Recessional: A Novel (14 page)

When Andy received these instructions he went immediately to his sedan and scooted up the good Florida highways to the Georgia border, from where he had a clean run into Vidalia. After asking a few questions he learned that the well-known muscle expert Bedford Yancey lived not in Vidalia itself but in a little rural town to the north on Route 297.

There he located the Yancey farm, with a somewhat run-down house standing in front of a barn that had obviously been mended and refurbished. In the kitchen of the house he found Ella Yancey, a short roundish woman who took him directly to the barn, where her husband was working on a patient. The bonesetter was about six feet two inches tall, thin as a willow wand and marked with a tousled head of red hair. He was busy at the task of rotating and kneading the left arm of a young man who looked to be a farm lad but who was a pitching hopeful of the St. Louis Cardinals, whose team trained in the area.

Hesitant to interrupt Yancey’s work, Zorn approached him only when Yancey beckoned him over. Introducing himself. Zorn asked: “Do you remember a Mr. Wilmerding from Chicago who talked with you a couple of times this year?”

“Couldn’t forget him,” Yancey said, not missing a stroke as his big hands massaged the ball player’s muscle. “Quite a talker.”

“He sent me to see you.”

“About what he mentioned last time?”

“Yes. You ready to talk?”

“Are you for real? This ain’t smoke rings?”

“I brought many photographs to show you. The most attractive offer you’ll ever get.”

Still keeping his powerful thumbs pressing on the pitcher’s muscles, Yancey nodded his head in the direction of the farmhouse and said: “Talk to Ella first. On some things she’s brighter than me,” and Zorn was dispatched back to the kitchen.

There he said directly: “Mrs. Yancey, my name’s Dr. Andy Zorn. I’m up from Florida to talk about offering you and your husband important jobs in the health field.”

“Doin’ what?”

“The things he’s already doing, but on a more permanent basis. They tell me you’re one of the best nurses in Georgia—in rehabilitation,
that is—and you’d have a first-class facility to work in and wonderful people to work on.”

“What kind of people?” she asked cautiously, and he showed her a photograph that caught the entire Palms complex. “You’d be in this fine building.”

Studying the imposing structure, she asked suspiciously: “You own this?”

“My company does.”

“Are you in bankruptcy? Looking for help from us?”

He laughed: “Mrs. Yancey—”

“Call me Ella.”

“My company owns eighty-seven of these health centers. This is one of our best.”

“From what I hear on television it’s the big companies that slide into bankruptcy. We got our own troubles here in Vidalia, don’t need to go lookin’ for others.” But she did study the additional photographs of what she and her husband would find at the Palms, and gave special attention to the brochure that listed the Taggart holdings across the country.

“Why would you concentrate on me and Bedford for this one in Florida?”

“Because that’s where I work. I’m the manager and I need a couple just like you to build our rehab center.”

“Considerin’ husband and wife,” she said, “I’d have to agree that we’re one of the best, at least in this part of Georgia,” but she turned back to that first photograph of the Palms and studied it from various angles.

“You promise that this is already built? It’s not what they call ‘an artist’s rendition’?”

“It’s there. Look at the autos lined up.”

“He can draw them, too, better than real.”

Now Bedford came in from the barn, bringing with him the baseball pitcher whom he had been treating, and as the athlete worked his left arm back and forth, the four shared cups of strong country coffee, slabs of greasy bacon and excellent thin pancakes with jet-black sorghum molasses. Andy was astonished at how quickly the other three made the breakfast disappear, and the ball player, noticing his reaction, said: “When you work out most of the morning, or massage the way Bedford does, you need somethin’ solid to help you
along, and the good thing about black strap molasses is that you can almost feel the vitamins goin’ to work through your veins.” He said his arm felt wonderful, but he did eat with his right hand to avoid putting even slight stress on the damaged left.

After Ella had cleared the table, she spread the photographs before her husband and the ball player: “I was teasing Dr. Zorn that these were just artist’s renderings, but he assures me they’re for real,” and they discussed with frankness the pros and cons of moving away from the lovely freedom of Bedford’s barn and her poorly paid job in the local hospital. The ball player said: “It’s human nature to test yourself in the big leagues. And you two are the best there is. You owe it to yourselves to give it a try.”

