But in reading it, the hand had defeated its own purpose: for those lines written in frantic haste took time to interpret; while it was quick work to go through those written with careful painful pauses, written slowly, to compel the reader to read slowly and attentively, a habit she might have made in conversation.
— Plain morphine, doctor?
— Better give her a half-grain.
— I don't think there's any on this floor. We've been using Pan-topon.
— All right. A forty-milligram dose.
— Surgery recommended Trilene, with an inhaler?. .
— To hell with Surgery.
— Yes doctor. And now. . the nurse went on, turning, — Miss Deigh, or Mrs. Deigh, Mrs. or Miss?. . which is it? I'll just bet it's Mrs. she said coyly, seeing a letter there on the night table addressed Mrs. The letter was from an insurance company, to inform her that upon receipt of her signature on the enclosed waiver, they would make payable to her the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars ($25,000.00) in life insurance on her husband, who had fallen off a bar stool in Hollywood. — And wasn't that an interesting young man that came to visit you tonight! Why, I think I could turn into a Buddhist myself with him to talk to me. The Four Noble Trutas! and the Eightfold Noble Path! Why, life is suffering, isn't it… you just try to lie still now. The nurse finished tidying up the bed and went out of this private room, where the patient had just been moved, mumbling, as she passed a ward, — But to say suffering is caused by desire?. . and that story he told about Bishop. . Whutley?. . which she repeated to the nurse in the drug room, — And so this Bishop says to the man praying there in front of this little wheel, who are you praying to and what are you praying for my good man? and the man says, I'm not praying to anybody and I'm not praying for nothing…
But that nurse shrugged her shoulders too, handed over the prescribed Pantopon, and went back to straightening the gay handkerchief pinned to h;r blouse, and untangling the plain gold cross whose chain had got caught on a button.
The night nurse paused on her return to reprimand a shapeless figure huddled half out of bed in the dark to receive this confidence from a low-tuned radio, — Another case of homicide. And so for really top-notch entertainment, listen in…
— All right now Mister Jenner, tomorrow's another day. And she carried her cheer, and the drug and a clean glass back to the private room. She turned on a bright light and started to speak, but the whistle of a boat, very near on the river, startled her, and she waited, pouring water into the clean glass on the nighí table, beside the flowers.
— Isn't this the nicest plant! she said, and her patient turned: until that moment the anthurium had really looked rather obscene.
About the only person whom the blasts of the whistle did not intimidate into silence was Arny: it brought him round just enough to raise his head, and speak for the first time in two hours. He said it was getting late, and he thought he should call his wife. But he did not speak distinctly, and the blasts of departure drowned out every other sound.
He was part of a gay throng on a promenade deck, where someone fluttered up to ask, — Where's Rwu-dy?
— Baby you'll find that one in the bridal suite. Alone.
The whistle blasted them into silence again. Arny alerted, and spoke.
Up above, the tall woman said, — My God, what do you suppose we've got next door this trip. . will you listen to that?. . pouring-on party?
Her husband put down his glass and stared at the passenger list for First Class. — Two United States Senators, he said finally, and got his glass back.
Aft, as near as he, could get to his wife and the two with her who had come down to see him off, Don Bildow waved again and straightened up. His wife cried something out to him. He waved. It was past midnight.
— If you can't be good, be careful, she repeated. He waved. Then, — Oh! Oh! Oh! Look!… he forgot and left his Methyltestosterone tablets, he won't be able to do anything without them. Look, he left his Methyltestosterone tablets…
He waved. With the other hand he held on his plastic glasses. The wind stirred his brown and yellow necktie. From down below, he looked like he was being abducted.
The whistle blasted again.
— Baby you were sweet to come see us off but you'd better get back on sho-wer. . we're going to sail.
— But I'm coming twoo.
Lines were cast off, and the ship, as large as a country town, commenced a grotesque rearward motion, now as though embarrassed at its size, like a football player backing out of a doll house. Finally, faced in the right direction by six tugboats, it recovered its dignity in imperious puffs of smoke and a shrill blast of steam that lowered enough to sound, to penetrate chasms ashore and be rendered back in particles, each one more faint, as though the island were loath to let it go.
Well below the water line, Stanley opened his door and looked into the passage. — It's all right, he said, — come on out.
Other Pilgrims were already apparent, and Stanley had, a few minutes before, met a priest whom he liked immediately, a man with a plump face which carried joviality easily, but could instantly recover a medieval sternness which, one realized, was there all the time. His name was Father Martin, and he accounted for the large number of Pilgrims, some of whom he was shepherding toward the impending Canonization ceremonies in Rome, which Stanley forthwith hoped, somehow, to attend. They had quite a chat in that minute or two.
— Come… he said again, and took her arm. — Don't you have any coat? You didn't bring any coat at all?
She looked at him and shook her head, her eyes impossibly large it seemed to him as hi's own widened. Then as though aware of the warmth of her elbow in his hand, he took her hand which was cold and led her up to an open deck.
She'd brought no luggage, only a sort of bundle, and what was tied up in it he had no idea, except for a paper book tied on the outside. It was labeled The Story of Barbara Ubrick. There was a picture on the cover captioned, Smothering a baby. And below, Why nunneries are within high walls, barred windows and bolted doors.
— But. . where did you get this?
She had looked at him with these wide eyes, instantly frightened at his wrath but with no challenge, no question but that it must be justified. — An-selm, she answered him; at that he'd looked away quickly, put the thing back, its cover turned down, and stood looking away unable to confront the sad hope that had suffused her empty face for that one moment, and the bright pleasure her eyes had almost dared over this thing they were to share, that he had brought her to.
She hardly spoke, except when he spoke to her and even then, only if he addressed a question, which she would answer very slowly, deliberate and brief. Though once she had burst out with, — Then do Pilgrims need a pass-port too? Or I shall wear a cockleshell, and he will know me and he will know me well. . Which disarmed Stanley: what could she know of Santiago de Compostela? or when with the same light about to break in her eyes, waiting only his confirmation, she had asked whether it were true, Did the mice eat Saint Gertrude's heart? — For she is patron saint of them. .