CHAPTER XLI

One morning I awoke about three o’clock hearing Catherine stirring in

the bed.

“Are you all right, Cat?”

“I’ve been having some pains, darling.”

“Regularly?”

“No, not very.”

“If you have them at all regularly we’ll go to the hospital.”

I was very sleepy and went back to sleep. A little while later I woke

again.

“Maybe you’d better call up the doctor,” Catherine said. “I think maybe

this is it.”

I went to the phone and called the doctor. “How often are the pains

coming?” he asked.

“How often are they coming, Cat?”

“I should think every quarter of an hour.”

“You should go to the hospital then,” the doctor said. “I will dress and

go there right away myself.”

I hung up and called the garage near the station to send up a taxi. No

one answered the phone for a long time. Then I finally got a man who

promised to send up a taxi at once. Catherine was dressing. Her bag was

all packed with the things she would need at the hospital and the baby

things. Outside in the hall I rang for the elevator. There was no

answer. I went downstairs. There was no one downstairs except the

night-watchman. I brought the elevator up myself, put Catherine’s bag in

it, she stepped in and we went down. The night-watchman opened the door

for us and we sat outside on the stone slabs beside the stairs down to

the driveway and waited for the taxi. The night was clear and the stars

were out. Catherine was very excited.

“I’m so glad it’s started,” she said. “Now in a little while it will be

all over.”

“You’re a good brave girl.”

“I’m not afraid. I wish the taxi would come, though.”

We heard it coming up the street and saw its headlights. It turned into

the driveway and I helped Catherine in and the driver put the bag up in

front.

“Drive to the hospital,” I said.

We went out of the driveway and started up the hill.

At the hospital we went in and I carried the bag. There was a woman at

the desk who wrote down Catherine’s name, age, address, relatives and

religion, in a book. She said she had no religion and the woman drew a

line in the space after that word. She gave her name as Catherine Henry.

“I will take you up to your room,” she said. We went up in an elevator.

The woman stopped it and we stepped out and followed her down a hall.

Catherine held tight to my arm.

“This is the room,” the woman said. “Will you please undress and get

into bed? Here is a nightgown for you to wear.”

“I have a nightgown,” Catherine said.

“It is better for you to wear this nightgown,” the woman said.

I went outside and sat on a chair in the hallway.

“You can come in now,” the woman said from the doorway. Catherine was

lying in the narrow bed wearing a plain, square-cut nightgown that

looked as though it were made of rough sheeting. She smiled at me.

“I’m having fine pains now,” she said. The woman was holding her wrist

and timing the pains with a watch.

“That was a big one,” Catherine said. I saw it on her face.

“Where’s the doctor?” I asked the woman.

“He’s lying down sleeping. He will be here when he is needed.”

“I must do something for Madame, now,” the nurse said. “Would you please

step out again?”

I went out into the hall. It was a bare hall with two windows and closed

doors all down the corridor. It smelled of hospital. I sat on the chair

and looked at the floor and prayed for Catherine.

“You can come in,” the nurse said. I went in.

“Hello, darling,” Catherine said.

“How is it?”

“They are coming quite often now.” Her face drew up. Then she smiled.

“That was a real one. Do you want to put your hand on my back again,

nurse?”

“If it helps you,” the nurse said.

“You go away, darling,” Catherine said. “Go out and get something to

eat. I may do this for a long time the nurse says.”

“The first labor is usually protracted,” the nurse said.

“Please go out and get something to eat,” Catherine said. “I’m fine,

really.”

“I’ll stay awhile,” I said.

The pains came quite regularly, then slackened off. Catherine was very

excited. When the pains were bad she called them good ones. When they

started to fall off she was disappointed and ashamed.

“You go out, darling,” she said. “I think you are just making me

self-conscious.” Her face tied up. “There. That was better. I so want to

be a good wife and have this child without any foolishness. Please go

and get some breakfast, darling, and then come back. I won’t miss you.

Nurse is splendid to me.”

“You have plenty of time for breakfast,” the nurse said.

“I’ll go then. Good-by, sweet.”

“Good-by,” Catherine said, “and have a fine breakfast for me too.”

“Where can I get breakfast?” I asked the nurse.

“There’s a café down the street at the square,” she said. “It should be

open now.”

