"I'd appreciate it if you'd call me again after the doctor comes and let me know if there's anything I can do, Mrs. Martin," the agent said with genuine concern. "Jamie's not just one of the best accompanists in the business, he's a very good friend of mine."
Mirelle kept the little notebook hidden in her hand when she removed the tray. Howell slid down under the blankets wearily, announcing his intention to sleep until the doctor came. Mirelle went to the kitchen and immediately phoned Margaret at her college.
"I'll cut afternoon classes and fly down, Mrs. Martin. You know, I'd wondered why I hadn't heard from Dad. He usually calls me when he gets back home," Margaret said. "You sure he isn't… I mean… it's so unlike him to be sick."
"He is sick but he told me that I was a managing female, that he was really dead and no one had thought to lay out his corpse. Then he made me call his agent."
"Then he intends to live," said Margaret with a laugh of relief. "I'm sure he doesn't mean it… about your being managing, Mrs. Martin…" she added in earnest apology.
"Well, I am, because he has no idea that I have managed to call you. He wouldn't willingly give me your phone number."
"Well, I'm glad you did. Aren't men the living end?"
Mirelle agreed heartily and hung up.
By the time she had finished the dishes and thrown out the spoiled food in the refrigerator, she heard Howell's croaking voice calling. She got half way up the stairs before she understood that he would like ice water. Just as she passed the front door, the bell rang. After fumbling with the lock, she admitted Will Martin.
She felt a trifle silly introducing doctor to patient and retired from the room, ignoring Howell's fierce scowl. When Will came back downstairs to the kitchen, he was muttering under his breath about damned fools who insist they enjoy the best of health. He dialed the pharmacy and ordered several prescriptions sent over as soon as they could be made up.
"Not when Bart has had a coffee break," he added. Then he turned to Mirelle. "Good thing you called and insisted I see him, Mirelle. He's one step away from an oxygen tent. I'd fling him into the hospital right now only they're so crowded…"
"Is he that sick?" Mirelle was alarmed.
"It's nothing that medication and proper food and rest oughtn't to cure. He does have the constitution of an ox, as he boasts, but he needs someone with him in case that lung congestion…"
"I phoned his daughter at college. She hoped to catch the 3:00 plane."
"He said he didn't need anyone!" Will Martin snorted. "Hadn't taken so much as an aspirin. 'Never have any in the house'. " Will did an excellent imitation of James Howell. " 'I'm never sick!' Ha, well, he's sick right now and I've given him a massive dose of penicillin - where it'll remind him that he is. I'll drop in again tomorrow." He cocked his head inquiringly at Mirelle.
"I'll stay until Margaret comes."
"You know the routine to tell her, don't you? Plenty of liquid, not too cold, plenty of rest. I'll want to know if there is any increased difficulty in breathing, or a significant rise in temperature." Mirelle nodded acknowledgment. "Is she a level-headed girl?"
"Seems so."
Will frowned for a moment. "In any case, he's better off at home than in the hospital. No other relatives? No? Will you be looking in?"
"I certainly can," Mirelle assured him, and was then apprehensive.
"Oh, I'm just cautious, that's all, Mirelle. But he's the stubborn type and unless his daughter can keep him in bed, this could easily turn into full-fledged pneumonia."
Mirelle thought of the concert which Jamie intended to play on the 18th and smiled. "I've a lever for her blackmail."
"Okay, then. Give her my answering service number. Eckerd's is sending the prescriptions and a vaporizer. He's to start the tablets tomorrow morning, every four hours, and the codeine syrup ought to inhibit that cough. His throat is raw meat." Will gave another disgusted snort. "And he's never sick!"
"With more people like him, Will, you'd be out of business."
"D'you think I'd mind after this winter?" With a weary shake of his shoulders, Will buttoned up his coat and left.
Mirelle brought Howell his cool water. "On the doctor's orders I phoned Margaret," she said.
Howell narrowed his eyes. "You phoned her before he got here. I heard the click on the extension. Presumptuous female!"
"You know a lot of them, don't you?" she said, lobbing his address book at his chest.
"That's why I can make accurately odious comparisons," he said, his long fingers closing absently about the book. "And you have magnanimously agreed to stay by my deathbed until she comes?"
"I've my orders."
"Managing female!" There was no real malice in his voice, and not much strength. He buried his head in his pillow and closed his eyes.
Mirelle looked down at him for a few moments, thinking how illness brings out the boy in a man. Distracting to reflect that even a sophisticate like Jamie Howell must have been a nice little boy - from time to time. Then she went to change the other beds. She made a neat pile of the sheets. From the marks on them, they must go to a laundry. Margaret would know which one. With the kitchen cleaned and himself asleep, there was little to do now but wait for the drug store delivery and Margaret. She didn't feel that she could unpack his suitcase nor make noise vacuuming the house which was dusty. Nor did she feel as if she could intrude on his music room. The phone rang and she nearly fell over a chair trying to reach it before it could disturb the sleeper.
It was Margaret. She was at Logan Airport, having broken all records getting there, and would fly out on the 2:00 plane. She'd get a cab from the airport in Philadelphia which would get her to Wilmington about 4:00 but did her father have enough money in the house because she didn't have cab fare?
"If he doesn't, I do, Margaret. Just come." Mirelle gave her a slightly expurgated version of Will Martin's diagnosis.
"Imagine! Dad sick enough to ask for a doctor!" She hung up.
If Margaret couldn't reach Wilmington before 4:00, Mirelle wondered what to do about her children. If she flew home about 3:00 to collect Tonia, the boys would be all right by themselves but she didn't really wish to inflict Howell with Tonia. And ten to one, Tonia would drop one of her ambiguous comments at precisely the wrong moment. But, if she arranged for a baby-sitter, that would also be noteworthy…
Mirelle fumed. It wasn't as if she were doing anything wrong, helping a friend. It was ridiculous that she couldn't feel at liberty to stay here. With a sudden inspiration she dialed Sylvia.
"Are you busy from 3:00 to 5:00 this afternoon?"
"Now that YOU inquire, no. Why?"
Mirelle explained.
"Isn't that just like a man?" was Sylvia's comment. "Say, if you had to clean out the fridge, should I pick up a few essentials for the girl?"
"Would you? That would be a tremendous help." And between them they concocted a list of what might tempt an invalid that a daughter, probably unused to cooking, could prepare. Sylvia would drop the groceries off on the way to Mirelle's house.
While she waited for Sylvia, Mirelle mused again on how much she liked the woman. No coy questions, no arch suggestions about why Howell called Mirelle. And today, too, when Sylvia had been so depressed.
She answered Sylvia's soft knock on the front door and ushered her into the kitchen where they unpacked the shopping bags.
"My mother had a sovereign convalescent remedy," Sylvia said with a sour expression as she waggled a butcher's package about. "Where are the pots? I need a double boiler. Having beef tea prepared by my mother's own lily white hands was nearly an incentive for me to contract an illness. Ah, thank you." Mirelle discovered the double boiler. "We'll just put the beef in the top, water in the bottom, cover well, and leave for about half a hour." Sylvia followed her own directions. "Throw the meat out - he doesn't have a dog? Well, give that cat of yours a treat then - But the residual juice… hmmm, concentrated protein, easily digestible and it tastes incredibly good as well as being incredibly restorative to all those depleted red blood corpuscles. For that recipe I have forgiven my sainted mother some of her lesser transgressions."