Everything was alive. The floor that hurt your shoes that hurt your feet. The napkin that touched your dress that pressed against your thighs. Pain everywhere.
No privacy. You could never be alone. You always had to touch things and have them touch you. You had to swallow and be swallowed, have things inside you — alive things...
Her shoulders began to twitch.
She’s impatient to leave, Miss Eustace thought. A good sign. Usually she just wants to stay where I’ve put her.
Miss Eustace rose. Callously her feet struck the floor, roughly she folded the napkins.
“Come along and we’ll get the mail.”
She put out her hand as if to help Lucille up. Lucille stared at the hand, and a shriek began to rise up inside her, making her throat raw and thick.
Miss Eustace saw the screaming eyes and began to talk fast and at the same time to coax her with gentle fingers out into the corridor.
The mail — push — what did she suppose she’d get this morning? — push — you never could tell with mail — parcels were the best, though...
Arm in arm, close, intimate, they strolled down the corridor.
They stopped at the mail desk. Andrew’s daily box of flowers had arrived, but the incoming mail had not come yet and the girl behind the wicket was looking over the patients’ outgoing mail. She picked up an envelope labeled in red crayon. “Wother.”
“Look at this,” she said, and passed the letter through the wicket to Miss Eustace. “He writes dozens of them every day.”
“Wother? What’s that?”
“He inverts his M’s. He means his mother. I can’t let his letters go out, I have to take them in to Dr. Nathan. They upset his mother terribly because all the boy does is complain.”
“Hush,” said Miss Eustace with a frown toward Lucille.
But Lucille hadn’t heard anything. She was standing with her arms tight around the box of flowers. Brutally, the box hugged her breasts, and she embraced the pain.
“Though I just hate to suppress any letters,” the girl said. “It’s against my principles.”
“Dear Wother,” Miss Eustace read. “I can’t stand it any longer the inflationary bargains of the state of the world, wother they are cruel to we they hate we and hardly any consequence could eventuate under the status quo of”
It was not signed but there was a row of X’s at the bottom.
“Such a pity,” said Miss Eustace, sighing. “I always say, it’s the family that suffers most.” She raised her voice. “Mrs. Morrow, you’re crushing the box. Shall we go back up now or do you want to wait for the mail?”
“I don’t know,” Lucille said.
“Then I suppose we might as well wait. Shall we open the flowers?”
Lucille’s grasp on the box tightened for an instant and then quite suddenly her fingers relaxed and the box fell on the floor. The lid came off and there was a spill of violets.
“Oh, the darlings,” said Miss Eustace, picking them up. “Aren’t they grand? Such an earthy smell, somehow.” She nuzzled them while Lucille watched, suffering in silence for the violets, the long-limbed delicate children, too delicate to breathe and so, dead, and blue in the face, giving off the smell of earth, earth-buried coffins.
The live floor quivered under her feet, the air touched her cheeks and arms, its caress a warning and a threat, and the violets returned to life. They had only been holding their breath like Cora, and their little bruised faces puckered in pain! Oh, I hurt, I hurt, and what have I done? Oh, what have I done?
So tight and sad did the little faces become that they turned into eyes, damp blue eyes dragging their limp and single legs behind them into the box.
“Here you are,” Miss Eustace said, passing the box to her. “Why, they’re just the color of your eyes.”
Lucille felt the sharp corner of the box touch her arm. The pain was so intense and unbearable that she had to reach out and grab the box and thrust the corner of it into her breast like a knife.
I have died. I am dead.
She smiled, and clutching the symbol of death, she moved silently and swiftly down the corridor.
“Mrs. Morrow, wait for me!” Miss Eustace caught up with her, panting. “Well, I declare, I didn’t know you were in that much of a hurry. Were you going somewhere?”
“Out.”
“Out where?”
“I want some fresh air.”
“Oh, you do?” Miss Eustace said, half-pleased, half-suspicious.
“I want some fresh air.”
“Well, let’s wait a bit until the sun gets stronger, then we’ll go out on the roof garden, there’s such a pretty view from there. Wait here a minute and I’ll go back for the mail.”
Miss Eustace returned to the wicket, moving in a kind of sideways fashion so that she could keep Lucille in sight. Lucille made no attempt to get away from her. She stood, straight and alert, as if she was standing guard over something precious to her.
Miss Eustace came back. “Here’s a letter for you, dear. Now aren’t you glad we waited?”
Lucille wouldn’t take the letter so Miss Eustace put it in the pocket of her uniform. So unnatural not to be interested in mail, she thought, and tried again when they reached the room.
“Here’s your letter. You can read it while I’m doing the chart. Sit down right there. I’ll put the flowers in water.”
She settled Lucille in a chair and placed the letter on her lap. Then, humming softly, she went into the bathroom and filled a Monel vase with water. She was always excited by mail, other people’s as well as her own. Even the most commonplace observations on the weather were glamorous when sealed and postmarked, with privacy protected by His Majesty, King George VI.
I wonder who it’s from, she thought, and returned to the room. “Do you want me to read it to you?”
“I don’t care.”
Miss Eustace, thrilled, slit the envelope with an efficient thumbnail.
“It’s signed ‘Edith.’ I always peek at the end of a letter just to see who it’s from. Well, here goes. ‘Dear Lucille: I hope you received the chocolates and pillow rest I sent day before yesterday.’ Well, of course, we did, didn’t we? Those back rests are very comfy. ‘It is very difficult to get chocolates these days, one has to stand in line.’ Wasn’t it silly of you to destroy them when she went to so much trouble to buy them?”
Lucille turned her head and looked deliberately out of the window. It is very difficult to get poisoned chocolates these days, one has to stand in line.
“ ‘We all miss you a great deal, though I feel so hopeless saying it because I know you won’t believe it.’ ”
I feel so hopeless.
“ ‘Everything is such a mess. The policeman Sands was here again, talking about the train wreck. You remember that afternoon? I don’t know what he was getting at, but whoever did anything to you, Lucille, it wasn’t me, Lucille, it was not me! I don’t know, I can’t figure anything out any more. I have this sick headache nearly all the time and Martin is driving me crazy.’ ”
“She isn’t very cheerful, is she?” said Miss Eustace in disapproval. “Shall I go on?”
“Go on.”
“Very well. ‘They have always seemed like my own children to me, the two of them, and now, I don’t know, I look at them and they’re like strangers. Meals are the worst time. We watch each other. That doesn’t sound like much, but it’s terrible — we watch each other.’ ” Silly woman, thought Miss Eustace, and turned the page.
“ ‘I know Andrew Wouldn’t like me to be writing a letter like this. But, Lucille, you’re the only one I can talk to now. I feel I’d rather be there with you, I’ve always liked and trusted you.’ ”