Outside it was getting light. I walked down the empty street to the

café. There was a light in the window. I went in and stood at the zinc

bar and an old man served me a glass of white wine and a brioche. The

brioche was yesterday’s. I dipped it in the wine and then drank a glass

of coffee.

“What do you do at this hour?” the old man asked.

“My wife is in labor at the hospital.”

“So. I wish you good luck.”

“Give me another glass of wine.”

He poured it from the bottle slopping it over a little so some ran down

on the zinc. I drank this glass, paid and went out. Outside along the

street were the refuse cans from the houses waiting for the collector. A

dog was nosing at one of the cans.

“What do you want?” I asked and looked in the can to see if there was

anything I could pull out for him; there was nothing on top but

coffee-grounds, dust and some dead flowers.

“There isn’t anything, dog,” I said. The dog crossed the street. I went

up the stairs in the hospital to the floor Catherine was on and down the

hall to her room. I knocked on the door. There was no answer. I opened

the door; the room was empty, except for Catherine’s bag on a chair and

her dressing-gown hanging on a hook on the wall. I went out and down the

hall, looking for somebody. I found a nurse.

“Where is Madame Henry?”

“A lady has just gone to the delivery room.”

“Where is it?”

“I will show you.”

She took me down to the end of the hall. The door of the room was partly

open. I could see Catherine lying on a table, covered by a sheet. The

nurse was on one side and the doctor stood on the other side of the

table beside some cylinders. The doctor held a rubber mask attached to a

tube in one hand.

“I will give you a gown and you can go in,” the nurse said. “Come in

here, please.”

She put a white gown on me and pinned it at the neck in back with a

safety pin.

“Now you can go in,” she said. I went into the room.

“Hello, darling,” Catherine said in a strained voice. “I’m not doing

much.”

“You are Mr. Henry?” the doctor asked.

“Yes. How is everything going, doctor?”

“Things are going very well,” the doctor said. “We came in here where it

is easy to give gas for the pains.”

“I want it now,” Catherine said. The doctor placed the rubber mask over

her face and turned a dial and I watched Catherine breathing deeply and

rapidly. Then she pushed the mask away. The doctor shut off the petcock.

“That wasn’t a very big one. I had a very big one a while ago. The

doctor made me go clear out, didn’t you, doctor?” Her voice was strange.

It rose on the word doctor.

The doctor smiled.

“I want it again,” Catherine said. She held the rubber tight to her face

and breathed fast. I heard her moaning a little. Then she pulled the

mask away and smiled.

“That was a big one,” she said. “That was a very big one. Don’t you

worry, darling. You go away. Go have another breakfast.”

“I’ll stay,” I said.

We had gone to the hospital about three o’clock in the morning. At noon

Catherine was still in the delivery room. The pains had slackened again.

She looked very tired and worn now but she was still cheerful.

“I’m not any good, darling,” she said. “I’m so sorry. I thought I would

do it very easily. Now—there’s one—” she reached out her hand for the

mask and held it over her face. The doctor moved the dial and watched

her. In a little while it was over.

“It wasn’t much,” Catherine said. She smiled. “I’m a fool about the gas.

It’s wonderful.”

“We’ll get some for the home,” I said.

“_There one comes_,” Catherine said quickly. The doctor turned the dial

and looked at his watch.

“What is the interval now?” I asked.

“About a minute.”

“Don’t you want lunch?”

“I will have something pretty soon,” he said.

“You must have something to eat, doctor,” Catherine said. “I’m so sorry

I go on so long. Couldn’t my husband give me the gas?”

“If you wish,” the doctor said. “You turn it to the numeral two.”

“I see,” I said. There was a marker on a dial that turned with a handle.

“_I want it now_,” Catherine said. She held the mask tight to her face.

I turned the dial to number two and when Catherine put down the mask I

turned it off. It was very good of the doctor to let me do something.

“Did you do it, darling?” Catherine asked. She stroked my wrist.

“Sure.”

“You’re so lovely.” She was a little drunk from the gas.

“I will eat from a tray in the next room,” the doctor said. “You can

call me any moment.” While the time passed I watched him eat, then,

after a while, I saw that he was lying down and smoking a cigarette.

Catherine was getting very tired.

“Do you think I’ll ever have this baby?” she asked.

“Yes, of course you will.”

“I try as hard as I can. I push down but it goes away. _There it comes.

Give it to me._”

At two o’clock I went out and had lunch. There were a few men in the

café sitting with coffee and glasses of kirsch or marc on the tables. I

sat down at a table. “Can I eat?” I asked the waiter.

