I had slammed down the phone, cutting him off. It was all well and good. But how do you charge off on a balance sheet the life of a man who was killed by your greed? Is there an allowable deduction for death on the income-tax returns? It was I who had killed Amos and no matter how many expenses I deducted from my own soul, I could not bring him back.
The door opened and I looked up. Rosa came into the room, followed by an intern and a nurse wheeling a small cart. She came over to the left side of my bed and stood there, smiling down at me. "Hello, Jonas."
"Hello, Rosa," I mumbled through the bandages. "Is it time to change them again? I didn't expect you until the day after tomorrow."
"The war is over."
"Yes," I said. "I know."
"And when I got up this morning, it was such a beautiful morning, I decided to fly down here and take off your bandages."
I peered up at her. "I see," I said. "I always wondered where doctors got their logic."
"That isn't doctor's logic, that's woman's logic. I have the advantage of having been a woman long before I became a doctor."
I laughed. "I’m grateful for the logic, whichever one of you it belongs to. It will be nice to have the bandages off, even for a little while."
She was still smiling, though her eyes were serious. "This time, they're coming off for good, Jonas."
I stared at her as she picked up a scissors from the cart. I reached up and stayed her hand. Suddenly, I was afraid to have her remove the bandages. I felt safe having them wrapped about my face like a cocoon, shielding me from the prying eyes of the world. "Is it soon enough? Will it be all right?"
She sensed my feeling. "Your face will be sore for a while yet," she said, snipping away at the cocoon. "It will be even sorer as the flesh and muscles take up their work again. But that will pass. We can't spend forever hiding behind a mask, can we?"
That was the doctor talking, not the woman. I looked up at her face as she snipped and unwound, snipped and uncovered, until all the bandage was gone and I felt as naked as a newborn baby, with a strange coolness on my cheeks. I tried to see myself reflected in her eyes but they were calm and expressionless, impersonal and professionally detached. I felt her fingers press against my cheek, the flesh under my chin, smooth the hair back from my temples. "Close your eyes."
I closed them. I felt her fingers touch the lids lightly. "Open."
I opened them. Her face was still quiet and unrevealing. "Smile," she said. "Like this." She made with a wide, humorless grin that was a slapstick parody of her usual warm smile.
I grinned. I grinned until the tiny pains that came to my cheeks began to burn like hell. And still I grinned.
"O.K.," she said, suddenly smiling now. Really smiling. "You can stop now."
I stopped and stared up at her. "How is it, Doc?" I tried to keep it light. "Pretty horrible?"
"It's not bad," she said noncommittally. "You were never a raving beauty, you know." She picked up a mirror from the cart. "Here. See for yourself."
I didn't look at the mirror. I didn't want to see myself just yet. "Can I have a cigarette first, Doc?"
Silently she put the mirror back on the cart and took a package of cigarettes from her coat pocket. She sat down on the edge of my bed, put one in her mouth, lit it, then passed it to me. I could taste the faint sweetness of her lipstick as I drew the smoke into me.
"You were cut pretty badly when Winthrop pushed you through that port. But fortunately- "
"You knew about that?" I asked, interrupting. "About Amos, I mean. How did you find out?"
"From you. While you were under the anesthetic. We kept getting the story in fragments, along with the fragments of glass we were picking out of your face. Fortunately, none of your important facial muscles were severely damaged. It was largely a matter of surface lesions. We were able to make the necessary skin grafts quickly. And successfully, I might add."
I held out my hand. "I’ll take the mirror now, Doc."
She took my cigarette and handed me the mirror. I raised it and when I looked into it, I felt a chill go through me.
"Doc," I said hoarsely. "I look exactly like my father!"
She took the mirror from my hand and I looked up at her. She was smiling. "Do you, Jonas? But that's the way you've always looked."
Later that morning, Robair brought me the papers. They were filled with the story of Japan's capitulation. I glanced at them carelessly and tossed them aside. "Can I get you something else to read, Mr. Jonas?"
"No," I said. "No, thanks. I just don't feel much like reading."
"All right, Mr. Jonas. Maybe you'd like to sleep some." He moved toward the door.
"Robair."
"Yes, Mr. Jonas?"
"Did I- " I hesitated, my fingers automatically touching my cheek. "Did I always look like this?"
His white teeth flashed in a smile. "Yes, Mr. Jonas."
"Like my father?"
"Like his spittin' image."
I was silent. Strange how all your life you tried not to be like someone, only to learn that you'd been stamped indelibly by the blood that ran in your veins.
"Is there anything else, Mr. Jonas?"
I looked up at Robair and shook my head. "I'll try to sleep now."
I leaned back against the pillow and closed my eyes. I heard the door close and gradually the noise from the street faded to the periphery of my consciousness. I slept. It seemed to me I'd been sleeping a great deal lately. As if I was trying to catch up on all the sleep I'd denied myself for the past few hundred years. But I could not have slept long before I became aware that someone was in the room.
I opened my eyes. Jennie was standing next to my bed, looking down at me. When she saw my eyes open, she smiled. "Hello, Jonas."
"I was sleeping," I said, like a child just waking from a nap. "I was dreaming something foolish. I was dreaming I was hundreds of years old."
"It was a happy dream, then. I’m glad. Happy dreams will help you get well faster."
I raised myself up on one elbow and the pulleys squeaked as I reached for the cigarettes on the table next to the bed. Quickly she fluffed the pillows and moved them in behind me to support my back. I dragged on the cigarette. The smoke drove the sleep from my brain.
"In another few weeks, they'll have the cast off your leg and you can go home."
"I hope so, Jennie," I said.
Suddenly, I realized she wasn't wearing her hospital white. "This is the first time I've seen you in a black veil, Jennie. Is it something special?"
"No, Jonas. This is what I always wear, except when I'm on duty in the hospital."
"Then this is your day off?"
"There are no days off in the service of Our Saviour," she said simply. "No, Jonas, I've come to say good-by."
"Good-by? But I don't understand. You said it would be a few weeks before I- "
"I'm going away, Jonas."
I stared up at her stupidly. "Going away?"
"Yes, Jonas," she said quietly. "I’ve only been here at Mercy Hospital until I could get transportation to the Philippines. We're rebuilding a hospital there that was destroyed in the war. Now I am free to leave, by plane."
"But you can't, Jennie," I said. "You can't leave the people you know, the language you speak. You'll be a stranger there, you'll be alone."
Her fingers touched the crucifix hanging from the black leather cincture beneath her garment. A quiet look of calm deepened in her gray eyes. "I am never alone," she said simply. "He is always with me."
"You don't have to, Jennie," I said. I took the pamphlet that I'd found on the table by my bed and opened it. "You've only made a temporary profession. You can resign any time you want. There's still a three-year probationary period before you take your final vows. You don't belong here, Jennie. It's only because you were hurt and angry. You're much too young and beautiful to hide your life away behind a black veil."
She still did not answer.
"Don't you understand what I’m saying, Jennie? I want you to come back where you belong."