Orphan #8 (26 page)

They disgorged at Althea’s parents’ house, an impressive Queen Anne with steep gables. Its shingled turret looked like a doll’s house to Rachel compared to the clock tower of the Castle. The children ran to their grandmother—even little Mae toddled up the brick walk—but Rachel hung back. Dr. Abrams came up behind her, carrying one of Althea’s bags and the cardboard case. “Would you take these?” he said. “I’m going back for the rest of the luggage now.”

“Excuse me, sir, but I need to go on to Leadville. Perhaps you could bring me back to the station with you?”

“The Mail to Leadville doesn’t leave until the morning. I’m afraid there aren’t any more trains tonight.”

Dr. Abrams called his wife down from the porch. After a hurried consultation, he got back in the sedan and motored away. Mrs. Abrams spoke to Rachel. “It’s been settled. You’ll stay with us tonight. Now come on in, dear.”

Rachel sat with the boys while Althea and her mother went upstairs to settle Mae and the baby. By the time they came back down, Simon and Henry were nodding in their chairs. “I’ll take
them, Althea, if you want to wait up for your father,” Mrs. Abrams said.

“I’m too exhausted for conversation, Mother. I’ll drop the boys off in the nursery and get into my old bed. I’ll see you at breakfast.”

As Althea and the boys climbed the stairs, the front door opened and Dr. Abrams came in with the luggage. It took him two trips to carry it all in from the car and up the stairs. When he was finished, he dropped into a chair and removed his round wire-rimmed glasses to wipe his forehead with a napkin. Mrs. Abrams poured him a glass of iced tea, her strong arms managing the heavy glass pitcher as if it were weightless.

“I checked on the Mail to Leadville. It leaves at nine, but you won’t arrive until the afternoon, it makes absolutely every stop along the way. Perhaps I could arrange for someone to drive you?”

“I could do it, Charles. A day trip to Leadville would make a nice diversion for the children.”

“No, thank you, Dr. Abrams, Mrs. Abrams, I won’t mind the time on the train.” They didn’t seem to believe her. “I’ve been so busy helping Mrs. Cohen with the children I haven’t had any time to prepare myself. My father, you see, is very ill.”

“As you wish. The scenery will be spectacular at least, especially around Breckenridge,” Dr. Abrams said. “I’ll say good night now.”

“I’ll be right in, Charles, I’m putting Rachel in the Ivy Room.”

Mrs. Abrams took Rachel upstairs, past the bedrooms where Althea and the children slept, to a narrow staircase. Rachel followed her up to a cozy room in the attic, where she found a freshly made bed, a small dresser, and a sink with hot and cold taps. The electric light brought green vines and goldfinches out of the wallpaper.

“I meant to have the au pair in here. I hope you don’t mind, Rachel.”

Rachel didn’t mind in the least. Tucked into the circular turret, its view of Colfax Avenue fractured by the small panes of a leaded window, the Ivy Room made her feel like a princess in a tower. Pulling shut the curtain, she took off her hat and clothes and washed herself from head to toe with a warm, soapy cloth. She opened the case to pull out her nightdress. Rachel had forgotten about the braid. Catching the light, Amelia’s hair smoldered accusingly.

D
OCTOR
A
BRAMS DROPPED
Rachel at Union Station the next morning. Buying her ticket for the Mail train, she was grateful to have traveled from Chicago with the Cohens—what she had left of Naomi’s money might not have covered the whole trip. But on the slow train that took most of the day, Rachel didn’t worry about what she’d do if Sam wasn’t in Leadville after all. Instead she pictured his face spreading into a smile as she appeared. He’d be impressed that she’d done this all on her own, relieved to know it wasn’t his job to worry about her anymore.

And this Rabinowitz who owned the dry goods store? The more Rachel thought about it, the more she convinced herself he must be their father. She thought of Simon in the house on Colfax Avenue, securely circled by his mother, his brothers and sister, his grandparents. And back in Chicago his father and another set of grandparents, and cousins, maybe, and aunts and uncles. Even Naomi had her Uncle Jacob and Aunt Estelle, and Vic had his mother, too. Didn’t she at least deserve to have a father?

The engine chugged over ravines and along creek beds high in
the Rockies, stopping often to drop off mailbags and take on passengers. Finally, the conductor called Leadville. Rachel stepped off the train onto a wooden platform. The evening sky, still bright, was overbearingly blue. The few rough men who’d gotten off the train with her quickly scattered. She asked the man picking up the mail if he knew where she could find Rabinowitz Dry Goods.

