Guests on Earth (22 page)

F
OR WEEKS
I
h
ad been promising Freddy that I would show him the fabled Grove Park Inn, yet it was nearly Christmas when we finally got there. “Good God!” he exclaimed upon first glimpsing the hotel itself, banging his hand upon the steering wheel so that he inadvertently blew the horn, which tickled me. The better I got to know Freddy, the funnier he became—he was not at all the serious man he seemed at the hospital; and in some ways, after all my time in Europe, I was actually more sophisticated than he.

Initially he refused to relinquish his keys to the doorman at the Grove Park Inn, for instance—one of a bevy of such doormen who met all arriving and departing cars. “How do I know they won’t lose them? It’s my mother’s car, you know.”

I knew. “They never lose them,” I said, then enjoyed his reaction as we entered the cavernous lobby with huge fires burning in the fireplaces at either end. The tree stood at least thirty feet high, so bedecked with ornaments and lights that one could scarcely see its green needles. The rockers before the fireplaces and all the chairs in every group were taken. A holiday tea dance was in progress. Looking at these festive folk, I felt underdressed, even though I was wearing my good black dress and Ruth’s pearls for this occasion. A jazz version of “White Christmas” came from the grand piano, played by a tuxedo-clad old man, clearly a master. Couples were dancing on the shiny dance floor in front of the piano. Others sat at the little round tables, waiters and waitresses moving among them. I looked for Moira at the hostess station—or Mrs. Hodges—and felt oddly relieved to see neither on this occasion.

“Should we try to get a table over there?” Freddy asked, but I said, “No, not yet, there’s more to see,” pulling him toward the grand arcade where all the photographs of famous guests were hung—presidents, movie stars, and kings, as well a photograph of Mr. and Mrs. Fitzgerald in evening dress, which we looked at for a long time.

We continued to an exhibit of gingerbread houses, a holiday contest in which the gingerbread constructions were truly works of art—not only the usual cottages from fairytale lore but also castles, mansions in the Newport style, and feats of whimsy, defying gravity. We wandered down the line slowly with the others, marveling.

“Speaking of Mrs. Fitzgerald,” I said, suddenly remembering, “You know I made a dollhouse with her help once, in Art Class,” and then I told him all about it, in every detail.

Freddy was extremely interested. “Where is it now?” he asked.

“Lord, I don’t know,” I said. “Maybe it’s over at Homewood someplace. I can ask Mrs. Carroll, I guess, when they get back, though I doubt she’ll know either. Somebody probably threw it out.”

We moved on down the row. I enjoyed the gingerbread houses themselves and also the children who had been brought to see them, especially the little girls all dressed up in velvet and silk dresses, with their white stockings and patent-leather shoes. I remembered how my own mother used to dress me up in white organdie. In New Orleans it was so seldom cold that I had had only one fancy winter dress for church, gray velvet with a white lace collar.

Later, after we had ordered our tea, I leaned across the table toward Freddy, who sat there smiling in his nice navy jacket and a tie with little reindeer all over it, and said, “After my mother’s death I learned that I am the child of her and her father—her father was my father—and now I believe this is why she fled the parish and never went back. Someone came to our apartment for money, though, every week until we moved, and then they couldn’t find us, I suppose—it was a woman, I remember that much, I remember seeing her from the back, though I don’t know who she was—a cousin? A sister? Perhaps the money was for him, our father, or her mother, or perhaps it was blackmail money, for somebody else . . . what do you think?”

If he was stunned, Freddy did not betray it. Instead he simply reached across the embroidered tablecloth and took both my hands. “I think your mother must have loved you very much,” he said.

I can’t remember anything else about our tea, though afterward, as I nibbled the last macaroon, he said, “Let’s dance!” surprising me mightily.

“I don’t know how.” I remembered the French heel fiasco with Robert, the only time I had ever tried.