“It is past time for lunch.”

“Isn’t there anything for all hours?”

“You can have _choucroute_.”

“Give me _choucroute_ and beer.”

“A demi or a bock?”

“A light demi.”

The waiter brought a dish of sauerkraut with a slice of ham over the top

and a sausage buried in the hot wine-soaked cabbage. I ate it and drank

the beer. I was very hungry. I watched the people at the tables in the

café. At one table they were playing cards. Two men at the table next me

were talking and smoking. The café was full of smoke. The zinc bar,

where I had breakfasted, had three people behind it now; the old man, a

plump woman in a black dress who sat behind a counter and kept track of

everything served to the tables, and a boy in an apron. I wondered how

many children the woman had and what it had been like.

When I was through with the _choucroute_ I went back to the hospital.

The street was all clean now. There were no refuse cans out. The day was

cloudy but the sun was trying to come through. I rode upstairs in the

elevator, stepped out and went down the hall to Catherine’s room, where

I had left my white gown. I put it on and pinned it in back at the neck.

I looked in the glass and saw myself looking like a fake doctor with a

beard. I went down the hall to the delivery room. The door was closed

and I knocked. No one answered so I turned the handle and went in. The

doctor sat by Catherine. The nurse was doing something at the other end

of the room.

“Here is your husband,” the doctor said.

“Oh, darling, I have the most wonderful doctor,” Catherine said in a

very strange voice. “He’s been telling me the most wonderful story and

when the pain came too badly he put me all the way out. He’s wonderful.

You’re wonderful, doctor.”

“You’re drunk,” I said.

“I know it,” Catherine said. “But you shouldn’t say it.” Then “_Give it

to me. Give it to me._” She clutched hold of the mask and breathed short

and deep, pantingly, making the respirator click. Then she gave a long

sigh and the doctor reached with his left hand and lifted away the mask.

“That was a very big one,” Catherine said. Her voice was very strange.

“I’m not going to die now, darling. I’m past where I was going to die.

Aren’t you glad?”

“Don’t you get in that place again.”

“I won’t. I’m not afraid of it though. I won’t die, darling.”

“You will not do any such foolishness,” the doctor said. “You would not

die and leave your husband.”

“Oh, no. I won’t die. I wouldn’t die. It’s silly to die. There it comes.

_Give it to me._”

After a while the doctor said, “You will go out, Mr. Henry, for a few

moments and I will make an examination.”

“He wants to see how I am doing,” Catherine said. “You can come back

afterward, darling, can’t he, doctor?”

“Yes,” said the doctor. “I will send word when he can come back.”

I went out the door and down the hall to the room where Catherine was to

be after the baby came. I sat in a chair there and looked at the room. I

had the paper in my coat that I had bought when I went out for lunch and

I read it. It was beginning to be dark outside and I turned the light on

to read. After a while I stopped reading and turned off the light and

watched it get dark outside. I wondered why the doctor did not send for

me. Maybe it was better I was away. He probably wanted me away for a

while. I looked at my watch. If he did not send for me in ten minutes I

would go down anyway.

Poor, poor dear Cat. And this was the price you paid for sleeping

together. This was the end of the trap. This was what people got for

loving each other. Thank God for gas, anyway. What must it have been

like before there were anæsthetics? Once it started, they were in the

mill-race. Catherine had a good time in the time of pregnancy. It wasn’t

bad. She was hardly ever sick. She was not awfully uncomfortable until

toward the last. So now they got her in the end. You never got away with

anything. Get away hell! It would have been the same if we had been

married fifty times. And what if she should die? She won’t die. People

don’t die in childbirth nowadays. That was what all husbands thought.

Yes, but what if she should die? She won’t die. She’s just having a bad

time. The initial labor is usually protracted. She’s only having a bad

time. Afterward we’d say what a bad time and Catherine would say it

wasn’t really so bad. But what if she should die? She can’t die. Yes,

but what if she should die? She can’t, I tell you. Don’t be a fool. It’s

just a bad time. It’s just nature giving her hell. It’s only the first

labor, which is almost always protracted. Yes, but what if she should

die? She can’t die. Why would she die? What reason is there for her to

die? There’s just a child that has to be born, the by-product of good

nights in Milan. It makes trouble and is born and then you look after it

and get fond of it maybe. But what if she should die? She won’t die. But

what if she should die? She won’t. She’s all right. But what if she

should die? She can’t die. But what if she should die? Hey, what about

that? What if she should die?

