Desperation made her voice high and shrill. No one said a word.
They lifted Jory off the stretcher by using the sheet, carefully deposited him on his bed, then chased all of us out but Chris. In the hall outside I held Melodie and waited, waited.
Melodie and I went back to Foxworth Hall toward dawn, when Jory's condition seemed stable enough for me to relax a little. Chris stayed on, sleeping in some little room used by the interns on duty.
I had wanted to stay as well, but Melodie grew ever more hysterical, hating the way Jory slept, hating the medicinal smell of the hospital corridors; hating the nurses who scurried in and out of his room with trays of instruments and bottles; hating the doctors who wouldn't give her, or me, a straight answer.
A taxi drove us both back to the Hall, where a light had been left burning near the front doors. The sun was just peeking over the horizon, flushing the sky with frail pink. Little birds woke up and fluttered tentative fledgling wings, while their parents sang or chirped their territorial rights before they flew away to find food. I supported Melodie up the stairs and into the house. She was by this time so deeply detached from reality that she staggered and seemed drunk.
Up one side of the dual staircase carefully, slowly, with my arm about her waist, thinking every second of the baby she was carrying and the effect this night might have on him or her. In the bedroom she shared with Jory she couldn't manage to undress, her hands trembled so badly. I helped, then slipped a nightgown over her head, tucked her into the bed and turned out the light. "I'll stay if you want," I said, as she lay there bleak and hopeless looking. She wanted me to stay, wanted to talk about Jory and the doctors who wouldn't give us any encouragement. "Why do they do that?" she cried.
How could I tell her how doctors protected themselves with silence until they were sure of their facts? I covered for all Jory's doctors, telling Melodie that Jory had to be all right or they would have wanted her to stay on.
Finally she drifted into restless sleep, fretting and tossing, calling Jory's name, waking up often to jerk back to awareness and cry all over again. Her anguish was painful to see and hear, and I was left feeling as wrung out as she was.
An hour later, much to my relief, she sank into deep sleep, as if even she knew she had to escape that way.
I had a few minutes of sleep myself before Cindy barged into my room and perched anxiously on my bed, waiting for me to wake up. The very sinking of the mattress when she sat opened my eyes. I saw her face, opened my arms and held her while she cried. "He is going to be all right, Momma?"
"Darling, your father is there with him. Jory had to have immediate surgery. He's in a private room now, asleep and resting comfortably. Chris will be there when he wakes up. I'm going to eat a quick breakfast and then drive to the city to be there, too. I want you to stay here with Melodie--"
Already I'd decided that Melodie was much too hysterical to go to the hospital with me.
Instantly Cindy protested, saying she wanted to go and see Jory herself. I shook my head, insisting she stay. "Melodie is his wife, darling, and she is taking this very hard, and in her condition she shouldn't go back to the hospital until we know the truth about Jory. I've never seen a woman carry on so much about being in a hospital. She seems to think they are as bad as funeral homes. Now stay, and say anything to keep her calm, wait on her, see that she eats and drinks. Give her the peace she is seeking desperately now . . . and I'll telephone when I know something."
Melodie, when I peeked in a few minutes later, was so deeply asleep I knew I'd made the right decision. "Explain to her why I didn't wait for her to wake up, Cindy, lest she think I'm taking her place . . ."
I drove very fast toward the hospital.
Because Chris was a doctor, I'd spent a great deal of my life going to and from hospitals, letting him off, picking him up, visiting friends, meeting a few patients he particularly favored. We'd taken Jory to the best hospital in our area. The corridors were broad to allow the passing and turning of stretchers, the windows were wide, with plants hanging. Every modern diagnostic aid was there, despite the expense. But the room where Jory slept on and on was tiny, so tiny, as were all the rooms. The single window was so recessed it was difficult to look outside, and when I did, I saw nothing but the entranceway to the hospital and, farther away, another
wing.
Chris was still sleeping, though a nurse told me he'd been in to check on Jory five times during the night. "He's really a devoted father, Mrs. Sheffield."
I turned to stare down at Jory, who now wore a heavy cast on his body with a window through which his incision could be viewed and treated, if necessary. I kept staring at his legs, wondering why they didn't twitch, bend, move--they weren't enclosed in the cast.
Suddenly an arm slipped around my waist and warm lips brushed the nape of my neck.
"Didn't I order you not to come back until I called?"
Relief immediately flooded me. Chris was here. "Chris, how can I stay away? I've got to know what's wrong, or I can't sleep. Tell me the truth, now that Melodie isn't here to scream and faint."
He sighed and bowed his head. Only then did I see how exhausted he looked, still wearing his rumpled and soiled tux. "It's not good news, Cathy. I'd rather not go into details until I've talked again with his physicians and surgeon."
"Don't you pull that old trick on me! I want to know! I'm not one of your patients who thinks doctors are gods on pedestals and I can't ask questions. Is Jory's back broken? Was his spinal cord injured? Will he walk again? Why doesn't he move his legs?"
First he pulled me out into the hall, in case Jory was awake but had his eyes closed. Softly he closed the door behind him and then led me into a tiny cubicle where only doctors were allowed. He sat me down, standing to tower above me, and made me realize I was about to hear very serious news. Only then did he speak. "Jory's spine was broken, Cathy. You guessed correctly. It's a lower lumbar fracture, so we can be grateful his injury wasn't higher. He will have full use of his arms and will eventually gain control over his bladder and intestinal functions, but right now they are in shock, so to speak, and tubes and bags will function until he regains the feeling of when he has to go."
He paused, but I wasn't letting him off that easily. "The spinal cord? Tell me that it wasn't crushed."
"No, not crushed, but damaged," he said reluctantly. "It is bruised severely enough to keep his legs paralyzed."
I froze. Oh, no! Not Jory! I cried out, with no more control than Melodie. "He'll never walk again?" I whispered, feeling myself go pale and weak and slightly light-headed. When next I opened my eyes, Chris was on his knees by my side, gripping both my hands hard.
"Hold on . . . he's alive, and that's what counts. He won't die--but he'll never walk again."
Sinking, I was drowning, drowning, going under again in that same old familiar pool of hopeless despair. The same little sparkling swanhead fish rushed to nibble on my brain, taking bits out of my soul. "And that means he'll never dance again . . . never walk, never dance . . . Chris, what will this do to him?"