“It doesn’t matter,” said he with utter confidence. “I’ll show you. Come on”—leading me onto the shiny circular floor where a mirrored globe turned slowly. Freddy grasped me firmly and said, “Now just do what I do. Follow my lead. Right foot forward, that’s good, now left, now back . . .” and somehow, with his hand pressing firmly on the small of my back, I could do it—even twirling about beneath his arm held high in the air. For years, I had watched other girls performing this step. Freddy explained that his sisters, needing a partner to practice with for dances and dates, had pressed him into service as a child, with this result. He was a grand dancer, and I found that I had a knack for it myself, something I had never suspected, always having been the accompanist at every such occasion. I stepped and spun until I was dizzy and out of breath.

“Let’s get some air.” I led him past the piano to the long French doors that a doorman opened for us, and then we were out on the wide terrace facing the vast sweep of open air and the mountains beyond, on every side. We walked over to the low stone wall and stood looking out at Asheville below us in the bottom of the bowl of mountains. Somehow, it had gotten to be twilight already. Long shadows slanted across the wintry plain of the golf course. The weak sun was mostly caught now behind gray clouds massing at the horizon, the entire scene a darkening palette of somber hue. Lights came twinkling on like stars in Asheville below.

Someone opened the door for a minute so that we heard the music and the laughter inside. Then it cut off abruptly. Now I was freezing.

“I guess it’s time to go back,” I said.

“Just a minute.” Freddy put his arms around me as firmly as he had on the dance floor. “Evalina, you have told me something important today, and now I have something important to tell you.”

“What is it?”

“You cannot be in the therapy group any longer,” Freddy said, “because I am falling in love with you.”

But when I closed my eyes at the moment of our kiss, I was dismayed to see a clear vision of a princess peering over the battlements of a gingerbread castle, looking down a mountainside like the mountain we were on, still searching anxiously—for what? for whom? Nevertheless, I was not a fool. I kissed him back soundly.

P
ROMPTLY AT NOON
o
n December 20, Brenda from the Beauty Box, the Overholsers, Dr. Schwartz, and I joined Dixie to stand under the Highland Hall portico and wait for her husband Frank to arrive. He had driven all the way from Georgia to pick her up himself. His mother, Big Mama, was at home with the children, who were said to be very excited about their mother’s return. So was Frank Calhoun, apparently; he had planned two nights in a big Atlanta hotel—plus a shopping trip! to Dixie’s delight—on the way back home, a sort of “second honeymoon,” he’d called it. Dixie was all ready: every dark hair curling perfectly in place, wearing a sky blue wool coat and matching blue beret that I had never seen before. She had pulled the beret down rakishly on one side, just so. Dixie was literally sparkling, herself—her white teeth, her bright blue eyes, her shiny red lipstick, “Fire and Ice,” I knew, for she had bought me some, though I had not had the nerve to wear it. In fact I knew that a lot of Dixie’s total effect was caused by makeup, but she was good at it, and it didn’t look like makeup. She was the most beautiful living person I had ever actually known, or even seen. Her matching red luggage was lined up along the curb like some small, uniformed army standing at attention.

Back inside the hospital, papers had been signed and good-byes had been said. Perhaps because of her “missing carapace,” everybody who knew Dixie or had worked with her seemed to love her, not only me. Even Dr. Bennett started to shake her hand, then unexpectedly embraced her, wiping his eyes as he went back inside his office. I had been witnessing such phenomena for days. Truly, it was as though Dixie really was a princess, or some kind of royalty, a special person. Everyone had to touch her as they told her good-bye. All were sad, but I was devastated.

Suddenly a ripple ran through our group—here he came! Dixie stepped forward, putting up a hand to shield her eyes from the sun.

“Don’t forget,” Richard Overholser blurted out, “college!”

“Hush, Richard,” Claudia said.

“Lord God, would you look at that big old car!” Brenda cried as Frank Calhoun came into view driving the longest, whitest, shiniest automobile I had ever seen, like a vision from another life.

“Oh, that’s Frank!” Dixie cried. “Here he is—” running lightly down the steps and straight out into the road to greet him. If there had been another car, she’d have been hit.