Finally Bedford spoke in a reserved, cautious voice that echoed rural simplicity: “Seems like if they mean this, Ella, we better pile into our pickup and drive down to see the folks involved—and the setup of the buildings.” But before this could be discussed further, another patient appeared—a girl of fourteen who had broken her right arm by falling off a pyramid during cheerleading practice. Her arm had to be brought back to full use or she would miss her entire freshman year on the squad, a tragedy she could not face.

Rather ungainly but just on the verge of being beautiful, she seemed to have the potential for becoming a first-class cheerleader insofar as spirit, liveliness and charm were concerned. If cheerleading was now and in the foreseeable future the biggest thing in her life, she deserved the best that the talented bonesetter could provide.

Andy was astonished and pleased to see how Bedford, this tall, gawky man with the magic hands, was able to convert himself into an eighteen-year-old to bring himself down to near her level. He spoke differently, he hunched himself up to become more nearly her size and he adopted her word patterns and concerns. “He adapts exactly the way I did with my patients,” Andy said to himself. “Good sign. He’d be wonderful with our old people,” and he smiled as Bedford led the girl to his gymnasium in the barn.

When her treatment ended, with her recovering some flexibility in her right arm, Bedford returned to the kitchen, studied his schedule for the days ahead, asked Ella to telephone the people scheduled to meet with him the next three days, and advised her to rearrange her meetings, too. When she asked why, he said: “We’re headin’ down to
explore this Palms affair. If it’s as good as he says, maybe we’ll catch ourselves a better life.”

The Yanceys had planned to drive south in their own pickup, but Andy proposed that they ride down with him and fly back to one of the airports convenient to Vidalia, from where they would find their way back home. “I’ll pay the airfare and your cost home from the airport,” he promised, and this plan was adopted.

It was a rewarding choice, because they calculated the distance to Tampa to be about three hundred miles, and since each of them was an experienced driver, they could make the trip without stopping, except for sandwiches. During the trip Zorn had an opportunity to talk intimately with the Yanceys, and the more they said, the more convinced he became that they were a rare couple, lacking in polish perhaps, but trained at excellent schools and full of rural wisdom. They were devoted to the health field, had a unique understanding of what could be achieved, and a lively interest in making their own unique contribution.

By the time they reached the northern outskirts of Tampa, Zorn had decided that if the two Georgians found that they could operate constructively at the Palms, and if he judged that they would fit in with elderly patients, he would offer them a job, tell Miss Foxworth and Krenek to convert a big room in Health into a gymnasium, and launch a vigorous program to let west Florida know that a world-class rehabilitation program was soon to be available.

They reached Tampa by midafternoon, and Andy turned right off the major highway and drove them slowly down the splendid avenue of palms and Brazilian peppers to the spot at which the medieval gate, the protective walls and part of the big building were visible. “That’s a home to be proud of, Mrs. Yancey. The health-services wing, where you’d work, Bedford, is over to the left.”

Allowing the Georgians time to absorb first impressions, he then drove slowly around the oval till he reached the entrance to Health. There he parked his sedan in the director’s zone and took the Yanceys inside, leading them directly to the big room where modest efforts at rehabilitation were under way with an enthusiastic but inadequately trained nurse.

She was working with an eighty-one-year-old woman from Assisted Living who’d had a total hip replacement but was making little progress in recovering strength or control in her left leg. For some minutes Bedford watched the out-of-date exercises the nurse was encouraging
her patient to perform, and they were so inappropriate that Yancey asked both Andy and the nurse politely: “Could I show her a trick we’ve used with some success in Georgia?” He stepped before the elderly woman and underwent an almost miraculous transformation. He bent down so that he was about her size. The big hands that had thumped and banged the baseball pitcher became soft, gentle agencies of healing, and his words were those of consolation, one mature person to another. “Ma’am,” he almost whispered, “I’ve seen you before, nigh a hundred times, and usually not in as good condition as you are today. They all recovered use of their leg and so will you. What you must do…” and in the gentlest manner—of touch, smile, voice, hands—he exercised her damaged leg, twisting it into contortions she would not have believed possible. When it was fully relaxed, he suddenly grasped her by both hands, gently raised her to a walking position and pulled her along in a kind of awkward dance, with him backing up and smiling, she coming slowly forward on a leg she had been afraid she might never again use. At the conclusion of their little dance, her pale face flushed with excitement, he caught her in his powerful arms and replaced her in her chair.