“Sure, it’s next to the Tabor. Just go up Harrison Street, it’ll be on the left, can’t miss it.”

Rachel made her way along the raised sidewalk, stepping up and down at each street crossing, mud caking to her shoes from the unpaved roads. Her breath quickened and her heart thudded after only a couple of blocks. She worried she was getting ill until she remembered what Dr. Abrams had told her about the altitude. She rested a moment, looking around at Leadville. Only a few people were out—men in work clothes, women in plain dresses—and traffic was a car motoring past a horse cart. The entire town consisted of the one road and the few muddy lanes that crossed it. Beyond was nothing: no bridges or rooflines or streetlamps. Althea Cohen had spoken of the Rockies as expansive and open, but to Rachel, Leadville seemed a lonely island overshadowed by snowy peaks. Its isolation was as oppressive as the closeness of the sky. She wondered how her father had ended up here, how Sam had found him. Taking as deep a breath as she could, she lifted the cardboard case and continued.

She nearly passed it before noticing the letters
T-A-B-O-R
affixed to the facade of a large building. She hadn’t expected “the Tabor” to be an opera house. Rachel looked around, her eyes scanning above doorways. There it was, Rabinowitz Dry Goods, painted on brick, faded and peeling. She peered through the shop
window, stuffed with dusty goods, and saw a long counter stretching the length of the store. A row of enameled ovens marched down the center aisle, which was blocked by barrels of nails and stacked wheelbarrows. The walls were obscured by shelves piled with cooking pots and hatchets and pie pans and bolts of cloth.

Rachel tugged at the door. A bell jangled as it opened. “Be right out!” a man’s voice called. Through the maze of goods, she saw a figure emerging from the back of the store. White hair circled his head, dipped down his cheeks, and crossed his upper lip. Beneath his jutting eyebrows, he squinted through round glasses. He was older, of course he was, but there was something deeply familiar about the shape of his chin, the reach of his nose, the slope of his shoulders. As he neared, Rachel flew back in time. She was four years old and a man with this nose, this chin, was lifting her to those shoulders, kissing her cheek, calling her a little monkey. She dropped her case. In two running steps she met him, her arms around his neck.

“Papa!” All the anxiety of her long journey was released in a rush of child’s tears.

Chapter Fourteen

D
R.
F
ELDMAN’S NURSE WAS NAMED
B
ETTY
—I
READ IT
on the nametag she wore pinned to her uniform. From her stern voice on the telephone, I’d expected someone Gloria’s age, but she was younger than she sounded and more fashionable, too, with manicured nails and hair sprayed into place. Still, the brisk way she took my information left no doubt who was in charge. Once she’d started my chart, she led me into an examination room and told me to get undressed. “Right down to your panties, then put this on.” After I’d changed, she tied the cotton gown for me behind my back, tugging each little bow securely in place. She’d be a reassuring woman to have as a mother, I thought. Polished and dependable, if a little intimidating. Flo was nice as could be, but it pained me to see how her kids ran her ragged.

When I returned from providing a urine sample, Betty had me perch on the examination table while she took my pressure and pulse. I was surprised to see her ready a draw kit without being given an order. “He always wants blood drawn from new patients,” she said, answering my unasked question. As she wrapped the rubber tube around my upper arm and patted the inside of my
elbow to raise a vein, I wondered what she got paid. It would be nice to work in a doctor’s office: steady hours, a good salary, no changing shifts or heavy lifting of patients. Why hadn’t I ever applied for a job like this?

“Oh, I hear Dr. Feldman coming now,” Betty said. The door from the adjoining office opened abruptly.

“And who do we have here?” I opened my mouth to introduce myself when I realized Dr. Feldman hadn’t asked me, wasn’t even looking at me, but instead was reaching for the chart Betty held out to him. He settled thick glasses on a nose so biblical I couldn’t help but think of him as a rabbi.

“Call if you need me,” Betty said to him, turning to leave. The look they exchanged was so intimate, as if they knew everything about each other, it reminded me why I preferred the more impersonal environment of a hospital or the Old Hebrews Home.

“So, what brings you here today, Miss Rabinowitz?”

