught in the hygiene course), and I did that very cautiously; it did not seem to harm him, however, nor affect his breathing.

Altogether it was quite a messy job. I have a big wash to do, and I know now that I was not cut out to be a nurse. I did consider it at one time; from a distance it seemed like a good profession, since your whole occupation is helping people who need help, and if you are trained you get paid for doing it. But I had decided on teaching instead; it is also a job of helping people, though perhaps not as much as nursing.

It is still hard for me to realize, even after all this time, that I am not going to
be
anything, not ever have a job or go anywhere or do anything except what I do here. I had chosen teaching because I liked specifically the idea of teaching English. I like books and reading more than anything else, not just poetry but any good writing. My plan was, as I taught, also to study, to take graduate courses in English literature and possibly writing. You can do that quite easily and cheaply if you are a teacher.

That whole idea is over now, there being no more schools and no one to teach. I know that; yet I keep thinking about it. Another part of my plan was to live at home, save money, and spend my entire first year's salary on books. I have so few that I have read them all twenty times or more.

Thinking about that set me to wondering. A lot of the books I would like to buy—would
have
liked to buy—are in the Ogdentown Public Library. There is also a gift shop in Ogdentown which has a small bookstore in it. For that matter, there are some pretty big houses there that probably have book-shelves in them, with books that nobody else is ever going to read. What I wonder is, what would happen if I could bring some of them here?

I am thinking of the safe-suit of course. Having travelled all this way, Mr Loomis could easily—I should think—make a trip to Ogdentown to get some books.

But would they be dangerous to bring in to the valley? Or would it be possible to set them out somewhere—up the hillside, with a cover over them to keep the rain off"—until they lost their radioactivity? I think we could test them (like the creek) once a week with the Geiger counter. I don't know enough about that, but Mr Loomis would. Though he might not be too interested, being, apparently, not much of a reader.

Thinking about that I got really excited. I thought: if it could be done, if the books would become safe to handle, and Mr Loomis did not want to go, I could go. That is, if he would lend me the safe-suit.

And that brought me back to Edward with a jolt.

June 8th

He opened his eyes this morning, but they were blank and unfocused, the eyes of a new-born animal. He was not seeing anything at all.

He also seemed to be trying to speak, or make a noise, but all that came out was a croak. I guessed he was asking for water. I got some, and fed it to him with a spoon. He wanted it all right; I gave him half a glass and then stopped, afraid he would get sick if he drank too much too quickly. The best thing was that he could swallow it quite well, though some did run out the corners of his mouth and down his chin.

I knew he was not really conscious. But it was progress and I felt better. A little later I also took his temperature. I had to sit and hold both the thermometer and his chin (which has grown whiskery), but it worked. He has a hundred and three—
much
better.

But he is skin and bones. Now that he could swallow, at least liquids, that was the next thing to work on. I thought about the most nourishing liquids I could concoct. Soup, of course. But even better, I decided, boiled custard. I made some—milk, egg-yolks, sugar, salt. While I waited for the milk to boil I wished again for the stove.

And I thought—well, why not. I had the tractor now.

When I dismantled the stove I had planned to haul it, piece by piece, on the small and rather rickety old hand cart. I had not even thought about it since I—we—got the tractor running. With the tractor cart I could move the whole thing in a matter of minutes. And it would not take long to reassemble it in the kitchen; I knew exactly where I wanted it to stand.

So, while I waited for the custard to cool I ran to the barn, backed the tractor and the cart to the loading platform and lowered the tailgate. The cart and the platform are almost exactly the same height—not by accident; my father built a sort of earth-ramp leading up to the barn just for that purpose.

I had already put the firebox, the heaviest part, on its masonite sled and dragged it near the door. So with a little bit more tugging I had it aboard the cart. The other parts I could carry in.

Unloading at the back porch of the house was equally easy. It was about six inches lower than the cart, so I unchained the tailgate and used it as a gangplank. Getting the firebox over the doorsill was a small problem, but I remembered a trick of my mother's: I rubbed the sill with very soapy water, and the masonite slid over quite easily.

Reassembling it was harder than I thought. Some of the bolts did not want to slip through their holes; also I put the grate on backwards the first time and had to take it off again. I worked on it all afternoon, occasionally checking that Mr Loomis was all right (quite a lot of hand-washing each time).

When his custard was cool enough I tried feeding it to him with a spoon, a sip at a time. Again he did not wake up, nor, this time, even open his eyes. But he did swallow it, gulping each spoon with an effort. Swallowing seems to be a reflex, an instinct not requiring thought, and I am glad of that. Still I gave him only about two ounces at this first feeding. I wanted to be sure he could digest it.

The stove is finished. It needs now only two lengths of stovepipe and an elbow, which I will get later from Mr Klein's store, to connect it to the kitchen chimney. Then I will polish it. It is black with nickel trim, and will look beautiful. I am proud of it—especially the oven—and of myself; it is like getting a Christmas present.

Chapter Fourteen

June 15th

A week has passed, one of the best of weeks.

Today is my birthday. I am sixteen, and for dinner we had a roast chicken and a cake, both cooked in my new oven. I will not say it is the first cake I have ever baked; I have done it before, but always under my mother's supervision. So I will say it is the first I have baked alone, and the first in this oven, and it came out perfect. I made a white cream frosting, and it was perfect, too.

We were celebrating not only my birthday, but Mr Loomis's recovery, which has been astonishing, though it is still not complete. He still cannot walk; his legs are weak and buckle under him. As I suspected, they were not getting proper circulation. I think they will be all right eventually, but it is slow.

So we had a birthday dinner on a folding card table which I set beside his bed. I put a white linen cloth on it and set it with the good china; I even polished the silver, and this time I remembered to get candles (not birthday-cake candles, however; I could find none of those in Mr Klein's store).

The best thing about getting it ready was that Mr Loomis slept through the preparations, and then woke up just at the right time. The table was all set, and candles shining on the silver. He opened his eyes, looked at it, closed them and opened them again. He said: "It seems like a miracle." And in a way it really did, when I considered that a week ago he was nearly dead, and I had almost given up hope. But I think he was talking about the table.

His recovery had already begun when his breathing slowed down, though I was not sure of that at the time. I felt surer the next day, late in the afternoon, when he finally woke up. I had just walked into the room, and apparently he heard me; his eyes opened, focused, and I could tell he saw me. To my amazement, he spoke, very faintly, and the first thing he said was:

"You played the piano."

I wanted to hug him, but instead I sat down in the chair by the bed. I said: "Yes. I didn't know if you could hear."

"I heard. It faded away…" His eyes closed, and he did not finish the sentence. He was asleep again already.

It was not much, and yet it seemed momentous. He could see, he could talk again! I let him sleep on for half an hour; then I got some soup I had made and sat down to feed it to him as I had been doing with the custard. He woke up again immediately. He did not talk any more at first, but swallowed the soup spoon by spoon—I could even say hungrily, because he did seem to like it. I had brought a cupful. He ate it all. Then he said: