do.â
âMy father? What else does he say?â
âHe had not noticed any weakness in the legs; he says you walk a great deal.â
âYes.â I was terrified that the doctor was just waiting to confront me with my self-Âabuse.
âYou are somewhat slim for a farm girl,â he continued.
âI am not aâ â
âAnd you have complained of pains in the head.â
âYes.â I could feel myself getting smaller in my chair. âI have aâÂa sound in my head sometimes.â
âWhat sort of sound?â He seemed unsurprised.
âA wheezing sound.â
âAh.â
I knew I had pleased him.
âI hear it in the silence of the night; I think it is the strangled beating of my heart.â
âHave you any feelings of oppression?â
Oh, I almost laughed then. As I sat in that chair getting smaller and smaller I could feel the entire oppressive weight of the hospital on my poor aching head. Quite soon I would be the size of a mouse!
âSince my arrival here,â I said.
He wrote again in his notebook, and then we sat in silence for another little while.
âYour father,â he said finally, as though surfacing from some great depth, âsays that your disposition for intellectual work is very good.â
âWell,â I said, not knowing the correct answer to this, âwe like to talk in the evenings.â
âIt will be good for you that all such discussions will be suspended while you are here.
âDr. Charcot has authorized me to give this to you.â He pushed a small journal toward me across his desk. I had noticed it the moment I sat down: a black journal with hard cardboard for front and back. I had been eyeing it with something like lust the entire interview! I could not believe that it was now mine.
I burst out, âWhy?â
âThe doctor feels it will be beneficial,â was all he said, and I found myself thinking, To whom?
âI have called for an orderly,â he said. âHe will familiarize you with the routines of your rehabilitation.â
He turned and looked out the window. I did not know what to do. I had thought I was going to be given a chance to defend myself. Instead I heard footsteps coming. They started as a far-Âoff rhythm, then became a tapping that turned loud as a drumbeat in my head. Somewhere the laughing started again. I wanted to throw myself on the mercy of the man in front of me, but I still could not remember his name. I felt like the condemned listening to the executionerâs footsteps. Then another man was standing in the doorway, and I said to the doctor, âIs that all you have to say to me?â
âGuillaume will tell you all you need to know.â
âAm I to have nothing to say for myself, then?â
When the orderly took my arm I dared not shake it off.
âYoung woman,â said the doctor, turning around, âI am familiar with the particulars of your case. If you follow the excellent regimen Dr. Charcot has set up for his patients, you will almost certainly make a full recovery. It is not too late for you to be made fit for your future duties as mother and wife.â With that he turned back toward the window, and the orderly took a more firm grip on my arm. There was a noise in the hall. As we came out the door I saw an older woman, perhaps thirty, being walked down the hall by a male attendant. The woman was talking to the attendant; she smiled quite naturally at me as she passed. Was this the woman who had been laughing? It felt wrong to have a strange man holding my arm. He hadnât said anything but to greet the other attendant, though not, I had noticed, his patient.
The halls were an interminable labyrinth. Again it became difficult not to laugh at myself, waiting for the Minotaur.
But of course there was no monster, just empty halls, then an empty room. The orderly left me standing by a naked white bed, looking out a
Jonathan Strahan [Editor]
Kit Morgan
Emmie Mears
Jill Stengl
Joan Wolf
A. C. Crispin, Ru Emerson
Calista Fox
Spider Robinson
Jill Barnett
Curtis C. Chen