The doctor came into the room.

“How does it go, doctor?”

“It doesn’t go,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“Just that. I made an examination—” He detailed the result of the

examination. “Since then I’ve waited to see. But it doesn’t go.”

“What do you advise?”

“There are two things. Either a high forceps delivery which can tear and

be quite dangerous besides being possibly bad for the child, and a

Cæsarean.”

“What is the danger of a Cæsarean?” What if she should die!

“It should be no greater than the danger of an ordinary delivery.”

“Would you do it yourself?”

“Yes. I would need possibly an hour to get things ready and to get the

people I would need. Perhaps a little less.”

“What do you think?”

“I would advise a Cæsarean operation. If it were my wife I would do a

Cæsarean.”

“What are the after effects?”

“There are none. There is only the scar.”

“What about infection?”

“The danger is not so great as in a high forceps delivery.”

“What if you just went on and did nothing?”

“You would have to do something eventually. Mrs. Henry is already losing

much of her strength. The sooner we operate now the safer.”

“Operate as soon as you can,” I said.

“I will go and give the instructions.”

I went into the delivery room. The nurse was with Catherine who lay on

the table, big under the sheet, looking very pale and tired.

“Did you tell him he could do it?” she asked.

“Yes.”

“Isn’t that grand. Now it will be all over in an hour. I’m almost done,

darling. I’m going all to pieces. _Please give me that._ It doesn’t

work. _Oh, it doesn’t work!_”

“Breathe deeply.”

“I am. Oh, it doesn’t work any more. It doesn’t work!”

“Get another cylinder,” I said to the nurse.

“That is a new cylinder.”

“I’m just a fool, darling,” Catherine said. “But it doesn’t work any

more.” She began to cry. “Oh, I wanted so to have this baby and not make

trouble, and now I’m all done and all gone to pieces and it doesn’t

work. Oh, darling, it doesn’t work at all. I don’t care if I die if it

will only stop. Oh, please, darling, please make it stop. _There it

comes. Oh Oh Oh!_” She breathed sobbingly in the mask. “It doesn’t work.

It doesn’t work. It doesn’t work. Don’t mind me, darling. Please don’t

cry. Don’t mind me. I’m just gone all to pieces. You poor sweet. I love

you so and I’ll be good again. I’ll be good this time. _Can’t they give

me something?_ If they could only give me something.”

“I’ll make it work. I’ll turn it all the way.”

“Give it to me now.”

I turned the dial all the way and as she breathed hard and deep her hand

relaxed on the mask. I shut off the gas and lifted the mask. She came

back from a long way away.

“That was lovely, darling. Oh, you’re so good to me.

“You be brave, because I can’t do that all the time. It might kill you.”

“I’m not brave any more, darling. I’m all broken. They’ve broken me. I

know it now.”

“Everybody is that way.”

“But it’s awful. They just keep it up till they break you.”

“In an hour it will be over.”

“Isn’t that lovely? Darling, I won’t die, will I?”

“No. I promise you won’t.”

“Because I don’t want to die and leave you, but I get so tired of it and

I feel I’m going to die.”

“Nonsense. Everybody feels that.”

“Sometimes I know I’m going to die.”

“You won’t. You can’t.”

“But what if I should?”

“I won’t let you.”

“Give it to me quick. _Give it to me!_”

Then afterward, “I won’t die. I won’t let myself die.”

“Of course you won’t.”

“You’ll stay with me?”

“Not to watch it.”

“No, just to be there.”

“Sure. I’ll be there all the time.”

“You’re so good to me. There, give it to me. Give me some more. _It’s

not working!_”

I turned the dial to three and then four. I wished the doctor would come

back. I was afraid of the numbers above two.

Finally a new doctor came in with two nurses and they lifted Catherine

onto a wheeled stretcher and we started down the hall. The stretcher

went rapidly down the hall and into the elevator where every one had to

crowd against the wall to make room; then up, then an open door and out

of the elevator and down the hall on rubber wheels to the operating

room. I did not recognize the doctor with his cap and mask on. There was

another doctor and more nurses.

“_They’ve got to give me something_,” Catherine said. “_They’ve got to

give me something._ Oh please, doctor, give me enough to do some good!”