Brakes squealed as her husband slammed them on, not parking but just stopping dead in the middle of the street. He leapt out, leaving his door wide open—we all got a glimpse of the red leather interior with wrapped gifts piled high in the backseat. Frank Calhoun was a big, vigorous man with a rugged, deeply tanned, and beaming face beneath his wide-brimmed leather hat, the hat of an outdoorsman.

“Missy!” He swept her up in his arms and twirled her around and around until they looked like a spinning top. Then he set her down and gave her a big, long kiss. “Are you ready?” he asked, pulling back to look at her, and she said “Yes,” laughing, adjusting her beret.

“Let’s do it then,” he said, bowing in the most courteous way to the rest of us, whom she introduced one by one as he moved among us shaking hands and thanking everyone for “taking such good care of my girl.” He gave Brenda and me special hugs. When he said, ”Oh, you are Evalina! I know all about Evalina,” I could feel myself blushing.

“All right, boys,” he said to Bernard and Marcus, two hospital workers who hovered at the edge of our group, “Let’s load her up.” They put all of Dixie’s red luggage into the trunk, then brought the wrapped gifts from the backseat and placed them carefully on the steps of Highland Hall. “Now a few of these have got a tag on them,” Frank said, winking at me, “but as for the rest, y’all can just give ’em out however you want, to everybody that’s been nice to my baby.”

“That’s everybody,” Dixie said, twinkling.

“There’s some fudge and some fried pies in those two baskets.” Frank pointed at them. “So y’all had better get right on with it. Honey?” He opened the passenger side door.

But first, Dixie ran over to whisper her parting advice in my ear. “You hang on to the doctor, now, you hear? And just forget all about that retarded yard boy!” Then she jumped in the car.

Frank Calhoun got behind the wheel and slammed the door, tipping his hat to all.

“Good-bye, good-bye!” we chorused as the car pulled out; he blew the horn in response, several long, musical blasts as they drove down the hill and out of sight.

“My goodness!” Claudia Overholser said.

“Well, what did you expect?” her husband asked peevishly.

“But he’s so genuine, so much charm and goodwill, so generous . . .” Dr. Schwartz mused as if to herself.

“And she absolutely loves him, doesn’t she?” I said. I had known this, but hadn’t understood it. Now I did.

“Yes, and that’s the main thing, that’s the kind of thing we can never understand about a patient’s real life, those of us who only see them for one short hour here and there during what is just a short and removed period of time in their actual lives, an interlude—”

“Intermezzo,” I interrupted.

“Yes,” Dr. Schwartz said, glancing at me. “An intermezzo. How can we ever expect to understand a whole life? Or to influence it in any way? How arrogant of us, really . . . This is an absurd enterprise.” Dr. Schwartz caught her breath sharply as she turned away.

Bernard, one of the hospital workers, looked at the rolled bill that Frank had apparently slipped him, then grinned as he pocketed it again, saying, “Now that man, he somebody, ain’t he? And ain’t he got a great big car?”

CHAPTER 11

B
Y
C
HRISTMAS
E
VE, ANYONE
w
ho had anyplace else to go had already gone, including Freddy, who was driving his station wagon across the country—all those big, square, orderly states—to Indiana, where six little nieces and nephews eagerly awaited him, along with his mother and sisters and their husbands. Freddy and I had had dinner with the Overholsers and several others the night before he left—a huge roast cooked by Richard, much too rare for my own taste, though acclaimed by all the rest.

“I guess you’d like my mother’s cooking, then,” Freddy told me. “She cooks everything all day long. If we had a big roast like this, she’d make pot roast out of it. In fact, we probably will have pot roast!” Beneath the tablecloth, his hand closed over mine. “I wish you were going with me,” he blurted out, sotto voce, in my ear.

Amidst all the hubbub, I hoped that no one would notice, but Dr. Schwartz chose that moment to smile at me across the table, and I worried that perhaps she’d heard him after all. This bothered me on two counts. Not only was Freddy very close to breaking the rules for doctor/patient relationships, but also I knew—we all knew—that Dr. Schwartz’s marriage had just ended. This was not her choice; her husband, a therapist in private practice in Asheville, had “fallen in love with someone else,” as she’d put it delicately.