Facing him, I found myself tongue-tied. I’d had no trouble telling it all to Betty: the Infant Home, the X-ray experiment, Dr. Feldman’s article in the library. Wasn’t it all in my chart already, or had he only pretended to read it? Mute, I touched my breast.

“Yes, well, my nurse tells me you’ve found a lump. Let’s start there, shall we?” Dr. Feldman positioned himself beside the table, facing my back, and tugged open the gown. I moved to lie down, but he stopped me. “Just place your hand on top of your head.” I did, feeling like a child playing Simon Says, while his fat fingers, yellowed by nicotine, searched my breast. I was embarrassed to see my nipple harden—from the air-conditioned cold as much as his prods and pinches—but he seemed to take no notice. After bruising his way up and down one side of my chest and armpit,
he had me switch hands, forgetting to pull the gown back up over my shoulder, leaving me naked to the waist. He accompanied his examination with rumbling sounds in the back of his throat.

“Very good. You can get dressed now.” He called for Betty on his way out, lighting a cigarette before the door was even closed. When I was presentable, she ushered me into his office. It reeked of smoke. Next to the overflowing glass ashtray on his desk was a pretentious blue pack of French cigarettes. The air conditioner rumbling in the closed window seemed only to recirculate the sickly smell.

“Miss Rabinowitz,” he said from behind the fortress of his desk. “I’ll need to see the results of your blood work, but my examination of your breast, coupled with the X-ray treatments my nurse tells me you received as a child—”

“They weren’t treatments,” I interrupted, surprising both of us with my vehemence. “It was an experiment. I was experimented on, not treated.”

“Be that as it may, I have been noticing a statistically significant correlation between excessive childhood exposure to radiation and cancers later in life. Now, forgive me for asking, but have you ever given birth to a child or nursed a baby?”

“No, of course not.” I sounded so prudish, I said again, simply, “No, I haven’t.”

“Have you experienced normal menses? Are you postmenopausal?”

“I didn’t start until I was sixteen, and I’ve never been exactly regular.”

“I see. Is there any chance of pregnancy?”

“None.”

“Well, we’ll see what the urine test tells us. As I was saying, based on my examination, I’d say you’re quite lucky. The tumor is distinct with discernible edges. Though it may be fast growing, we have caught it in time to qualify you for surgery. If it was too advanced, you see, it wouldn’t be advisable to cut across the cancer field.”

He walked across the room and flicked a switch. A spotlight turned on, illuminating a laminated poster of a woman on his wall. He took a crayon from his pocket and began drawing on it. I could see smudges from past demonstrations. “I begin with an excision of the tumor, which is examined for cancer cells. If the results are negative, I finish the procedure and do what I can to repair the remaining breast tissue. If the results are positive, as I expect they will be, I proceed directly to a mastectomy of the entire breast and related lymph nodes. Unlike some of my colleagues, I don’t find it advisable to remove the pectoral muscle, but as a prophylactic measure, I’d recommend taking the other breast as well. For a woman with your history who’s never had a pregnancy or nursed an infant, it would be the wise choice.”

His dashed lines crisscrossed the woman’s chest as if he were planning a military maneuver on undulating terrain. I wanted to cover my breasts with my hands, to reassure and comfort them. Instead I gripped the arms of my chair. I hated how he kept mentioning babies, as if this wouldn’t have happened if I’d been a normal woman.

“And, of course, I’ll perform the castration.” His crayon dipped below her waist, dabbing the lower abdomen where her ovaries were hidden. His back to me, he didn’t see the blood drain from my face.

“Oophorectomy is standard procedure for all breast cancers, though I usually prefer to accomplish castration with radiation. Obviously, that wouldn’t be recommended in your case. Neither would X-ray treatments following surgery, another reason to be aggressive while I have you on the table. Take them both and be done with it.” He paused and considered his two-dimensional patient. Speaking more to her than to me, he said, “The operation is disfiguring, but at least in your case there’s no husband to consider.”

He switched off the light and took his seat behind the desk. He reached for the pack of cigarettes, lit one for himself, then tilted them in my direction. I was tempted but declined; I didn’t want him to see how badly my hands were shaking.

“This isn’t a cure, you understand. In my experience with this disease, even the most complete mastectomy merely delays a recurrence. But that delay can be significant. Two years, five. I have one patient who has survived eight years since her operation. The sudden onset of menopause due to the castration may be unpleasant, but we’ll cross that bridge when we come to it, shall we?”