Zorn stood silent. He had now seen Bedford Yancey, this big redheaded Georgian, in three different roles: a brawny adult knocking a professional athlete about, an empathic friend of a teenager cherishing a dream, and the inspiring companion to an old woman fearful of being permanently crippled. In Yancey he saw the kind of healer he would himself like to be. A few minutes later as the trio surveyed the future rehab gymnasium, Andy Zorn hired Bedford Yancey and his wife, giving them only one commission: “I want you to make this place first-class.”

At that moment Andy could not have foreseen that the fruitful consequences of his act would turn out to be considerable, for when the Yanceys moved down from Vidalia and took control of the rehab center, they kept in contact with some of the professional athletes Bedford had served in his barn. When the men appeared in Florida, and occasionally one of the women tennis players, everyone in both the Palms and the surrounding retirement areas as far north as Tarpon Springs and south to Sarasota heard about it, and elderly men who were sports fanatics began making pilgrimages to see in the flesh great quarterbacks, outfielders and basketball centers.

Incredible as it seemed to Zorn, a few ultra-dedicated sportsmen
would try to rent a room in Assisted Living so as to be on hand when some great star was in attendance. Zorn did not allow this but he did encourage a more sensible reaction. Men who had enjoyed watching Yancey work with the athletes reported to their social circles along the West Coast: “That Palms in Tampa is a top-class operation with a genius in control of the rehab. If I ever have to leave home for something serious, try to get me into the Palms.” This enthusiastic endorsement did not fill all the vacancies in Assisted, but enough sports enthusiasts took beds to reduce the deficit to almost acceptable levels. In a tantalizing way it seemed that solvency would be achieved in one more month, but it didn’t happen. However, Miss Foxworth did detect one reassuring omen: “When they come in to pay their rental in Assisted, three say they enjoyed their contacts with Bedford Yancey, but nine say: ‘That nurse in charge of the gymnasium, the Georgia woman Ella, she has curing hands.’ ” When that vote of confidence circulated it brought in even more outside patients who required specialized rehabilitation for their broken hips, mastectomies and sports injuries. The Palms of Tampa was becoming an important and widely known health center.

Once Zorn found a partial solution to the vacancies in Assisted, his mind had time to wander freely to other problems, and one day he realized that slowly, subtly and almost subversively he was being drawn back toward the medical profession. He had been meticulous in informing the residents that he was not licensed to practice in Florida, but he could not prevent them from asking him about their health problems. If an illness was serious, he immediately referred the resident to Dr. Farquhar, who was authorized to give advice and write prescriptions.

So, when Laura Oliphant, the onetime headmistress of an elite school for girls, came to Zorn with one of the most terrifying problems a woman could face, he had to listen, especially when she said, her hands trembling and her eyes looking frantic: “I have no one to turn to.”

“Regarding what?”

“I’ve been diagnosed, all the tests are pretty conclusive—I have a cancer in my left breast. And they tell me so many different things I’m at my wit’s end, totally confused,” and her hands trembled.

Zorn was saddened to see this woman who had seemed so strong
and self-reliant when they had first met now reduced to a pitiful, childlike state. Determined not to meddle in medical matters, he said as he comforted her: “Now, Ms. Oliphant, you must seek professional advice. You know I’m not licensed to practice medicine. I can’t—”

“I’m seeking your advice as a trusted friend. You understand these things, I don’t.” She lowered her head and began weeping, which he wisely did not try to restrain—he knew she needed the release. After some moments of tearfulness she cleared her throat resolutely, sat upright and said matter-of-factly: “Thirteen years ago I had a radical mastectomy on my right breast. Complete removal, and after that, radiation to track down any stray cancerous cells—six months’ treatment.”