One of the doctors put a mask over her face and I looked through the

door and saw the bright small amphitheatre of the operating room.

“You can go in the other door and sit up there,” a nurse said to me.

There were benches behind a rail that looked down on the white table and

the lights. I looked at Catherine. The mask was over her face and she

was quiet now. They wheeled the stretcher forward. I turned away and

walked down the hall. Two nurses were hurrying toward the entrance to

the gallery.

“It’s a Cæsarean,” one said. “They’re going to do a Cæsarean.”

The other one laughed, “We’re just in time. Aren’t we lucky?” They went

in the door that led to the gallery.

Another nurse came along. She was hurrying too.

“You go right in there. Go right in,” she said.

“I’m staying outside.”

She hurried in. I walked up and down the hall. I was afraid to go in. I

looked out the window. It was dark but in the light from the window I

could see it was raining. I went into a room at the far end of the hall

and looked at the labels on bottles in a glass case. Then I came out and

stood in the empty hall and watched the door of the operating room.

A doctor came out followed by a nurse. He held something in his two

hands that looked like a freshly skinned rabbit and hurried across the

corridor with it and in through another door. I went down to the door he

had gone into and found them in the room doing things to a new-born

child. The doctor held him up for me to see. He held him by the heels

and slapped him.

“Is he all right?”

“He’s magnificent. He’ll weigh five kilos.”

I had no feeling for him. He did not seem to have anything to do with

me. I felt no feeling of fatherhood.

“Aren’t you proud of your son?” the nurse asked. They were washing him

and wrapping him in something. I saw the little dark face and dark hand,

but I did not see him move or hear him cry. The doctor was doing

something to him again. He looked upset.

“No,” I said. “He nearly killed his mother.”

“It isn’t the little darling’s fault. Didn’t you want a boy?”

“No,” I said. The doctor was busy with him. He held him up by the feet

and slapped him. I did not wait to see it. I went out in the hall. I

could go in now and see. I went in the door and a little way down the

gallery. The nurses who were sitting at the rail motioned for me to come

down where they were. I shook my head. I could see enough where I was.

I thought Catherine was dead. She looked dead. Her face was gray, the

part of it that I could see. Down below, under the light, the doctor was

sewing up the great long, forcep-spread, thick-edged, wound. Another

doctor in a mask gave the anæsthetic. Two nurses in masks handed things.

It looked like a drawing of the Inquisition. I knew as I watched I could

have watched it all, but I was glad I hadn’t. I do not think I could

have watched them cut, but I watched the wound closed into a high welted

ridge with quick skilful-looking stitches like a cobbler’s, and was

glad. When the wound was closed I went out into the hall and walked up

and down again. After a while the doctor came out.

“How is she?”

“She is all right. Did you watch?”

He looked tired.

“I saw you sew up. The incision looked very long.”

“You thought so?”

“Yes. Will that scar flatten out?”

“Oh, yes.”

After a while they brought out the wheeled stretcher and took it very

rapidly down the hallway to the elevator. I went along beside it.

Catherine was moaning. Downstairs they put her in the bed in her room. I

sat in a chair at the foot of the bed. There was a nurse in the room. I

got up and stood by the bed. It was dark in the room. Catherine put out

her hand, “Hello, darling,” she said. Her voice was very weak and tired.

“Hello, you sweet.”

“What sort of baby was it?”

“Sh—don’t talk,” the nurse said.

“A boy. He’s long and wide and dark.”

“Is he all right?”

“Yes,” I said. “He’s fine.”

I saw the nurse look at me strangely.

“I’m awfully tired,” Catherine said. “And I hurt like hell. Are you all

right, darling?”

“I’m fine. Don’t talk.”

“You were lovely to me. Oh, darling, I hurt dreadfully. What does he

look like?”

“He looks like a skinned rabbit with a puckered-up old-man’s face.”

“You must go out,” the nurse said. “Madame Henry must not talk.”

“I’ll be outside,” I said.

“Go and get something to eat.”

“No. I’ll be outside.” I kissed Catherine. She was very gray and weak

and tired.

“May I speak to you?” I said to the nurse. She came out in the hall with

me. I walked a little way down the hall.

“What’s the matter with the baby?” I asked.

“Didn’t you know?”

“No.”

“He wasn’t alive.”

“He was dead?”

“They couldn’t start him breathing. The cord was caught around his neck

or something.”