Richard stood up, glass in hand, to offer a toast, “To Indiana and her fair-haired boy!” and everyone drank, myself included, though I never took more than a sip, instinctively wary of what might happen should I take too much. I didn’t like the tongue-in-cheek way Richard had said, “To Indiana and her fair-haired boy!” as if it were somehow a joke, as if he were almost but not quite making fun of Freddy. Richard was a bit hard to take in general, I had decided, so opinionated—though it was clear that Claudia adored him.

Richard Overholser was the very opposite of straightforward Freddy, who stopped by the next morning to envelop me in a huge bear hug before he left. “This courtship will resume when I return!” he announced, his words floating out as white puffs in the chilly air. He looked ridiculous in that silly hat with the ear flaps. Yet tears came to my eyes as I watched him drive off on his long journey home, so far away.

The next day was Christmas Eve. The hospital grounds looked empty and forlorn, though beautiful, as I hurried over to Highland Hall, where I would play for the traditional candlelight vespers service in the drawing room. This had always been my favorite event at Highland, though it would be different now, without Dr. Carroll’s long prayers, for he had fancied himself a preacher as well as an orator. Only the very sickest among the patients and those who had nowhere else to go, plus a skeleton staff (what a horrible expression! I realize as I write these words) remained at Highland now. The severely ill were housed as always on the top floors of the Central Building. I noticed the lights up there burning brightly—though there were lights in all the buildings, an attempt at cheer, I suppose, Christmas being an exceptionally emotional time for all.

Though only late afternoon, it was already dark, or almost dark, that lovely gray twilight of French impressionist paintings, with the lightly falling snowflakes as dabs of white on the canvas. Pointillisme. Oddly dislocated by the snow, I felt a kinship with those painted ladies in Mrs. Fitzgerald’s cityscapes who had no ground at all beneath their dancing feet. But they didn’t seem to care. They were always gazing up, up, up, at something beyond the picture frame—what? When I looked up myself, the rushing snowflakes fell like soft, cold kisses on my face. As I crossed our beautiful campus, all the streetlights along Zillicoa Avenue came on at once, each globe casting a lovely round silver glow filled with falling flakes—for all the world as if the streetlights had been transformed into big snow globes, the sort that you turn upside down to make it snow upon the little scene within. Mrs. Carroll used to collect those, too.

Light-headed, I had to stop and catch my breath, which made me nearly late. Everyone was already seated when I slipped into the drawing room to take my place at the spinet piano, starting off with “Deck the Halls,” for we were to keep this service upbeat, short, and “not religious,” according to Dr. Bennett, who had decked himself out in a red plaid vest with a green tie for the occasion. His wife looked like an enormous cream puff in ruffled beige lace. Phoebe Dean, large herself, could have been a Wise Man in her long purple frock, which buttoned up the front, like a robe. She led them vigorously in singing “Jingle Bells,” and then we all listened to old Mr. Pugh’s vigorous recitation of “T’was the Night Before Christmas.”

Everyone who could come had been encouraged to do so, I believe, for all the regular chairs had been pulled forward and were now filled, as well as a number of additional folding chairs. Most people had dressed up a bit, too, as much as they were able, with varying results. Another thing about being crazy is that you are not self-conscious, but totally unaware of how you look or how you might appear to others. Old Mr. Crowninshield, sitting on the front row, wore a blue velvet smoking jacket with his red-striped pajama pants and monogrammed bedroom slippers. A more recently arrived lady was the very picture of elegance in a long pink satin evening dress that Cinderella herself might have worn to the ball. It made me sad to note that four of the men had chosen to wear their military uniform jackets—medals, too—honoring that which had harmed them so badly.

Phoebe handed out song sheets that I had mimeographed earlier, and we started in upon “The Twelve Days of Christmas.”

