Chapter 14
THE FEVER DID NOT SWEEP on him suddenly. For several days he had been bothered with headaches and nausea.
He had spent that afternoon with Fran, and when he returned home he lay down on the couch to rest while Helen prepared supper. "I may doze off," he told her. "Wake me if I do."
When she woke him he told her he wasn't hungry yet, to let him sleep a while longer. At ten he awoke with a start and tried to sit up. His stomach felt quivery, his head throbbed, every muscle in his body ached. Helen was seated beside the couch, watching him, her face drawn with anxiety. He asked her to help him get up, for he could not straighten his hack. She led him to the bed, helped him undress.
"It's cold in here," he muttered, "(let me some covers."
She covered him, tucked him in, yet he continued to shiver.
"I've called the doctor," she said. "He should be here any moment. You were moaning as you lay asleep, your face was flushed and perspiring."
Afterwards he vaguely recalled that the doctor, a gray-haired man with a pencil-line mustache, had been there, that he had tried to stay awake and answer questions. He awoke several times during the night, but each time was up only a moment or two then dozed off again. In the morning he tossed and moaned so much that he frightened Helen and she woke him. "Huh-what time's it?" he asked.
"It's eleven. Are you hungry, dear?" Is there anything I can-"
He turned from her in disgust, tried to fall asleep again. He succeeded in doing so, at once had a vivid, horrible dream.
It began with him finding himself alone in a large room, which for some reason looked very familiar. He tried to recall when he had been in that room before, but couldn't. His hand seemed weighted down. When he looked he saw that he was holding a hatchet. There was wet blood on the blunt edge of its steel head. In horror, he dropped it. It fell with a deafening clatter, which alarmed him still further. Just then he heard a man's voice shouting, and recognized it. His father! What was he doing here? He did not wish to seethe old man, who was coming directly to this very room. The thought of escape flashed through his mind. He started for the door and had almost reached it when his father burst through, blocking his way.
"Ah-ha, caught you red-handed. Yes, red-handed-look!"
He looked down at his hands, saw that what his father said was true. They were sticky with blood.
"Mother-killer!" his father screamed; enraged, he came towards him and raised his hand as if to strike him. He stood waiting for the blow, for he wished to be struck, to feel pain, to be punished. But his father, sensing this perhaps, didn't strike him.
"See what you have done!" The old man pointed to the far side of the room. He turned and what he saw made his skin crawl. On shaky legs he approached a corpse. As he drew closer he saw that it was his mother, her head had been crushed and was slowly oozing blood. He tried to scream, but no sound issued from his throat.
"You did it!" his father accused, "You killed her! You are a murderer!"
He tried to deny it, but again no sound emerged. He realized that his denial would have been a lie anyway, since he was the murderer.
He threw himself at his father's feet in the hope the old man would kick him, spit on him. He wished punishment for his crime. Anything-the more terrible, the better. He would have had his eyes gouged out, his fingernails pulled, had himself burned alive. He had to pay for the awful crime he had committed. but his father was wise to him, knew what he craved and wouldn't give it to him.
"There is your punishment." He pointed to the dead woman. "Look at her, see her, see her forever-and never forget that you did it!"
He got up and ran to the door. He had to escape-get out-keep running forever! But as he reached it, the door shut in his face.
"There is no way out," his father told him. "You must stay in this room forever!" His father came close to him, waving his arms and pointing to him with a long crooked forefinger, began to lecture him.
He couldn't bear this. He thought of escape again, remembered there was none. He placed his hands over his face to shut out the accusing voice, but the words penetrated and exploded in his mind like claps of thunder.
"Look at me, Joe Brody-" he called him by his full name, for some inexplicable reason-"look at me! I am a bread baker. I have worked at it all my life, now I am old and bent and broken by work. You see me and you do not like my looks, eh? You fool! Do not look at the outside, the shell of the man-look Inside, in the heart of a man before you judge him. I have taken the slow hard road, yes. It was a struggle. But I have hurt no one, I have led a clean honest life and I am not ashamed. I sleep easy of a night, and I am content with my lot. This is happiness, do you understand? This is all the happiness the world can offer a man.