“So he’s dead.”

“Yes. It’s such a shame. He was such a fine big boy. I thought you

knew.”

“No,” I said. “You better go back in with Madame.”

I sat down on the chair in front of a table where there were nurses’

reports hung on clips at the side and looked out of the window. I could

see nothing but the dark and the rain falling across the light from the

window. So that was it. The baby was dead. That was why the doctor

looked so tired. But why had they acted the way they did in the room

with him? They supposed he would come around and start breathing

probably. I had no religion but I knew he ought to have been baptized.

But what if he never breathed at all. He hadn’t. He had never been

alive. Except in Catherine. I’d felt him kick there often enough. But I

hadn’t for a week. Maybe he was choked all the time. Poor little kid. I

wished the hell I’d been choked like that. No I didn’t. Still there

would not be all this dying to go through. Now Catherine would die. That

was what you did. You died. You did not know what it was about. You

never had time to learn. They threw you in and told you the rules and

the first time they caught you off base they killed you. Or they killed

you gratuitously like Aymo. Or gave you the syphilis like Rinaldo. But

they killed you in the end. You could count on that. Stay around and

they would kill you.

Once in camp I put a log on top of the fire and it was full of ants. As

it commenced to burn, the ants swarmed out and went first toward the

centre where the fire was; then turned back and ran toward the end. When

there were enough on the end they fell off into the fire. Some got out,

their bodies burnt and flattened, and went off not knowing where they

were going. But most of them went toward the fire and then back toward

the end and swarmed on the cool end and finally fell off into the fire.

I remember thinking at the time that it was the end of the world and a

splendid chance to be a messiah and lift the log off the fire and throw

it out where the ants could get off onto the ground. But I did not do

anything but throw a tin cup of water on the log, so that I would have

the cup empty to put whiskey in before I added water to it. I think the

cup of water on the burning log only steamed the ants.

So now I sat out in the hall and waited to hear how Catherine was. The

nurse did not come out, so after a while I went to the door and opened

it very softly and looked in. I could not see at first because there was

a bright light in the hall and it was dark in the room. Then I saw the

nurse sitting by the bed and Catherine’s head on a pillow, and she all

flat under the sheet. The nurse put her finger to her lips, then stood

up and came to the door.

“How is she?” I asked.

“She’s all right,” the nurse said. “You should go and have your supper

and then come back if you wish.”

I went down the hall and then down the stairs and out the door of the

hospital and down the dark street in the rain to the café. It was

brightly lighted inside and there were many people at the tables. I did

not see a place to sit, and a waiter came up to me and took my wet coat

and hat and showed me a place at a table across from an elderly man who

was drinking beer and reading the evening paper. I sat down and asked

the waiter what the _plat du jour_ was.

“Veal stew—but it is finished.”

“What can I have to eat?”

“Ham and eggs, eggs with cheese, or _choucroute_.”

“I had _choucroute_ this noon,” I said.

“That’s true,” he said. “That’s true. You ate _choucroute_ this noon.”

He was a middle-aged man with a bald top to his head and his hair

slicked over it. He had a kind face.

“What do you want? Ham and eggs or eggs with cheese?”

“Ham and eggs,” I said, “and beer.”

“A demi-blonde?”

“Yes,” I said.

“I remembered,” he said. “You took a demi-blonde this noon.”

I ate the ham and eggs and drank the beer. The ham and eggs were in a

round dish—the ham underneath and the eggs on top. It was very hot and

at the first mouthful I had to take a drink of beer to cool my mouth. I

was hungry and I asked the waiter for another order. I drank several

glasses of beer. I was not thinking at all but read the paper of the man

opposite me. It was about the break through on the British front. When

he realized I was reading the back of his paper he folded it over. I

thought of asking the waiter for a paper, but I could not concentrate.

It was hot in the café and the air was bad. Many of the people at the

tables knew one another. There were several card games going on. The

waiters were busy bringing drinks from the bar to the tables. Two men

came in and could find no place to sit. They stood opposite the table

where I was. I ordered another beer. I was not ready to leave yet. It

was too soon to go back to the hospital. I tried not to think and to be

perfectly calm. The men stood around but no one was leaving, so they

went out. I drank another beer. There was quite a pile of saucers now on

the table in front of me. The man opposite me had taken off his

spectacles, put them away in a case, folded his paper and put it in his

pocket and now sat holding his liqueur glass and looking out at the

room. Suddenly I knew I had to get back. I called the waiter, paid the

reckoning, got into my coat, put on my hat and started out the door. I

walked through the rain up to the hospital.