As they sang lustily through the turtle doves, French hens, and calling birds, I looked around the beautiful drawing room, transformed by the glowing candles, the red poinsettias we had grown, and the greenery we had gathered in the woods. Mrs. Carroll’s collection of manger scenes covered every available surface. Some of them I remembered, such as the primitive stone Inuit group from Alaska, nestled into their own stone cave; the colorful Russian egg set; those bright tin Haitian figures; and the minimal Swedish stick people. I remembered Mrs. Carroll showing me the small painted terra-cotta set from Provence called a santon, with its various characters from village life—the scissors grinder, the fishmonger, the chestnut seller, everyday people. It had always been my favorite. They used to roast chestnuts on the street in Paris; Joey Nero and I ate them right there, out in the bitter cold, wearing our overcoats. There was also a menorah on the sideboard, and an Islamic star and crescent display.

No doubt about it: Mrs. Carroll had broadened my world, as well as determined the course of my life. It is a complicated thing to be broadened and determined, of course—not to mention saved and abandoned! But as I sat playing the piano in that beautiful room on Christmas Eve, I was able to thank her for all of it.

I smiled to recognize the crude little nativity made with popsicle sticks, a recent Christmas project for staff children that I had helped Miss Malone conduct in the Art Room. There sat Miss Malone and Karen Quinn now, shoulder to shoulder in the front row, Karen wearing one of those Scandinavian knit hats that made her look like she had pigtails. In fact, she could have been Miss Malone’s daughter. Mrs. Hodges was there, too, having coaxed her own reluctant-looking daughter Ruthie into bringing her over. Mrs. Hodges always said she wouldn’t miss this service for the world.

Dr. Schwartz looked like one of the Murano glass figurines, thin and almost transparent, yet singing beautifully on the “five golden rings,” her small, perfect soprano quivering above the rest. They all sang out on “five golden rings,” holding the notes as long as they could while I ran arpeggios up and down the keys. Mrs. Fitzgerald, seated with the Morrises, looked the best I had seen her in years, laughing as she tried to keep up the pace on the repeated verses, which grew speedier and speedier as the “days of Christmas” progressed. I knew that Mrs. Fitzgerald was expecting another grandchild soon, to be produced by her beloved daughter Scottie Lanahan, the real “Patricia Pie-Face,” now living in New York with her husband and little son Tim.

The Morrises had brought several young people and two small children (grandchildren?) along with them, a fact that I somehow resented—it seemed so odd for Mrs. Morris to have grown children I did not even know, for her to have an entire life away from the greenhouse, away from us. Huge Carl Renz hovered in the back of the drawing room, standing, pacing, turning his hat in his hands—he never sat down. We were all used to it. But where was Pan? I wondered. Down in his mountain lair, beneath the falling snow that must be accumulating seriously by now? Or out playing music somewhere, perhaps in an Asheville tavern? But I didn’t really know, did I? I didn’t have any idea of where he went or what his life was like, any more than I knew what the Morrises’ life was like. Or the Overholsers’. Or anybody’s, really . . . all of us a collection of snow globes.

On the seventh day of Christmas, my true love gave to me seven swans a-swimming, six geese a-laying . . . There was the pretty receptionist Sharon Green, and Dr. Pine with his flowing moustaches and his cheerful elfin wife. And he looked like Einstein, as everybody said. On we marched, through maids and pipers, though the pink lady cried out, “How many goddamn verses are there, anyhow? I’ve had about enough of this!” prompting general amusement. And finally we were done, with the last resounding major chords of “a partridge in a pear tree!” They all shouted it out, then collapsed in laughter.

Having achieved, I imagine, the mood he’d been aiming for, Dr. Bennett was adjourning us all to the dining room when old Mr. Crowninshield, wild-haired and white-bearded, jumped up and croaked, “Sir! Sir! I beg you! at least, a prayer, a blessing—for it is Christmas, after all!” his voice breaking. It was a voice that bespoke culture, refinement, an entire life of public speaking—perhaps he was a minister himself, in his real life outside these hospital grounds.

I thought Dr. Bennett might cut him off, but he, with a courtly gesture, said, “Please, Sir—proceed!” and bowed his head. Most bowed their heads but I did not, looking around the lovely room as the old man prayed, calling for peace in the world as in our troubled hearts, and asking God to “bless us every one.”