"You, who chose the easy way, the short, sweet life-have you found happiness? One hour of it? One minute of it? One second of it? No, you have not found it, and if you think you did, you have lied to yourself, you have forced yourself to believe what you wished to believe. Because there is no easy road to happiness-to find it you must take the hard road!"
His father magically disappeared, and he was kit alone in the room with the dead woman. He returned to her and stood over her, weeping. It seemed that he had recovered his voice now and he wept aloud-so loud that the sounds filled the room.
Helen shook him and awakened him. "Joe-are you all right!"
He gazed at her and asked, "Where am I?"
"You're at home, Joe. Oh darling, you were crying in your sleep-wailing aloud, like a child. .It frightened me so!"
During the third day of the fever his head cleared somewhat, and he smiled to Helen when he saw her hovering about, taking care of him. In the morning of the fourth day he sat up in bed, and when Helen entered the room, he called her to him. She came to the side of the bed, and he reached out his arms, hugged her, and kissed her. He did not explain why, and she did not press him for an explanation.
The following day he was up and about. Helen tried to restrain him, but he overrode her protests. He went out-of-doors and took a cab in Fran's bungalow.
Fran threw herself into his arms and wept. When she stepped back and dried her eyes he noticed that she looked haggard and worn. He laughed and said, "To look at us, they'd guess you were the sick one."
"Was it very bad, Joe?" she asked. "I was half crazy with worry. I knew you were sick. I passed the apartment and saw the doctor."
"Why didn't you visit me, then?"
"How could I, with her there? No, I couldn't lace her. I made up my mind to, then just couldn't bring myself to mount the steps and ring the bell. It was awful. II you only knew how many times I walked back and forth past that house!"
He thought, fleetingly, of telling her about the nightmare, but changed his mind.
As if a mutual understanding had been arrived at by means of mental telepathy in the interval of their separation, neither of them mentioned California or the five thousand dollars for all of the week that followed. The nightmare had a profound effect on him, for the time being at any rate. The day he got out of bed, he put through a call to the Bronx and spoke to his mother. She was alive and well, and she gushed with joy upon hearing his voice. That evening he was home with Helen and he kept staring at her, and frowning and thinking. And when he lay in bed that night, he vowed to go straight-never to think of California or the five thousand again, to get himself a job and make some attempt to pay Helen back her money, stay on with both Helen and Fran as long as they would have him. He realized vaguely that they would not go on sharing him forever, sooner or later he must choose between them. That was the future, however; it was a matter of policy with him not to think of the future.
Fran didn't get the message of Joe's change of heart by mental telepathy: she read it in his eyes when he came to her that first day after his illness. The reason she did not speak of California and the five thousand was that she knew it would be a waste of effort. She realized that his mind was definitely made up; this time words alone would not budge him.
A gambler by nature, she decided to run a risk. If it came through she had him, and the money and California as well. If it missed-well, then she had lost everything, and it was back to. Columbus Ohio for her, back to the Charley Grants, the cheap cafes, the gray rooming houses.
It was on a Friday she made her decision, and since this was also pay day, she took the first step towards carrying it out. She quit her job at the Club Seventy-Seven.
The following day she told Joe not to meet her there anymore and explained why.
"You just up and quit?" he asked.
"Yes," she replied.
"How come?"
She shrugged and said, "I'll need to rest a week before I set off for California."
"Who are you going with?"
"No one."
"On your lonesome, eh?" He laughed at her. "Go ahead, see if I care."
He knew the bait was out, that she expected him to take it. Well, he would never touch Helen's money, would never think of harming her for a low-down tramp like Fran. Not him. Not a chance!