Upstairs I met the nurse coming down the hall.

“I just called you at the hotel,” she said. Something dropped inside me.

“What is wrong?”

“Mrs. Henry has had a hemorrhage.”

“Can I go in?”

“No, not yet. The doctor is with her.”

“Is it dangerous?”

“It is very dangerous.” The nurse went into the room and shut the door.

I sat outside in the hall. Everything was gone inside of me. I did not

think. I could not think. I knew she was going to die and I prayed that

she would not. Don’t let her die. Oh, God, please don’t let her die.

I’ll do anything for you if you won’t let her die. Please, please,

please, dear God, don’t let her die. Dear God, don’t let her die.

Please, please, please don’t let her die. God please make her not die.

I’ll do anything you say if you don’t let her die. You took the baby but

don’t let her die. That was all right but don’t let her die. Please,

please, dear God, don’t let her die.

The nurse opened the door and motioned with her finger for me to come. I

followed her into the room. Catherine did not look up when I came in. I

went over to the side of the bed. The doctor was standing by the bed on

the opposite side. Catherine looked at me and smiled. I bent down over

the bed and started to cry.

“Poor darling,” Catherine said very softly. She looked gray.

“You’re all right, Cat,” I said. “You’re going to be all right.”

“I’m going to die,” she said; then waited and said, “I hate it.”

I took her hand.

“Don’t touch me,” she said. I let go of her hand. She smiled. “Poor

darling. You touch me all you want.”

“You’ll be all right, Cat. I know you’ll be all right.”

“I meant to write you a letter to have if anything happened, but I

didn’t do it.”

“Do you want me to get a priest or any one to come and see you?”

“Just you,” she said. Then a little later, “I’m not afraid. I just hate

it.”

“You must not talk so much,” the doctor said.

“All right,” Catherine said.

“Do you want me to do anything, Cat? Can I get you anything?”

Catherine smiled, “No.” Then a little later, “You won’t do our things

with another girl, or say the same things, will you?”

“Never.”

“I want you to have girls, though.”

“I don’t want them.”

“You are talking too much,” the doctor said. “Mr. Henry must go out. He

can come back again later. You are not going to die. You must not be

silly.”

“All right,” Catherine said. “I’ll come and stay with you nights,” she

said. It was very hard for her to talk.

“Please go out of the room,” the doctor said. “You cannot talk.”

Catherine winked at me, her face gray. “I’ll be right outside,” I said.

“Don’t worry, darling,” Catherine said. “I’m not a bit afraid. It’s just

a dirty trick.”

“You dear, brave sweet.”

I waited outside in the hall. I waited a long time. The nurse came to

the door and came over to me. “I’m afraid Mrs. Henry is very ill,” she

said. “I’m afraid for her.”

“Is she dead?”

“No, but she is unconscious.”

It seems she had one hemorrhage after another. They couldn’t stop it. I

went into the room and stayed with Catherine until she died. She was

unconscious all the time, and it did not take her very long to die.

Outside the room, in the hall, I spoke to the doctor, “is there anything

I can do to-night?”

“No. There is nothing to do. Can I take you to your hotel?”

“No, thank you. I am going to stay here a while.”

“I know there is nothing to say. I cannot tell you——”

“No,” I said. “There’s nothing to say.”

“Good-night,” he said. “I cannot take you to your hotel?”

“No, thank you.”

“It was the only thing to do,” he said. “The operation proved——”

“I do not want to talk about it,” I said.

“I would like to take you to your hotel.”

“No, thank you.”

He went down the hall. I went to the door of the room.

“You can’t come in now,” one of the nurses said.

“Yes I can,” I said.

“You can’t come in yet.”

“You get out,” I said. “The other one too.”

But after I had got them out and shut the door and turned off the light

it wasn’t any good. It was like saying good-by to a statue. After a

while I went out and left the hospital and walked back to the hotel in

the rain.

THE END

TRANSCRIBER NOTES

Misspelled words and printer errors have been corrected. Where multiple

spellings occur, majority use has been employed.

Punctuation has been maintained except where obvious printer errors

occur.

[The end of _A Farewell to Arms_ by Ernest Hemingway]