I continued to play a soft little Christmas medley of my own devising as everybody headed to the dining hall for a cold meal left by the kitchen staff, who had been given this night and most of tomorrow off for the holiday. Christmas Eve supper always featured picnic fare and forbidden sweets: thick ham sandwiches, deviled eggs, potato salad, red and green jello salad, fudge, and pecan pie, with bowls of hard candy and tangerines for treats. Suddenly it crossed my mind to wonder if Flossie had had a hand in any of this—a chilling thought, for some reason, though surely she had.

“Merry Christmas, Evalina!” Claudia called out to me. “We’re heading on home now, while we can still get home!”

“Oh! I didn’t even realize you were here,” I called back, very surprised to see the Overholsers present, as Richard was a self-proclaimed atheist, and they were not churchgoers—unlike Freddy, a Lutheran. But the Overholsers wanted to give their daughter Ellen a religious sense, Claudia came up and whispered to me, a sense of drama and mystery, and this service was just perfect, wasn’t it? Wasn’t it perfect?

It was.

In fact, it had been so perfect that I couldn’t bear to leave the drawing room, even after Mrs. Hodges had said “Merry Christmas” and hugged me good-bye and the Overholsers had wrapped themselves up and left. I played “Silent Night” as the room cleared out, then “Ave Maria” once all were gone, losing myself in the rippling, emotional music, imagining Lillian Field’s voice as she might have sung it.

“Evalina, this is beautiful, but you’d better come along and have some supper now before it’s all gone,” Mr. Pugh remarked, startling me. I don’t know how long he had been standing behind me.

“Oh, I’m not very hungry,” I announced, to my own surprise. “I’ll just stay here a minute, if you don’t mind, and finish this piece, and then I’ll come along. Don’t worry, I’ll blow out the candles,” I assured him.

“It’s time to go, honey,” Mr. Pugh said. “Come on, go over to the dining hall and grab a sandwich, and I’ll close up here. I always do.”

“I just hate to leave all these little pietàs,” I said, still playing. I really didn’t mean to be obstinate, I just couldn’t stand to leave.

“Pietàs? What do you mean, pietàs?” Mr. Pugh sat down next to me on the piano bench, and I moved over to accommodate him.

“The santon from France,” I said, “and that painted tin one from Haiti, I remember those from when I was a child. All these little pietàs. She got them out every Christmas. “

We both knew who “she” was.

“Evalina,” Mr. Pugh said in what I knew to be his “instructive” tone, “You have confused your terms, my dear. These are not pietàs. They are crèches, manger scenes, nativities. “

I was confused. “”Well, what’s a pietà, then?”

Ever the pedant, Mr. Pugh did not hesitate. “A pietà is a depiction of the Virgin Mary cradling the body of the crucified Christ, the dead Christ. Such as Michelangelo’s famous sculpture at St. Peter’s, or Titian’s last painting, or El Greco’s famous depiction . . .” Dr. Pugh always went on longer than he needed to.

“Robert would have known that, wouldn’t he?” I mused. “The difference between a pietà and a crèche.”

“Yes, I expect he would.” Mr. Pugh patted my shoulder awkwardly. “And we still miss him, don’t we? I expect we always shall. ”

“Yes.” I slid into “Silent Night” and went on playing—I could not have stopped if my life depended upon it.

“It’s a well-known fact that the infant Jesus is frequently stolen from crèches,” Mr. Pugh went on, sounding like Robert himself. “Many of them can be purchased with two or three Jesuses, in fact, for that very reason.”

“Jesus triplets!” I had to laugh.

Mr. Pugh cleared his throat as if to speak again, and then did not. He stood up. “You take your time, then, Evalina,” he said. “I’ll just have a cup of coffee and another piece of that pie, and check back here later.” He squeezed my shoulder and lumbered off, an old man, a good man. I was alone in the beautiful room with the glowing candles, the poinsettias, the piney scent of evergreen, and all the little crèches, each with its baby Jesus. Or not.