Frieda glimpses Mr. Crowley standing ten yards off, with the
floorwalker from the Notions department. Can he hear? Does he see that
she’s not wrapping? Twice last week he scolded her for minuscule infractions
(sitting before her break, excessive laughter). What would he inflict for this
transgression? “You’re scaring me,” she says to the strange woman. “Would
you please leave?” She grabs a slip of tissue to stuff within a frock, but her
fingers only fold the flimsy paper.
“No,” says Mrs. Sprague. “No, I can’t. It seems that your name
and address — well, the fact that you work here — were given by a soldier to
the Camp Devens guard — and then to our Committee on Prevention — when
the soldier was found to be infected.”
“Infected?”
Mrs. Sprague colors and looks down, away from Frieda.
She plucks a mote of cotton from her sleeve. “You might have
heard the layman’s terms. The pox. The clap.” Despite her lowered voice, the
consonants resound; the smack of them seems to make her wince. “The
soldier has reported that you were his last contact. We have to assume you
were the source.”
But Frieda thought you had to “go the limit” to risk sickness —
and she hasn’t, not with anyone but Felix. (Well, and Jack Galassi, but that
was long ago.) “Felix?” she says. “I don’t . . . I can’t believe it.”
“I’m not at liberty to disclose the soldier’s name.”
Lou arrives with two piqué petticoats to be wrapped, and piles
them onto Frieda’s growing backlog. She taps Frieda’s right shoulder: You all
right?
Frieda nods, but the movement nauseates her. In the teeter of her
panic she tries to summon Felix’s face; haziness is all that she can muster.
His smell, though, storms upon her — pistachios, spilled spirits — and the
agitated rapture of his kisses.
“Okay?” Lou says, this time aloud.
Before Frieda can answer, Mr. Crowley sees them huddled and he
scowls; Lou returns to her customers.
“You’re lucky,” explains Mrs. Sprague. “Because you met this
soldier outside of the moral zone, we don’t have authority to arrest you. And
we can’t force a medical exam.” She peers at Frieda as if judging the future
of a stained dress. Is it salvageable as rags, or just trash? “But here’s
warning: if you’re found anywhere within five miles of Camp Devens — or any
installation for that matter — believe me, you’ll be head and ears in trouble.
Stay away from the town of Ayer. Hear?”
As if ducking a blow, Frieda nods.
“Our hope,” Mrs. Sprague continues, her tone a bit tempered, “is
that you’ll volunteer for medical care — and help us all by helping your own
health. It’s not too late to turn away from ruin.”
But Frieda can taste the ruin already, a spoiled-milk acridness
near her tonsils. She feels sweat — or something worse? — beneath her
skirts.
Mrs. Sprague finds a pad and pencil in her purse. “Do you live at
home? We’d like to reach your parents.”
“They’re dead,” Frieda mutters. (Papa is; Mama might as well be.)
“You’re adrift.” The woman marks something in her book. “Then
tell me where you yourself live.”
“Harrison,” comes out automatically, but she’s quick enough to
falsify the number. “Seventy-two,” she says — Mama’s Chambers Street
address.
“Telephone?”
Frieda shakes her head.
Mrs. Sprague makes another note and tucks her pad away,
looking saddened by the thought of such privation. One after the other she
lifts her gray braids, which have fallen in front of her hunched shoulders, and
places them back behind her neck.
A bold, mesmerizing novel about the woman known as "Typhoid Mary," the first known healthy carrier of typhoid fever in the burgeoning metropolis of early twentieth century New York.
Two Lives is a memoir written by international best-selling author, Vikram Seth. In this interesting and engaging book, Seth writes about his great...
read more
Z, the novel about the life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald is at points charming and; like another reviewer, I kept thinking of the movie, "Midnight...
read more
Although heavy on the scientific details, which slowed down the story for me (OK, I admit, I was one of those liberal arts majors who skipped out on...
read more
British Parliament asks Amazon to clarify why it pays $9 million in income tax on $23 billion of UK sales.(May 20 2013) Amazon will be called back to give further evidence to members of the British Parliament "to clarify how its activities in the U.K. justify its low corporate...
Full Story
